Driving in to work this morning, I was scowling at the non-stop 9/11 memorializing and pontificating and sentimentalizing that I was listening to on NPR. I've been scowling a lot lately, and going out of my way NOT to read or listen to, much less watch, anything about that day.
So in the car I started thinking, scowling is rather an odd reaction for me to have. And wondering just what do I think about the event. Looking within, I'm deeply conflicted about 9/11, and what it means to me. Also, very reluctant to honestly express what I really feel, since it goes against the template of emotions that I've been instructed, or rather assumed, to feel by society as verbalized by the media and the various political figures (mostly on the right, but on the left too) trying to manipulate me into supporting their agenda.
I'll start with the big, ugly, most unspeakable feeling first.
I'm over 9/11. It happened. It was terrible. Let's not forget about it. Or the good people we lost that day. Let's definitely stop it from ever happening again (more on this later). But for fuck's sake let's get on with being America again. It didn't change my life forever. It didn't change the world forever. It didn't end an era for me and radically change how I think about the world. I already knew that there were people out there that wanted to hurt America. They got lucky one day, that's all.
Lest I sound callous, let me give a little bit of background. I was living in New York City, Upper East Side, that day and have done my share of cursing and crying, thinking about the poor souls so desperate to escape the inferno within the building they jumped out of the city's tallest building. In fact, just writing that previous sentence made my eyes burn and water.
But I don't think anyone in that building that day would have wanted America to drop everything else on our plate and focus on The War On Terror, 24/7, to the exclusion of all else, since. They were busy people, capable of multi-tasking and would have expected us to do the same.
Second, I'm and angry and disgusted by what has happened since that day. And, yeah, I'm going to get political here. This administration took the justifiable anger and desire for justice 9/11 created and perverted it to justify a completely unrelated, optional war they had been wanting to wage for over a decade.
To me that's the lowest, most shameful sort of manipulation there is. As a matter of fact, I'm more angry at our own government than I am at Bin Ladin. Bin Ladin is a fundamentalist Islamic jihadist who had sworn to attack us. Being angry at him would be like being angry at a scorpion for trying to sting you. Like a scorpion, I want to stop him. I want to kill him. I want to punish him. But there's no sense of violated trust.
With Bush and Cheney, it's different. After 9/11, I set aside my misgivings about the government and supported my President in our time of need. And in return, they have lost American lives, wasted American money and soiled American honor. I feel profoundly betrayed by the Republicans and what they've done.
Third, they've failed to address the most important piece of stopping this thing from happening again.
I believe that preventing another 9/11 has two parts: the first is making less possible to COMMIT another terrorist attack on the US. The second is to make it less common to WANT to.
The administration seems to be completely focused on the first part, and doing a passible job at it, in a completely inefficient, costly, bassackward fashion. Say what you will, turning Afghanistan & Iraq into bloody war zones does keep long-term, complex terrorist plans from being developed in those countries.
But as far as that second, more important, piece, making it less common for people to WANT to attack us... they are utter, counterproductive, disasters.
Maybe I'm one of those "Blame America First"-ers the Rightwingers keep nattering on about, but as I was walking back to my apartment in the crowd of people denied our usual subway ride home that day I was thinking that an event like this should make America examine just what it is we've done in the world that would make people hate us badly enough to do this to us. Call me crazy, but I believe that if I am attacked, I should at least take a moment to examine myself and my behavior.
I believe that it's very possible that I could have done something to offend or injure the other party. Personally, as a matter of my own personal ethics, I want to try to keep my behavior as ethically sound as I am capable. To keep my side of the street clean. I fail often, and when I do there are often consequences. I step on someone's toes and they push back. For a combination of moral and purely selfish reasons --- I don't want to live in a world where I keep getting pushed back --- I want to avoid stepping on people's toes, even accidentally.
And the US, to put it mildly, has a long history of a lot of toe-stepping, without a whole lot of push-backs.
But instead of deciding to step more gingerly going forward, and get our own legal, ethical and moral house in order our Administration decided to say, in essence, "not only will we continue to step on your toes if we want, we will kick you in the ass and stomp on your neck at will and anyone that doesn't like it can expect to get more of the same himself." Then proceeded to act out this threat in Afghanistan, Iraq and now threatens to do the same in Syria and Iran.
As a result, I feel LESS safe now than I did on September 12, 2001 and MORE hated around the world. Which is one hell of a way to mark five years later. Fuck.
Monday, September 11, 2006
Thursday, September 29, 2005
Laguna Beach, the Real OC
Yesterday I took a break from working at home and watched the block of channels ranging from BET on the low end and up to one of the generic music video channels up at the top, that I never can remember the name of.
This span of four or five channels is one of my favorite time wasting destinations. Bounded on both sides by the viewing equivalent of high voltage fences (Country Music Television and C-SPAN) I can bounce up and down through MTV, MTV2, VH1, BET and the other music channels and always see enough tits, ass, bling and 80s-era cheese to feel the kind of simultaneous satiation and tantalization that can keep me enthralled for hours.
After a fairly even dispersal of attention among the channels I eventually narrowed my bouncing to "VH1's 100 Hottest Hotties" and MTV's fake reality program "Laguna Beach: The Real OC."
I'd been hearing rumors about this show for some time, mainly that the characters were supposed to be real but were using fake names. Nothing I had read or heard, however, touched upon the compelling nature of this show. Despite a near-complete lack of story, writing, special effects, narrative arc, character development, dialogue or any of the other attributes that supposedly make for enjoyable entertainment consumption I could not tear my eyes from this show and found myself only turning over to the much slicker eye-candy of the 100 Hottest Hotties only during MTVs long and frequent commercial breaks.
The lack of plotline is actually kind of refreshing, compared to the hyper-dramatic soap opera mix of seductions, feuds, accidents, misunderstandings ... that usually make the editing cut. Instead these young, white, rich, goodlooking teens go from restaruant to coffee shop to snowboarding slope casually talking about each other and hooking up.
The dialogue could not be scripted, its far too inane and empty and stupid and repetitious except for inflections that carry the entire meaning of the word (like "bitch" and "slut" becoming a friendly greeting) sort of like I remember Chinese is supposed to be.
I was transfixed through two episodes with a mixture of condescension, awe and envy. These are the popular kids!!! I never got to know what they did when I was in high school and now I do! What's more, by extension, I know what they are doing now. Because I'll wager that the life that the 33 year old versions of Laguna Beach's popular set are probably every bit as parallel as the pathetic, socially retarded bookworm life that I led in high school is parallel to the pathetic, socially retarded, Internet-surfing life I currently lead.
This span of four or five channels is one of my favorite time wasting destinations. Bounded on both sides by the viewing equivalent of high voltage fences (Country Music Television and C-SPAN) I can bounce up and down through MTV, MTV2, VH1, BET and the other music channels and always see enough tits, ass, bling and 80s-era cheese to feel the kind of simultaneous satiation and tantalization that can keep me enthralled for hours.
After a fairly even dispersal of attention among the channels I eventually narrowed my bouncing to "VH1's 100 Hottest Hotties" and MTV's fake reality program "Laguna Beach: The Real OC."
I'd been hearing rumors about this show for some time, mainly that the characters were supposed to be real but were using fake names. Nothing I had read or heard, however, touched upon the compelling nature of this show. Despite a near-complete lack of story, writing, special effects, narrative arc, character development, dialogue or any of the other attributes that supposedly make for enjoyable entertainment consumption I could not tear my eyes from this show and found myself only turning over to the much slicker eye-candy of the 100 Hottest Hotties only during MTVs long and frequent commercial breaks.
The lack of plotline is actually kind of refreshing, compared to the hyper-dramatic soap opera mix of seductions, feuds, accidents, misunderstandings ... that usually make the editing cut. Instead these young, white, rich, goodlooking teens go from restaruant to coffee shop to snowboarding slope casually talking about each other and hooking up.
The dialogue could not be scripted, its far too inane and empty and stupid and repetitious except for inflections that carry the entire meaning of the word (like "bitch" and "slut" becoming a friendly greeting) sort of like I remember Chinese is supposed to be.
I was transfixed through two episodes with a mixture of condescension, awe and envy. These are the popular kids!!! I never got to know what they did when I was in high school and now I do! What's more, by extension, I know what they are doing now. Because I'll wager that the life that the 33 year old versions of Laguna Beach's popular set are probably every bit as parallel as the pathetic, socially retarded bookworm life that I led in high school is parallel to the pathetic, socially retarded, Internet-surfing life I currently lead.
Wednesday, September 21, 2005
John Roberts, Arrogant Prick
I know that the press has been in heated competition to come up with laudatory adjectives to heap on John Roberts and what a gentlemanly, brilliant, humble, kind-hearted person he is.
After watching about as much of the questioning as my ADD would allow, I have come to just the opposite conclusion.
Seeing him duck and weave and evade all the substantive questions put to him, simpering all the while, made me think that he is, as the title of this post suggests, an arrogant prick.
He's like the guy who's recommended for a job by a company's CEO, but who needs to get interviewed and approved by one of that company's department managers to make it official.
A truly humble, self-deprecating, decent person would go into that interview determined to win that approval by demonstrated honesty, forthrightness and competence.
But instead our boy has sauntered in, smirk at full strength, propped his feet up on the Manager's desk and said "The Boss told me I have this job already, so I don't have to say shit to you."
After this behavior, any self respecting Manager would look up the company regulations and find the fine print where he gets to block this prick's appointment and do so.
After watching about as much of the questioning as my ADD would allow, I have come to just the opposite conclusion.
Seeing him duck and weave and evade all the substantive questions put to him, simpering all the while, made me think that he is, as the title of this post suggests, an arrogant prick.
He's like the guy who's recommended for a job by a company's CEO, but who needs to get interviewed and approved by one of that company's department managers to make it official.
A truly humble, self-deprecating, decent person would go into that interview determined to win that approval by demonstrated honesty, forthrightness and competence.
But instead our boy has sauntered in, smirk at full strength, propped his feet up on the Manager's desk and said "The Boss told me I have this job already, so I don't have to say shit to you."
After this behavior, any self respecting Manager would look up the company regulations and find the fine print where he gets to block this prick's appointment and do so.
Tuesday, June 07, 2005
Yes... Firing People Fixes Everything
NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - General Motors Corp. is cutting 25,000 jobs and closing an unspecified number of plants over the next 3-1/2 years, CEO Rick Wagoner told shareholders Tuesday, as the world's largest automaker struggles to stem huge losses.
Wagoner, who is also chairman of GM, did not offer more details other than to say the troubled automaker needs to cut capacity by the end of 2008. GM, which has lost $1.1 billion in the first quarter, is facing its worst financial crisis in more than a decade.
----
The best part about this whole debacle is that this Wagoner asshole blamed GM's inability to compete on the high cost of health care that gets folded into each and every car that they make.
That's fucking funny. Health Care. Right.
Not the fact that GM built Hummers and Escalades as fast as America's fattest assholes could jump into them and drive off to the exurbs without ever thinking about what would happen if gas prices ever rose. Because, I mean, it's only a limited natural resource that comes out of the ground in the world's most unstable trouble zones. Who would ever think that something would happen to make the supply fluctuate? To think that far ahead you'd have to get paid a lot more than the $2.2m salary and $2.46m bonus(!) poor Mr. Wagoner got lot year.
I'm old enough to remember when Clinton tried to do something about U.S. health care and the large corporations paraded a lot of CEOs just like Rick Wagoner squealing and crying that there was nothing wrong with the current system and that changing it would cost America jobs.
Wagoner, who is also chairman of GM, did not offer more details other than to say the troubled automaker needs to cut capacity by the end of 2008. GM, which has lost $1.1 billion in the first quarter, is facing its worst financial crisis in more than a decade.
----
The best part about this whole debacle is that this Wagoner asshole blamed GM's inability to compete on the high cost of health care that gets folded into each and every car that they make.
That's fucking funny. Health Care. Right.
Not the fact that GM built Hummers and Escalades as fast as America's fattest assholes could jump into them and drive off to the exurbs without ever thinking about what would happen if gas prices ever rose. Because, I mean, it's only a limited natural resource that comes out of the ground in the world's most unstable trouble zones. Who would ever think that something would happen to make the supply fluctuate? To think that far ahead you'd have to get paid a lot more than the $2.2m salary and $2.46m bonus(!) poor Mr. Wagoner got lot year.
I'm old enough to remember when Clinton tried to do something about U.S. health care and the large corporations paraded a lot of CEOs just like Rick Wagoner squealing and crying that there was nothing wrong with the current system and that changing it would cost America jobs.
Are We Crazy?
U.S. To Lay Off 500,000 In Iraq
By Warren Vieth
Los Angeles Times
05 June, 2003
U.S. reconstruction officials will soon hand out pink slips to nearly half a million Iraqi military and civilian personnel, exacerbating an unemployment crisis that experts say could slow the pace of postwar reconstruction.
The layoffs will mean the loss of a government paycheck for roughly 1 in 10 Iraqi workers. The Bush administration hopes to soften the blow by making cash "termination payments" to members of Saddam Hussein's armed forces, Information Ministry employees and other government workers whose services are no longer wanted. The amount of the payments had not been announced.
Officials of the U.S.-led reconstruction effort acknowledged that the dismissal of so many people will magnify the economic misfortune of a country where a majority of the population depends on food rations; an estimated 30% of the labor force works for the government; and unemployment, as best anyone can tell, already exceeds 20%. The layoffs will be the latest blow to the once-thriving trading nation, already reduced to Third World subsistence levels by nearly three decades of authoritarian rule, international sanctions and intermittent war.
---
Yes, this is exactly what Iraq needs... more economic misfortune at the hands of the United States.
That's what's going to turn the whole insurgency thing around for us. First we invade on false pretences, then we destroy their infrastructure, then we start firing the few people who still have steady jobs left.
Hey jackasses, the last thing that country needs is more people with a grudge against us. Does the phrase 'disgruntled ex-employee" mean anything to you? If you thought that they were bad news in the Postal Service just think what they could do in a country awash in AK-47s and loose bombs stolen from unguarded military installations.
We would be smarter to do just the opposite. We should HIRE another 500,000 Iraqis --- no, make that 5 million --- and put them to work rebuilding their country, shuffling papers, any fucking thing. Just so long as they get a check that says "U.S. Government" every two weeks.
Employees don't kill their employers (often) and I'd rather have those Iraqis sniggering at Dilbert comic strips where they've written "Uncle Sam" underneath that boss with the pointy hairdo than driving into checkpoints wearing a napalm jockstrap.
By Warren Vieth
Los Angeles Times
05 June, 2003
U.S. reconstruction officials will soon hand out pink slips to nearly half a million Iraqi military and civilian personnel, exacerbating an unemployment crisis that experts say could slow the pace of postwar reconstruction.
The layoffs will mean the loss of a government paycheck for roughly 1 in 10 Iraqi workers. The Bush administration hopes to soften the blow by making cash "termination payments" to members of Saddam Hussein's armed forces, Information Ministry employees and other government workers whose services are no longer wanted. The amount of the payments had not been announced.
Officials of the U.S.-led reconstruction effort acknowledged that the dismissal of so many people will magnify the economic misfortune of a country where a majority of the population depends on food rations; an estimated 30% of the labor force works for the government; and unemployment, as best anyone can tell, already exceeds 20%. The layoffs will be the latest blow to the once-thriving trading nation, already reduced to Third World subsistence levels by nearly three decades of authoritarian rule, international sanctions and intermittent war.
---
Yes, this is exactly what Iraq needs... more economic misfortune at the hands of the United States.
That's what's going to turn the whole insurgency thing around for us. First we invade on false pretences, then we destroy their infrastructure, then we start firing the few people who still have steady jobs left.
Hey jackasses, the last thing that country needs is more people with a grudge against us. Does the phrase 'disgruntled ex-employee" mean anything to you? If you thought that they were bad news in the Postal Service just think what they could do in a country awash in AK-47s and loose bombs stolen from unguarded military installations.
We would be smarter to do just the opposite. We should HIRE another 500,000 Iraqis --- no, make that 5 million --- and put them to work rebuilding their country, shuffling papers, any fucking thing. Just so long as they get a check that says "U.S. Government" every two weeks.
Employees don't kill their employers (often) and I'd rather have those Iraqis sniggering at Dilbert comic strips where they've written "Uncle Sam" underneath that boss with the pointy hairdo than driving into checkpoints wearing a napalm jockstrap.
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