Last Week Tonight: Radical New College FL

(LastWeekTonight) New College of Florida: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO)

• Go Null Sets!
• New College of Florida (Wiki)
• NCF: New College of Florida

Bend the Arc: Jewish Action: Mamdani

(The Katie Halper Show) American Jew brutalized by Zionist Jewish IDF soldiers in Israel

RSVP: Lessons from Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s race - Bend the Arc: Jewish Action

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Power the Jewish fight to resist Trump

Trump works for Israel and for Trump, not US

The Jewish fight to resist Trump's cruel policies and keep our beloved communities safe will take all of us. A gift today will power action alongside our partners, organizing in communities around the country and fighting back in the streets and the halls of power. Bend the Arc: Jewish Action (bendthearc.us)

• ‎شرش | Shoresh | שר”ש‎ (@shoresh_us)

• Neturei Karta: NKUSA.org
• Rabbis for Ceasefire
• Jewish Voice for Peace
• ifnotnowmovement.org
• CODEPINK: Women for Peace
• American Veterans for Peace
• American Civil Liberties Union

Raise a hand if you’ve had a difficult conversation about Jewish antisemitism (Arabs being Muslim Semites) recently. ✋✋✋ Disagreements about NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani, Jewish safety, and other important issues are happening across Jewish communities. That’s why antisemitism messaging expert Sharon Goldtzvik and BTA are excited to share new messaging guidance and tools — to rise to this challenge and begin the work of bridging us back together. More

Jews were all over Middle East, having wandered far from Palestine ('Israel')

• Katie Halper; Bend The Arc; Sheldon S., CC Liu (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Female teachers have sex with students

Female teacher arrested for sex with underage male student in school 40+ times [bodycam]

Villain, cheater, Christian hypocrite, athlete, mean girl, stuck up, child molester (Instagram)

I groomed him when he was 14, and then he cheated on me with a teenybopper HS girl.

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I'm not a cheater. I was in love with the child.

(Criminal Minds Uncovered) July 5, 2025: All individuals mentioned in this video are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.

Chicago, ILLINOIS. On March 16, 2025, Downers Grove police pulled over a vehicle. This wasn’t a routine stop. They were targeting the driver, 30-year-old Christina Formella, a special education teacher and soccer coach at Downers Grove South High School.

The felony allegations (when she was 28 and the boy was 15) surfaced when the boy's mother discovered disturbing text (sexting) messages on her son’s new iPhone.

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  Hot victim, the boytoy jock?* (Alamy)

  When Christina Formella, a Downers Grove teacher and coach, was charged with sexual assault of a student, her story "splintered" across the internet. The flood of TikTok and tabloid coverage of Formella’s felony case has fractured into a thousand different story lines and angles, breaking the image of one woman into discrete villainous archetypes: the predatory teacher, the ungrateful cheater wife, the high school mean girl, the evil athlete, a perversion of Christian schooling. With each new rendering, viewers, readers, and TikTok users can be shocked and outraged and titillated again. Formella’s case: Instagram
• (August 2025) Good looking' teacher accused of child sex crimes with teen tries to duck cameras

CHAPTERS

• 0:00 - Sexting texts uncovered
• 0:48 - Formella’s arrest
• 5:01 - Who is Christina Formella?
• 6:13 - The victim's story
• 8:19 - Escalation to abuse
• 12:01 - 55 felony counts
• 14:29 - Community and school reaction

Famous female child molesters

(Women of Crime) 10 Most Twisted Female Teachers That Shocked America (2025 cases)

(Anna Solves) Hot adult catfish Alyssa Zinger, 22, who lured teen boys into her revenge trap

(Women of Crime) EXPLAINED: Formella's 3 manipulation tactics used on her teen student

• Mrs. Mary Kay Letourneau
• Mrs. Debra Lafave (Debra Jean Beasley)
• Brittany Zamora at Arizona State Prison Complex – Perryville
• Brittany Gray from small town Oklahoma
• Coach Brooke Reinhardt (Law & Case On the Case)
• Mrs. Pamela Smart (nee Wojas, molester and convicted murderer)
• Mother molests teen girls at sleepover

Why do 'hot' teachers molest? Ego?

Formella case: 'Good looking' teacher stalked 15-y.o. victim (True Crime)

• Teacher had sex with student 50+ time: new sex charges: exposed by her own cell phone digital diary | Christina Formella
• Exclusive | Accused dirty teacher Christina Formella is all smiles in court with husband — as she asks judge to let her move closer to student whom she’s ‘sexually abused 50 times’ (NY Post)
• Who is Christina Formella, the teacher accused by authorities of sexually molesting a student?
• Exclusive | Peter Goodwin of Virginia cheats on wife with former nanny: court papers
• Influencer couple dies in off-roading accident in British Columbia (People Mag)
• Travis Kelce shares rare glimpse into his love story with Taylor Swift

*No, it's probably not, and anyway his name is a pseudonym to protect the baby victim of his teacher's villainous predation. Strangely, it seems to be legal for a minor to have sex with a teacher given that they are innocent victims and nothing more.

Copyright Disclaimer: Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, commentary, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use permits uses that might otherwise infringe copyright. Non-profit, educational, or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use. For inquiries, please contact: criminalmindsuncovered@gmail.com

• Ashley Banfield x Drop Dead Serious investigates; Ananda (Dharma Buddhist Meditation), Ashley Wells, Seth Auberon (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Meet Buddhism's Creator and Savior

(Larry King) Hindu Sankhya philosophy, Jain, Buddhist

Great Brahmā (as understood in Buddhism) - Tibetan Buddhist Encyclopedia

Does Buddhism have a creator? Yes. What about a savior? Yes, that, too, sort of

"God" has a sense of humor (Far Side).

Recently, Ven. Subhuti, a student of the awakened scholar-monk Pa Auk Sayadaw, made a video explaining a common question he gets asked as an American Buddhist monk in the West:

“Do you believe in a creator?” It is a loaded question usually asked by devoted Christians. They are expecting him to say “No,” but he answers, “Yes.”

Dyeus: The Proto-Indo-European "Sky Father"

Buddhism and the God-Idea

The real answer is that karma [kamma, deeds, intentional actions of body, speech, and mind, all that we sow and can expect to reap] is the creator [of our lives, our circumstances, our fruit, what we get].

He quotes a stock phrase from the Pali canon, Theravada Buddhism's canonical texts recorded in the lingua franca (common language) the Buddha spoke:

Kammassakomhi, kammadāyādo, kammayoni,

“It is my actions (deeds) that I own, it is my actions that I am heir to, it is my actions that I am born from,

I'll leave this one in the Garden.

kammabandhu, kammapaṭisaraṇo --

“Actions are my kinsfolk, actions are my guide --

yaṁ kammaṁ karissāmi, kalyāṇaṁ vā pāpakaṁ vā,

Whatever actions I perform, whether skillful or unskillful,

tassa dāyādo bhavissāmī ti.

“to that will I be heir.”

pabbajitena abhiṇhaṁ paccavekkhitabbaṁ.

“One who has gone forth [from home into the left-home life of a Buddhist monastic] should frequently reflect on this.”

• If by karma we are "created," so it is by karma that we are "saved." Therefore, in that sense, our karma (our deeds) are our savior:

No one saves us but ourselves

No one can and no one may;

We ourselves must walk the Path;

Buddhas only point the way.

COMMENTARY

Wisdom Quarterly

Buddhist Publication Society

Does that mean that there is a God in Buddhism? There are many Gods (brahmas) and gods (devas) in Buddhism, none quite fitting the exaggerated description of the omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent Judeo-Christian conception, except perhaps the Gnostic Christian view. But karma fits the omni-description.

Buddhism is nontheistic as well as polytheistic. How? Nontheism is not atheism. Theism is the certainty that there is some all-powerful God as imagined by monotheists; atheism is the certainty that there is not.

Nontheism, by distinction to both of these extremes, says that whether there is a God or whether there is not has no bearing on one's own awakening, enlightenment, and liberation (ultimate salvation). Why?

The gods and Gods themselves are not free. The Buddha excelled the Gods in that sense, and many of them (such as Maha Brahma and Baka Brahma) knew it, as hard as it was to believe. The Buddha is not worshiped, is not now sitting in his heaven welcoming and excluding souls. It's nothing like that.

But it is curious that Christians say things that are true without knowing it, such as: "God works in mysterious ways." Nothing could be more true of the working out of KARMA (actions begetting reactions, small causes and their exponential effects, deeds and their resultants).

The working out of karma is imponderable and is not mocked. "God is not mocked," it is said, but the Jewish/Christian God is mocked all the time. What is not mocked is karma, in the sense that both are given credit for producing results appropriate to actions.

Whatever is done, it is seen. It does not go unseen. And there are results, for the most part with some exceptions. (Not every action has to produce a result, e.g., if the soil upon which a seed was planet becomes barren, i.e., if a person becomes fully enlightened and therefore no longer liable any further results after this life).

God can be bargained with to avoid or modify some results. Karmic resultants are modified by other karma (actions). One easy way to understand this is given in an ancient example.

Freshwater naturally dilutes saltwater

Let's say a person were living a fairly good life but then did something very grave and wrong. That person could be compared to a cup with water in it that is now spiked with salt. How can that bitter saltiness ever be removed (the "sin forgiven")? While it can't be removed, it can be diluted.

The solution to saltiness is not removing salt but adding more fresh water. That will dilute it and make it less salty. Having done one "wrong," one might do many "rights" to compensate for it.

It'd be magic if salt disappeared

If one does many little wrongs, that also makes the cup salty and hard to swallow. Doing many little rights and some big ones, too, will be very helpful for the long future of drinking. We imagine there's only this life, but there are many more.

Karma is the creator (of our lives, our circumstances, our environment), the orchestrator, the chooser, the Generator, Operator, and Destroyer (G.O.D.)

Unlike Maha Brahma (the "Great Supremo") or the countless devas (celestial and terrestrial "shining ones"), all faring along according to their karma, it would be wise to engage in the karma that makes an end of all karma, that brings suffering to a final end, that results in knowing-and-seeing.

Why? "Karma, it's everywhere you're going to be."

• The symbolism and significance of the mighty God Brahma (Wordzz)
• Bhikkhu Subhuti (AmericanMonk.org, Feb. 3, 2025); Dhr. Seven and Sayalay Aloka (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly COMMENTARY

Prostitution: Do escorts have O’s?

(Ms Jessica Jaye) Do I have 😮rgasms with clients working in a business that is so condemned?

Do I 😮? 

Dancer Josephine Baker 1926

(Ms Jessica Jaye) March 14, 2025: Brisbane, AUSTRALIA, Down Under, working it in Sydney. Can a sex worker be candid about the oldest profession in the world? It is not all a sleazy street exchange. In some places, like parts of the state of Nevada (outside of the county Las Vegas is in places like The Love Ranch) in the USA. In countries around the world, this is going on every day. In fact, some would argue that there is no country, no state, no city where it is not. Instagram: msjessicajaye. TikTok: msjessicajaye1.

• Sex workers legal in some parts of the world
• Is it prostitution if there's no pimp or pressure?

Courtesan Cora Pearl

The Five Precepts would seem to preclude this line of "work," given that it is a kind of sexual misconduct (abusing sex) in the eyes of society. Moreover, one might argue that it is "trade in living beings," one of the forms of Wrong Livelihood (from the Noble Eightfold Path), exploiting oneself and/or others, and for all appearances it is corrosive to the individual engaging in it. Does it have to be?

Geisha girl in traditional garb

Weren't there always courtesans (royal call girls) and geishas (well-mannered conversationalists for the rich)? These high-class escorts may not exactly be the same thing. They may be. But they are not regarded as such by the society.

One must take care not to rationalize that all wives are engaged in this line of work for fear of falling into specious reasoning and logical fallacies.

Buddhism and Sex (M. O'C. Walshe)

Ultimately, who is responsible for me but me? The buck stops here. We simply wish to share the Buddha's advice. The British scholar Maurice O'Connell Walshe dared to tackle this topic from a Buddhist perspective.

See Wheel #225 — Buddhism and Sex (Buddhist Publication Society)

• Ananda (Dharma Buddhist Meditation), Ashley Wells, Dhr. Seven (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Peace is a choice for evolution (1/29)

PEACE CLASS with Mandy Kahn

Friends, Peace Class meets tonight (Wednesday). To join us, simply click on this Zoom link at 6:00 pm (Pacific Time) on Jan. 29th:

• Zoom: us02web.zoom.us/j/84439689810?pwd=SVo2a3hsRVA1RWY5UW42YW1SaGJhdz09
• Passcode: 495948
• Meeting ID: 844 3968 9810

Feel free to share this link with friends and fellow humans. ALL are welcome. At last week's class, we talked about THE LAW OF PEACE-BY-CHOICE.

THE LAW OF PEACE-BY-CHOICE

Mindfulness Yoga at PRS: Meditating w/ Chaos & Uncertainty, multiple dates (Eventbrite)

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Peace, Love, and Happiness versus? Your choice.

Sooner or later, all beings choose to live in a way that is peaceful, one that honors all beings. Peace-by-choice is the direction of all spiritual evolution. Choosing is not enforced; there is no need to enforce it.

A peaceful way of being is always ultimately chosen. There is no expected timeline for choosing to live in a peaceful and loving way. There is simply a natural law that all will choose to live this way eventually. Notice that it was not said that all must choose to live this way. No one ever has to choose it.

What's so great about sustainable practices?

But time is unending. In all that time-without-end, eventually everyone does choose it. We'll call this the Law of Peace-by-Choice. Think of it as a natural law, a bit like gravity. Gravity is not enforced; it simply exists. Peace-by-choice is not enforced — it is simply a path that all will eventually walk. [Could there be war without end? That would me unmanageable, untenable, and ultimately unsustainable, whereas peace is sustainable].

There is no external expectation regarding how quickly peace is chosen, and there is no time limit. Some may spend many lifetimes exploring other choices before choosing a peaceful way of being. And others may choose a peaceful expression right away. It is up to every being to choose how quickly that being wants to evolve.

Peace-by-choice is always the forward direction of evolution. Here's an analogy that helps explain how this law functions: Imagine a person lives in a hotel and that, at every meal, she may choose to eat whatever she likes from a large and varied buffet. Among the many options available is a cookie that we'll call the Peace Cookie. This person has complete free will to eat or not eat that cookie. There are many other desserts to choose from — war cakes and cruelty pies, massacre meringues and mass bombing mousses, and of course smart-Alec tarts.

The great clock in the sky says time's passing.

Perhaps this person might go an entire lifetime without trying this one delicious cookie, given there are so many other options to explore. But to understand how the law of peace-by-choice works, one must come to understand the endlessness of time (going on for aeons as explained by the Buddha).

If that person does not choose the cookie of peace during her first lifetime, she will be reborn again and will again have absolute free will to choose whatever she'd like from the buffet. And if she doesn't choose peace during her second lifetime, there will be a third and so on ad nauseum.

This process can go on as long as the chooser likes [that is, until she does something about it to bring all suffering to an end and gain nirvana]. Eventually, that cookie will be chosen. It might take thousands of lifetimes to choose it, or it might be chosen quickly.

It's not that it must be chosen but rather that, eventually, it always is chosen. Why? Eventually, everything else is unsustainable. Eventually, that person becomes curious about that cookie. At some point, all other options will have been tried. At some point, that cookie will become the most appealing option. Then it will be chosen.

And only when the cookie of peace has been eaten will the person realize that it is unlike every other food available at the buffet. It's not just a food — but a doorway to a new kind of experience. It's a doorway out of this dingy hotel for good. There is never any external pressure to try that cookie. It is simply always made available. There may even be obstacles to it. It is the free will of every person to choose it or not to choose it at any given moment. Free will is always honored by the universe.

• THE PHILOSOPHICAL RESEARCH SOCIETY
• EVENTS at The Philosophical Research Society
• The Zen of Alan & Elda: The Films of Alan Watts & Elda Hartley
• A Historic Trip: Altered States at Esalen (An Illustrated Lecture) Tickets, Wed, Jan 29, 2025, at 7:00 PM | Eventbrite

And the law of peace-by-choice functions everywhere in the universe. All beings, wherever they reappear and whenever they are reborn, are subject to this law.

This law is how we evolve. There is a gravity-like pull that draws us towards choosing peace, but there is also a spirit around us that respects our timing and honors our free will. This law applies to us, and it applies to our neighbors. No matter how our neighbors might act, they are evolving towards their own peacefulness.

They might be evolving by not choosing peace yet. They might be evolving by eating a massacre meringue, or by shoveling slices of war cake right down others' throats. They might be evolving by appearing to do whatever seems to be the furthest thing from expressing peacefulness that they can find to do. Our neighbors might choose to furiously sample everything at that buffet, life after life, until they tire themselves out, until they discover for themselves how it feels to choose what isn't peace.

We might look at our neighbors and think, "No people could be further from peacefulness." However, there isn't anyone who isn't evolving towards choosing peacefulness at their own pace at all times. We do not need to regulate our neighbor's peace-choosing process because it is already regulated by natural law.

All-that-is has already determined that our neighbors will choose peace eventually. Knowing that, we can feel free to focus on our own evolution. Our neighbor's pace is our neighbors' choice to make. The opportunity we were reborn to have is the opportunity of the self. The question we came here to consider is this one: How quickly do I choose to evolve?

• PEACE CLASS with Mandy Kahn (Eventbrite)
• Mandy Kahn, Philosophical Research Society (prs.org), Hollywood, Jan. 29, 2025; edited by Dhr. Seven, Wisdom Quarterly Lunar New Year's Day

Jimmy Dore stops smoking pot, stays clean

Jimmy, you're making a lot of sense. - Elon

For only the second time, standup comic and former hopeless pothead Jimmy Dore has had a spiritual awakening. This time it was prompted by quitting cannabis (THC) and reading New Age literature from the sound of it. His new focus? The collective unconscious or what Carl Jung talked about in terms of archetypes and consciousness, dreams and the deeper meaning of life. This may only be a phase. The good news? His sense of humor survived, and the The Jimmy Dore Show will continue bigger than ever. Due to some unbelievable good fortune, voiceover and comedian Mike MacRae .com is still onboard with the politician and celebrity impressions. (Where's Hillary Supporter? We want to hear from Hillary Supporter, weekly if possible, and can do with less of Al Pacino).

• Mike MacRae, Jimmy Dore (jimmydore.com); Seth Auberon, Pfc. Sandoval, Dhr. Seven (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly COMMENTARY

Rejoice: Flower Garlands of Merit (Subhuti)

Ven. Subhuti (Jeremy Glick), americanmonk.org, 3/10/24; Dhr. Seven (ed.), Wisdom Quarterly

Making Garlands of Merit

Let's make merit with this bud. - Not smoke it?

(March 10, 2024) Recently, American Theravada Buddhist monk Venerable Subhuti has been making more videos rather than written posts. This enables him to put more into each presentation.

Here he shares personal stories along with the Dhamma, the Buddha's precious Teachings.

What can be done with flowers other than giving?

While most may be more interested in hearing about what the monastic life is like over learning the Dhamma, we will still hear about both.

Readers love personal information. This Dhamma talk explores Verse 53 of the Dhammapada and the different aspects of making merit (profitable karma) he thinks most will like.

Why would this make anyone smile? What human thing in us is moved?

Rejoice (anumodana)

Wisdom Library (wisdomlib.org) edited by Dhr. Seven, Wisdom Quarterly

Dana is sharing, letting go, giving, charity, caring, developing generosity, benefitting others.

It is very good karma (meritorious deeds known as punya) made even better by sharing word of it so that others may rejoice (anumodana) and make the rare good karma of rejoicing in good deeds others have done.

We are misguided in the West, always "hiding our light under a bushel," which is good advice as far as it goes. But it goes too far. We as a culture are not taught to be happy for others, to derive happiness from them being happy. Instead, we're taught to be competitive and selfish and actually to take delight in their lack of success, loss, ruin, and misery.

It's called schadenfreude. a German term imported into English, not because we're all genetically German but because our American culture is. We're very much painted by Germanic and Ashkenazi influences on our religions and ways to interpret and practice them.

In the East, we rejoice! Asians customarily help neighbors do good things. They delight that good things are being done for the whole community, even joining in to grow the good and partake of the merit. Such people spread word of others' good deeds, praising and rejoicing, rejoicing and praising.

DEFINITION

Anumodana (अनुमोदन) means “joy in the joy of others, in sympathy with others' joys.” It represents one of the “seven types of devotional practice” (pūjā), according to Buddhist teachings followed by the Buddhist Newah people in the Kathmandu Valley of Nepal, whose roots can be traced to the Licchavi period, 300-879 CE.

The connection that Vajrayāna (Himalayan Buddhism of Nepal, Tibet, Bhutan, and parts of Kalmykia, Siberia, Mongolia, and Russia) has to the larger Mahāyāna ("Greater Vehicle") is expressed through the saptavidhānottara-pūjā, "the sevenfold supreme offering," a seven-step procedure for setting the intention to become a Buddha (samma-sam-buddha, pacceka-buddha, or personal-buddha called an arhat).

Anumodana (happiness derived from others' giving or other good deeds) refers to cultivating joy because others are joyful or, by having done good, in store for wished for and pleasant results. Big causes of joy are reflecting on the virtues of the buddhas (awakened ones), bodhisattvas (those intent on becoming buddhas), and arhats (fully enlightened ones).

An example of “anumodanā”

Feeding others is giving health and strength.

Someone is practicing to develop good qualities (generosity, virtue, skillfulness in meditation). A spectator rejoices in seeing those acts and congratulates that person, saying: “Good, good, good! Sadhu, sadhu, sadhu! In this impermanent world enveloped with shadows of ignorance, you are strengthening great mind [of bodhi or enlightenment] and are planting merit (puṇya)!’’

Imagine a devoted donor (dāyaka) and a beneficiary (pratigrāhaka) and a third person standing beside them. The third person is joyful at the sight of the good action. One rejoices with them. The other two lose nothing. Such is the characteristic of experiencing joy in others' joy (anumodanā).

Thus, just by having a mind of such joy, happy just because others are happy or doing deeds that will come to fruit as more happiness in the future, a Bodhisattva or practitioner surpasses the ordinary practitioners of the two Vehicles (Mahayana and Theravada).

How much more could be said if one actually practices the qualities over which one is rejoicing? Now there is not just happiness that they are doing good and that future good is coming to them. Now I am happy at the goodness I see and practicing for future happiness that is coming my way, which if I'm lucky others will be happy for. and we will all make more good for being happy.

It's a positive feedback loop by way of which one stores up a great deal of merit. More