James Thomas Rook Jr.

That presumes that all Jehovah's Witnesses think exactly the same way, about the exact same things, which is the Society's goal .. but it never happens. The Society has NEVER been right about ANYTHING they predicted .. which is why "new light" is discovered AFTER the facts become evident.  I remember as a preteen boy accompanying my Mom to Assemblies where the "King of the North" and "Gog of Magog" were discussed with millions of words extending over 60 years of my lifetime, and NONE of it had any practical relevance to my or any other person's life, with the possible exception of keeping me too busy to get into trouble.
We have seen so much "New Light" that no one has noticed the long trail of dead, corroded batteries trailing behind, from "light" that was actually darkness.
It is no shame to say to any hypothesis "I am GUESSING ... I really have no idea whatsoever "  Sorta like the Pyramids found in Europe recently that are at least 25,000 years old.
"Prophets" in modern times never have to work hard, miss any meals, or turn down "green handshakes".
.My guess about Russia is  .... to paraphrase ... "STUFF HAPPENS!".
 

That presumes that all Jehovah's Witnesses think exactly the same way, about the exact same things, which is the Society's goal .. but it never happens. The Society has NEVER been right about ANYTHING they predicted .. which is why "new light" is discovered AFTER the facts become evident.  I remember as a preteen boy accompanying my Mom to Assemblies where the "King of the North" and "Gog of Magog" were discussed with millions of words extending over 60 years of my lifetime, and NONE of it had any practical relevance to my or any other person's life, with the possible exception of keeping me too busy to get into trouble.
We have seen so much "New Light" that no one has noticed the long trail of dead, corroded batteries trailing behind, from "light" that was actually darkness.
It is no shame to say to any hypothesis "I am GUESSING ... I really have no idea whatsoever "  Sorta like the Pyramids found in Europe recently that are at least 25,000 years old.
"Prophets" in modern times never have to work hard, miss any meals, or turn down "green handshakes".
.My guess about Russia is  .... to paraphrase ... "STUFF HAPPENS!".
 

Yeah, as Abraham Lincoln once warned ... "Never believe anything you read on the Internet!"
Could be worse ... could be a picture of Jesus holding out two fingers with a Gillette Razor between them.
With my usual lack of humor I present the Draft Copy of the December 2016 issue of the Watchtower which showed a Brother shaving on the cover ... it was changed before being distributed, because the Brothers responsible for the VERY GOOD and accurate article ... disappeared mysteriously.
After you save the file to your hard drive, from the TOOL BAR, be sure to set your ADOBE PDF reader under VIEW to "Reading Mode" and under ZOOM,  "Fit Page" to read it.
 
Dec 2016 Watchtower draft article .pdf

Yes, but they have to hold it at arm's length straight out, with the other arm bent and hand on hip, and the head covering has to be a large Mexican Sombrero, with tassels.

.
Well, it appears that the Russian Prosecution is grasping at straws on this "extremism" accusation, which is a catch-all for anything that they don't culturally like ... sort of like our term "brazen conduct", which shows up for the first time in the 2010 secret Elders Handbook, and three years later for the first time in ANY Bible translation in the 2013 New World Translation, for obvious reasons.
The only time in my life I had heard the term "brazen" heard before was in a Western cowboy movie where the refined womenfolk of a frontier town were incensed that the saloon prostitutes when shopping dared to come on the "respectable" side of the street ... referring to them as "brazen hussys!"
As far as "extremeism" goes ( whatever THAT means ...) Jehovah's Witnesses are the most pacifistic people on the Earth, and are no clear and present danger to ANY secular society or government ... and most of the secular world is fully aware of that.
The prosecution tried to throw the blood issue up against the wall to see if it would stick, but from the pseudo-translation/summary it looks like ( to mix some metaphors..) the low down caper on that scam did not fly, for the reasons stated.
My first GUESS is that the Russian Orthodox Church wants JWs out of the country, and wants to confiscate their assets. Putin THINKS of himself as a solid Christian, and a defender of his doctrines, and the Russian Orthodox Church's doctrines .. plus it would be fun to confiscate all their assets. He is a multi-billionaire many times over and can afford to play with the "pawns".
My second GUESS, which was actually the first thing that came to mind, is that the Global reputation Jehovah's Witnesses have for within their own ranks, exhibiting extreme cruelty in the manner of disfellowshipping ... disciplining one person, and destroying entire family relationships between immediate families, and across generations and extended families, and across every person in his culture .. is akin to setting a disobedient baby on fire.
It will be interesting to eventually get full and complete transcripts of this case after it fully plays out, and someone makes it available on the Internet.
I hope that, since the Brotherhood has spent about $80,000,000 ( Eighty MILLION DOLLARS) on international postage, that the Society will be the ones to provide those transcripts to not only the Brotherhood, but the whole world.
It is shameful when in order to get HARD NEWS, we have to go elsewhere.
I thank everybody for making available what we have so far ...
.
 
 
 
 

TTH:
Every post from you is TRULY amazing! 
I am continually stunned at what you perceive the real world to be like.
In that same light ( old or new light?) I am posting a photo of me when I was a younger man, that some upstart Scottish truck driver turned actor turned into a successful movie career, just to deceive Jehovah's Witnesses from Russia, but with love.
 

 
.
.
..... think I should sue him?
... think I should sue him?

Yes, it is a bit extreme ... but when you find it necessary to discipline one person, and you destroy him, his family, and extended family relationships .. it is cruel, viscous, and callous.
It also creates an atmosphere of fear, internally, for fear that YOU MIGHT BE NEXT,.
A boy that was baptized at age 8 who grows up and chooses another path based on his conscience at age 20 gets his family ripped apart ... something that DID NOT happen between Ruth and Naomi, who lived in a family of mixed religions before the husband died, and they immigrated to Israel.
Jehovah's Witnesses are becoming known globally NOT as a people for His name ... but for their brazen, blatant cruelty and unreasonableness.   That is a FACT! 
That is why with BILLIONS of hours spent witnessing last year, Europe's JW growth last year was utterly pathetic, and in some countries there was actually a LOSS.
I personally was dragged into "Room 101" last year by three angry Elders who chewed me out for responding "Hello.." to someone who started a conversation with me. 
After the initial shock and stunned disbelief that this crap NEVER ENDS .... I have decided since then that I am going to be pleasant with ANYONE who is pleasant with me. I will not discuss Theology with them, but I will be openly courteous and friendly with all.
Remember, even Jesus sat down and ate with sinners and tax collectors who had rejected the old Jewish System, which was STILL supported by Jehovah God !
The head-shot cartoon is a bit extreme, but for those who have deep love for their families, it is LESS CRUEL than current JW standard practices.
.The head of the Australian Royal Commission was flabbergasted that the Australian Branch head, under specific questioning about that .... did not understand that elementary fact.

Anna:
In the REAL world, divorced from agenda driven fantasy, there is a rule that can never be violated.
It's called the "Holy Rule of Design", and it ESPECIALLY applies to Bible translation ... that is why the best Bible Translation in the World ( 1962-2012 NWT) took ten years to make, even though labor was almost free.
Good + Fast = Expensive
Choose good and fast and we will postpone every other job, cancel all appointments and stay up 25-hours a day just to get your job done. But, don't expect it to be cheap. This supposes EXTREMELY qualified people, young, strong and motivated .. AND EDUCATED.
Good + Cheap = Slow
Choose good and cheap and we will do a great job for a discounted price, but in the case of the PRE- 2013 paraphrased "Silver Sword" , the 1962-2012 NWT 2013 it took ten years and the quality was MAGNIFICENT! (Read Jason Bedunn's unbiased "Truth in Translation", available on Amazon for a full explanation WHY).
Fast + Cheap = Inferior
Choose fast and cheap and expect AN INFERIOR job delivered on time. You truly get what you pay and in the case of translating 880 different items on a schedule is a nightmare.
Translation is NOT a science ..it is an art, and in the case of translating a paraphrased Bible (2013 NWT) into paraphrased magazines and literature, and even other bibles, also paraphrased ... something has to GIVE.  And that something is QUALITY. 
In a culture (ours) where we hang on every nuance,  and discuss everything to death ... extracting truth from something that has been paraphrased across languages to OTHER paraphrases across languages , by people OTHER than people who are talented and well educated in BOTH languages is almost impossible ... and still retain the nuances and accurate idiomatic expressions of the original.
The PERFECT real life example example of this is the 2013 NWT, which uses the word "Brazen" at least twice.  Be a sport ... REALLY look it up. Nowhere in the Bible is the word brazen used in ANY translation, before the "Silver Sword" ... not even the NWT..
If you look it up in Benjamin Wilson's "Emphatic Diaglott", which the Society bought and publishes, , or the "Kingdom Interlinear"  Translation, and look up the same scriptures, NOTHING even remotely close is there.  (As an an extremely IMPORTANT aside, The Super Secret 2010 Elders Handbook which 95% of all JWs do not even knows exist, and sisters are not permitted to read, and no one is to make copies ( but which was instantly available all over the Internet), mentioned that "brazen conduct" was a disfellowshipping offense, whatever THAT means, and they needed to PUT that word in the 2013 NWT .... Copies of the 2010 Handbook were given to the Government of Finland, and Australia for their reference,... but YOU can't read it, unless you are an elder ... but that is a whole other very, VERY  sad discussion ....).
I could go on for perhaps 20 pages about this, but I just got out of the Hospital this afternoon, and I tire easily ... fortunately I had highly qualified, highly educated, experienced doctors taking care of me. It was fast, and it was good ... but it was NOT cheap.  What made it GOOD was HIGHLY qualified experts ... because without REAL EXPERIENCED experts, you may as well hammer with a rock.
.I hope you have enough real life experiences to discern what reality is ... because the Universe will judge us impartially, and without mercy if we are wrong.
 
 

.Pick any TWO.
The Universe will not allow you to have all three..
 

My original question had no discriminatory flavor to it.
In Science Fiction, the term is "xenophobic", which locally refers to a hatred or dislike of people of other countries.
PALOMAR MOUNTAIN, CALIFORNIA
Place Of Dreams Fulfilled.
When I was a pre-teenager, about 1957 or so, the Russians awakened the world as if throwing ice water or sleeping planet by launching into space the Sputnik satellite, a small ball about the size of a basketball in orbit around the earth, and several times a day the satellite would travel over the United States of America with its beeping signals, very primitive by today’s standards, and you could stand out in your front yard and look into the night sky and see it pass overhead as a rapidly moving star.
It’s hard to even explain nowadays the galvanizing effect this had on the nations in general and the United States in particular, but as an 11-year-old boy who somehow had picked up the desire to go to space this captured my imagination as much as it scared the imagination of military and political leaders around the world. At the time I had no geopolitical sense whatsoever so I was totally enthralled by what I saw in the night sky.
It’s hard to even explain nowadays the shock effect that this obvious and apparent demonstration of Soviet superiority had on the world and specifically the United States. Overnight, it seemed, the educational system was ramped up to include science and mathematics beyond the imagination of what people had planned merely months before. The Soviet satellite, and the implications of Soviet superiority were the topic of every magazine, every newspaper and every mass media market that existed at that time… Extremely primitive by today’s standards.
As usual, anything that captured the imagination of the American people, could be exploited to make a dollar off of it, and very soon in the exact same manner that the sport of baseball had baseball cards, there were space cards available in every store and outlet that I was aware of. You could buy a pack of space cards with a slab of bubblegum and there would be pictures of space stations, meteor strikes, what we thought the planets look like then, and everything even remotely related to space.
If memory serves, it’s through these space cards that I became aware of the great observatory at Palomar Mountain, the Palomar Observatory, which took seven years to build as I later found out and was truly as magnificent piece of technology such as the world had never seen before.
By the age of 13, I had become so enthralled with Palomar Mountain and Palomar Observatory that I hungrily absorbed any and all information I could find about it, and vowed that when I grew up I would make a pilgrimage to Palomar Mountain and feast my eyes on the giant eye that could see across the universe and unravel the secrets it contained. By understanding the universe, as an aside, it occurred to me that I could understand the mind of God, which is partially true.
So with this in mind, I have provided the link below so that if you’re not familiar with Palomar Observatory, which is in Southern California, you can review the Wikipedia link, which will add a great deal to your understanding and appreciation of the poem “Infinity”, by Rosser Reeves.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palomar_Observatory
………. About 1963 or so I discovered a old yellow science fiction book in the upper levels of my library at the high school I attended, and I believe I read all the science fiction that they had in the school at that time and in this old yellow science fiction book was this poem.
I was so stunned by the magnificence and scope of the poem, that I have tried my entire life to commit fully to memory, and several times I did, but that was then, and this is now. I can still recite the poem pretty much from memory, if I have it written down before me so I can glance down and see what comes next.
If you remember the old advertising slogan “… Melts in your mouth not in your hand”, that M&M candy company used to use on television, the same guy that invented that slogan, is the guy that wrote this poem.
All of this having been said, with great pleasure I present to you as if it were my personal gift ……….. the poem, “Infinity”, by Rosser Reeves.
INFINITY by Rosser Reeves
=======================
The probing eye of Palomar peers skyward to reveal
A billion molten, fiery stars in our galactic wheel...
And shows that even this great disc
Is but a firefly burning,
Within a much more monstrous wheel,
Slowly, slowly turning.
May not this next celestial wheel
Be but an atom's glow in some big molecule of stars
In some huge flake of snow?
For may not space flow on and on from door to opening door,
Like seas that open into seas and never reach a shore?
If in our atom's tiny flame a billion stars are whirled
And millions of these lonely suns has each a captive world,
Just follow to the trillionth power and on beyond to see,
What must be true when ciphers link down to infinity.
Somewhere red planets swing around a triple silver sun,
And pale, pale rainbows interlock their arches one by one.
Somewhere, dark girls upon their brows grow curving, scarlet horns,
And ride in tinkling gardens on great golden unicorns.
Somewhere rains of diamonds fall on foaming, milk-white seas,
Where rockets follow streaming light from star to star with ease.
And soft-eyed girls with honeyed lips swim up to sing and free
Their water-weighted lashes from their native shining sea.
Great blue-white giant blazing suns control a thousand spheres
Where reptiles march in glistening ranks and fight with jeweled spears;
Where lizards lounge on ivory thrones
And keep to weave and spin, to clean their overlapping scales,
A smooth-skinned race of men.
Somewhere crustaceans think like Gods and muse eternal laws
And write the music of the spheres with clicking bony claws.
Or beetles, fish and furry things emerge as sentient breeds,
Or, working with atomic fires are thinking centipedes.
Or, coal-black spiders sway in webs
Beneath chill alien moons,
And finger gemlike instruments to strum immortal tunes.
Or serpent-men on serpent worlds evolve to racial prime,
And glide in fourth dimensions where
The riddle solved is time.
For if there is no end of worlds and nature keeps her laws,
Who knows which life will win which world:
The hands...the coils...the claws?
So feathered things and crawling things
And creeping things all go
Their separate ways on separate worlds,
Around, above, below.
If God employs infinity His wonders to perform,
And there's no end of endlessness,
Can there, then, be a norm?
Would God give souls to sentient beasts
Or would they still be clods?
If evolution is God's way,
Whose image, then, is God's?
An endlessness of worlds implies a world of every kind:
Worlds where our past repeats itself until the end of time.
Worlds where our future's far events enact themselves before;
Where every closing portal means another opening door.
So if there is infinity, if endlessness is true,
Somewhere, Napoleon walks again the fields of Waterloo;
And somewhere, always, in the depths of time's vast shoreless sea,
Upon the ghastly Hill of Skulls,
Christ hangs upon the tree.
===============================================
 

…. it appeared in "The Best From Fantasy and Science Fiction, Tenth Series" in 1961. The cover price is/was 45¢!!
The editor's comment: "The author is chairman of the board of a large corporation, and we confess we find it intriguing and comforting to know that a man whose workday is devoted to the harsh realities of multi-million-dollar profit and loss has in him that good old-fashioned sense of wonder."
.

My original question had no discriminatory flavor to it.
In Science Fiction, the term is "xenophobic", which locally refers to a hatred or dislike of people of other countries.
PALOMAR MOUNTAIN, CALIFORNIA
Place Of Dreams Fulfilled.
When I was a pre-teenager, about 1957 or so, the Russians awakened the world as if throwing ice water or sleeping planet by launching into space the Sputnik satellite, a small ball about the size of a basketball in orbit around the earth, and several times a day the satellite would travel over the United States of America with its beeping signals, very primitive by today’s standards, and you could stand out in your front yard and look into the night sky and see it pass overhead as a rapidly moving star.
It’s hard to even explain nowadays the galvanizing effect this had on the nations in general and the United States in particular, but as an 11-year-old boy who somehow had picked up the desire to go to space this captured my imagination as much as it scared the imagination of military and political leaders around the world. At the time I had no geopolitical sense whatsoever so I was totally enthralled by what I saw in the night sky.
It’s hard to even explain nowadays the shock effect that this obvious and apparent demonstration of Soviet superiority had on the world and specifically the United States. Overnight, it seemed, the educational system was ramped up to include science and mathematics beyond the imagination of what people had planned merely months before. The Soviet satellite, and the implications of Soviet superiority were the topic of every magazine, every newspaper and every mass media market that existed at that time… Extremely primitive by today’s standards.
As usual, anything that captured the imagination of the American people, could be exploited to make a dollar off of it, and very soon in the exact same manner that the sport of baseball had baseball cards, there were space cards available in every store and outlet that I was aware of. You could buy a pack of space cards with a slab of bubblegum and there would be pictures of space stations, meteor strikes, what we thought the planets look like then, and everything even remotely related to space.
If memory serves, it’s through these space cards that I became aware of the great observatory at Palomar Mountain, the Palomar Observatory, which took seven years to build as I later found out and was truly as magnificent piece of technology such as the world had never seen before.
By the age of 13, I had become so enthralled with Palomar Mountain and Palomar Observatory that I hungrily absorbed any and all information I could find about it, and vowed that when I grew up I would make a pilgrimage to Palomar Mountain and feast my eyes on the giant eye that could see across the universe and unravel the secrets it contained. By understanding the universe, as an aside, it occurred to me that I could understand the mind of God, which is partially true.
So with this in mind, I have provided the link below so that if you’re not familiar with Palomar Observatory, which is in Southern California, you can review the Wikipedia link, which will add a great deal to your understanding and appreciation of the poem “Infinity”, by Rosser Reeves.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palomar_Observatory
………. About 1963 or so I discovered a old yellow science fiction book in the upper levels of my library at the high school I attended, and I believe I read all the science fiction that they had in the school at that time and in this old yellow science fiction book was this poem.
I was so stunned by the magnificence and scope of the poem, that I have tried my entire life to commit fully to memory, and several times I did, but that was then, and this is now. I can still recite the poem pretty much from memory, if I have it written down before me so I can glance down and see what comes next.
If you remember the old advertising slogan “… Melts in your mouth not in your hand”, that M&M candy company used to use on television, the same guy that invented that slogan, is the guy that wrote this poem.
All of this having been said, with great pleasure I present to you as if it were my personal gift ……….. the poem, “Infinity”, by Rosser Reeves.
INFINITY by Rosser Reeves
=======================
The probing eye of Palomar peers skyward to reveal
A billion molten, fiery stars in our galactic wheel...
And shows that even this great disc
Is but a firefly burning,
Within a much more monstrous wheel,
Slowly, slowly turning.
May not this next celestial wheel
Be but an atom's glow in some big molecule of stars
In some huge flake of snow?
For may not space flow on and on from door to opening door,
Like seas that open into seas and never reach a shore?
If in our atom's tiny flame a billion stars are whirled
And millions of these lonely suns has each a captive world,
Just follow to the trillionth power and on beyond to see,
What must be true when ciphers link down to infinity.
Somewhere red planets swing around a triple silver sun,
And pale, pale rainbows interlock their arches one by one.
Somewhere, dark girls upon their brows grow curving, scarlet horns,
And ride in tinkling gardens on great golden unicorns.
Somewhere rains of diamonds fall on foaming, milk-white seas,
Where rockets follow streaming light from star to star with ease.
And soft-eyed girls with honeyed lips swim up to sing and free
Their water-weighted lashes from their native shining sea.
Great blue-white giant blazing suns control a thousand spheres
Where reptiles march in glistening ranks and fight with jeweled spears;
Where lizards lounge on ivory thrones
And keep to weave and spin, to clean their overlapping scales,
A smooth-skinned race of men.
Somewhere crustaceans think like Gods and muse eternal laws
And write the music of the spheres with clicking bony claws.
Or beetles, fish and furry things emerge as sentient breeds,
Or, working with atomic fires are thinking centipedes.
Or, coal-black spiders sway in webs
Beneath chill alien moons,
And finger gemlike instruments to strum immortal tunes.
Or serpent-men on serpent worlds evolve to racial prime,
And glide in fourth dimensions where
The riddle solved is time.
For if there is no end of worlds and nature keeps her laws,
Who knows which life will win which world:
The hands...the coils...the claws?
So feathered things and crawling things
And creeping things all go
Their separate ways on separate worlds,
Around, above, below.
If God employs infinity His wonders to perform,
And there's no end of endlessness,
Can there, then, be a norm?
Would God give souls to sentient beasts
Or would they still be clods?
If evolution is God's way,
Whose image, then, is God's?
An endlessness of worlds implies a world of every kind:
Worlds where our past repeats itself until the end of time.
Worlds where our future's far events enact themselves before;
Where every closing portal means another opening door.
So if there is infinity, if endlessness is true,
Somewhere, Napoleon walks again the fields of Waterloo;
And somewhere, always, in the depths of time's vast shoreless sea,
Upon the ghastly Hill of Skulls,
Christ hangs upon the tree.
===============================================
 

…. it appeared in "The Best From Fantasy and Science Fiction, Tenth Series" in 1961. The cover price is/was 45¢!!
The editor's comment: "The author is chairman of the board of a large corporation, and we confess we find it intriguing and comforting to know that a man whose workday is devoted to the harsh realities of multi-million-dollar profit and loss has in him that good old-fashioned sense of wonder."
.

.
Why doesn't the Society translate and provide the Russian Court Transcripts for us?
Since somewhere around 5.5 million Brothers spent somewhere around 20 million hours writing letters to the officials of the Russian Federation mailing an average of somewhere around 4 letters each at an international postage rate of perhaps 80 MILLION DOLLARS, total ... why has the WTB&TS not translated FOR THE BROTHERHOOD, translations of the Russian REAL transcripts, so we will know exactly what is going on?
You would think that for 80 or so MILLION DOLLARS, some usable hard data would be forthcoming, from people that reportedly are the world's best translators !!
This affects the Brotherhood worldwide, as well as being banned in the Russian Federation .... I sure hope this is not a repeat of the Haiti Relief Fiasco, where the news was so onerous, the WTB&TS Relief efforts intertwined with the United Nations, and the Red Cross that the news of what really happened throughout the relief effort could not be published on the Society's "News" portion of the web site.
Why doesn't the Society translate and provide the Russian Court Transcripts for us?.
... and the WORLD at large!
.That is hard news EVERYBODY can use!

There are ways to use this fact to better effect than the stack of letters themselves.

...
It's not a moot point , but what has been presented above is a SUMMARY of a transcript, this one is pretty good, but some I have seen have  probably translated with a software program, such as "Google Translate".
The BIG QUESTION that begs to be answered for me is this: 
Since somewhere around 5.5 million Brothers spent somewhere around 20 million hours writing letters to the officials of the Russian Federation mailing an average of somewhere around 4 letters each at an international postage rate of perhaps 80 MILLION DOLLARS, total ... why has the WTB&TS not translated FOR THE BROTHERHOOD, translations of the Russian REAL transcripts, so we will know exactly what is going on?
You would think that for 80 or so MILLION DOLLARS, some usable hard data would be forthcoming, from people that reportedly are the world's best translators !!
Soon, an English translation WILL be available somewhere, possibly from several sources.
Why do we have to go elsewhere for hard news?
.
.
 

Caleb and Sophia?
If only it were that ..... ONLY!
Pyramid scale construction projects?
83,000 Bethelites and Special Pioneers being severed?
A hundred page and more response to the Australian Royal Commission on Child Sexual Abuse, but not one word to the Brotherhood?
being elbowed in the ribs in print and video how to give money to the Society?
Tight Pants Tony?
Million dollar Caleb and Sophia buses with $30.000 paint jobs?
Governing Body Members with $20,000 Rolex watches?
Blood Transfusions OK now ... if you have the parts come in on 13 different IV tubes?
The Society "Nationalizing" all Kingdom Halls in the World?
Regional Translation Centers using barely literate people?
Real Estate purchases of many millions of dollars for "meditation?
Allowing Chilean National Flags to fly at Kingdom Halls?
Massive systems of JW retirement homes for those in the "in crowd"?
Caleb and Sophia Merchandise, purses, briefcases, pins, buttons, slacks, suspenders and bow ties, and pictures, back car window decals, book covers, wall posters, 3d dolls like GB Bro. Anthony Morris III has in his Bethel Office, Videos, DVDs, coloring books, decorated birthd...er... baptism cakes, stand up displays, literature bags, greeting cards, Sophia colorful tote bags for girls, and Sophia cloth shopping bags for Wal-Mart, etc., book markers, key chains, 3d Printer statues of Caleb, ball point pens, and penlights, pins and brooches for older Sisters, and cartoon wall hangings for the inside of Caleb and Sophia dioramas, or JW.ORG men's ties, lapel pins, wristwatches, aluminum military style dog tags, rings, aluminum pendants for neck chains and charm bracelets, car bumper stickers, car window decals, women's pocket mirrors, flags to tie to radio aerials, put on flagpoles outside Chilean Kingdom Halls ( ... what's a Chilean Kingdom Hall doing with a flagpole, anyway ...?)Swiss Assembly Grounds, and OTHER places where a pale blue flag would look spiffy, and in the absence of a breeze, look like a U.N. Flag hanging limp. Then there is the JW.ORG blue oversized umbrellas, Unisex Hoodie Jackets, neck lanyards, hand lunch boxes with Paradise scenes, and of course Caleb and Sophia., and to contrast, from Peru, a BRIGHT Pink Caleb and Sophia Bible cover entitled New World Translation of the HOLY SCRIPTURES ... over a large picture of guess whom? Of course the refrigerator magnets and motivational jewelry are big sellers, not so much for the Caleb crochetable doll ?
The Society heavily investing in the Stock Market, and we get DFd for buying a one dollar lottery ticket?
The fact that the entire Assembly of Brothers fears what secret stuff goes on in the dreaded "little back room"?
The Society handling BILLIUONS of dollars, with absolutely ZERO disclosure or accountability?
Naw ..... it's those damn apostates who lie about there being a global JW pedophile problem, three weeks before the Austrailian Government exposes it all.
It's almost as if Caleb and Sophia had ALREADY taken control of supervision and leadership of the Society!
 

No.
It is the scriptures and reality that caught my attention ... not an artist's graphic.
.
 

...
It's not a moot point , but what has been presented above is a SUMMARY of a transcript, this one is pretty good, but some I have seen have  probably translated with a software program, such as "Google Translate".
The BIG QUESTION that begs to be answered for me is this: 
Since somewhere around 5.5 million Brothers spent somewhere around 20 million hours writing letters to the officials of the Russian Federation mailing an average of somewhere around 4 letters each at an international postage rate of perhaps 80 MILLION DOLLARS, total ... why has the WTB&TS not translated FOR THE BROTHERHOOD, translations of the Russian REAL transcripts, so we will know exactly what is going on?
You would think that for 80 or so MILLION DOLLARS, some usable hard data would be forthcoming, from people that reportedly are the world's best translators !!
Soon, an English translation WILL be available somewhere, possibly from several sources.
Why do we have to go elsewhere for hard news?
.
.
 

.
...too often that is true in every judicial system ... remember ... even the Nazis had a fully staffed "Department of Justice", but there was no Justice. ... Justice we get from Jehovah God ... everything else is more often than not only "due process".
.
 
 

.
...too often that is true in every judicial system ... remember ... even the Nazis had a fully staffed "Department of Justice", but there was no Justice. ... Justice we get from Jehovah God ... everything else is more often than not only "due process".
.
 
 

.
...too often that is true in every judicial system ... remember ... even the Nazis had a fully staffed "Department of Justice", but there was no Justice. ... Justice we get from Jehovah God ... everything else is more often than not only "due process".
.
 
 

.
...too often that is true in every judicial system ... remember ... even the Nazis had a fully staffed "Department of Justice", but there was no Justice. ... Justice we get from Jehovah God ... everything else is more often than not only "due process".
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I really liked that idea the Brother made,  with the Literature Rack on the back of his red Yamaha Motorcycle ... it has the advantage of being a licensed vehicle, and the motorcycle is cargo, so no "corner permit" should be needed (?).
Many of you will remember Bro. Johnny 5, who started out as a military robot with lasers and missiles ... but who forsake war as he got smarter, and whose credo was " input, Input, INPUT, INPUT!", and who could read about 126 pages a minute.
His baptism was at age three, and was a bit different, as water would have short circuited him after he dropped his armament, so he was baptized in a lightweight oil.
What?  What's that you say?  ....  Oh!, gimmee a break! ... TPT invented Caleb and Sophia, 
'NUFF said.

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With my usual lack of humor I present the Draft Copy of the December 2016 issue of the Watchtower which showed a Brother shaving on the cover ... it was changed before being distributed, because the Brothers responsible for the VERY GOOD and accurate article ... disappeared mysteriously.
Dec 2016 Watchtower draft article .pdf
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TrueTomHarley:
In any REAL  civil debate the TRUTH will always win out.
IT IS EVERY SEEKER OF REAL TRUTH'S RESPONSIBILITY TO PRESENT ACCURATE FACTS, AND TO KNOW WHAT IS TRUE ... if for no other reason that YOU PERSONALLY can win an argument on any topic, Antarctica to Zepplins ... based on facts, reason, logic and common sense.
Calling people names and trying to disparage their character, or appealing ( read: WHINING) to "overlords" only sends up a red flare into the night sky, that you cannot defend what is true, based on what is actually true, and need a "Big Brother" to shut the opposition down .. because you cannot defend your position, facts, philosophy, perspective of Theology in the REAL world, outside of pretzel shaped sentences and words.
The TRUE test of ANY philosophy, perspective or God supported religion is this ;
1.) It must make plain 'ol common sense outside of a convoluted million word semantics trap, where ANYTHING can be rationalized, and explained with applied stupidity.
2. It has to be based on free will, without coercion in any way, shape or form.
3. It has to be defendable against ALL COMERS ... in every circumstance ... in every case ... and the Arena Of Ideas by necessity must run red with rivers of blood from bad ideas exposed, and piled high with the bodies of the deluded, to stink in the hot midday sun.
The reason people inside, and outside of the Brotherhood fail at this is that they are afraid of philosophical combat, and TRYING to find out what is true.
THEY FEAR BEING PUNISHED SEVERELY FOR RATIONAL THOUGHT AND FREEDOM OF SPEECH.  This is why in in a judicial system based on FEAR, in 50 years, with 1,006 criminal child molesters, in over 5,000 incidents ... ONLY ONE was reported to the Australian police.
The word the entire Planet uses for this  ... is TYRANNY.
Without rational thought being encouraged, and Freedom of Speech, with EVERYBODY encouraged ... we become draft animals for anyone who, even though they may have the highest goals and the very BEST motives as rulers, and shepherds ... THEY INTEND TO RULE.
The effect  ALWAYS is an almost imperceptible slide from fear, to accepting tyranny as "the way things should be",
Instead of debating and abandoning what is false ... they debate and defend their untenable and wrong positions, ideas, and totems, and lose the simplest arguments about what is True and what is not, resorting to "Theocratic Warfare", where lying is an acceptable tactic.
It's a TRAP.

It does not matter if they take Bobby's word for it or not ... OUR responsibility is to DO WHAT WE CAN ... all that we can .. for basic JUSTICE!
ESPECIALLY for those in our extended family of the Brotherhood!
FOR EVERYBODY!
.Otherwise, like those men who refuse to take care of their families ...  we are worse than those who are without the Truth.
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We are here to assist each other and not be hypocritical in our love.  So we expose our bad sides when we are honest and way too often we may need adjustment - but this is good if we willingly adjust - because then we can be more pliable to be used by Jehovah and we improve as time goes by. We do not miss the mark as often!  LOL.
I use the words from the Bible when I say that a sweet fountain will not bubble forth bitter water all the time....  And sometimes we can come across as too critical and bitter and we do not allow the sweetness to bubble forth.
I had a friend like this in England.  She was too quick to see all the mistakes that everyone made and yet, ....    I learnt a lot from her about persistence under difficult circumstances. She did get some resistance from others because of this trait ... and I sometimes had to give myself a break from her because she was too much regarding her temperament to see the negative. On the other hand she was like a mother to me and taught me a lot.....
To influence others in an beneficial way we need to not be afraid to show our sweetness, to be perceived as weak and vulnerable.  We then are true towers of strength.  We can show empathy.
You have the experience of a lifetime.  I am sure you know a lot of positive things that other brothers can benefit from but you must gain their trust by allowing the wholesome, healing water to flow out of you.  Become a vessel for good use.  You seem to have the zeal!