LAURAL'S DISH
Laural is our dog, my dog. Everyone else heads off to school, "people like me and Laural" stay home. He's a fine companion, but you have to understand. If he's having a really good time he tries to bite you, me, anyone. Not hard, just…similarly, if you're scratching his belly real good, but then shift to his (apparently less preferable) ears, he'll growl at you. The irregular spelling of his name results from the time that Alexandra and I were mulling the possibilities, in a tunnel in Newton Abbot, when we came across the graffiti: Laura L is a dog.
Laural loves to eat more than any living being ever created, and he will eat absolutely anything. We've weaned him from rocks but he once tried to eat an unopened can of Carlsberg Export. surprise! So his dish frequently has unusual things in it, bits of this or that, absolute treasures that others might consider slightly unfit for human consumption, for whatever stupid reasons.
Beneath please find my literary reflection of Laural's Dish:
Laural's Dish comes out on Fridays, before lunch, usually.
30 September 2011
http://www.tmz.com/2011/09/25/sly-stone-homeless-van-sylvester-stewart/
As a former illegal, relatively unrepentant drug user-I had a good time, I stopped for a reason, I haven't even smoked weed since Bush the Elder was president-I do believe that it's a national imperative to (first, legalize drugs, and then; or in reverse order if it's easier, but do both) do something for, if he wants, Sly Stone. "We got to live together!" Sly was the man who most took popular music to a point of inclusion, didn't matter man, if you white or black or both or yellow or orange or kinda purplish (help that man!) …."We got to live together!!" Different strokes for different folks.
He sang and dreamed of a world without racism. At the time I lived it-I thought it was already here-growing up in military bases in Heidelberg and Heilbronn, Germany; and the naval base in Guantanamo Bay. There was no racism among the kids, only jokes about some stupid asinine long-gone culture. It was only when I moved to Louisiana in early 1980 (age 17) that I realized that racism in American still existed as an evil force.
Unfortunately the Woodstock vision that Sly so articulately expressed was lost to that same racism which-whether it was his fault or not-regained popularity during the Reagan era and has been a between-the-lines political issue ever since (Bushes both, J'assuse; and at least half the Republicans in the 2012 race). BUT, when Sly was happenin' things were different. It DID seem possible-more than that, inevitable, accomplished-that America was to or had become a place where racism was a bunch of historic, embarrassing bullshit. He-and his multicultural band-helped make that moment possible-and it's not their fault that we lost; short-term to now.
I don't know a lot about Sly Stone, personally. As, I guess, a honky, I mainly think of him-beyond the brilliant music-personally, in terms of two autobiographies by two other guys. My all-time favorite baseball player, Tug McGraw, was very proud to relate that he went to the same high school as Sly, in perhaps the greatest baseball autobiography ever written, Screwball. [Tug belongs in the Hall of Fame, if only in the writers' wing]. And more recently reading Slash' autobiography, Slash went on a little bit about how Sly lived in his same apartment complex and occasionally dropped by-saying very little-to smoke crack in the bathroom, as he considered his own apartment insecure, bugged, whatever.
Sylvester Sly stood (STAND!!!!!) for a number of great things in his greatest time….we've done pretty good with the "cool" shit, but somehow we've lost a lot of the "Right On!" I had a brilliant Philosophy professor at LSU-Dr. Charles Bigger….he wrote things…in English…but even I couldn't understand them because his vocabulary was so immense…on the last day of class (1983?) he started talking about the Civil Rights movement and Reagan Administration, and damn near started to cry…"When you think what the the possibilities have been, and the roads that we've taken, it's nearly enough to make you weep."
It's even more than that.
Here's what I suggest, to help starting make it better, to start making it right again: a duet, all proceeds to Black inner-city charities, of Sly's "Don't Call Me Nigger, Whitey," with guest vocalists President Obama and Nancy Reagan. It would go kind of like this:
OBAMA: Don't call me nigger, whitey
NANCY: Don't call me whitey, nigger
TOGETHER: When I went across the country/and I heard some voices rang/they was talkin' softly to each other/and not a word could change a thang…
And then they could kind of hug, or however that's comfortable. That might help un-do some of it. And, to be fair and tell the truth, I think as the video faded it wouldn't be inappropriate if she said, "Oh, just say no, Sylvester..."
If that's not acceptable, he should just move into her mansion and she relocate to his van. That would better represent their relative contributions to society.
http://news.yahoo.com/obama-says-republicans-cripple-us-214803507.html
"From the moment I took office what we've seen is a constant ideological pushback against any kind of sensible reforms that would make our economy work better and give people more opportunity," the president said…
What we've also seen is an unbearable retreat every time he's been faced with even the most pathetic, unsupportable opposition to those sensible reforms. Obama culpa. That's why I can't vote for him, and his re-election would be in trouble if the Republicans suddenly morphed from in-fighting goofs to a party unified behind a sensible candidate (which they won't, and haven't since at least Eisenhower...so I continue to say that Obama's Second Term is about the safest bet on the planet)
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/scientists-proved-einstein-theory-wrong-230650760.html
Ok, cool, to it turns out that time travel is likely, as some of us expected. As soon as we can plug in I'll see ya at Fillmore West, April 27, 1969….Led Zeppelin's fucking playing, they're so entirely on their game it's ridiculous, the improvs are to live for…time travel's weird, I don't know if I'll share that joint you're passin'-I wouldn't then (I was five), I wouldn't now (I'm 49 Wednesday), but I woulda so many years between-we'll just kind of play this time travel shit by ear…yeah, Ok, I'll probabably…
and how about concluding with the movie I've been most looking forward to for more than twenty years near somewhere near production...how about concluding with a film update...how about in the order of how much I identify with the hero...
24 September 2011
This week's Laural's Dish is brought to you by Jefferson Starship/Airplane's last truly great effort, Red Octopus
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bilderberger
http://www.infowars.com/14-reasons-why-rick-perry-would-be-a-really-really-bad-president/
I have to admit that, for the moment, I find Rick Perry the most interesting presidential candidate going. I won't be voting for him. But how well he works is going to say an awful lot-probably much of it awful-about American politics. It has been a matter of faith on the American hard right for nearly fifty years that there's a conspiracy going on…you know, the ultra-rich trying to take over the world…and at the center of this are The Bilderberger Group and the Trilateral Commission. They are and have been-to much if not all of the right wing intelligentsia-working their fat butts off to install a global one-world socialist government. I admit to not being able to frame a sensible argument as to how what the Bilderbergers might be doing is in any way socialist, but the one-world stuff holds up quite well so far as conspiracy theories go: witness GATT and NAFTA, and the European Union.
To be fair there are a number of liberals who view the same organizations with similar skepticism: Bilderbergers and Trilateralists setting up a "kinder, gentler fascist state" where the über wealthy are royalty, and the government says "fuck everyone else": see Southern California.
So it's nothing about Mr. Perry, personally, that fascinates me so much as his place in a number of very active and ongoing dynamics. As an acknowledged Bilderberger, one might think that the Tea Party would be more inclined to lynch him than put him in charge, but the jury's still out on that one: he enjoys Tea Party support, though hardly the passionate/unalterable variety of the Ron Paul enthusiasts….and it's questionable whether he can take "home girl" Michigan congresswoman Michelle Bachmann in Iowa, where she grew up. And-Bilderberger or not, Reagan wannabe, whatever-he can't count on those gruffy sorts who vote Republican in New Hampshire, they're Yankees and he's a Texas goofus …he may have to wait for South Carolina for a decent showing and even in that case-even given that he'll have-almost literally-all the money in the world, might it not be too late?
Probably not, Bob Dole got his butt kicked early-never, never forget Pat Buchanan's New Hampshire victory speech enjoining his supporters to "grab your pitchforks and march to the sound of gunfire!", that's populist conservatism of an almost appealing manner, my friends…but Dole had (and Perry has, if they decide they can profit from his having it) enough cash to not worry about it if he can gain momentum on up the line.
I have to admit that I've never paid all that much attention to Rick Perry, he seemed a simpleton corporato wrapped in conservative rhetoric…but they're going to try and pass him off as Reagan II. And there are similarities: brash manner, an almost desperate drive to say bizarre and offensive things (these tend to unite people, but only against others), and…not least…not least…he's something of a dimwit entirely reliant on being guided by considerably worse people standing in a guarded cordon around him.
There aren't too many issues that I'm with Rick Perry on, even against in terms of what I still consider Ron Paul's Tea Party. In fact the only one I can think of is immigration, which Mr. Perry is somewhat open to (omigosh, more minimum wage workers for Corporato whilst real Americans go jobless/fewer good people living in fear ). Perry, posturing as a Reagan (and no doubt with an eye on the Hispanic vote that is as disillusioned with Obama as anyone else; but I don't think he can take it, Obama's position is pretty much the same and he is, too, a minority). But immigration is the smoking gun that Tea Party intellectuals will have to play, if they're going to keep Perry from taking a large portion of their movement and momentum and turning it into exactly the opposite of what it was meant to be.
http://news.yahoo.com/palestinians-push-u-n-statehood-bid-despite-obama-010647713.html
The one, single, thing in the world that would end the most killing…is the establishment of a Palestinian state. President Obama says that he agrees (like all of the diplomatic world has, seemingly forever) , but that it should be a matter of negotiation between Palestine and Israel. Which makes absolute sense unless you think about it for more than a millisecond: THAT'S WHAT'S FUCKING FAILED FOR THE PAST SIXTY YEARS!!!!! Israel is a semi-functional democracy but they're never going to give anything back to the Palestinians (that recently "stole" and have traded over the past few thousand years) unless (1) the United Nations gets in their face, oh wait, that's been done, repeatedly, Israel is a rogue state without compare in ignoring UN resolutions, so that's not (1)……(1) and only (1) is that the United States of America tell Israel that we're not going to back their bullshit bullying apartheid any longer. My long standing suggestion has been to even things up: give both parties six months to sort it out at which point we're going to let our arms dealers sell to both sides and make it a fair fight…that would work, actually, unfortunately, long term. The current administration is going to hem and haw like it does…very articulate hemming and hawing, but it boils down to a bunch of crap that ensures that more brave young Americans are going to die in the sand, Palestinian moderates have no political leverage because there's no way in hell that anyone thinks that they can deliver justice, and Israel keeps on electing the worst of its worst, because there's a profit in it.
http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/gary-johnson-gets-chance-230947988.html
If I had to vote today, I'd vote for Gary Johnson.
http://www.rte.ie/news/2011/0922/president1.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Derry
Speaking on local radio in Cork, Mr McGuinness said he would not say what role he played in the IRA in Derry in the early 1970s because it would leave him open to charges that he was being boastful.
Of course he need not clarify his role, everyone knows that he was running the revolution.
He did clarify that he never shot or killed anyone. I really fucking doubt it, I mean, I believe the boastful part-he was the toughest sonofabitch in a historic lot of tough sumbitches and how do you say that?-but lying about things that would just bewilder the electorate anyway is not something that disqualifies presidential candidates, to me (or you couldn't even vote, ever, could you?)
Martin McGuinness, Gerry Adams, Wolfe Tone, James Connolly, Bobby Sands...all those guys...they were fighting a cause every bit as right-and even more of a long shot-than George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Paine.
Martin McGuinness is a badass. Period. He liberated a substantial portion of Northern Ireland and kept it liberated as the British brought in more and more and more troops, to the point where it became so embarrassing that they had to bring in the whole damn army. The Cause of Irish independence is obvious, and predates the birth of McGuinness by something measurable in centuries. That he escalated the battle to the point that a measure of acceptable (i.e. not apartheid) peace could be attained…he was the man who drove the center of that.
My Irish roots are a few generations too far back for me to vote in this one. But GOD I wish I could vote for Martin McGuinness. Hell, I may write him in for President of the United States this election if it keeps going on like this…
17 September 2011
This week Laural's Dish is brought to you by The Clash, Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds' Abatoir Blues, Carlsberg Special Brew and Guns N' Roses at the Hippodrome, Paris 6/6/92
I've stated, repeatedly, that Sarah Palin is more than qualified to be President of the United States. She has served as Governor of the proud state of Alaska for some time, until she quit. She was a Vice-Presidential Candidate. And I am very, very, very unlikely to ever consider voting for her, for anything, even if she moved to Exeter and ran for dogcatcher (and not just because I don't like dogcatchers, generally).
I also very strongly believe that anyone has the right to write any book about her, biography, saying anything that they believe is true or might be true; so long as they set forth their sources and back it up. But this book is crap.
It's crap, to me, because, first of all because who fucking cares? I don't care if Sarah Palin-as a teenager!- engaged in a fourty-fivesome with basketball players of every race and creed (except, ok, Satanism, that would bother me some); I don't care if years ago she snorted cocaine off the entrails of dead mooses or if she fucked every business associate her husband ever had…for the record, I consider the book bullshit, it likely contains some truth but is so desperately postured as to render itself unworthy of consideration as a serious document.
The corporate media's focus on this sort of nonsense at the expense of who people are NOW and what their views are is no small part of what's strangling American politics. As Palin's kind of an idiot anyway, if an entertaining one, I would instead turn your attention to Oregon Congressman Peter DeFazio. I've met him, he's a very bright man; I've seen him in assemblies of people with incredibly and aggressively divergent views (Serbs/Croats)…he's who you want moderating things. He represents Eugene (a beacon for the world) and in the mid '90s was a runaway front-runner for a Senate seat eventually filled by…a lesser man, and politician…he was up by something around 65-20 in the polls…but he dropped out when the media started talking about people he knew. He remains wildly popular and Eugene will elect him forever, but has stayed put (they told him, yeah?). I doubt that he was defending himself, I suspect that he was defending his father or a close friend, but we lost a helluva senator and, quite frankly, he would have been the best president since JFK.
Moral of the intro? We need to grow up and just say "I kNOw your bias" to corporate media, "you helped get us into this shit and you sure as hell [actually surer than that] ain't gonna help get us out."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-14909983
I hold President Kennedy in the very highest esteem. He was not a great president because he didn't have time to be a Great President. He did some great things, some lousy things, planned more great things that he got cut off before (so? probably) he couldn't get to them, he was not beyond political calculation though not in the evil manner of, say, Henry Kissinger or Adolf Hitler. On balance he was a very good-potentially great-but imperfect president.
The revelations of the Jackie Kennedy tapes raises somewhat peripheral issues. Jackie comes off as a soft-spoken, occasionally bitchy (oh, surprise!), entirely loyal wife. I think that's about right, but what does it say about her even more famous half. Was he, for example, as family oriented?
I think the answer is "kind of, yeah pretty much." John F. Kennedy's pictures with his children reflect a love that can not be faked. I think we're all kind of settled that he continued to be something of a philanderer but-given his father-he thought that he was supposed to. That's neither excuse nor defense, extenuating circumstance I guess. But he loved Jackie, I believe that, and if he didn't always do his best he usually did some semblance of it, by her. Was he self-absorbed? Sure. Self-centered, obviously at least to some extent, but there's no denying-to me-that he did epitomize in his own strange lost way that sense of family that the Kennedy legend has sustained (and properly so, I think) in the barrage of negative allegations (so many true) that would suggest the contrary.
So when she calls Martin Luther King a "phoney," I don't think she was talking about politics or civil rights. Martin put it all on the line every day, he knew he was the walking target for every racist, conservative nut in the world, every big business lunatic, every associated CIA splinter group (once he expanded beyond racial equality to social equality-which is, not incidentally I think, when he got hit)….
I think Jackie was venting against John when she said that about Martin. And in that way that we all rationalize, and measure, and try to make things the way we want them…and, to her at that moment, probably always…Martin Luther King's marital indiscretions were worse than those of her beloved husband, because…after all, Martin was a preacher.
It's fascinating how minds work, and particularly powerful minds…the ones that have even more power to chase pathologies and illusions, and imbed them with reality and insight in whatever way's most comfortable.
I'm not in denial, but I consider John & Jackie a great love story, and John a great father.
http://news.yahoo.com/a-family-remembers--hero-of-9-11-gave-life-to-save-thousands.html
This is what 9/11 is about, to me. The heroes, the firefighters, the cops.
Because after that, it gets shaky. The sonofabitches who rammed jets into the World Trade Towers killed far fewer people than UN sanctions had, very recently, Iraqi children. It's not about politics to me, it's about people.
I'm not a violent person. I haven't hit anyone in anger since…I don't know, maybe '88 or something, you have hair and a mouth like me and sometimes you have to hit people, usually back, but occasionally pre-emptively because it's obvious that it's coming and it's a fact that fights are most often won by throwing the fist punch. So if it's coming anyway, you're neither dumb nor evil to throw it first, it kind of helps.
I'm not spiritually developed enough to even pretend that I'm with Jesus or Gandhi in not ever hitting. Personal violence-in self-defense-is one thing, and political violence is another. Well, I'm not quite there yet either. I tend to respect groups like the Irish Republican Army (under Martin McGuinness, who did the politically [if not spiritually, there is some days a conflict] right thing in bombing his way to the peace table, in my opinion) who go out of their way to minimize civilian casualties (like the US Army in Iraq, though they call civilian casualities "collateral damage," hooray for spin doctors) in contrast to what happened at the World Trade Center.
But I'm not going to pretend that I'm not absolutely awed at the idea of attacking The Pentagon. I'm not saying that it's right-details below-but when President George W. Bush called the perpetrators "cowards" that was about the height of bullshit in the history of human rhetoric. And as for the World Trade Center….what do you do when you are being destroyed by economists instead of warriors?
Ok, enough Devil's Advocate. The reality is that 9/11 was a tragedy for many, many, many reasons…the loss of good and innocent lives foremost…but the absolute lack of extenuating circumstances is what makes it more horrible and evil and disgusting than anyone is ever able to describe. Osama bin Laden and his minions are way, way, WAY, WAYWAYWAY bigger assholes than anyone they hit in the Pentagon, or even the worst rogue traders in the history of the towers. Don't get me wrong: every group and measure described in the preceding sentence is responsible for death (murder or neglect) and making the world a worse place…it's a matter of magnitude.
Some Islamist fundamentalists (like some Christian ones-who we keep contained in compounds in Idaho and Texas, which we occasionally shoot the hell out of when it gets too deep) are hell-bent on reducing women to subhuman status, ensuring that everyone else is as miserable as they are, and killing or torturing anyone who looks or thinks or especially acts anything like me as quickly and to the fullest extent possible.
I don't have mixed feelings about 9/11. I just wish it had led to as much thinking as it did unbridled bigotry, racism and corporate expansionism. I wish we hadn't turned it into the all-time recruiting device for Islamic extremists by invading Iraq.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/paul-heroux/ron-paul-al-qaeda_b_959430.html
http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/ron-paul-s-critique-us-foreign-policy-draws-debate-jeers
http://www.historycommons.org/essay.jsp?article=essayaninterestingday
Senator Al Franken wrote something like-in his no doubt brilliant book that I haven't read and probably won't, Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot -he wrote something along the lines of "Conservatives love America like their mommy-everything it does is automatically good. Liberals love America like a best friend they don't want to make mistakes that hurt himself."
Ron Paul-if you accept Franken's caricature and consider Ron a conservative-breaks the mold. In suggesting that there are reasons that the Arab World hates us-generally, on Main Street/ and violently from the alleys-Congressman Paul has demonstrated that he's more interested in telling the Truth than being president; which makes him more acceptable presidential timbre to me.
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/embassy-protesters-burn-us-flag-132118970.html
I am a Free Speech Fanatic. I am a Jeffersonian, a Thomas Paine worshipper (and descendant). People should be able to say what they think, no matter how unpopular. That's it.
I have also-it must be said-considered protesting outside the U.S. Embassy in London-first against long lines for Theresa to get her passport and later-in writing-threatening to hang a "Corporate Stooge" placard around the head of the bust (of) Ronald Reagan. So free speech, protest….I'm not necessarily for you, but I'm definitely for your right to do it. With edges.
If I was a London copper with the Islamic crazies on one side glorifying 9/11, and the (totally fascist Hitler-worshipping) BNP trying to get at them…I don't need to rationalize it to concede that I would have told the nearest BNP guy, "We'll be back in an hour or two."
9 September 2011
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/09/06/michigan-governor-signs-48-month-welfare-limit/
http://news.yahoo.com/fact-check-perry-romney-twist-records-debate-021556685.html
It pains me to write this, but the Tea Party has become-collectively-a masochistic/sadistic idiot. What once held great promise as a (decidedly conservative, but there are sensible strains) populist movement has been so conned by Corporato that they should (but definitely won't!) share in the largesse of tax breaks and bailouts. The turning point was Wisconsin-where they had the choice of backing the unions that share their fundamental concerns of working Americans, or a corporate stooge. They went for the stooge and they've never recovered; I don't see them ever recovering, only dissipating loudly and increasingly idiotically…
I definitely do not mean to say that everyone involved in the Tea Party is an idiot, little could be further from the truth. The conservative intelligentsia, such as it is, tends towards Ron Paul and they're damn right on a lot of things. But as a collective mass the Tea Party currently resembles nothing more than Jim Jones (with Corporato in the lead role) hell-bent on (economic) suicide. Less taxes on the filthy rich, antagonism to the working people and their representatives and those desperate to work but can't find a job because (Corporato) technology and (Corporato) globalism have so limited the jobs available to Americans…it borders on tragic. But it was never my movement, so I don't weep for their self-destructive stupidity. On the other hand, I can't laugh, either.
Rick Perry is the Corporato Dream, and they're floating him even though he doesn't have much of a chance. Corporato don't care, Corporato's long since put President Obama in their back pocket. It's a win ridiculously/win big situation so far as Corporato can tell, and unless something unlikely-Ron Paul as a Third Party candidate and a liberal Fourth Party candidate to balance-….wow, surprise, Corporato wins again, you lose, I lose, everyone you know (ok, maybe I have one close friend who won't, economically)…America loses! Just like every election since 1980.
But imagine the Corporato glory under President Perry…let's face it, Corporato has already economically strip-mined America for all that it's worth, leaving only pathetic little remnants for the bordering-on-starvation poor and ancient retirees…but Perry could also get them that! Social security? A con game, he says, let's take it! Welfare? Let them move to China where we sent the jobs. Unbelievable. I increasingly believe that Thomas Jefferson and George Washington would be considering bomb throwing, though in my heart I'm sure they could figure out something better. I just wish I could figure out what it is.
If I were on a jury I would refuse to convict anyone who kidnapped Michigan Governor Rick Snyder and forced him to watch his family subsist on rice and salt for a week (while incessantly watching Fox News). Plenty of his subjects are doing it every day, he demands that they settle for less. Self defense, your honor.
The wild card is Ron Paul. His followers are the brighter Tea Party members, and they have no more affection for Perry than they did for Ted Kennedy (discussed, incidentally, below ). I could not more emphatically agree with Ron Paul on a great number of matters, and disagree with him on fewer other-but at least as fundamental-ones. I do not believe that if we cut social programs to near zero America will be a better place. What will happen (President Perry/Paul) is that many-towards the millions-will suffer, crime will rise and become increasingly violent, and America proper will come to look more and more on a daily basis like the Kinder, Gentler Fascist Blueprint of Southern California: gated communities (for Corporato and its minions who think they're in on it), and huge sections of town entirely written off by the government and cops to do what they like. So I won't be voting for Ron Paul.
But Ron Paul is our only hope, as a Third Party candidate; joined, necessarily by a Fourth Party candidate. If Ron can pull his loyalists (a given, they think he's akin to a political Moses) and the minority of thinking members of the Republican Party, and a Fourth Party liberal gives us anywhere else to go (my current plan is to write in "Patti Smith")...the absolute imperative of Saving America couldn't be more wide-open.
So that's where we are, my brothers and sisters. Obama appears very, very, very, very, very likely to be re-elected even though no one particularly likes him and only Corporato should (but don't, as much as someone who might ALSO give them your social security money…they're monitoring THAT, it's good for a ring or a BMW accessory or something). No one is excited about Romney, and were Perry to gain the nomination we'd see 98% of over-65's (a huge voting bloc, and the only one that would bother to turn out; other than Corporato/wanna be's which is maybe 3%) voting for the president. Neither Perry nor Romney can beat Obama. Ron Paul as a Third Party candidate only makes Obama's re-election more certain. The only hope is something we don't know about.
Hell, if Perry is elected we can start writing obituaries on the greatest political project in the history of the world, the United States of America-at least as a superpower that anyone in their right mind looks up to…unless congress (oh, sure) stymies him…or less (or more, and he's thrown from office) hell breaks out in the next four years than should be expected.
That's where we're at. Sorry.
http://news.yahoo.com/libyan-intelligence-documents-show-ties-cia-102850383.html
Just as a slight example…we are now negotiating oil deals with a guy who was previously tortured as an (alleged) al-Qaeda operative. Where's the democratic idealism of Washington (then or now)? Where's the respect for the 9/11 victims? Where's anything moral or just or right? I'll tell you: it's fallen beneath the boot of the profit bottom-line of Corporato oil. It should be said that Reagan* set Corporato off, W. Bush (with the assistance of his "brain," Cheney) did the torturing-whether the guy was guilty or not-and Obama is the current president who should be all over this shit.
*It is historical fact that Ronald Reagan set Corporato into major motion; he didn't create it he just gave it the tools and a green light. Discussing this with a learned friend-who has benefited greatly-but who also despises at least W. and Obama-he simply said, "Reagan inherited a mess, he left a different one." I think it's fair enough to say that even the hopelessly delusional (at best-at worst?-evil genius) Reagan never contemplated Corporato stealing social security checks from disabled grandmothers…but Rick Perry apparently thinks it's a good idea…and so goes Corporato, until checked….
http://news.yahoo.com/tony-blair-major-unheralded-role-mideast-talks-062930648.html
Haha! That's right! They gave him a big-deal position, but for some reason (um…Iraq?????) he's only able to convince one side that he's doing anything but Corporato Israel loves him, no matter what he suggests (they know they don't have to pay any attention to him now). HE may be Dick Cheney's hell-mate. How fucking stupid do they think we are….(no corporatos answer, please …you're apparently right)? Naming Tony Blair as Middle East envoy was akin to naming Goebbels envoy to an anti-Semitism convention, and now we're applauding him for making it worse.
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/inquiry-look-uk-links-libya-torture-113723233.html
This is, of course, wonderful news. The British government persists in endless enquiries into everything….all of which result in the finding that "mistakes were made but it wasn't anyone in particular's fault." Wheeee!, makes me feel so good about paying taxes. Let me conduct this one guys…
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It strikes me that the tragedy of the Obama Administration-and let's face it, it's not a Democratic tragedy, or a liberal tragedy, or a Black people's tragedy, or an Ivy League tragedy, it's an American tragedy…how a potentially great president turned out to be a shitty one at a disastrous time-probably comes down to one thing: the untimely death of Ted Kennedy. Forget, if you like, that Ted got Obama the Democratic nomination. Studies and surveys invariably demonstrate that liberal Americans are the most educated voting bloc on the planet. That is, it must be said, not necessarily the same thing as the smartest or most politically savvy, or the best people. But when Hillary Clinton turned the tide in the primaries Ted stepped in-remember the great footage of Ted and Caroline and Obama?-and it was tough but good sailing from there.
Ted Kennedy was a giant, in my opinion the greatest Senator in the history of the United States of America, and that's (mostly) a very proud and resplendent history. He was someone who could not be ignored, or ignored at your utter peril. By the end Ted had become the physical incarnation of the voice of working Americans, unions, the poor and the dispossessed.
I do not believe that Senator Kennedy would have berated the president, publicly. Partly because that wasn't his style, but more because it wouldn't have been necessary. Can you imagine the exchange of words when Obama wobbled (and eventually folded) on universal healthcare? Ted would have offered to kick his fucking ass across his brother's desk!!, and the fold wouldn't have happened. On abandoning the "Big Idea" Candidate Obama had on the shift to Green energy? Ted would have pointed out that technology invariably causes the loss of jobs, oil regimes are more despotic than democratic, and so the right thing to do is create them where you need them.
Ted Kennedy understood the big picture, and got toughest on the big points. Obama's failure is that he does not.
2 September 2011
http://autos.yahoo.com/news/cheney-opposed-gm-bailout.html
This is interesting. The self-proclaimed hero of the American working class (and who clearly belongs in prison for war crimes), has just written a "memoir" in which anyone else ever mentioned is screaming "libel!"…was also willing/eager/enthusiastic-to sell out American jobs. Doesn't surprise me, actually it's exactly what I said at the time.. It can not be over-emphasized that the Reagan, Bushes, Clinton and now Obama administrations have not been battling on behalf of the American worker, but instead on behalf of a global economy that is served by the American economy. The beneficiary: Corporato.
I remember when Dick Cheney was the darling of the right. (actually, I remember a decade or two before that when I first saw him on PBS and thought he was the dumbest, biggest lunatic ever voted into the senate-shame on you, Wyoming, SHAME!)…I guess I shouldn't have been laughing.
So here's the same dumb clod who convinced W. not to worry about weapons of mass destruction or anything else in the way of our taking control of Iraqi oil, trading out American jobs on the side. WOW! He must be somebody's hero [Corporato, but only until people start to get what happened]. Particularly the way he responded to 9/ll….going underground-miles underground, literally-for literally months, no doubt hoping that something awful would happen to W., and he could "assume control" (in the phraseology of Alexander Haig).
Do you have any idea, the lunatics that are running the United States of America?, and have since at least 1980? Do you have any idea how lucky we've been that the peripheral lunatics like Cheney haven't taken control? How long can our luck run? I mean, really, Cheney makes Obama look...almost good.
http://news.yahoo.com/dems-want-obamas-job-speech-contrast-gop-220214826.html
I saw the headline that some (only some?!!!) Democrats were finally sick and tired of President Obama "compromising" (really, it's looked more like surrender as a first response, to me) with Republicans...and for a fleeting moment there was hope. Yes, after selling out universal healthcare, and forgetting the "big idea" of making the absolutely necessary and fundamental (and job creating!) shift from death oil to renewable energy...at least finally something had pissed off Beltway Democrats, yeah! Yea!!! yea...
But too soon. It turns out that they're mainly upset that he changed a speech date to suit Republicans. Oh, fuck you all! I'm sure it will be a wonderful speech for anyone who bothers to listen to it, but the problem with this presidency is not what the president says (nearly always great), or when he says it (who cares), but instead what he does, and doesn't do.
http://news.yahoo.com/wall-street-cash-shifts-romney-obama-200949045.html
http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/civil-war-tea-party-group-invites-romney-speak-201044591.html
http://www.theatlanticwire.com/politics/2011/09/bachmann-blowing-new-hampshire/41988/
But he's going to be re-elected, unless he's challenged from the left (which would also open up things for the Tea Party candidate, and is the only thing that could do so-in fact if there's anyone sophisticated enough on the right to think of it-an open question--they're spending 24/7 recruiting a liberal stalking horse, and I'm not talking Seinfeld or Daryl Hannah [though I'd probably vote for either of them in this mess..].).
Bachmann's crazy blowing off New Hampshire. She has neither the staff nor organization to regain momentum after a major drubbing, and the powers that be have moved the primaries closer together after Gary Hart damn near won '84, so you can't build on the run like Bobby Kennedy did in '68.
Corporato has finally come to understand that Mitt Romney won't work, and their alternatives have proven even less inspiring (Pawlenty) or even more embarrassing (Perry). There is a very strong chance that Ron Paul will emerge from Iowa/New Hampshire with more momentum and delegates than anyone. At which point the corporate media will-without question-engage in political assassination. It won't be pretty but-given the company he's kept-not entirely undeserved. The loyalists will remain and he will likely enter the convention with a lot of delegates, but he's no more electable than Barney Frank or Bernie Sanders (either of whom I'd gladly vote for, in this mess).
The great irony-and I believe that this can be blamed on President Clinton-is that Corporato now finds it easier to take over the Democratic Party (the party of the Kennedys and Hart and Tip O'Neill and Jerry Brown) than the Republicans (who they've owned since Nixon). Bad news for the Democrats because they now mean little to nothing (beyond abortion, a catastrophic problem for Ron Paul-an individual rights candidate against choice?), and only slightly worse news for the Republicans, because they're gonna lose.
http://news.yahoo.com/u-sue-big-banks-over-mortgage-securities-report-031719348.html
'bout fucking time, but it's a paper tiger until we get convictions. And it's a media game if it boils down to "damages" that are less than the bailouts. And it's business as usual unless they throw some criminals in jail, which these lawsuits are postured not to do.
On Autumn
I used to hate the change of seasons. When I was a kid, in Germany, it was the end of everything good…baseball, instead it was the start of school and cold weather. I couldn't stand cold weather. Of course when we moved to Cuba there wasn't much of a change, and to this day that strikes me as the best weather I ever lived in. Louisiana gets colder-even snowed once, and I strode barefoot through the Quadrangle at LSU just because everyone wondered whether I would-California has a definite change of seasons…I lived in the Haight District of San Francisco for a little over a week and planned on living there forever, but when the fog blew in off the bay (in mid August!) and I wished I had my ski coat I moved a few hundred miles back south to O.B. by the end of the week, where my ski coat was.
In Oregon, I didn't always dislike the rain but hated the gloom (we happened to live in the McKenzie River Valley during the historic winter of '93 where you, literally, didn't see the sun for like 48 days), the great snows on Orcas were cool (I'll never forget, during the state of emergency…spending seven hours digging out our wood from under ten feet of snow, Hawkwind and Parliament blasting from the boom box I'd brought outside) sometimes, but I'm just a sunny kind of guy. But I knew, after 1993, that I had to be, as my all-time favorite doctor assured me-with me listening, unbelieving, refusing-that I had to be "one of those guys who hang out in the shade at the Fourth of July picnic" from now on.
So great weather mainly makes me jealous. Jealous of the guys who wander around with their shirts off, jealous of my daughters in sundresses, jealous of Theresa who tans in minutes due to her Indian blood (I have some too, we're Indians!). [ of course, I have a little bit of everything; a lot of Scots and British, quite a bit of Irish; no small measure of Nederlander, French, German and Italian…and a black guy whose' genes aren't as apparent in my physical incarnation, though I love to imagine that's where I get my sense of rhythm … I know George Clinton would rightly say I didn't get quite enough ]
Exeter's a fine place for me to live, we have little enough great weather on the British Riviera. But I do stop and stand in it once and awhile, for a few minutes. It's incredible, it's glorious…I follow skin-cell research with more interest-and certainly more passion-than most dermatologists…they're learning to hit back, but the possibility of my relocating to the Caribbean and living in open Hawaiian shirts (!! the dream ) is years, maybe decades, away.
And so, somehow, I've learned to actually enjoy the change of seasons. No more jealousy is a small part of it (self-centered, oh my goodness!), but it's more that I've come to appreciate the things that irritated me before. Changing leaves, the incredible lighting in the mornings and such, particularly the way it angles in when Theresa and I have our morning smoke in the van; the general cool, sense of autumnal contentment…I'm still not totally into it, but I've come more to appreciate the clothes that keep me warm than resent them.
Then there's the sports thing that's been central since the age of nine (with the exception of a few years where I was too cool to follow even baseball). Autumn used to mean (American) football, which was then an acceptable replacement for baseball and tennis. I used to win money betting on the thing, it's not so hard--a flex defense does shit against someone who can throw like Dan Marino--but I've entirely lost interest in football, and somewhat in tennis…baseball is where all of my sports attention goes these days. So when the box scores stop showing up….I work more. I spend my summers writing some stuff…stuff I can't help write…on my ongoing novel…and hanging out with my family, and doing baseball, and setting up my work to write in the fall. So now….Theresa went back to school on Wednesday, everyone else next week…that's here. And it's ready. I think I'm about to bust a literary move, actually that's one of the safer bets in the universe.
Even when I was single in Ocean Beach and averaging at least 20 parties a week I always-not on purpose, just naturally-took a few hours a day to myself. The autumn schedule regiments that. People like me and Laural stay at home, everyone else goes off somewhere to teach or learn or-in the event of Amelia's science class-try to fill in enough blanks to not to fail, and not get suspended for incendiary behaviour in the process.
So, I'm not saying that I welcome the oncoming autumn…I don't particularly, but it's not the disaster that it once was. I can't wait to figure out how I…
It's all a Blessing, man. Everyone knows that, only the suicides are side-tracked or confused. Every moment, every blush of cooler air, every cloud, every moment every awkwardly placed adjective, every possibility defined by motion, every time we take a moment or take a chance, every time we're willing to go on. It's all incremental, all relative, all not that big of a deal but part of a big deal…whether the sun shines straight on us or whether we work ever harder in its shadow.
Imagine…no experience …cold weather, open windows, and Blue Oyster Cult's "Astronomy" blasting so loud that your neighbors have no choice but to complain. (mine don't, they know better, but that's several other stories...you'll see, complaining neighbors can be fun)
http://news.yahoo.com/pentagon-under-fire-over-war-contracts-020229247.html
http://news.yahoo.com/panel-widespread-waste-fraud-war-spending-053533054.html
Ah, now there's a shock, particularly to those of us who have been screaming about Pentagon waste and abuse for decades….I bet that they'll turn good now, though, don't worry or pay attention…also, don't worry about where the money going to Iraq, Afghanistan or Libya is really going [Corporato], I'm sure it's all fine…
http://news.yahoo.com/hiv-case-causes-la-porn-industry-shutdown-213600946.html
This is terrible, but inevitable. I remember reading an interview with Slash in the late '80s, where he said that he expected to die from LA-metal AIDS, because "we're all fuckin' the same chicks."
http://uk.tv.yahoo.com/blog/article/462742/where-are-the-teletubbies-now.html
The Teletubbies are a terrible show, none of my children ever watched them. I watch them more. I used to watch them when I had the flu or had hangovers (I don't have hangovers anymore); for that they're perfect. They spend half the show saying "hello," then there's like 42 seconds of plot and drama, then they spend the rest of the show saying "bye, bye."
Bye, bye.
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