I have one caveat about the Aztec and the Inca, and the relative ease with which The Conquistadors conquered them, and this has nagged me for years. Does anyone remember in the book "Dune", by Frank Herbert, the 'Bene Gesserit' Sisterhood of Priestesses had, for thousands of years, introduced myths and legends whenever they first encountered a new, primitive society as they systematically seeded the Galaxy with their religious dicta. These myths were specifically engineered and tailored to provide a pre-existing mythological niche for any Bene Gesserit cognoscenta that found themselves, perhaps millenia later, on any planet so acculturated, Thus the inculcated social imprinting provided in cultural "leverage" with which the missionaries might manipulate the natives toward whatever end was deemed necessary for the benefit of the church.
In one instance, the Spaniards appeared to a segment of the native population on THE EXACT YEAR, MONTH & DAY THAT THE NATIVE RELIGION HAD, FOR HUNDREDS OF YEARS, PREDICTED THAT A GROUP OF "FAIR-SKINNED" REPRESENTATIVES OF ONE OF THEIR FOUNDER GODS WOULD APPEAR!
Absolutely too bizarre an occurence (given that both the Incas and the Aztecs had similar culturally imbedded resonant mythologies that truly allowed the Spaniards to be treated with an absence of suspicion about there motives, and an abundance of gratuitous deference and a lowering of defensive attitudes towards alien races) too be a simple random instance of benificent fortune I say. There are a few researchers [Sitchin and Hambly (?) to name two] who, from Sumerian texts onward can point to evidence for the theory that the developement and then maintenance of Homo Sapiens (and later, Homo Sapiens Sapiens) was a bio-engineeering process, repeated on various habitable ecospheres also engineered (terraformed) across this Galaxy, the process providing the "Custodial" beings, possessed of advanced technology which seemed to make them "Divine" beings as perceived by the slave races, with plentiful and subjugated labor forces suitable for the mining and garthering of materials the "Custodians" needed for the support of their advanced spaceworthy vehicles and devices. At this point I can almost just hear Dave grinding his teeth as he realizes I've once again managed to introduce my pet "Von Daniken" hypothesis to yet another unsuspecting forum. There are confirmational references to this subject matter (The Michael is assuring me as I type) in the body of recorded, but never formally published channeled material from the first 4 years of the Orinda Group (including my obsession: the texts from the sessions channeled through the "upgraded/reengineered" Ouija Boards - necessitated because the 'store bought' products apparently wore out under the inundation of data coming through at that time). J.P. Van Hulle has been kind enough to have given me the phone number of the gentleman/Orinda Group Member/one time Archivist who is supposed to still have this stuff somewhere. I will endeavor to track it down. John Roth may know of whom I speak or maybe one of the other kind souls/scions of the members of the original group will recall something.
So, have I strayed too far through Expression to Oration? You all will have to not worry about offending me and tell me when I have plunged of the edge of the world of brevity into the misty netherworld of insufferable digression, OK. I supposedly (statistically) have between only one and three years of harvested saphous vein arterial bypass longevity remaining after my open-heart surgery two years ago and I feel compelled to 'get it all down'. John Dalmas, you better not outlive me by too many decades, or I'll be offended. - Thrasher