Okay.
We've passed a spending bill with a deadline for troop withdrawls attached to it. Didn't that seem a little bit easy to you?
Especially you, Harry. Why do you think that it was even allowed to go to a vote, instead of getting shut down like all the other substantive bills the Senate Republicans have blocked?
I think we know. Because George W. Bush actually wants to veto it.
He could use the distraction, from the Attorneygate, GSA-gate and whatever other gate's erupt between now and whenever the bill hits his desk. He likes making grand, dramatic stands. He thinks that he can take the high, terrorist-fighting, troop-supporting road on this issue.
Furthermore, he believes that doing so will cost him nothing. He believes, with some historical validity, that Democrats will cave and compromise. That we will settle for some sort of meaningless, non-binding, bullshit little addendum to the spending bill that he can smirk at and ignore.
Let's prove him wrong.
He wants to play chicken. Great. Let's throw the steering wheel out the window while he watches.
Let's announce to the world that this is the only spending bill that he is going to see. And he can either sign it or not. Period.
More to the point, let's stick to it, no matter what.
What's the worst that could happen? Our troops have to come home in April? Great. Something tells me the National Guardsmen on their third deployment aren't going to be too pissed about that. The Republicans will accuse us of cowardice and treason? They already are doing that. The Iraqis will descend into civil war? Ditto. Democrats might suffer some political fallout for taking a firm stand for our principles? It's worth it.
This is our chance, the best one in a long, long, time to break Bush's willful defiance of the facts --- of Iraq, the Constitution, what the American people want, and the new balance of power in Washington.
He's not going to like it. He's going to bluster, and threaten, and cuss, and call us names. Fuck him.
He's been on a six year binge of other people's lives and money.
We can cut him off now.
Let's do it.
Wednesday, March 28, 2007
Tuesday, March 27, 2007
Why The US Attorneys Firing Scandal Matters
There are still some people who purport to be confused as to why the reason or method or people involved in the firing of the eight US Attorneys matters. And why Congress should issue subpoenas and force a Constitutional conflict to get to the bottom of it.
These people point out that nothing illegal happened, that US Attorneys serve "at the pleasure of the President" and that he has the right and privilege to remove and replace them at any time and for any reason.
That I will grant. Yes, the President, and his appointed Attorney General do have that right, and should have that right.
But I would add that the U.S. public has the right to know about it.
The President, the District Attorney and the US Attorneys, let's not forget, are all public servants. All are charged with doing the people's business.
If the President, his staff and the appointees he puts into place believe that the proper method of executing this business is to reward political loyalty and punish impartiality and competence, I guess it's not exactly illegal.
But it certainly shouldn't be secret.
That is exactly the kind of information that voters should be made aware of, so that we can more accurately assess how we cast our votes next time we're asked to elect our next batch of public servants. And Congress has the right and duty to reveal that information to us.
After all, who else will? Not the press, who lacks the legal authority (and the spine) to wrest the needed documents and testimony from the participants. Not the judicial system. And certainly not the executive branch, through some sort of Special Investigator like Daniel Fitzgerald. They know they can't squeak through another one of those without getting really hurt.
Secondly, even if the nakedly partisan firings and hirings aren't illegal, they raise the possibility of other illegalities that may have been committed. Namely obstruction of justice and false charges by those US Attorneys who got the hint about what was expected of them if they wanted to stay employed. Pursuing this investigation to its logical end is the best way of unearthing those crimes.
These people point out that nothing illegal happened, that US Attorneys serve "at the pleasure of the President" and that he has the right and privilege to remove and replace them at any time and for any reason.
That I will grant. Yes, the President, and his appointed Attorney General do have that right, and should have that right.
But I would add that the U.S. public has the right to know about it.
The President, the District Attorney and the US Attorneys, let's not forget, are all public servants. All are charged with doing the people's business.
If the President, his staff and the appointees he puts into place believe that the proper method of executing this business is to reward political loyalty and punish impartiality and competence, I guess it's not exactly illegal.
But it certainly shouldn't be secret.
That is exactly the kind of information that voters should be made aware of, so that we can more accurately assess how we cast our votes next time we're asked to elect our next batch of public servants. And Congress has the right and duty to reveal that information to us.
After all, who else will? Not the press, who lacks the legal authority (and the spine) to wrest the needed documents and testimony from the participants. Not the judicial system. And certainly not the executive branch, through some sort of Special Investigator like Daniel Fitzgerald. They know they can't squeak through another one of those without getting really hurt.
Secondly, even if the nakedly partisan firings and hirings aren't illegal, they raise the possibility of other illegalities that may have been committed. Namely obstruction of justice and false charges by those US Attorneys who got the hint about what was expected of them if they wanted to stay employed. Pursuing this investigation to its logical end is the best way of unearthing those crimes.
Tuesday, March 20, 2007
Nope, nothing wrong here.
"In his remarks Tuesday, Bush emphasized that he appoints federal prosecutors and it is natural to consider replacing them. While saying he disapproved of how the decisions were explained to Congress, he insisted "there is no indication that anybody did anything improper.""
That's one of the things that's so frustrating about this guy. You don't really ever really know if he's being extremely stupid, ass-headedly stubborn, or is simply lying.
With each subsequent testimony and document dump, it becomes increasingly clear that the Administration wanted to use United States Attorneys as guard dogs for Republican politicians and attack dogs against Democratic ones. And that the USAs that didn't want to go along with that got pushed out and replaced with ones that did.
I suppose, it is possible that Bush doesn't see anything 'improper' about that... he did, after all, 'win' the Presidency. And these are all supposedly 'his' guys, that serve 'at his pleasure.' Which, to him and his circle of cronies might very well mean that they are supposed to do his bidding, no matter how nakedly political and partisan that is.
The rest of us here in America find it very improper indeed. Also disgusting. And more than a little frightening.
We might accept that people come into a politically appointed office with certain leanings and tendencies. And even understand if they allow these leanings and tendencies to affect them in the fringes of their duties... like if there's a very close judgement call to be made, their judgement might be nudged toward the direction of their leanings and tendencies. People, after all, are not perfect.
But this is a case that goes far beyond that. This is the sort of stuff that conspiracy theories and banana republics are made of. This is an attempt to stymie prosecutors from following a clear trail of wrongdoing and to send them down false trails for political gains.
That's a road that no American, Republican or Democrat, should want our justice system to begin going down. Not only does it make a mockery of the hard work that our country has done to preserve our laudable level of professionalism, but it sets a nasty precedent that could be used with the change of administrations.
Of course, that's in the long term. And if there's one aspect of Bush's personality that isn't tough to read, it's that he doesn't really give a fuck about anything any further out time-wise than his next brush-clearing vacation.
That's one of the things that's so frustrating about this guy. You don't really ever really know if he's being extremely stupid, ass-headedly stubborn, or is simply lying.
With each subsequent testimony and document dump, it becomes increasingly clear that the Administration wanted to use United States Attorneys as guard dogs for Republican politicians and attack dogs against Democratic ones. And that the USAs that didn't want to go along with that got pushed out and replaced with ones that did.
I suppose, it is possible that Bush doesn't see anything 'improper' about that... he did, after all, 'win' the Presidency. And these are all supposedly 'his' guys, that serve 'at his pleasure.' Which, to him and his circle of cronies might very well mean that they are supposed to do his bidding, no matter how nakedly political and partisan that is.
The rest of us here in America find it very improper indeed. Also disgusting. And more than a little frightening.
We might accept that people come into a politically appointed office with certain leanings and tendencies. And even understand if they allow these leanings and tendencies to affect them in the fringes of their duties... like if there's a very close judgement call to be made, their judgement might be nudged toward the direction of their leanings and tendencies. People, after all, are not perfect.
But this is a case that goes far beyond that. This is the sort of stuff that conspiracy theories and banana republics are made of. This is an attempt to stymie prosecutors from following a clear trail of wrongdoing and to send them down false trails for political gains.
That's a road that no American, Republican or Democrat, should want our justice system to begin going down. Not only does it make a mockery of the hard work that our country has done to preserve our laudable level of professionalism, but it sets a nasty precedent that could be used with the change of administrations.
Of course, that's in the long term. And if there's one aspect of Bush's personality that isn't tough to read, it's that he doesn't really give a fuck about anything any further out time-wise than his next brush-clearing vacation.
Um, sorry, that's not going to do it
In this article, Bush makes his grandiose offer.
"Bush said his White House counsel, Fred Fielding, told lawmakers they could interview presidential counselor Karl Rove, former White House Counsel Harriet Miers and their deputies — but only on the president's terms: in private, "without the need for an oath" and without a transcript."
Bushie-Boy seems to be laboring under the delusion that his ideological and financial cronies still run things in Congress.
You'll note that he doesn't give any hint of reason why his staff can't testify under conditions in which it's more difficult to get away with lies, besides ""We will not go along with a partisan fishing expedition aimed at honorable public servants. ..."
A more laughable statement can't be imagined coming from someone who only came as close to election as he did in 2000 on the strength of exactly that... a fishing expedition into Clinton's real estate dealings that uncovered the shocking fact that a man would tell fibs to avoid getting caught cheating on his wife.
Still you can hardly blame him for shielding his henchmen so vehemently.
Once Rove and his thugs are up on the stand, under oath and in front of the cameras there's no telling what kinds of skeletons, corpses and bound-and-gagged living captives might fall out of the administration's closet.
"Bush said his White House counsel, Fred Fielding, told lawmakers they could interview presidential counselor Karl Rove, former White House Counsel Harriet Miers and their deputies — but only on the president's terms: in private, "without the need for an oath" and without a transcript."
Bushie-Boy seems to be laboring under the delusion that his ideological and financial cronies still run things in Congress.
You'll note that he doesn't give any hint of reason why his staff can't testify under conditions in which it's more difficult to get away with lies, besides ""We will not go along with a partisan fishing expedition aimed at honorable public servants. ..."
A more laughable statement can't be imagined coming from someone who only came as close to election as he did in 2000 on the strength of exactly that... a fishing expedition into Clinton's real estate dealings that uncovered the shocking fact that a man would tell fibs to avoid getting caught cheating on his wife.
Still you can hardly blame him for shielding his henchmen so vehemently.
Once Rove and his thugs are up on the stand, under oath and in front of the cameras there's no telling what kinds of skeletons, corpses and bound-and-gagged living captives might fall out of the administration's closet.
Monday, March 19, 2007
I'm Ready for the 2nd DOJ Corruption Helping, Thanks!
As the DA purge investigations continue, it's clear that the Administration was playing the the same crude and blatant politicization game with the Department of Justice as with every other person, place or thing they've had occasion to interact with.
One thing that you can say about that group of thugs and cavemen is that--- with the exception of the wily Rove, who layers a thin veneer of slickery, gotcha-proof, slime on top of his thuggery --- they aren't hard to read.
Their mandate was pretty clear to the DAs: Help get Republicans elected. Try to find (non-existent) voter fraud cases. Indict Democrats. And above all, stop investigating Republicans.
By firing the 8 DA's who, in the words of their own emails, weren't being "loyal Bushies," and accelerating or decelerating investigations at GOP command, they have more or less tipped off anyone of a suspicious mindset that the other 85 DA's were. Being loyal Bushies that is. And, on a side note, as of March 19th, 2007 I can't think of a more embarrassing label than that.
I'm rubbing my hands together waiting for the parties stung in the process --- like Dems who were unfairly singled out for investigations and intimidation, and prosecutors who had clear-cut corruption investigations against Repubs terminated --- to jump on the bandwagon and start telling their stories.
I'm betting that there is plenty of that particular kind of shit for us to push Republican noses into, while telling them that they are "Bad Americans! Bad!" before sending them out of the house, so they never get a chance to shit on the American carpet again.
One thing that you can say about that group of thugs and cavemen is that--- with the exception of the wily Rove, who layers a thin veneer of slickery, gotcha-proof, slime on top of his thuggery --- they aren't hard to read.
Their mandate was pretty clear to the DAs: Help get Republicans elected. Try to find (non-existent) voter fraud cases. Indict Democrats. And above all, stop investigating Republicans.
By firing the 8 DA's who, in the words of their own emails, weren't being "loyal Bushies," and accelerating or decelerating investigations at GOP command, they have more or less tipped off anyone of a suspicious mindset that the other 85 DA's were. Being loyal Bushies that is. And, on a side note, as of March 19th, 2007 I can't think of a more embarrassing label than that.
I'm rubbing my hands together waiting for the parties stung in the process --- like Dems who were unfairly singled out for investigations and intimidation, and prosecutors who had clear-cut corruption investigations against Repubs terminated --- to jump on the bandwagon and start telling their stories.
I'm betting that there is plenty of that particular kind of shit for us to push Republican noses into, while telling them that they are "Bad Americans! Bad!" before sending them out of the house, so they never get a chance to shit on the American carpet again.
Friday, March 16, 2007
Republican Priorities
According to this LA Times article, Carole Lam, the District Attorney for San Diego was fired because she preferred to pursue high level, white collar criminals (including Republican Congressman/Geriatric Partyboy, Randy "The Duke-stir" Cunningham) instead of immigration law violators.
How very Republican.
Thinking that it's less important to prosecute rich white people defrauding U.S. taxpayers than poor brown people trying to become them.
How very Republican.
Thinking that it's less important to prosecute rich white people defrauding U.S. taxpayers than poor brown people trying to become them.
Monday, February 26, 2007
Hilary ’08: Getting Ugly Early
Though it’s still early, nay, pre-rosy-fingers-of-dawn days for the ’08 elections, already La Hilary is looking less and less enticing as time goes by.
Her whole campaign, to my way of thinking, has always been more or less based on the “who else ya got?” factor. Though the number of people who are actually jazzed at the thought of a Hilary Clinton Presidency is miniscule… so miniscule that even I, who consort exclusively with hard-core Dems and godless Liberals have yet to engage in conversation with anyone that would fit that description.
Most of them, like me, have said something along the lines of “Yeah, there’s no doubt that she’d do a good job. Yeah, I guess if I had to choose between a Republican and Hilary, I would choose Hilary.”
I also add the caveat that I wouldn’t like it. And that I would be very uncomfortable, probably even physically nauseous, having to persuade someone else to vote for her too.
This, friends, is a problem for someone running for elected office. Let’s not kid ourselves that the process of picking office of President of the United States selects out the most qualified. The process is a popularity contest, along with other even less savory things.
And Hilary, despite her formidable intelligence and many gifts, simply is not popular.
There’s no shame in that. Being popular, as any junior high-schooler will tell you, just kind of happens to some people and doesn’t to others, and there’s little that any of us can do to force it. Kind of like being a great athlete. Hard work can take you far, but then when you reach the edges of your capacity, you get smoked by those who’ve worked just as hard and also have a natural edge on you.
That’s what we’re seeing now with the Obama infatuation. Obama is likable, and as such, he’s the biggest threat that Hilary faces. After all, her candidacy falls apart when people feel like they have another option.
So get ready to watch Team Hilary & Bill do everything they can to cut off Obama’s funding, disparage his readiness, and in general delegitimize his candidacy. Kind of like the shot they just sent across his bow with the David Geffen thing last weekend.
Also, keep your fingers crossed that they fail. And that the Clintons realize that the party, and the nation, would be better served if they put their awesome powers behind a candidate with the natural gifts to get elected.
Because if the Clinton Machine does manage to outmaneuver and starve and crush all the other Dem candidates, the end result will be a lot of surly and disappointed Democrats squaring off against a Republican base energized beyond belief for a fight against an unlikable, unpopular figure they’ve spent the last 16 years demonizing.
And that, my friends, will be really ugly.
Her whole campaign, to my way of thinking, has always been more or less based on the “who else ya got?” factor. Though the number of people who are actually jazzed at the thought of a Hilary Clinton Presidency is miniscule… so miniscule that even I, who consort exclusively with hard-core Dems and godless Liberals have yet to engage in conversation with anyone that would fit that description.
Most of them, like me, have said something along the lines of “Yeah, there’s no doubt that she’d do a good job. Yeah, I guess if I had to choose between a Republican and Hilary, I would choose Hilary.”
I also add the caveat that I wouldn’t like it. And that I would be very uncomfortable, probably even physically nauseous, having to persuade someone else to vote for her too.
This, friends, is a problem for someone running for elected office. Let’s not kid ourselves that the process of picking office of President of the United States selects out the most qualified. The process is a popularity contest, along with other even less savory things.
And Hilary, despite her formidable intelligence and many gifts, simply is not popular.
There’s no shame in that. Being popular, as any junior high-schooler will tell you, just kind of happens to some people and doesn’t to others, and there’s little that any of us can do to force it. Kind of like being a great athlete. Hard work can take you far, but then when you reach the edges of your capacity, you get smoked by those who’ve worked just as hard and also have a natural edge on you.
That’s what we’re seeing now with the Obama infatuation. Obama is likable, and as such, he’s the biggest threat that Hilary faces. After all, her candidacy falls apart when people feel like they have another option.
So get ready to watch Team Hilary & Bill do everything they can to cut off Obama’s funding, disparage his readiness, and in general delegitimize his candidacy. Kind of like the shot they just sent across his bow with the David Geffen thing last weekend.
Also, keep your fingers crossed that they fail. And that the Clintons realize that the party, and the nation, would be better served if they put their awesome powers behind a candidate with the natural gifts to get elected.
Because if the Clinton Machine does manage to outmaneuver and starve and crush all the other Dem candidates, the end result will be a lot of surly and disappointed Democrats squaring off against a Republican base energized beyond belief for a fight against an unlikable, unpopular figure they’ve spent the last 16 years demonizing.
And that, my friends, will be really ugly.
Thursday, January 25, 2007
the 21.5k solution
I was gone from the country for two weeks, from about Christmas to mid January and was astounded by how fast Bush's surge idea has been imposed on the country.
When I left, the talk was all about the Iraq Study Group, and their recommendations and how Georgie was going to deal with them. Two weeks later, the Decider has spoken, and all of that group's suggestions have been swept aside and the surge is a done deal.
I've got a lot of problems with the idea, but am also curious as to where he came up with the number of 21,500 troops.
In the first place, that's kind of small. It almost implies that we're only 20 something thousand soldiers away from winning this thing... like it's been more or less a closely balanced see-saw up until now, and by putting just that tiny little extra weight on the scales, it's going to swing to Victory with a mighty clank.
Secondly, it's such an oddly precise number.
Did someone parse it out so clearly as to decide that 21,000 wouldn't quite be enough to do the job, yet 22,000 would be overkill?
If so, who?
When I left, the talk was all about the Iraq Study Group, and their recommendations and how Georgie was going to deal with them. Two weeks later, the Decider has spoken, and all of that group's suggestions have been swept aside and the surge is a done deal.
I've got a lot of problems with the idea, but am also curious as to where he came up with the number of 21,500 troops.
In the first place, that's kind of small. It almost implies that we're only 20 something thousand soldiers away from winning this thing... like it's been more or less a closely balanced see-saw up until now, and by putting just that tiny little extra weight on the scales, it's going to swing to Victory with a mighty clank.
Secondly, it's such an oddly precise number.
Did someone parse it out so clearly as to decide that 21,000 wouldn't quite be enough to do the job, yet 22,000 would be overkill?
If so, who?
Monday, November 20, 2006
Why People Suck: Part 3,479 - Geting Your Eruv On
11/20/06 LA Times
"Members of the Pacific Jewish Center in Venice welcomed the California Coastal Commission's decision last week to grant their request to run fishing line between lampposts and sign poles through several miles of prime beachfront, creating an unbroken symbolic border.
The eruv boundary, which also will stretch inland through parts of Santa Monica and Los Angeles, eases certain Sabbath restrictions by allowing Orthodox Jews to consider themselves to be "at home" within its broad outlines."
Personally, and this is just my opinion here, it's more than a little pathetic to live a life ruled by a lot of Bronze Age and medieval superstitions in the first place. This is the 21st fucking century here, and Los Fucking Angeles. Surely we should at this point be able to separate out the living, divinely-derived sap of a religion's spiritual message from from the dead wood of that religion's petty, human-created, arbitrary rituals by this point. And recognize that these sorts of dead wood commandments have as much validity as other bogus superstitions against not walking under ladders or letting black cats cross our paths.
But if some humans can't manage to make that leap then they should at least be consistent. If some decides to reap the psychic benefits of closely following some ancient tradition (a sense of righteousness a sense of community, a feeling of superiority over the less spiritual and disciplined) then they should be willing to pay the burdens of that decision.
According to Wikipedia, observant Orthodox Jews are not allowed to do any work on the Sabbath, which includes carrying or pushing items outside their home. Meaning that Orthodox Jews going to church wouldn't be able to push a baby carriage or even carry their keys with them.
This eruv loophole lets them do this by transforming the streets and sidewalks within this magical fishing wire fence to be considered indoors, or more accurately, inside a single enclosed courtyard. Basically, according to this thinking, the eruv is the top of the doorway and the light and utility poles are the sides of the door. Anything inside is the same as being in a shared living quarters, so carrying things is okey-dokey.
Well.
Which I suppose is all well and good. And I almost admire the ingenuity of the loophole that has been created. But I have a couple, nagging question:
If there is indeed a God, and he really does (for his own inscrutable reasons) not want anyone carrying keys to church on Saturday, is he really going to be fooled by a fishing line strung between lightposts?
"Members of the Pacific Jewish Center in Venice welcomed the California Coastal Commission's decision last week to grant their request to run fishing line between lampposts and sign poles through several miles of prime beachfront, creating an unbroken symbolic border.
The eruv boundary, which also will stretch inland through parts of Santa Monica and Los Angeles, eases certain Sabbath restrictions by allowing Orthodox Jews to consider themselves to be "at home" within its broad outlines."
Personally, and this is just my opinion here, it's more than a little pathetic to live a life ruled by a lot of Bronze Age and medieval superstitions in the first place. This is the 21st fucking century here, and Los Fucking Angeles. Surely we should at this point be able to separate out the living, divinely-derived sap of a religion's spiritual message from from the dead wood of that religion's petty, human-created, arbitrary rituals by this point. And recognize that these sorts of dead wood commandments have as much validity as other bogus superstitions against not walking under ladders or letting black cats cross our paths.
But if some humans can't manage to make that leap then they should at least be consistent. If some decides to reap the psychic benefits of closely following some ancient tradition (a sense of righteousness a sense of community, a feeling of superiority over the less spiritual and disciplined) then they should be willing to pay the burdens of that decision.
According to Wikipedia, observant Orthodox Jews are not allowed to do any work on the Sabbath, which includes carrying or pushing items outside their home. Meaning that Orthodox Jews going to church wouldn't be able to push a baby carriage or even carry their keys with them.
This eruv loophole lets them do this by transforming the streets and sidewalks within this magical fishing wire fence to be considered indoors, or more accurately, inside a single enclosed courtyard. Basically, according to this thinking, the eruv is the top of the doorway and the light and utility poles are the sides of the door. Anything inside is the same as being in a shared living quarters, so carrying things is okey-dokey.
Well.
Which I suppose is all well and good. And I almost admire the ingenuity of the loophole that has been created. But I have a couple, nagging question:
If there is indeed a God, and he really does (for his own inscrutable reasons) not want anyone carrying keys to church on Saturday, is he really going to be fooled by a fishing line strung between lightposts?
Tuesday, October 10, 2006
Progressives: Let's Drop the "War on Terror" Metaphor
Just got through reading George Lakoff's "Moral Politics" book, about a year after everyone on the blogs was talking about it. For those of you who haven't gotten to it yet, I'm sure you've heard the basic idea... that people understand the world through metaphors, and process new facts within basic conceptual "frames" based on these metaphors.
Further, Lakoff states, the Republicans have intuitively understood this for some time now and have gotten a head start refining how to pitch their ideas in words that fit into and reinforce the frames, then disseminating those words through their media apparati.
Basic examples of this process being the substitution of "pro-life" for "anti-abortion" and "death tax" for "estate tax."
One of the biggest successes that the Republicans have pulled off in the last five years is to create a nearly unanimous embrace of the "War on Terror" metaphor and phraseology. Not only have they hammered it home in countless speeches and papers, but they have gone out of their way to ridicule and lambast anyone who appears to endorse the alternative metaphor of "law enforcement."
According to these conservatives, anyone who seems to think that we will prevail against terrorists by gathering intelligence about them, arresting them and jailing them is weak and foolish and dangerous to national security. They are so bad, they are just like Bill Clinton, who as everyone knows, allowed 9/11 to happen.
Instead, the efforts to prevent terrorist attacks must take the form of a War. A "Global War." A "Long War." "A War of Civilizations." Yada, Yada, Yada.
Once we, as a nation, bought into this metaphor, we handed the terrorism issue over to the Republicans, who are PERCEIVED as being better at waging wars (a perception based more on tough talk than a historical war-winning record, btw).
Furthermore, we automatically acquiesced to some rather sweeping and drastic notions. Notions that may not be supported by facts or jibe with the norms and liberties the U.S. has grown accustomed to.
Consider:
1. A War implies that the struggle is for our very survival as a nation.
2. Because the War is for our very survival, it raises the stakes and gives our government greater leeway. In war, the government can ask greater sacrifices, spend more, curtail more rights and silence criticism in ways that they can't in peace.
3. When a nation is at War, those who disagree with that nation become supporters of the enemy and, consequently traitors.
4. In a War, captured enemies (who pose a threat to our survival, remember?) do not deserve or receive the same rights and considerations that accused criminals might receive.
We've seen all of these points made, ad infinitum, from W's lectern and the wingnut blogs to support this War metaphor. To me it falls apart at point one. As many times as I have it screeched at me, I just can't believe that a couple hundred Al Queda can destroy or conquer the United States of America.
However, this War metaphor been successful at cowing many Democrats into meekly following the Republican leads on many, many bad moves. So it's been a success in that sphere.
But in the sphere of actually reducing the number of terrorists and their capability and motivation to attack globally, the War approach has been a total flop, as the recent National Intelligence Estimate pointed out.
So in other words, this War metaphor only serves to make Republicans stronger and everyone in greater danger.
So let's stop buying into it. Let's stop using it. Let's correct others when they do use it.
The next time, you are in conversation with a wingnut and they use the phrase "War on Terror" say:
"Do you really think it's a War?"
Then follow up with questions that ridicule and destroy that notion:
"Wars are between nations. Which nation are we at War with? What does their uniform look like? Where is the battlefield? Who is in the chain of command? How do we win this war? When will we know? Who will sign the articles of surrender on the deck of a battleship?"
This will throw them. They'll begin searching their database of Rush Limbaugh talking points and come back at you with something along the lines of "so I guess you think this is a law enforcement issue." They might even throw in "like Clinton."
Now you crush their thinking as simplistic and antiquated and overwhelm them with how much more advanced your thinking is on this topic. You also slap them with one of their own code words, with the meaning twisted to suit your purpose.
"Your thinking is so pre-9/11. That there are only two ways to think about terrorism. This is the 21st century.
There are some aspects of a war to this, in some limited cases. If a state or nation is officially or unofficially providing support to terrorists, then it's appropriate to take action on the state or national level, like declaring a war.
And there are some law enforcement aspects to ending terrorism attacks. In fact, I'd say that the biggest successes in the last year have been the result of good, solid intelligence work in London, not our expensive, losing, bloody war in Iraq. And that it's a lot more efficient to work with foreign governments to round up and arrest terrorists than it is to destroy a country to fight them in the streets.
But if we really want to end terrorism, we've got to be more comprehensive than just War and Law Enforcement.
For instance, it's also a marketing campaign. The imans of these radical islamist mosques and madrassas are telling their side of the story to the impressionable Islamic youth. We've got to convincingly SHOW and TELL our side as well to PREVENT more young people from being converted into someone who wants to attack us.
It's an economic issue. Though the most visible terrorists are rich pricks like Bin Laden, they get their emotional support from the miserable poor who feel like they've got no future in this world and want to reverse course to some fabled Islamic past. Freeing up widespread economic opportunity thoughout the world will drain that swamp of the resentment they feel against the West and isolate the real radicals from their potential base of support.
It's a political issue. How many times do we have to hear Arabs of all stripes --- fundamentalist, radical, moderate and liberal --- say that they're angry about the Israeli/Palestine issue before we accept that it's a problem which keeps inflaming that part of the world? The U.S. needs to get tough and fair with both sides, and broker a peace shuts down that engine of hatred."
At this point, the Conservative is beginning to suffer a cognitive panic. He likes to have a single, cohesive, structural framework for his thoughts. You've buffetted his War frame and unless he is offered something similarly over-arching, he'll disregard everything he's heard so far and retreat back to it.
So you hold out an alternative frame.
Now, don't think that he's going to take it. He probably won't.
But what it might do, hopefully, is introduce the idea that there are other, logical, comprehensive ways to think about how to end terrorism. That serves to weaken his fervor for the War metaphor. Which is enough. Just like in elections, often you know you can't convert your opponent's voters to your side so you try to depress them and keep them home. In this case, you create one less person walking around parroting the Republican line to other people.
My favorite metaphor is the disease metaphor. It's simplistic, it's reductive, it's comprehensive.
I say:
"First off, ending terrorism in a globalized world is too complex and novel a situation to reduce to a simple metaphor. It is its own thing. Not a war. Not an anti-crime initiative. It is stopping the capability and destroying the incentive of people around the world to attack us. But if I had to pick an analogy, I would think of ending terrorism as fighting a disease. Like a virus. Or a cancer.
You absolutely do all you can to isolate and destroy the diseased cells. With caution but without mercy. This means using force selectively and precisely.
But you're also smart about it. Along with destroying those cells, you also do everything you can to strengthen your body to prevent the disease from getting a toehold in the first place. This means political and economic reform.
You also strengthen an immune system that will automatically fights the disease wherever it pops up. This means working with the governments around the world to find and catch terrorists that we don't even know about yet.
And most of all you don't ever, ever allow anyone to sell you on a cure doesn't work and actually makes you sicker. Surely I don't have to explain to you what that means."
Further, Lakoff states, the Republicans have intuitively understood this for some time now and have gotten a head start refining how to pitch their ideas in words that fit into and reinforce the frames, then disseminating those words through their media apparati.
Basic examples of this process being the substitution of "pro-life" for "anti-abortion" and "death tax" for "estate tax."
One of the biggest successes that the Republicans have pulled off in the last five years is to create a nearly unanimous embrace of the "War on Terror" metaphor and phraseology. Not only have they hammered it home in countless speeches and papers, but they have gone out of their way to ridicule and lambast anyone who appears to endorse the alternative metaphor of "law enforcement."
According to these conservatives, anyone who seems to think that we will prevail against terrorists by gathering intelligence about them, arresting them and jailing them is weak and foolish and dangerous to national security. They are so bad, they are just like Bill Clinton, who as everyone knows, allowed 9/11 to happen.
Instead, the efforts to prevent terrorist attacks must take the form of a War. A "Global War." A "Long War." "A War of Civilizations." Yada, Yada, Yada.
Once we, as a nation, bought into this metaphor, we handed the terrorism issue over to the Republicans, who are PERCEIVED as being better at waging wars (a perception based more on tough talk than a historical war-winning record, btw).
Furthermore, we automatically acquiesced to some rather sweeping and drastic notions. Notions that may not be supported by facts or jibe with the norms and liberties the U.S. has grown accustomed to.
Consider:
1. A War implies that the struggle is for our very survival as a nation.
2. Because the War is for our very survival, it raises the stakes and gives our government greater leeway. In war, the government can ask greater sacrifices, spend more, curtail more rights and silence criticism in ways that they can't in peace.
3. When a nation is at War, those who disagree with that nation become supporters of the enemy and, consequently traitors.
4. In a War, captured enemies (who pose a threat to our survival, remember?) do not deserve or receive the same rights and considerations that accused criminals might receive.
We've seen all of these points made, ad infinitum, from W's lectern and the wingnut blogs to support this War metaphor. To me it falls apart at point one. As many times as I have it screeched at me, I just can't believe that a couple hundred Al Queda can destroy or conquer the United States of America.
However, this War metaphor been successful at cowing many Democrats into meekly following the Republican leads on many, many bad moves. So it's been a success in that sphere.
But in the sphere of actually reducing the number of terrorists and their capability and motivation to attack globally, the War approach has been a total flop, as the recent National Intelligence Estimate pointed out.
So in other words, this War metaphor only serves to make Republicans stronger and everyone in greater danger.
So let's stop buying into it. Let's stop using it. Let's correct others when they do use it.
The next time, you are in conversation with a wingnut and they use the phrase "War on Terror" say:
"Do you really think it's a War?"
Then follow up with questions that ridicule and destroy that notion:
"Wars are between nations. Which nation are we at War with? What does their uniform look like? Where is the battlefield? Who is in the chain of command? How do we win this war? When will we know? Who will sign the articles of surrender on the deck of a battleship?"
This will throw them. They'll begin searching their database of Rush Limbaugh talking points and come back at you with something along the lines of "so I guess you think this is a law enforcement issue." They might even throw in "like Clinton."
Now you crush their thinking as simplistic and antiquated and overwhelm them with how much more advanced your thinking is on this topic. You also slap them with one of their own code words, with the meaning twisted to suit your purpose.
"Your thinking is so pre-9/11. That there are only two ways to think about terrorism. This is the 21st century.
There are some aspects of a war to this, in some limited cases. If a state or nation is officially or unofficially providing support to terrorists, then it's appropriate to take action on the state or national level, like declaring a war.
And there are some law enforcement aspects to ending terrorism attacks. In fact, I'd say that the biggest successes in the last year have been the result of good, solid intelligence work in London, not our expensive, losing, bloody war in Iraq. And that it's a lot more efficient to work with foreign governments to round up and arrest terrorists than it is to destroy a country to fight them in the streets.
But if we really want to end terrorism, we've got to be more comprehensive than just War and Law Enforcement.
For instance, it's also a marketing campaign. The imans of these radical islamist mosques and madrassas are telling their side of the story to the impressionable Islamic youth. We've got to convincingly SHOW and TELL our side as well to PREVENT more young people from being converted into someone who wants to attack us.
It's an economic issue. Though the most visible terrorists are rich pricks like Bin Laden, they get their emotional support from the miserable poor who feel like they've got no future in this world and want to reverse course to some fabled Islamic past. Freeing up widespread economic opportunity thoughout the world will drain that swamp of the resentment they feel against the West and isolate the real radicals from their potential base of support.
It's a political issue. How many times do we have to hear Arabs of all stripes --- fundamentalist, radical, moderate and liberal --- say that they're angry about the Israeli/Palestine issue before we accept that it's a problem which keeps inflaming that part of the world? The U.S. needs to get tough and fair with both sides, and broker a peace shuts down that engine of hatred."
At this point, the Conservative is beginning to suffer a cognitive panic. He likes to have a single, cohesive, structural framework for his thoughts. You've buffetted his War frame and unless he is offered something similarly over-arching, he'll disregard everything he's heard so far and retreat back to it.
So you hold out an alternative frame.
Now, don't think that he's going to take it. He probably won't.
But what it might do, hopefully, is introduce the idea that there are other, logical, comprehensive ways to think about how to end terrorism. That serves to weaken his fervor for the War metaphor. Which is enough. Just like in elections, often you know you can't convert your opponent's voters to your side so you try to depress them and keep them home. In this case, you create one less person walking around parroting the Republican line to other people.
My favorite metaphor is the disease metaphor. It's simplistic, it's reductive, it's comprehensive.
I say:
"First off, ending terrorism in a globalized world is too complex and novel a situation to reduce to a simple metaphor. It is its own thing. Not a war. Not an anti-crime initiative. It is stopping the capability and destroying the incentive of people around the world to attack us. But if I had to pick an analogy, I would think of ending terrorism as fighting a disease. Like a virus. Or a cancer.
You absolutely do all you can to isolate and destroy the diseased cells. With caution but without mercy. This means using force selectively and precisely.
But you're also smart about it. Along with destroying those cells, you also do everything you can to strengthen your body to prevent the disease from getting a toehold in the first place. This means political and economic reform.
You also strengthen an immune system that will automatically fights the disease wherever it pops up. This means working with the governments around the world to find and catch terrorists that we don't even know about yet.
And most of all you don't ever, ever allow anyone to sell you on a cure doesn't work and actually makes you sicker. Surely I don't have to explain to you what that means."
Thursday, October 05, 2006
Let's talk about Sex, Foley
Let's talk about sex, baby
Let's talk about you and me
Let's talk about all the good things and the bad things
That may be
Let's talk about sex
- Salt-n-Pepa
You know, if I didn't know better I would start to think that the Democrats had learned some lessons from the pastings that Karl Rove and the Republican Slime Machine have been giving us for the last six years. In the last two weeks, two news cycles have been consumed with attacks aimed right at the conjoined, misshapen hearts of the Republican's supposed "strengths": National Security and Moral Values.
First, Clinton laid out some devastating comparisons of his al-Queda fighting record compared to the Bush Administration's on Chris Wallace's show. Comparisons that were coincidentally backed up with the next weeks publication of Bob Woodward's new book, which stated that Condi Rice "brushed off" George Tenant's July 10th warnings of an imminent attack in the United States. Granted, to those of us who've been paying attention the last six years, this isn't new news to us. It's what Richard Clarke was saying in 2004, before he was drowned out by the Mighty Wurlizter. It is, however, a welcome piling on of testimony, dates, times and proof that Rice, Bush and Cheney were asleep at the wheel that summer (or worse).
I'm already planning on making that July 10th brush off a major talking point when I'm combatting the notion that the Republicans have kept us safer.
Then came the Foley page scandal: it's pure, unadulterated sickness of the acts themselves and the coldly calculated coverup when the House Republican leadership learned about it one (three? five? eleven?) years ago.
I know that as liberals and Democrats, we have an innate tendency to take the high road on matters of a sexual and personal nature.
We'd prefer for the American public to become outraged about the negation of Habeas Corpus, the legalization of torture, the record budget deficit, the slashed student loan funding, the dishonest way in which we were led to a losing, disastrous war, the incompetent waging of that war, and the cynical, vomitous invocation of 9/11 and terrorists to justify all of those acts.
But the broader American public is not going to become outraged about those things. They are going to be outraged by where someone puts their pee-pee. To them that's what constitutes a "scandal." It's a simple, reductive, narrow conception of what's truly disgusting. But it's theirs.
These are, after all, people that think Nascar is a sport and Mountain Dew is a tasty beverage.
So let's go with it.
I want to dig out every sordid, disgusting detail about Mark Foley and his page fetish anyone can come up with. If I had to read about Clinton and Monica's cigar games and blue dress stains, I expect the same sort of massive, invasive, retch-inducing detail about Mark Foley jerking off in his office right before a house vote. I want to know if he came in a kleenex or if he's got a page's athletic jock in his desk drawer he jizzes on, then sniffs.
He claims that he's never fucked any of the pages. Well, let's just see about that. I want this guy's personal life examined until I know WHO he's fucked, how old they were, and if they whimpered or squealed when they took it up the pooper. This is not a time for us to get squeamish about appearing homophobic or anti-gay. We're not. But the people we want to shake up are and we want to rub their noses in what their supposed "Morality" party does on their dime.
Just like the Republicans linked the words "Democrat" and "intern" and "blowjob" so tightly that Al Gore felt compelled to get closer to Joe Leiberman and further from Bill Clinton in preparation for the political fight of his life, I want for the words "Republican" "16-year-old boy" and "masturbate" to become inextricably linked together in the public's mind.
I want to force Republicans to openly defend and minimize the gay lifestyle on Mark Foley's behalf, just like I had to defend and minimize adultery on Clinton's behalf. Which irked me to no end, as I was hoping to put off defending adultery until I got married and began committing it myself.
Besides raising the gorge of the Values Crowd and forcing them defend what they hate the most, these ongoing, explicit sexual revelations are the sorts of details that will keep putting this story on the front pages over and over and over again during the coming weeks no matter what Rove tries to orchestrate to push it off.
If there's one thing I know about the American people it's this--- if forced to pay attention to a story about where the rich and powerful shoot their loads and anything short of a full scale terrorist attack on U.S. soil, we're going to follow the jism.
So, Dems, like W in Iraq, let's stay the course on this one... right into Mark Foley's humid, rancid, sticky underwear... until it brings us the victory we need to put this country back on the right track again.
Let's talk about you and me
Let's talk about all the good things and the bad things
That may be
Let's talk about sex
- Salt-n-Pepa
You know, if I didn't know better I would start to think that the Democrats had learned some lessons from the pastings that Karl Rove and the Republican Slime Machine have been giving us for the last six years. In the last two weeks, two news cycles have been consumed with attacks aimed right at the conjoined, misshapen hearts of the Republican's supposed "strengths": National Security and Moral Values.
First, Clinton laid out some devastating comparisons of his al-Queda fighting record compared to the Bush Administration's on Chris Wallace's show. Comparisons that were coincidentally backed up with the next weeks publication of Bob Woodward's new book, which stated that Condi Rice "brushed off" George Tenant's July 10th warnings of an imminent attack in the United States. Granted, to those of us who've been paying attention the last six years, this isn't new news to us. It's what Richard Clarke was saying in 2004, before he was drowned out by the Mighty Wurlizter. It is, however, a welcome piling on of testimony, dates, times and proof that Rice, Bush and Cheney were asleep at the wheel that summer (or worse).
I'm already planning on making that July 10th brush off a major talking point when I'm combatting the notion that the Republicans have kept us safer.
Then came the Foley page scandal: it's pure, unadulterated sickness of the acts themselves and the coldly calculated coverup when the House Republican leadership learned about it one (three? five? eleven?) years ago.
I know that as liberals and Democrats, we have an innate tendency to take the high road on matters of a sexual and personal nature.
We'd prefer for the American public to become outraged about the negation of Habeas Corpus, the legalization of torture, the record budget deficit, the slashed student loan funding, the dishonest way in which we were led to a losing, disastrous war, the incompetent waging of that war, and the cynical, vomitous invocation of 9/11 and terrorists to justify all of those acts.
But the broader American public is not going to become outraged about those things. They are going to be outraged by where someone puts their pee-pee. To them that's what constitutes a "scandal." It's a simple, reductive, narrow conception of what's truly disgusting. But it's theirs.
These are, after all, people that think Nascar is a sport and Mountain Dew is a tasty beverage.
So let's go with it.
I want to dig out every sordid, disgusting detail about Mark Foley and his page fetish anyone can come up with. If I had to read about Clinton and Monica's cigar games and blue dress stains, I expect the same sort of massive, invasive, retch-inducing detail about Mark Foley jerking off in his office right before a house vote. I want to know if he came in a kleenex or if he's got a page's athletic jock in his desk drawer he jizzes on, then sniffs.
He claims that he's never fucked any of the pages. Well, let's just see about that. I want this guy's personal life examined until I know WHO he's fucked, how old they were, and if they whimpered or squealed when they took it up the pooper. This is not a time for us to get squeamish about appearing homophobic or anti-gay. We're not. But the people we want to shake up are and we want to rub their noses in what their supposed "Morality" party does on their dime.
Just like the Republicans linked the words "Democrat" and "intern" and "blowjob" so tightly that Al Gore felt compelled to get closer to Joe Leiberman and further from Bill Clinton in preparation for the political fight of his life, I want for the words "Republican" "16-year-old boy" and "masturbate" to become inextricably linked together in the public's mind.
I want to force Republicans to openly defend and minimize the gay lifestyle on Mark Foley's behalf, just like I had to defend and minimize adultery on Clinton's behalf. Which irked me to no end, as I was hoping to put off defending adultery until I got married and began committing it myself.
Besides raising the gorge of the Values Crowd and forcing them defend what they hate the most, these ongoing, explicit sexual revelations are the sorts of details that will keep putting this story on the front pages over and over and over again during the coming weeks no matter what Rove tries to orchestrate to push it off.
If there's one thing I know about the American people it's this--- if forced to pay attention to a story about where the rich and powerful shoot their loads and anything short of a full scale terrorist attack on U.S. soil, we're going to follow the jism.
So, Dems, like W in Iraq, let's stay the course on this one... right into Mark Foley's humid, rancid, sticky underwear... until it brings us the victory we need to put this country back on the right track again.
Monday, September 11, 2006
Five Fucking Years Later.
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.
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.
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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