You're Fired or You're Dead? Reality TV Suicides

There is an angry reality television star running for President named Donald Trump.  Americans are beginning to wake up to this state of affairs. What are people thinking? Mr. Trump is well-known for his publicized abrasive personality.

There is an ugly little secret about reality television ~ from the design of the interactions to the hosts' external outbursts to the reactions of the viewership. All of this can be felt as extreme abuse to the people receiving the interactions. Some folks even kill themselves due to this supposedly acceptable use of force, threats, intimidation, and displays of aggressively dominating others. Suicides result from bullying, and in the test tube of reality television, it does happens.

Take the case of Charlotte Dawson, a New Zealand–Australian television personality. In 2012, she appeared as one of the "celebrity" contestants, raising money for her chosen charity, on the second season of The Celebrity Apprentice Australia. In 2012, Dawson was admitted to St Vincent's Hospital in Sydney after attempting to kill herself due to a much publicized battle with Twitter trolls and cyberbullying related to her television persona.

On February 22, 2014, Dawson died by suicide in her Woolloomooloo, New South Wales, Australia home. A real estate agent found her body when he arrived to inspect the property ahead of its auction. Police were called and confirmed her death at 11:18 am; there were no suspicious circumstances to the death. Toxicology reports state that she had overdosed on a drug, Baclofen, which, is mostly used to help muscle spasming in multiple sclerosis. Her friends were reported to be concerned when she did not update her Twitter or Instagram accounts in the previous 19 hours.

How common is this?

On February 28, 2016, reporter Dana Schuster wrote an article, "Dying for fame: 21 reality stars committed suicide in a decade." Please note, until I added her to the following list, Charlotte Dawson was not on this accounting. 

How many more reality television "celebrities" have died by suicide? 

Here is Schuster compilation, plus my addition of Dawson.

Reality TV Star Suicides: 22

2016: Alexa "Lex" McAllister, "The Bachelor" (prescription pill overdose)

 

2015: Mark Constantino (above), "Ghost Adventures" (shot his co-star wife, then himself)

2015: Anthony Riley, "The Voice" (hanged himself)

2014: Simone Battle, "The X-Factor" (hanged herself)

2014: Charlotte Dawson, “Celebrity Apprentice,” (Baclofen overdose)

2013: Gia Allemand, "The Bachelor" (hanged herself)

2013: Mindy McCready, "Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew" (shot herself)

2013: Mark Balelo, "Storage Wars" (carbon monoxide poisoning)

2013: Joshua Marks, "MasterChef" (shot himself)

2011: Russell Armstrong, "The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills" (hanged himself)

2011: Wesley Durden, "Next Great Baker" (shot himself)

2010: Joseph Cerniglia, "Kitchen Nightmares" (jumped off George Washington Bridge)

In 2007, Gordon Ramsay ripped apart struggling New Jersey chef Joseph Cerniglia on “Kitchen Nightmares,” screaming: “Your business is about to f - - king swim down the Hudson.” Three years later, Cerniglia jumped off the George Washington Bridge. Source.

The George Washington Bridge, which spans the Hudson River, is among the most frequently chosen sites in the New York City metropolitan area for dying by suicide. In 2012, a new record 18 people threw themselves off the bridge to their deaths, with 43 suicide attempts overall. The Port Authority reports there were 16 suicides in 2013, 18 in 2014, and 18 in 2015.

Cerniglia was the second suicide from a Ramsey show. The first was chef Rachel Brown, of Dallas, who shot herself to death after an appearance on Ramsay's elimination series Hell's Kitchen in 2006.

2010: Julien Hug, "The Bachelorette" (shot himself)

2009: Ryan Jenkins, "Megan Wants a Millionaire" (hanged himself)

2008: Nathan Clutter, "Paradise Hotel" (jumped to his death)

2008: James Terrill, "Supernanny" (shot himself)

2007: Cheryl Kosewicz, "Pirate Master" (suicide in home)

2006: Rachel Brown, "Hell's Kitchen" (shot herself)

2006: Paula Goodspeed, "American Idol" (overdose) Source

2005: Najai Turpin, "The Contender" (shot himself)

2005: Melanie Bell, "Vega Elvis" unaired (jumped to her death)

2004: Kellie McGee, "Extreme Makeover" unaired (overdose)

Source.

h/t Sarah HP

If you — or someone you know — needs help, please call 1-800-273-8255 for the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline. If you are outside of the US, please visit the International Association for Suicide Prevention for a database of international resources.

Pope Aide Dies Mysteriously

Pope Francis’s secretary, Miriam Wuolou of Eritrea, was found dead earlier this week — and the Vatican is calling mysterious. The 34-year-old had been working as a secretary at guest house Santa Marta for the last four years.

Wuolou’s body was discovered in her Rome apartment by police after her brother raised concern that she wasn’t answering her phone. She was seven months pregnant and suffered from diabetes, which can prove dangerous — even fatal — during pregnancy.

Police are investigating the possibility neglect contributed to her death and have interviewed family members, her ex-husband and boyfriend. Her brother discovered her body on Friday when he became concerned after he hadn't heard from her for several years.

The Vatican, however, has called for an investigation into the woman’s death. Police have interviewed her brother, her ex-husband and her most recent boyfriend, who is believed to be a policeman employed by the Vatican, the Italian newspaper Il Messaggero reports.

Investigators will also perform a DNA test on Wuolou’s fetus to determine the paternity of the unborn child.

Wuolou’s apartment has been sealed off; forensic teams have combed it for evidence and have even removed several personal effects for further examination, neighbors told The Daily Beast.

Pope Francis laid a dozen long-stemmed white roses at her memorial site in the church of Santo Stefano degli Abissini. He blessed the site for 20 minutes. He had been living at Santa Marta since 2013 when he was appointed pontiff.

A funeral service for Wuolou was held on Saturday. Pope Francis visited her body prior to the memorial, laying a dozen white roses next to her casket and sprinkling the coffin with holy water before beginning a 20-minute prayer.

Are there other deaths happening close to the Pope?

Last month, Pope Francis used the homily of one of his daily masses to mourn the loss of another woman from Santa Marta who passed away. According to Alessandro Notarnicola, who writes the blog Inside the Walls about life in Vatican City, the pope described the people who work inside Santa Marta as his family. “This group of men and women are part of our family,” he said, before offering a special prayer for the woman, who died after a long illness. “They form a family, they are not just employees.” Source.

Name Game Killings Leave 5 Dead

The "Name Game" associated with shootings is not an amusement activity but an analytic view of situations in which we look for patterns, synchronistically.

In a violent incident occurring Friday, February 26, 2016, several names detailed in this Twilight Language blog, including Washington, Mason, and Bell, not to mention an individual name ~ Wayne ~ were brought to bear.

The murder-suicide event took place Friday, near the rural community of Belfair, Mason County, Washington State.

George Washington (1722-1799), a Freemason, whose membership is well-known and celebrated. The Masonic mapmakers have honored Washington by using his name throughout the landscape of America.

Authorities employed tear gas to flush out a suicidal man who had killed three family members and a neighbor. After he stepped outside his house, he used a gun to kill himself.

David Wayne Campbell, the killer, was 51.

Over 3½ hours, trained negotiators tried to persuade Campbell to surrender, but “it became evident that the suspect was not going to leave the residence voluntarily,” the sheriff’s office said. Deputies could see him pacing inside, often holding a handgun to his head. He pulled the trigger, soon after.

Authorities said they found four other bodies in a chicken coop on the remote, wooded property on Horseshoe Drive, near Belair.

The victims are Lana J. Carlson, 49; Quinn Carlson, 16; and Tory Carlson,18. David Wayne Campbell was married to Lana Carlson.

The Name Game in the names.

In Jim Brandon's 1983 book, The Rebirth of Pan: Hidden Faces of the American Earth Spirit, he writes, regarding the "name game":

I'm not talking here of such spooky tongue-twisters as H.P. Lovecraft's Yog-Sothoth or Arthur Machen's Ishakshar, but of quite ordinary names like Bell, Beall and variants, Crowley, Francis, Grafton, Grubb, Magee/McGee, Mason, McKinney, Montpelier, Parsons, Pike, Shelby, Vernon, Watson/Watt, Williams/Williamson. I have others on file, but these are the ones which I have accumulated the most instances.

In my 1983 Mysterious America, I wrote:

Cryptologic or coincidence? Jim Brandon should be credited with calling attention to the name Watts/Watkins/Watson, and its entanglement with inexplicable things. Some other names involved in mysterious events pinpointed by Brandon are Bell, Mason, Parsons, Pike, Vernon, and Warren. The influence of such names as Mason, Pike, Warren, and Lafayette, for example, issues, in some cryptopolitical and occult way, from their ties to the Masonic tradition.

Followers of the Dark Knight/Batman might think of "Bruce Wayne," but other associations come to mind when the name "Wayne" is heard.

Within the "weird news" field, it has been a well-known truism that if a criminal has a middle name of "Wayne," no one in the newsroom is surprised he is being charged with murder. The examples are multiple. The most famous case, of course, is John Wayne Gacy.

My colleague and correspondent Chuck Shepherd, has been a student of this "name game" for years. Here's what Chuck says about it, in an introduction to the topic:

The Classic Middle Name

It only occurred to me in the early 1990s that "Wayne" was a popular middle name among a few of the most heinous murderers of our time, e.g., the clown John Wayne Gacy (who killed almost three dozen boys and young men in the late 1970s and buried most of them beneath the floorboards of his Des Plaines, Ill., home) and Elmer Wayne Henley (sentenced to six consecutive life terms in 1974 in Houston for his role, with ringleader Dean Allen Corll, in the murders of 27 young men). I began to publish periodic lists in 1996, and soon readers made sure I never missed a one that made the news. Source, plus his impressively long list of names.

Some names carry more baggage than others.

The Spawn of Bohemian Grove

Our country was founded in a conspiratorial ferment.
Many of the Founding Fathers belonged to a secret society, one that used strange ritualistic implements, costumes, and oaths. ~ Ritual America: Secret Brotherhoods and Their Influence on American Society: A Visual Guide
by Adam Parfrey and Craig Heimbichner (2012).

After Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia died the day before Valentine's Day this year, it was almost as if a black hole opened. Why did he die? What was the cause? What was this business about a "pillow over his head"? Who was there? Who were the 35-40 people he met at the ranch? What's going on?

Conspiracy theorists filled the void, including first Alex Jones saying it was murder and Mike Savage asking Donald Trump about the death and calling for a Warren Commission-like investigation.

Of course, considering what a coverup the Warren Commission was, it is a bit difficult to understand why Savage wanted to go down that road again.

But then, in the mainstream media, an actual set of answers did appear. The Washington Post published an in-depth article that stated in clear prose, with solid research, some shocking news. Scalia was at the Texas ranch with "high-ranking members of an exclusive fraternity for hunters called the International Order of St. Hubertus, an Austrian society that dates back to the 1600s."

While the names of most of the people there remain unknown, The Post observed (in part):

A review of public records shows that some of the men who were with Scalia at the ranch are connected through the International Order of St. Hubertus, whose members gathered at least once before at the same ranch for a celebratory weekend.
Members of the worldwide, male-only society wear dark-green robes emblazoned with a large cross and the motto “Deum Diligite Animalia Diligentes,” which means “Honoring God by honoring His creatures,” according to the group’s website. Some hold titles, such as Grand Master, Prior and Knight Grand Officer. The Order’s name is in honor of Hubert, the patron saint of hunters and fishermen.
Cibolo Creek Ranch owner John Poindexter and C. Allen Foster, a prominent Washington lawyer who traveled to the ranch with Scalia by private plane, hold leadership positions within the Order. It is unclear what, if any, official association Scalia had with the group.

...
Two other private planes that landed at the ranch for the weekend are linked to two men who have held leadership positions with the Texas chapter of the Order, according to a review of state business filings and flight records from the airport.
After Scalia’s death, Poindexter told reporters that he met Scalia at a “sports group” gathering in Washington. The U.S. chapter of the International Order of St. Hubertus lists a suite on M Street NW in the District as its headquarters, although the address is only a mailbox in a United Parcel Service store.
The International Order of St. Hubertus, according to its website, is a “true knightly order in the historical tradition.” In 1695, Count Franz Anton von Sporck founded the society in Bohemia, which is in modern-day Czech Republic.
The group’s Grand Master is “His Imperial Highness Istvan von Habsburg-Lothringen, Archduke of Austria,” according to the Order’s website. The next gathering for “Ordensbrothers” and guests is an “investiture” March 10 in Charleston, S.C.
...

In 2010, Poindexter hosted a group of 53 members of the Houston chapter of the International Order of St. Hubertus at the Cibolo Creek Ranch, according to a Houston society publication. A number of members from Mexico were also part of the ranch festivities that included “three days of organized shoots and ‘gala’ lunches and dinners.”
Poindexter told CultureMap Houston that some of the guests dressed in “traditional European shooting attire for the boxed bird shoot competition” and for the shooting of pheasants and chukar, a type of partridge.

"Is this the 'smoking gun' for Scalia (OK the "smoking hunting rifle") that takes us back to the Holy Roman Empire?" asks Tom Mellett.

Read the entire article for full details, but here's how it ended:

Law enforcement officials told The Post that they had no knowledge of the International Order of St. Hubertus or its connection to Poindexter and ranch guests. The officials said the FBI had declined to investigate Scalia’s death when they were told by the marshals that he died from natural causes.

Most remarkable of all, The Post article pointed to the direct origins of this American branch of this secret society.

The society’s U.S. chapter launched in 1966 at the famous Bohemian Club in San Francisco, which is associated with the all-male Bohemian Grove — one of the most well-known secret societies in the country.  ~ The Post 

The history of Bohemian Grove is well-known, as much as any secret society can be known.  The Club motto is "Weaving Spiders Come Not Here," which implies that outside concerns and business deals (networking) are to be left outside the Grove. But it appears the opposite occurs. In 1942, it was at Bohemian Grove where a planning for the Manhattan Project took place, leading to the creation of the atom bomb.

Summer, 1967 at Owls Nest Camp, Bohemian Grove. Around table, left to right: Preston Hotchkis, Ronald Reagan, Harvey Hancock (standing), Richard Nixon, Glenn T. Seaborg, Jack Sparks, (unidentified individual), (unidentified individual), Edwin W. Pauley. Source.

Bohemian Grove, 1909.  A lynching or public execution. If the body is a mannequin, observers have noted, it is certainly very authentic.

The Bohemian club! Did you say Bohemian club? That’s where all those rich Republicans go up and stand naked against redwood trees right? I’ve never been to the Bohemian club but you oughta go. It’d be good for you. You’d get some fresh air. ~ US President 42, Bill Clinton to a heckler, 2011.

No conspiracy theories are necessary. This new information has been revealed, and thus the revelation of the method is made overt.

This is significant "occult" (in the original meaning = "hidden") data that has been made known, which would not have been discovered without the death of Scalia. This organization does not honor animals by raising money for conservation efforts, but for game preserves to stock them with animals they hunt. It does not raise money to honor the animals with vegan affairs, but instead has costumed wild game dinners. It is a fraternity of men (wives are invited sometimes) who have a secret society that is more about politics and power than even hunting and animals. Actually, the "masked costume parties" sound like they are straight out of the movie, Eyes Wide Shut (top photo).

The International Order of Saint Hubertus

An International Fraternity of Sportsmen

“Deum Diligite Animalia Diligentes”

“Honor God by Honoring his Creatures”

The International Order of St. Hubertus, founded in 1695 by Count Franz Anton von Sporck in what was then the Kingdom of Bohemia. Count Sporck's intellectual interests led him to found a branch of Freemasonry in Bohemia. The knightly order was based on hunting and managing game and wildlife. First U.S chapter formed in 1966 at San Francisco’s Bohemian Club.

St. Hubertus was a Christian saint related to hunters, mathematicians, opticians, and metalworkers. The Saint who died a natural death.

Just as the Bohemian Grove used the cover of the arts to hide the secret society's power brokering, so too has the Order of St. Hubertus used hunting as the clouded front to a deeper meaning.

"Zoo" Shootings: Kalamazoo to Kansas

Preprogramming from the summer of 2015?

On Saturday, February 20, 2016, Uber driver Jason Brian Dalton, 45, killed six people in Kalamazoo, Michigan, in the 42nd mass shooting of 2016. The first people killed were Tyler D. Smith (17), and his father Richard E. Smith (53), who were both killed at the Kia car dealership. Four women – Mary Jo Nye (60), Mary Lou Nye (62), Dorothy Brown (74), and Barbara Hawthorne (68) – were killed at the Cracker Barrel. A 14-year-old girl who was with the four women at Cracker Barrel was shot in the head, and was initially presumed dead, but later confirmed to have survived. As of February 23, she remained on a ventilator and in critical condition.

Then another shooting happened in Kansas.

Gabrielle Giffords was to observe:

On February 25, 2016, three people were killed and fourteen others injured in a series of shootings in Newton and Hesston, Kansas, including in and outside an Excel Industries building. The dead victims were identified as Randall "Renee" Benjamin, 30; Joshua Higbee, 31; and Brian Sadowsky, 44. All were killed inside the Excel plant.The shooter, identified as Excel employee Cedric Larry Ford (pictured below), was then killed by a responding police officer.

The shootings began at around 4:57 p.m. at a street intersection in Newton, where Ford shot at two vehicles in a drive-by shooting. The first motorist suffered a non-fatal gunshot wound to the shoulder, while the second motorist escaped unscathed after a bullet pierced the car's windshield. He then drove down Old U.S. Route 81 and fired at oncoming traffic. His vehicle and another one crashed in a nearby ditch, after which he got out, shot and injured the other driver in the leg, and stole that victim's vehicle.

To excel is to do better than others. Mass shooters often covertly compete against each other.

Ford then arrived at Excel Industries, a manufacturer of lawnmowers, in Hesston, injured an elderly woman in the parking lot, went inside the building, and fired randomly at the assembly lines, shooting several employees. He then shot at the first officer to respond to the scene, and the officer fired back. He was struck by bullets and died at 5:23 p.m. Ford was armed with a Zastava Arms AK-47-style semi-automatic rifle and a Glock 22 semi-automatic pistol. At least 150 people were inside the plant at the time of the shooting there.

Recall that the mass shooting right before Newton-Hesston, Kansas, was the one in Kalamazoo. Strangely, in a CNN article on Cedric Larry Ford, it was noted: "On his first visit to a zoo, he was awestruck by the beauty of wildlife, friend and co-worker Matt Jarrell said." It seems an odd detail.

Attention should be given also to the fact that this shooting spree began in Newton, Kansas, reminding some of Newtown, Connecticut, the site of the Sandy Hook school shooting of December 14, 2012, occurred.

Many of the early settlers of Hesston, Kansas, were Mennonite farmers. In 1909, the Mennonite Church founded the Hesston College, because of that fact.

Cedric (French spelling: Cédric) is a masculine given name invented by Sir Walter Scott in the 1819 novel Ivanhoe. It is of Old English origin, and the meaning of Cedric is "kind and loved." The invented name is based on Cerdic, the name of a 6th-century Anglo-Saxon king (itself from Brittonic Cortices).

Have you noticed how the mainstream media are not talking about mass shootings as much as usual?

President Obama told the media that to mass shootings should dominate the news on Friday, February 26, 2016, saying "the real tragedy is the degree to which this has become routine."

The media is overwhelming the US public with its obsessive attention to ad hominem attacks between politicians, especially on the Republican side. Covert violence. Those who are being triggered to "go off" are getting the message.

It really is a zoo out there!

Unicorns, Astronauts, and Oscars Gold

The unicorn is a legendary animal that has been described since antiquity as a beast with a large, pointed, spiraling horn projecting from its forehead. The unicorn was depicted in ancient seals of the Indus Valley Civilization and was mentioned by the ancient Greeks in accounts of natural history by various writers, including Ctesias, Strabo, Pliny the Younger, and Aeolian.

An escaped "unicorn" gave authorities a run for their money on Wednesday [February 24, 2016]. Sandra Boos [a photographer doing a photo shoot] -- and the California Highway Patrol -- spent more than three hours chasing her runaway pony, who was outfitted with a unicorn horn, through orchards and roads in California. Source.

Golden coins known as the unicorn and half-unicorn, both with a unicorn on the obverse, were used in Scotland in the 15th and 16th century. The unicorn was a gold coin that formed part of Scottish coinage between 1484 and 1525. The obverse of the coin shows a crowned unicorn. The significance is that the unicorn is one of the heraldic symbols of Scotland, occurring most notably in the royal coat of arms of Scotland as crowned and chained supporters.

The [Unicorn] tapestries show pagan and Christian symbolism. The pagan themes emphasize the medieval lore of beguiled lovers, whereas Christian writings interpret the unicorn and its death as the Passion of Christ. The unicorn has long been identified as a symbol of Christ by Christian writers, allowing the traditionally pagan symbolism of the unicorn to become acceptable within religious doctrine. The original pagan myths about The Hunt of the Unicorn refer to an animal with a single horn that can only be tamed by a virgin; Christian scholars translated this into an allegory for Christ's relationship with the Virgin Mary. Source.

When a Unicorn is portrayed along with a lion it Symbolizes the Union of the feminine (white, lunar) and masculine (Gold, solar) aspects of our dual nature. This Symbolism also represents the Alchemical Marriage. Source.

"God brought him forth out of Egypt; he hath as it were the strength of an unicorn."--Numbers 24:8

Looking to Christopher Knowles' Secret Sun, there's this:

The Egyptians not only adopted the custom of burying the dead from the Sumerians they also adopted the reverence for gold, calling it "the flesh of the gods." Some believe it was associated with immortality in the ancient world since it doesn't rust or corrode (which explains an association or symbolism, but nothing more) Gold's chemical symbol Au, comes from the Latin Aurum, meaning "Shining Dawn."
As in Aurora.

Immortality. As in Jesus Christ?

Readers of this blog are well aware of my past writings about "Aurora" and "Red Dawns."

We have two immediately forthcoming events to watch.

First up, on Sunday, February 28, 2016, The 88th Academy Awards. The "theme" of the Oscars this year, in the wake of criticisms that not enough AfricanAmericans were nominated, is "We All Dream In Gold."

Gold on black looks regal. And the faces that are now on these ads are 35% AfricanAmericans, even though the Oscars will probably NOT be won by any Africans and AfricanAmericans.

One of the movies nominated for the Best Picture is The Martian.

Should we look to space too?

Next up is SuperTuesday, March 1, 2016. Will the primary install "Mars Red" as the new "Red Dawn" for the Republican Party?

Will Mars, the Red Planet, be on the minds of the media?

Outer space is going to be discussed in the midst of the wall-to-wall coverage of politics on the 1st, probably, because of one event.

March 1st is the date that NASA American astronaut Scott Kelly and Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko return to Earth from the International Space Station. Kelly is the first American to spend a year in space.

Scott and Mark Kelly

Why all the attention to Scott Kelly? He is pivotal to two longterm studies. One is of him and his twin, Mark Kelly, a retired NASA astronaut. Scott and Mark Kelly were born February 21, 1964.

February 21st is Ferālia, an ancient Roman public festival celebrating the Manes (Roman spirits of the dead, particularly the souls of deceased individuals). It fell on February 21 as recorded by Ovid in Book II of his Fasti. This day marked the end of Parentalia, a nine-day festival (February 13-21) honoring the dead ancestors.

A tradition associated with Ferālia (and thus February 21) is that one of the informed nymphs, Lara, could not hold her tongue and warned Juturna to flee. In addition, she approached Jupiter's wife Juno, saying, "Your husband loves the Naiad Juturna.” As a result, Jupiter rips out Lara's tongue in anger and summons Mercury to escort her to be a nymph in the Underworld. During this mission, Mercury becomes lustful of Lara and rapes her, begetting twins. These twins become the Lares, the guardians of intersections who watch over the city of Rome. Considering this is the birthday of the Kelly twins, it is an intriguing coincidence.

Mark Kelly is the husband of former Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, who was the victim of a Tucson, Arizona, assassination attempt on January 8, 2011 (where six people were killed), by Jared Lee Loughner. Before the shooting, Loughner expressed "anti-government" beliefs, such as the notion that the government was creating "infinite currency" without the backing of gold, and the assertion that NASA was faking spaceflights. conspiracy theories had a profound effect on Loughner, particularly the online film Zeitgeist: The Movie, with which friends claimed Loughner held an obsession. He was a member of the message board Above Top Secret, which discusses conspiracy theories; members of the site did not respond warmly to his posts. Loughner espoused conspiracy theories about the 9/11 attacks, the New World Order, and beliefs in a 2012 apocalypse, among other controversial viewpoints.

The second study with which Scott Kelly is involved: The Mission to Mars. 

This mission — which began with a launch last March — is all about Mars.
"I think we'll learn a lot about longer-duration spaceflight and how that will take us to Mars someday," Kelly said Thursday [February 25, 2016] in his final news conference from orbit. "So I'd like to think that this is another of many steppingstones to us landing on Mars sometime in our future."

* * *
Mars expeditions planned for the 2030s will last 2½ years; the anticipated crew size will be four to six. The astronauts will almost certainly have to grow some of their own food; that's the reason for an experimental greenhouse aboard the space station.

"Scott Kelly: Year in Space Mission is a Steppingstone to Mars," NBC Chicago.

Trucidation Trump Tales & X-Files' Tipping-Point Trumpets

In The X-Files episode, "Babylon," (Season 10: Episode 5, first broadcast 2.15.2016 on Fox), "Fox Mulder" told "Dana Scully" of the enigmatic reports of the sounds of trumpets coming from the heavens.  He informed Scully that the people who have heard the trumpets believe them to be a “Herald of End Times,” as described the Bible's Book of Revelation.

Were the trumpets fictional precursors of another kind?

The leading Republican candidate, according to primary and caucus results is New Yorker Donald Trump, famed for his Trump Towers.

Donald Trump’s German wine-growing ancestors were named Drumpf, according to journalist Gwenda Blair’s book The Trumps: Three Generations That Built An Empire. (Thanks Michael Skotnicki.)

Historically, the surname Drumpf's meaning is unknown. However, the name appears loosely associated with a “deceased person” – a dead issue.

The name Trump has its origins from English (Devon), being a metonymic occupational name for a trumpeter, from Middle English trumps, "trumpet," From German (Bavaria), Trump is a metonymic occupational name for a drummer, from Middle High German trumps, "drum." Source.

The early English medieval surname Trump is derived from the pre 8th century Olde French Trompeor, and as such was introduced by the Norman invaders of England in 1066. It is a metonymic or job descriptive name either for a trumpeter or a maker of trumpets, and is recorded in the modern forms of Trump and Trumper. Amongst the many early recordings are those of Patrick Trumpe in the rolls known as the "Calendar of Inquisitions for the county of Cumberland" in the year 1275. Source.

This is the coat of arms that up till now has been used on clothing and promotional material by Trump in Scotland. His new coat of arms (granted in 2012) will show a double-sided eagle representing the dual nationality of Trump's heritage. There will also be three chevronels - one more than depicted here - which will represent sky, sand dunes and sea. Source.

Numquam Concedere is Latin for "Never Give Up."

The verb “trump” also once meant to fabricate or deceive (from French “tromper”). The phrase “to trump up” still means “forge” or “invent,” as in “trumped-up charges” or the many, many headlines punning on “Trumped-up rhetoric” or “Trumped-up politics.” If last week’s Washington Post report suggesting that Trump is a compulsive golf cheat is any measure — “the worst celebrity golf cheat,” according to Alice Cooper — this definition of “trump” may be as essential to Trump’s identity as the other. ~ The Boston Globe, "Why Donald Trump trumps Donald Drumpf," 9.9.2015.

Double-headed eagles have been present in imagery for millennia. The two-headed eagle can be found in the archaeological remains of the Hittite civilization, dating from a period that ranges from the 20th century BC to the 7th century BC. The Gandaberunda is another example of a mythological two-headed bird, which is in common use in India (The Kingdom of Mysore).

This symbol has more recent links to Freemasonry.

I wrote the chapter "The Double-Headed Phoenix" in An Illustrated Guide to the Lost Symbol, edited by Dan Weber (NY: Simon and Schuster, 2009). I discuss how Dan Brown in his book subtly uses the evolution of the "double-headed Phoenix" to the "two-headed eagle" of Freemasonry to alert his readers to the rebirth of the Masonic spirit in the founding of America.

The use of the two-headed eagle as Trump's personal coat of arms appears intriguing, to say the least.

+++

In the midst of all the Trump talk, one of the dark shadows that few in the mainstream media wish to explore is the hints that there are some very real rumors of assassination of Donald Trump. It may be only a weird conspiracy thought (as shown here in this "Killing Trump"), but it appears to be one that Trump takes seriously.

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump reportedly always wears a bullet proof vest while he’s out campaigning. Sources 1, 2, 3, and 4.

Trump's inability to button up his coat is blamed on his wearing this bullet proof gear. Source.

During 2015, Trump asked the Federal Bureau of Investigation to look into the threats allegedly made by notorious drug kingpin Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman (who was eventually captured).

In such a strange political year, it is not out of the question that an assassination attempt might change the course of what's "predicted" now by all of the media pundits. There is good reason for Trump to protect against an assassination try on his person.

Assassinations in the past have redrawn the political map. It could happen again. It should not, and hopefully the U.S. Secret Service have stepped up their awareness across the board for all the candidates. These are strange days where body armor may not be enough.