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5 Questions: John Hagelin - Conclusion
by Keach Hagey

Last Exit Magazine    Translate This Article
30 November 2008

[The following is Part II of an interview with Dr John Hagelin published by Last Exit Magazine on 22 November 2008; the interview was conducted by Keach Hagey, Co-Editor, and is published here with permission. Please also see Part I of this article, which featured questions 1-3 of the interview, about Dr Hagelin's initiatives on Wall Street to help solve the current economic crisis.]

As panic gripped Wall Street in the final days before the election, Dr. John Hagelin, physics professor and director of the Institute of Science, Technology and Public Policy at the Maharishi University of Management and former presidential candidate, announced his own billion-dollar bailout plan. In the heart of the New York's financial district, his organization opened the Global Financial Capital of New York aimed at teaching bankers to meditate and thereby saving us all from financial ruin.

3. So what has the response been since you announced this new initiative on Wall Street?

Dr Hagelin: We had really a great response from the press who seemed to understand this message better than I thought they would. This is a novel approach. This is a scientific approach, it's a proven approach, but it's still novel. It's not something that's been used before in this way. We've had tremendous response from some of the top executives of major firms that surround us here. We all know the names. We've had interest and even action in terms of financial support, to support a group of this size, to engage people actually who could dedicate themselves to producing this calming effect, and also companies who have already introduced TM to benefit their employees, but also to benefit the economy.

4. [In response to a question about the US national election campaign, which was in its final days at the time of this interview, Dr Hagelin commented:]

Dr Hagelin: . . . . [most politicians] are unaware of the most innovative and modern and effective solutions to critical social problems. And there are today effective solutions to spiraling health costs, to the unstable markets—as we have discussed—to falling educational outcomes . . . . The purpose of my candidacy [in 2000] was really just to inject into the political dialogue critical discussion of innovative solutions that are scientifically sound—let's call them evidence-based solutions—to crucial social and economic problems. . . . There's a problem in this country with financing healthcare, and competing for limited healthcare dollars and trying to extend healthcare to the millions of Americans who don't have it. But the best way to cut the costs of healthcare is by keeping people healthy through effective preventative medicine, which is illegal now in the United States. Prevention is actually banned from Medicare and other government healthcare programs, and it's on the basis of effective prevention that healthcare costs can be prevented. It's kind of an old school of thought . . . .

5. [In the final question, Dr Hagelin was asked what he thought would be 'the best for the peace that, on your website and in your organization, you say you are striving for?']

Dr Hagelin: I would like to see a fresh new leadership in the country . . . . I don't believe that war should continue to be such a routine instrument of international policy. War should be nothing other than an absolute last-ditch option of desperation. We actually have talked about in this interview proven methods that have worked repeatedly, and in fact have never failed in any scientific study, to prevent war, and even stop warfare in war-torn areas like the Middle East, because war and terrorism are the consequence of mounting tensions—political, ethnic and religious tensions, among rival factions in critical hot spots throughout the world, like the Middle East. Those tensions, unchecked, can build to the boiling point and inevitably erupt as war and social violence. But this meditation approach, especially practiced in groups, can directly target and neutralize these mounting tensions so that war simply does not erupt and open warfare can be quelled in a matter of days. So this is something that works to prevent war, in preventing political, economic and ethnic tensions from reaching the boiling point, and providing a fertile field for diplomatic efforts to work. As long as the tensions are so acute, as long as the desire for vengeance and revenge are foremost in the hearts of the rival peoples, then paper treaties and ceasefires among elected representatives of those factions are really not worth the paper they are written on. You've got to target the basis of war and social violence, which is mounting tensions. And those can be directly targeted and diffused.

There are many solutions to prevent war, to reduce health care costs, solutions in the field of energy technology and agriculture, and certainlyeducation . . . .

The article is available online at: http://lastexitmag.com/article/john-hagelin

Copyright Last Exit 2008

Global Good News comment:

For information about Maharishi's seven-point programme to create a healthy, happy, prosperous society, and a peaceful world, please visit: Global Financial Capital of New York.





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