A moment of uplift before the oncoming storm

So I'm sitting here reading news and blogs and such like, right after spending 8 hours writing a particularly difficult paper for my library science class. And I had a sort of epiphany. I say sort of, because it's not really anything new or earthshattering, or anything like that. But it's a quiet realization and one that gives me almost elation.

Regardless of what occurs on Tuesday, or in the aftermath of Tuesday ...
Regardless of the reasons why the following is true, ...

In the past few months I've witnessed the greatest resurgence of democracy in my country that I can ever recall, especially in people around my age and a little younger. This is the generation baby boomers were writing off as pathetic, whiny and apathetic only a few years ... nay, months ... ago. When we have to, we learn, we organize and we stand up to the knife the short-sighted, power-mad bastards have at our collective throats. And regardless of how the fascist newthink of the Radical Right wants to play it, we can make ourselves heard. We have been heard. We will be heard.

Tuesday ... Slightly less than 34 hours to go till the polls open where I live. This is the home stretch.

Call people. Beg people. Cajole people. Drag people bodily to the polls. Do something!

The revolution starts ...

Now.

Easily distracted

[Us and the Press, this week]: Reason # 19575575 why Bush needs to go: Lost explosives! Bad! They kill Americans! Incompetent president! Gaaah!

(Osama Bin Laden appears on TV screen)

[Press]: Ooh, shiny! (run off to follow Osama)

[Us]: Gr.

I swear, sometimes my country and pretty much always its media are like a 10 year old with ADD on a sugar high.

Get yer heads outta yer asses!

KXXT Update

Just heard on the radio ... KXXT listener meetup at Nixon's at the Camelback Esplanade this evening!

Not sure yet if I'll be there, since it's so last-minute, but if you're around and you're a KXXT listener, you should go!

Is this their October surprise?

Could it be that this is the October surprise? If so, they've gone beyond scraping the bottom of the barrel to fishing in the outhouse.

I mean, I'm too stunned by the revelation that al-Qaeda apparently has a fully-equipped professional NTSC production facility in Pakistan or Afghanistan to even get into the rest of the problems with this.

I note the CIA says it can't confirm the authenticity, which in my book places this right along side 'Danger! Danger! Terror alert! Terror alert! (we know of no specific threat.)'

They've gone beyond pissing me off to just being pathetic. Start packing, boys.

Not politics, for a change

Well, after class last night I had a chance to have dinner with my friend 'Kniwt' while he was passing through town. Alas, he'd made his way to the desert Southwest seeking favorable weather for his bike riding. I say alas because, in case you're not in Phoenix, we're not exactly sunny and warm right now. Since about 12:30 last night, we've had a constant, steady light rain, occasionally heavy winds and nippy temperatures (presently 54 degrees, according to Weatherbug!).

That said, he did ride across the border from Douglas to Agua Prieta, Sonora, yesterday and seems to be generally having fun on his well-earned vacation from work, news a politics. He promises a full trip report on his return to scenic Fresno.

Finally caught up with schoolwork yesterday. I'm surprised my time is so inelastic these days that it took me four days to make up for the total of six hours I spent this weekend on birthday things. Fortunately, there's only a month and a half to go in the semester! I thought the first week of school was hard, but believe me, it was nothing compared to this week. I may have to forego a really cool Halloween party to which I was invited this weekend because the homework load going forward is still quite heavy, and there's a LOT of housework I didn't get done this week.

I actually have hopes I might be able to graduate this semester, since my school has unexpectedly allowed me till tomorrow to send in my paperwork (previously, I'd seen a deadline of Sept. 1, which led me to think I had no chance to get my parchment this December. That said, it all hinges now on timely delivery of my end-of-semester transcript from ASU, which is a little more iffy.

I more or less had to abandon two assignments for one class, one of which I left at home inadvertently and one of which I just spaced on, because the prof. doesn't accept late assignments at all. Fortunately, they're such a relatively small part of the grade I'll still be able to pull out at least a B or low A if I keep my nose clean going forward. No problem!

The reviews from Saturday's Haiku Rd. show have been uniformly positive from all corners. I can't tell if it's all politeness, but I think we may actually have something here! Just think ... if you were there and enjoyed it, we have a bassist now and we'll have a drummer if Pete ever moves out here, so it only gets better from here on out! Updates will appear here when/if we get gigs booked. Don't plan on anything before December, but that could change.

Bush Cheney e-mail ... A glimpse of what's to come

It's innocently titled 'Let the voters decide, not the lawyers.'

"We have already seen 35 lawsuits filed in 17 states - some before the first ballot was even cast. So far, the Democrats have failed in their attempts to win this election in the courts, rather than the ballot box."

What a load of bull-pucky. They like to make it seem as if Democrats are challenging election results or some such! Do I even need to tell you what those lawsuits are actually about? Missing ballots ... candidates missing from ballots ... candidates incorrectly included ... felons lists ... voter intimidation ... fraudulent voter registration efforts ... Are any of these defensible, if found to have occurred?

Anyway, it goes on to implicitly blame the DP for damage to Republican Party offices (whereas I'm sure they'd insist it was just rowdy youths who did the same thing to Democratic Party offices), then ask for contributions to the legal fund for fighting the election after the fact.

True, the DP has been seeking contributions for the same thing for a good while now. Everyone's gettin' lawyered up -- do you think they're just not going to use them starting Nov. 3?

But just one thing for anyone who blames Gore and the Democratic Party for the 2000 suit-fest:

Bush-Cheney filed the first lawsuit in 2000 to stop any recounts.

So stick that in yer pipe & smoke it, oh ye with short memories.

Oh. THIS is precious.

People occasionally confuse top-level domains. Like, for instance, when Dick Cheney sent people to factcheck.com instead of factcheck.org.

Here's a similar mistake, even more embarrassing to the Republican cause. Apparently, they discovered they had a 'catch-all' e-mail address that was accumulating e-mail intended for the Bush campaign.

One of my favorites:

"something needs to be done about this (below). can't we say something intelligent? can't Bush announce something progressive like dedicating even more federal funds to stem cells and other, more advanced areas such as cord blood? i am so tired of this nuttiness. (and when he says he was first prez to dedicate funds, the dem retort is that this research was not around several years ago, and amount is insignificant)

when healthcare is discussed next debate, things like stem cells and health care insurance and expensive drugs could bury him. i hope this is registering out there."

A public service for Arizona voters

Up for votes next Tuesday in Arizona is Proposition 200, a racist mandate thinly veiled as immigration enforecement. Read about it here.

Learned this morning something that hasn't shown up in much of the mainstream press coverage of this evil initiative. Virginia Abernathy, the chair of the Prop. 200 advisory committee, is a proud part of the Council of Conservative Citizens (just to give you a hint, my firewall blocks it at work, labelling it 'Racism and Hate,' so I can't actually look at their Web page.

So just ask yourself ... Should firefighters, emergency room nurses and election volunteers be turned into immigration officers? If you think that this law will be uniformly enforced, in that if I go into the emergency room they'll ask for proof of my citizenship before saving my life, you're sadly deluded.

These people need to crawl back under their rocks and perform their white-hood rituals in silence and leave us alone to do the work of bringing society into the 21st century.

Why did we have to wait for a foreign news media outlet to do this?

Boy, it's really link day here on my livejournal/blog, isn't it?

The presidential candidates in a nutshell

Read and learn. Seven days, folks.

Explosives? No problem!

Forget Ashlee Simpson, SNL gets 0wn3d!

Wil Wheaton dot Net and Tony Pierce sum up the Ashlee Simpson flap rather nicely. Sad but true.

Bush ... Terrorism ... Hypocrisy

From this article:

"Yes, because we have to be right 100 percent of the time in disrupting any plot and they have to be right once," Bush said. He said the nation is safer from terrorism, but "whether or not we can be ever fully safe is up — you know, up in the air."

So.

In other words, we'll likely never be entirely rid of terrorism, right?

So it'll always be a ... ahem nuisance?

Gotcha.

Pointless but amusing

How common are celtichris's interests

Universal none

Popular none

Common neil gaiman (18708) queer as folk (15057)

Specialist al franken (1615) babylon 5 (5217) celtic music (6505) dead like me (3847) douglas coupland (2887) farscape (6770) gay men (5182) great big sea (1480) ikea (5524) john kerry (4968) neal stephenson (2592) new wave (8677) pet shop boys (2646) soft cell (1894) the amazing race (1684) wonderfalls (1026)

Unusual air america radio (322) andrei tarkovsky (315) blogger (229) deacon blue (40) human league (654) lukas ridgeston (15) marc almond (444) marillion (459) old blind dogs (71) prog rock (782) randi rhodes (69) silly wizard (126) spandau ballet (218) spirit of the west (74) treo (39) ultravox (395)

Rare boris grebenshikov (8) iain f. banks (1) kxxt (1) oyster band (9)

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Enter username:

InterestRank was bought to you by _imran_ and MemeLand.org

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Bastards. Rat-bastards. I wanna smack 'em with my shoe or something

Direct refutation of the stupid 'the people of Saudi Arabia are your friends' dreck those corrupt f**kwads in Saudi Palaces have been inflicting on Air America listeners ...
who's funding the Iraq insurgency? Hm?

*phew*

School is paid for. I had to empty out three bank accounts the day after payday, but I managed to make the last two installment payments (one each to the Univ. of Arizona and Arizona State Univ.).

Now I can begin the long, painful process of paying back the people who loaned me/us the money to make this happen.

And now I just have to keep from failing my classes. Uff da.

I am now OFFICIALLY off my bloody rocker.

But remember, I thought I was off my rocker last year, and yet ...


I'm not optimistic that I'll finish this year, though.

New from Bush/Cheney

Got another exciting e-mail from the Bush/Cheney campaign, rife with material for new commentary.

First, this paragraph:

"The same qualities that make a great athlete make a great President--the determination to do what is right, regardless of the latest polls, the personal strength to bear the weight of the nation on your shoulders, and the faith that a higher power will direct the actions of good people."

Um.

I wasn't aware that there were polls on how athletes should do their thing, or what they should do. I'm also fairly certain that athletes are not universally faithful, or dependent on a higher power to direct their actions. 'Hm. Pray or exercise. Pray or execise. Screw practice. I think I'll pray.' And the image of a few hundred million people climbing on GWB's back and crushing him to a bloody pulp raises some mirth in me.

Then there's something that represents a fundamental philosophical difference between me and the president, and others of his ideological ilk. "In 2001, our nation was attacked without cause or provocation."

It's much, MUCH easier to an irrational, inhuman enemy who does horrendous things without reason, plan or cause. It's convenient to have such a bugaboo with which to scare people, to manipulate and use them. But it's also dangerously shortsighted.

To be sure, those terrorist attacks were brutal, inhumane, disproportionate and, dare I say it, evil. But to say there was no cause or provocation is to abdicate the best tool to meet our responsibility, the responsibility even BushCo says we have: To eradicate terrorism.

The best way to defeat terrorism as a tactic is to discover its root causes and change the conditions so it doesn't happen, it can't happen. To do that, we have to understand why they do what they do; why, rightly, or wrongly, they feel aggrieved; to fix what we can, and change what we must, either within ourselves or within them (including killing or bringing to justice those who act with indiscriminate violence against the greater good of society and will not abandon their murderous methods). The Bush/Cheney attitude seems to be that we never do anything wrong and we never have, and that there is no need to understand our enemies' mindset, or what or how they feel.

But we will never, never make any progress against terrorism until we address its root causes. Treat the disease, not the symptoms. Absent this, all we are doing is creating martyrs and, de facto, creating fertile ground for the growth of more terrorists.

They had a cause. They believed they had been provoked. This is not to say I think they were right -- that's simply absurd. But in their minds, they believed they had to act to stop us. They've even told us why they did it: Our unconditional support of Israel and the oppression of Palestinians, continued American interference into the affairs of the Middle East, American bases in Saudi Arabia, etc. Why won't BushCo listen? Understanding is not surrender, whatever they may think.

More from the BBC, this time on Korea.

I see from this article that S. Korea has given thought to moving its capital into the middle of the country and out of Seoul. The reasons the article cites are many, including overcrowding, inordinate dominance over the S. Korean economy, etc.

But it seems there's an elephant in the room no one's talking about. If N. Korea were ever to attack S. Korea, they could flatten Seoul before the South's military even had its boots on. I've always been of the opinion that that's the only reason anyone, from the US or in S. Korea or anywhere else, was even willing to sit down at the table and talk to those paranoid madmen.

Ach, well, who knows what'll happen.

A news story that makes me think of my niece

I'm sure the only two people who will be interested in this story are my sister and me, but I saw an interesting finding from BBC News this morning that babies born of caesareans have an increased risk of developing allergies and such. Since my sister has celiac, which admittedly isn't, properly speaking, an allergy, it seems like there might be some slightly greater risk nonetheless of Ceili developing it.

I hear she's to be tested soon, so we'll find out.

A moment of something besides politics, the space travel edition

For some reason, I find this story both really cool and really exciting.

To Mars in 76 days. It's about time someone innovated in this realm.

The wolves are gathering ...

Remember who has the power in a publicly-traded company: The shareholders, not the cryptoconservative whoremonger.

A long-winded letter to the editor that'll never get published.

In response to The Arizona Republic's editorial this morning, I wrote this:

It was with a mixture of amusement and horror that I read this morning's editorial calling for Pres. Bush's reelection. I'm sure you'll receive hundreds, if not thousands, of letters on both sides of the issue. Since I can find no brief way to argue the points in your editorial, I'm reasonably certain this response will be quickly set aside. But I'm writing it anyway; call it catharsis.

Now, I understand that as a Gannett newspaper, your editorial policy is in large part swayed by the policies of your corporate parent and that, in sum, is the biggest problem. Journalists are, by and large, careful and thoughtful people who do the best they can to present the news in as thorough and unbiased way as they can. But journalists do not hold the ultimate power in a newsroom. To be brief, corporatism, and corporate/conglomerate control of the media are stifling the truth and working to destroy intelligent discourse in America. This editorial makes it evident that its author (an individual or group) may not understand the truth either as reported in independent media or even in the pages of the Republic itself. Your interests appear to be those of corporate America and not of American, or Arizona, citizens themselves.

To the editorial itself ...

Your discussion of 'security moms' is laughable. The 'security mom' demographic is a population largely defined by, and ascribed charateristics by, the Republican Party and the Bush campaign. Analysis of this group by independent polling firms finds that, while they are concerned with the War on Terror(tm), it is not first in their minds. And while they rate Bush and stronger on this notion of security, they don't offer overall strong support for Bush. The whole notion of security moms seems, thus, to be a right-wing attempt to create, whole cloth, a constituency so that undecided women who fit the demographic, can feel they 'belong' and swing toward Bush. Your use of the term perpetuates the myth.

The next paragraph caused me some measure of confusion. It states at the end, 'Baghdad may not have been the fulcrum of terrorism before the U.S. overthrow of Saddam Hussein. But it is now.' In other words, you are tacitly admitting that what John Kerry says is true, that this was the wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time. And yet, you continue, Bush is the best person to win that war and win the peace. But if he messed up so badly to start with Iraq in the first place, how on earth do you seriously believe he can fix it?

Let's look at what he's done so far, and try to extrapolate onto the future. He invaded a country that was no threat, either imminently or in the forseeable future, to the United States or its neighbors, and whose citizens, while they surely harbored some ill will toward the United States (for its actions against them as well as for its refusal to offer promised support to revolutionaries after the first Gulf War), certainly were not a terrorist force. Bush's obsession with Iraq caused grave harm to the hunt for terrorists. And you agree that this war made Iraq fertile ground for terrorists, yet in his own speeches Bush denies all of this, saying merely that he 'wasn't happy' to find out there were no WMDs in Iraq.

Frankly, I WAS happy there were no WMDs in Iraq. Happy and relieved. Had he acted within the sensible parameters of the resolution authorizing him, conditionally, to use force in Iraq, the resolution in favor of which John Kerry voted, further weapons inspections would indeed have discovered this fact. There would be far fewer dead American military members. Those same soldiers, marines, airmen, etc., could instead have been finding and uprooting terrorism in the Middle East and elsewhere.

This is a man who has proven his unwillingness to accept an inconvenient truth. Why do you believe he'll change that if reelected?

His administration contributed, both tacitly and specifically, to the abuses at Abu Ghraib. Couple the confusion over the application of the Geneva Conventions with a military command structure that placed private mercenaries in charge of our military and you have a disaster. And yet, the administration carefully insulated itself from any responsibility for the inhumanity. They have blood on their hands and evil in their hearts. They, as you say, 'acted with dispatch to correct the awful malevolence,' but only to a point, which is to say, only as far as low-level poster-children for crimes against humanity, and denied any culpability. What of the culture of accountability Bush claimed they would bring to Washington?

The upshot of all of this is that Bush is now generally viewed by those in the crosshairs as a belligerent, power-mad warmonger. Rather than employing Iraqis to rebuild their own country, he has given the job to American-aligned multinational corporations who burn through American tax money at an alarming rate while reconstruction progresses painfully slowly. Even the ones who aren't taking up arms actively against us and simply want to get back to their own lives don't feel they can trust our President. If he is ever to achieve peace in Iraq and the Middle East, it will be the peace of the sword, of brute force. More Americans will die. Many more Iraqis will die. And resentment in the Middle East and the Muslim world will only grow.

He has broken faith with the American people. He has broken faith with the Iraqi people. He has broken faith with the world. Do you think he should force American will upon the entire world? That is what it would take, in my view.

John Kerry WILL be able to bring other nations to our side, by doing something George W. Bush seems completely incapable of doing: Listening to them. There is a difference between listening to our allies and bowing to them. The Bush campaign assures us that John Kerry seeks the latter. But good leadership requires diplomacy, not belligerence, not an attitude that says 'do as we say or you're our enemy.'

You claim an inability to guess 'where a Kerry presidency will lead' in regards to Iraq. I would expect a news organization to be better informed than this. His plan is hidden in plain sight, if you'd only take the time to look. Your generalizations about internationalists, anti-war activists and isolationists are condescending and shed no light on either John Kerry or your reasons for supporting President Bush.

You did an excellent job of parroting the Bush campaign talking points in regard to Kerry's comments about the 'coalition of the bribed and coerced.' Yet if you did some fairly cursory research about the time when Bush was assembling this coalition, you'd see that largely his assessment is correct. Many of the countries that were persuaded to join this coalition were initially extrememly reluctant, very UNwilling. And even those who joined did so in numbers that make it clear they were only willing, even after Bush Administration pressure was brought to bear, to make a token showing. They bear a burden alongside us, but it is a comparatively small one made only reluctantly, for the most part.

Again, Kerry CAN bring other nations to the table. France abandoned our efforts in Iraq only after Bush broke faith with the United Nations. They still work with us in Afghanistan. The German government has said it would be willing to discuss participating if John Kerry is elected. Your statement that 'It is not credible that (Kerry) ... can set that war on the right path' is simply erroneous. Kerry's contempt is not for other nations but for Bush's arm-twisting to drag those other nations into it.

To continue, you crow about Afghanistan. Yes, if democracy ever takes root there, it will be a great thing. But at this point, Karzai's government has at best a tenuous hold on the country. He rarely leaves the government complex because of the logistics and expense involved in keeping him safe. The elections could generally only be held in larger cities with significant US presence. Officials were actually PLEASED by the fact that some citizens had registered twice, three times, or more, to vote, yet this inaccuracy renders suspect the Bush administration's rosy assessments about how broad the spread of democracy was in Afghanistan.

Afghanistan is one step away from anarchy in the hands of the Bush administration, and yet you think that he, who cannot admit the problems there and work to fix them, can do so?

You trust that Bush will keep his promise of no 'litmus test' for supreme judicial appointments. Look at the judges he's appointed so far and tell me how credible that promise is. Do it now. No, really, I'll wait. I'm very patient.

Your claims of the unreasonableness of environmentalists' opposition to President Bush are in my view, as you might predict, offensive. The only carrots Bush has offered companies is an EPA so dessicated by budget cuts it can't enforce the regulations that are in place, enactment of new regulations with Orwellian names that virtually give them free reign to destroy our environment and the promise to do more of the same with four more years. He has de-funded Superfund to the point where it's functionally a historical footnote while there are countless sites yet to clean up. He tried to remove clean water standards for mercury, only to bow at the last minute to overwhelming public pressure.

Clean Skies, beneath its fine-sounding proposals, realigns regulation to allow more, and more toxic, air pollution. Ditto his clean water proposals. The Healthy Forests Initiative makes forests 'healthier' by allowing logging companies to strip out older trees, which are the bedrock of a healthy forest ecology. This is to say nothing of the damage that will be done to old-growth forests by the heavy machinery roaring in and out of the areas. Your contempt for those who care about the environment (which is, incidentally, the majority of Americans) is both insulting and unwise.

On to No Child Left Behind ... Yes, indeed, it would be a grand scheme if our President actually cared to fund its mandates. As it is, school districts across the country have refused to participate because its cost is far greater than the assistance the government is able to offer, and because state and local governments, who have had to bear the burden of other federally-mandated programs the Bush Administration has seen fit not to fund, cannot afford to take up the slack.

As for the tax cuts, let me ask a hypothetical. Assume you are a very wealthy person. Perhaps you are. You have enough money to afford everything you need or want. If you receive extra money, where does that money go? Do you buy more with it? Of course not. You either sock it away or invest it. But unless you're investing in an IPO, that money is not actually going to work in the economy. If you're poor, though, and you receive a check, where does it go? To food, to rent, to the next car payment, to a new TV or DVD player or a new refrigerator to replace the one that's barely worked for years?

Which one is a greater economic stimulus?

President Clinton understood this. I'm not an economist, but I do understand one thing: Supply side economics doesn't work. Clinton's economic plan contributed to the longest-ever, largest-ever period of economic growth in America's history. Kerry's economic plan abandons what our president's own father ridiculed as 'voodoo economics' in place of an economic plan that builds growth in the only place it can come from: the lower and middle classes.

As for your closing two paragraphs, I can only say this: Yes, the country was amazingly united following the events of Sept. 11. From what I can see, Bush played no part in this and in fact moved quickly to consolidate his power base, to ridicule the political left and exile it from serious discussion about the country's direction. In domestic politics as in international politics, Bush and the Republicans have played the 'either you do what we say or you're our enemy' game. Because of the slim margin and dubious origins of his election victory in 2000, it wasn't until such a galvanizing event that he could move full-bore on his unilateral agenda. I blame this more than anything for the divisiveness in American politics today.

I really wanted to believe in him. After the election, I reasoned that he would have to spend his four years in the center. But he has waged war on Iraq, on the American poor, on our environment and on our civil rights. I have great respect for thoughtful, intelligent conservatives. He is not one. He stifles dissent at every turn and spends money like a debutante with daddy's credit card. These are not conservative values.

Your editorial is a mix of misinformation, Republican spin, disinformation, hopeful thinking and rationalization. Quit acting like court stenographers, open your eyes and grow some balls.

Thank you.
Chris Devine
Phoenix

Bush haiku

So this is how absorbed I was by class Monday night ... I wrote a bunch of Bush haiku. Here are some of the better ones (except the BEST one, which will be reserved for Oct. 23 at the Willow House! Can't give away everything for free!) ...

Hardest job in world -
All stress. Dou you want it done
By a C student?

Kyoto Treaty signed.
World agrees on a problem.
Not George: "Bad science!"

Pres's daily brief
Plausibly deniable:
We know he can't read.

The lump on his back:
Radio? Bullet-proof vest?
Mind-control Martian?

Thousand-dollar suit,
Billions to Halliburton,
Dollar-fifty brain.

Clear skies, clean water:
No birds, no fish. Hi, mercury!
Orwellian names.

Government your foe?
Don't lose job. Don't send letter.
Don't drive on our roads.

Osama in cave.
"Look! Shiny object! Saddam!"
Osama escapes.

At the podium,
Tries to speak, mind freezes up.
"Um ... ," lots of blinking.

To see leader speak,
Loyalty oath is required.
Fascism, anyone?

"Charity." "Be kind."
"Lion with lamb." "Turn your cheek."
Jesus: Pantywaste.

How many lies?

A little behind the times here, but allow me to offer the following image as a public service, just in case you needed a photo with Dick Cheney and John Edwards in it. I was remiss and didn't record the specific date of this screen capture, but it's from sometime in 2001.

Liar-in-Chief

Notice I've, by and large, stayed out of talking about the debates. Everyone else is doing it, why should I? I also know I've mentioned this before, but it needs to be shouted from the rooftops, printed on placards, etc., etc.

Bush is a flip-flopper. Bush is a liar.

Tonight, he said (according to CBS's transcript): "Gosh, I just don't think I ever said I'm not worried about Osama bin Laden. It's kind of one of those exaggerations. Of course we're worried about Osama bin Laden. We're on the hunt after Osama bin Laden. We're using every asset at our disposal to get Osama bin Laden."

On March 13, 2003, he said: " ... I don't know where he is. Nor -- you know, I just don't spend that much time on him really, to be honest with you ... As I say, we hadn't heard much from him. And I wouldn't necessarily say he's at the center of any command structure. And, you know, again, I don't know where he is. I'll repeat what I said: I truly am not that concerned about him."

Say it with me. Bush is a flip-flopper. Bush is a liar.

Say, has anyone Google-bombed flip-flop yet?

United Church of Christ and the media

Oh, yeah, it's evil for churches to pressure the FCC to scrutinize license renewals of local television stations. All they want to do is push conservative values on an unsuspecting public. They press for censorship and want to act as moral police on the marketplace of ideas.

It's evil.

Evil.

Evil.

And I quote: "The Office of Communication of the United Church of Christ, Inc. (OC, Inc.)
was established in 1959. Throughout its history, OC, Inc. has advocated for
persons historically excluded from the media, especially women and people
of color; petitioned the FCC to issue EEO rules; sought to guarantee
educational and informational children's programming; defended the Equal
Time Rule for political candidates; supported efforts to establish
low-power FM radio; protected affordable access to emerging technologies;
and urged strengthening of basic corporate character requirements for those
who transmit images and data."

There is danger in painting with too broad a brush. Die, Sinclair, die.

Thoughts on my education

So after spending yet another Monday night in a classroom in Tucson, I've come to the realization that I HATE ... hate hate hate ... pure lecture classes. Seriously I feel like I'm wasting my time driving a total of 4 hours every Monday if all I'm gonna do is sit in a classroom for 2-1/2 hours while someone stands at the front of the room and yaps. Seriously, send me the notes and let me read by myself. It would save a lot of gas and time.

My Wednesday night is much the same. The professor is very condescending, generally teaching at an undergraduate level, going back over basic journalism stuff we all learned years ago and getting stuff just flat wrong (e.g., the convenient redefining of the concept of 'antinomial' ethics to fit [poorly] an equally convenient either-or comparison she was trying to make). But for almost three hours every Wednesday, she talks at us and asks leading questions that she has to answer herself because no one feels moved to speak, much less discuss, the topic. Everything is painted in very broad strokes with very basic colors. It's mind-numbing.

On Tuesday, though, it's all different, and it makes up for the other two nights with room to spare. This man is the professor (old article and he has a beard now, but that's him). Although I have to read an insane amount of stuff for this class, it's all thought-provoking, raising countless journalistic issues about which there are no easy answers, and about which there are always several ethical issues in conflict with one another. In class it's more like a conversation among smart and intellectually curious people than a lecture. There's even been one after-class cocktails session, and there's soon to be another.

This last class is by far the most rigorous and difficult of the three, but it's by far the most rewarding and (dare I say it?) fun, and I always leave the class with a little spring in my step, feeling like I accomplished something, learned something, resolved something.

Maybe I'm just a geek.

Some research this morning on the definition of fascism

I'm following some alarming thoughts that are not made entirely apparent by the fact that I'm pursuing this, but I wanted to see the degree to which corporatism defines fascism. There does seem to be disagreement on that point, but mostly because the most consistent definition of fascism I've seen is that it's inconsistent; it has few consistent principles. Broadly speaking, it's an opportunistic governing philosophy that tends to espouse egalitarian views while consolidating ruling power among the elite.

But some interesting things I found at this Web site (I've added emphasis to certain parts):


Fascism and Nazism as ideologies involve, to varying degrees, some of the following hallmarks:

• Nationalism and super-patriotism with a sense of historic mission.
  
• Aggressive militarism even to the extent of glorifying war as good for the national or individual spirit.
  
• Use of violence or threats of violence to impose views on others (fascism and Nazism both employed street violence and state violence at different moments in their development).
  
• Authoritarian reliance on a leader or elite not constitutionally responsible to an electorate.
  
• Cult of personality around a charismatic leader.
  
• Reaction against the values of Modernism, usually with emotional attacks against both liberalism and communism.
  
• Exhortations for the homogeneous masses of common folk (Volkish in German, Populist in the U.S.) to join voluntarily in a heroic mission_often metaphysical and romanticized in character.
  
• Dehumanization and scapegoating of the enemy_seeing the enemy as an inferior or subhuman force, perhaps involved in a conspiracy that justifies eradicating them.
  
• The self image of being a superior form of social organization beyond socialism, capitalism and democracy.
  
• Elements of national socialist ideological roots, for example, ostensible support for the industrial working class or farmers; but ultimately, the forging of an alliance with an elite sector of society.
  
• Abandonment of any consistent ideology in a drive for state power.
  

Well. Looking back on it, I ended up bolding almost the entire thing. Interesting.

Changing the language

For so long I've heard the two-party system referred to as 'choosing between the lesser of two evils.' I'm guilty of having uttered that cliche once or twice myself. Followed, then, to its logical extension, one hears quite often, 'the lesser of two evils is still evil.'

And this points to the chief problem with this cliche: It sounds cute, it has symmetry, it seems to make sense, and it abrogates intelligent thought by summing complicated issues with a simplistic platitude. And it contributes to a fundamental, corrosive cynicism about politics, society and civic life.

Its base assumption is that all Republicans and all Democrats are irretrievably and unequivocally evil; it's just that one party, or the other, and its adherents are more evil than the other. If that's actually what you believe, then by all means, please continue spewing forth this old chestnut. But it demonstrates a fundamental inflexibility of thought. Because the necessary corollary to this (thank you, statistics professors for teaching about null hypotheses, et al.), is that third parties are incorruptibly and unequivocally good (or, to be charitable, that at least one third party is incorruptibly and unequivocally good, as are all its members and adherents. Um, if there's an absolutely perfect political party out there, without blemish, someone let me know what it is, K?

Democrats and Republicans never do what's right. Third parties ALWAYS do (or some specific party always does).

Now, trust me, I have my beefs with the Democratic Party and they are many and legion, and in some cases severe. And John Kerry and the slate of Democratic electors up for the vote this time around are far from perfect. But generally speaking, even at their worst they are, collectively, 'a small step in the right direction.'

So. Frigging. There.

Mark it on your calendars ... Oct. 23

The Oct. 1 Haiku Rd. show at the Stop 'n' Look window in Phoenix was great fun. We played in between politically-motivated monologists, next to a have-to-see-to-understand political art installation and under projections on the wall of 1984 slogans and photos of BushCo-Conspirators with tape over their mouths. There was a small but not embarrassing and rather enthusiastic crowd and the weather was lovely.

But if you are in, or can get to, Phoenix on Oct. 23, you must come to Willow House that evening (it's a Saturday) for the biggest-yet Haiku Rd. show, where we'll actually play some of our good stuff that's not political (though since it's close to election time, expect a political song or two) and play actual long sets. We're trying to get the biggest crowd we can for two reasons: First, we'd like to convince the nice Willow House people that they done good by booking a relatively new and untested band on a Saturday night (about which, by the way, woohoo!) and second, it's my birthday!

More details to come. Be there. Aloha.

Debate anticipation ...

I wonder what kind of shiny object the administration will hold up in front of the American public so they can't pay attention to how badly Shrubby does tonight.

Mind you, he can be pretty good at connecting with a crowd, even when what comes out of his mouth makes about as much sense as a dada poem, though Kerry's MILES better at thinking on his feet, so we'll see.

Alas, we probably won't see anyone claim $8414.00 and ask Bush how many times he's been arrested, since it's my understanding that the moderator is selecting from a list of audience-submitted questions which ones he'll ask. Then again, maybe Chuck wants the money himself!

Yeah, well, hope springs eternal.

A little thing to chew on

From Bill Clinton's My Life ...

"All of us are vulnerable to arguments that let us off the hook ... "

Not much of a thing, but certainly germaine to today's development.

Back to Jeremiah

You know, I was just sitting here, doing my work quietly, when I flashed back to a scene from one of the last Jeremiah episodes, in which Kurdy has begun training an army, and has his first group of recruits in a large room, in which stands a fairly tall wall. He tells the hungry group that, in essence, lunch is waiting on the other side of the wall. And only once everyone has climbed over the wall will anyone get to eat.

A couple of the bigger guys with attitudes take flying leaps at the wall, jumping and scraping to try to get up and over, but to no avail; it's simply too tall. They complain that the task is impossible, that Kurdy's asking too much of them.

Standing off to the side is the small, nerdy and idealistic guy they've all been picking on since they got there. He puts the question to Kurdy, "You said we had to get over the wall, right? But you didn't say we couldn't help each other."

"That's right," Kurdy replied.

Nerdy guy then proceeds to have two strong guys hoist two other strong guys up to the top. Between the four of them, they lift everyone in the group up and over the wall.

At the time I just thought it was a clever morality play about the value of teamwork and thinking divergently.

The more I think about it, though, there's a strong sociopolitical lesson there, too.

JMS, you rock.

Modest October Surprise guess

I've been running this one around in my head for a couple of weeks, and decided I should get it down on the public record ... not that it's terribly creative, surprising, etc., but ...

Right before the election, say a week or two, they (Saudi Arabia, et al.) will flood the market with oil, allowing the price to drop precipitously.

I mean, they did say they were gonna do it, some months ago. But people have short memories.

factcheck.com

Your Vice President told you to do it. You know you want to. Go to factcheck.com. Comply!

Really.

(Thanks, Kniwt!)

More BushCult Follies

From a few days ago ...

"You've Partied for the President ...

* Um. The very idea makes me chortle with amusement. *

" ... now Walk the Vote!

"On the weekend of October 16, people will gather in homes all across America to organize the largest door-to-door walk program ever assembled - the Walk the Vote Weekend. We'll identify voters in your area, provide maps to their doors and a flyer to hand out, and ask you and your friends to reach out to your neighbors and turn out the vote."

Yeah. C'mon-a my house, my house, c'mon! I look forward to THAT conversation.

Ack! Disaster!

From today's Bush/Cheney example of cognitive dissonance ...

"After last week's debate, the Kerry campaign spin machine managed to mask their candidate's flip-flops on the war in Iraq, imposition of a 'global test' for protecting America, and repeated denigration of our troops and allies."

So, um, did nobody from the campaign watch the debates? Their disingenuous knows no bounds.

And if the BushCo spin machine isn't working, maybe it's because the press and the American people did watch the debate and know they're being lied to.

Shameless.

Stuck between a dimwit and a nutbar

The congressional race in my district causes me no end of dismay. As some may remember from awhile ago, Mason and I sent a letter to our US representative expressing our displeasure with his performance and pledging not to vote for him. He's nauseatingly conservative, a fact amerliorated only by the fact that he's a follower rather than a leader whose big leaderly push is a law that would require all future legislation to include a section detailing exactly which section of the Constitution authorizes the legistlation. Wow. That's what I call an urgent national priority.

I'm gonna keep my promise, but there's really no one to vote for, so I'll have to leave that section blank.

OK, so that's not entirely true. He does have one opponent, Mark Yannone. Even if I didn't find his ideas hopelessly unworkable (which I do), I find his entire attitude entirely unbecoming someone who aspires to be a publicly elected official. Read this news release from Mr. Yannone. Really. Read it.

Real statesmanlike, Marky boy.

I've done Web searches on the guy before, and this is entirely in character. He really acts like a petulant know-it-all who's never gotten over being bullied in high school. For the record, I'm a know-it-all, but I'm not terribly petulant and I got over being bullied.

So clearly I can't toss my vote there. What to do, what to do ...

* Standing back now to await Marky's nastygrams. I'll post any here if I get them.*

Air America observation

When I listen to Air America radio online, I use the Real Player, which works more or less like a TiVo if you want it to, in that you can pause it, go on break and catch up by skipping over commercials.

It was in this fashion that I discovered today that the length of their commercial breaks has gone up from four minutes to five.

And yet the corporate and right wing media seem to persist in referring to Air America as 'struggling' or 'troubled'.

Yeah. Tell yourselves that.

Dumbasses.

Gentle Haiku Rd. reminder

Haiku Road tonight, 7pm-ish, in front of the Stop 'n' Look Window at 1025 Grand Ave. in Phoenix. Please do come!