The trial was over and the only question remaining was if the scoundrel deserved the death penalty.
"Fry him," an editorialist advised, and won a journalism award.
It's the American way of death. Vengeance is ours, saith Amerika, and sometimes the blood lust runs a bit hotter than usual.
This is one of those times.
What else to expect when you have a president who, hoping to prove that he can be even more bad-ass macho than his predecessor, anointed himself with the authority to order the assassination of American citizens without judicial process?
Each time WikiLeaks turns over a new batch of real documents verifying what many of us already suspected about United States policy that frequently amounts to criminality and worse, the "fry him" chorus grows louder. The antecedent of "him" being Julian Assange, an Australian who created the website called WikiLeaks, and various individuals who in some way or other abetted his acquisition of the materials.
Aside from its barbarism, the blood lust is bizarre because United States laws defining treason apply only to United States citizens, which Assange is not. But that's a quibble the fry-him crowd ignores.
The previous batch of WikiLeaks documents, released in October, prompted the eminent moralist, Jonah Goldberg of National Reivew, to wonder publicly why Assange was still alive. Surely some patriotic Amerikan should have assassinated him long ago.
Bing West renewed the Journal's blood lust after the latest WikiLeaks dump, this time of diplomatic cables. "Whoever provided the material to WikiLeaks should be prosecuted under the death sentence, regardless of his of her alleged motivations or mental worries," West wrote. I haven't completely deciphered the code in that last clause, but the main message is clear. Fry them.
My favorite voice in the killer choir is Machine-Gun Mama Palin, former governor of Alaska. We should go after Assange, she says, with "the same urgency" we pursue al Qaeda.
The truth really hurts these people. Or perhaps it's just a sort of menopausal bitch by a woman who misses her favorite perk as governor: gunning down wolves from helicopters, then posing with their bloody carcasses. Because of the crop of the photograph, it's hard to tell for sure if the bright-eyed glint in her eye is post-orgasmic.
The chorus is also eager to hang or fry or otherwise terminate a 19-year-old Somali student who is a naturalized citizen and was set up as a terrorist by the FBI in a monumentally clumsy sting operation on the West Coast.
"Shooting's too good for him," a Tea Tweeter twitted. By "good" I presume the twitterer meant "humane." Indeed, another Foxie, Mike Huckabee, don't want no humane justice in his Amerika. "Anything less than execution is too kind a penalty," he told an interviewer.
Don't put away the knitting needles just yet, Ladies. Dr. Guillotine assures us that his device can be made less humane simply by letting the blade rust and go blunt.
Laissez le bon temps rouler! Que leurs têtes rouler!
Or, as the journalist Jimmy Breslin once wrote, "Some guys can't stand the sight of no blood."
"Don't tell Momma I'm a journalist; say I play the piano in a whorehouse."
Tuesday, November 30, 2010
Monday, November 29, 2010
Look Who's Back from the Dead, and Making Magic Again
All's well with the world -- somewhere.
Somewhere flags are flying, and somewhere children smile; life's worth living somewhere, and somewhere toil's worthwhile.
For a few brief shining moments Sunday, somewhere was London and what was well was tennis.
On the banks of the Thames, in a big muffin of a building punctured with toothpicks to see if it was done, they staged a world championship of significant sorts, a round-robin shoot-out among the ten best players on the planet to see who'd be the last man standing at the end of the year.
Appropriately, the No. 1 ranked player in the world stood on one side of the court. His name is Rafael Nadal and at 24, he's as boyish and naively charming as he was when, at 19 and wearing knickers, he first burst on the scene beating men many years his senior and supposedly many points his better.
Even more appropriately, the man on the other side of the court was named Roger Federer, and this was the real Roger Federer, the man whose grace and gifts had transformed tennis from sport to art form. This was not the shabby impostor who had sunk to No. 3 in the world during a dismal 2010. Some angel, it turned out, had rolled back the stone sealing his crypt and from it had emerged, after the U.S. Open, the man who floated like a butterfly, stung like a bee and did things on the tennis court that no man had done before him. These things included winning more Grand Slam championships than anyone and doing so while pulling off on the fly shots so improbable that neither names for nor descriptions of them existed.
In a tense, important Grand Slam match against a Top Five opponent, he ran back for a lob so deep that not even the world's fastest human, Usain Bolt, would have tried to run it down. Federer not only got there, but hit a shot back between his legs. A shot that not only cleared the net, but did so with enough pace, spin and accuracy to score a clean winner. He did this in a tense, important Grand Slam match not once, but twice -- in successive years.
Once I watched him practicing on a side court at Indian Wells, CA. He was playing points against a favorite practice partner, Gustavo Kuerten, himself once one of the top three players in the game. Kuerten, still no slouch, ran down a penetrating Federer approach shot to the backhand corner and launched a good defensive lob. At what seemed like the last second, Federer decided to try something I had never seen before, and have not seen since, which I can only describe as an overhead drop shot. Rather than kicking into the stratosphere, as most good overheads do, this one struck the court and died a quiet but brilliant death. Neither Kuerten, nor Maria Sharapova, who was waiting to take the court next, nor any member of her entourage, nor any of Federer's, nor any of the tennis aficianados watching, nor I, had ever seen anything like it. Shouts of amazement ensued, catcalls at the audacity of this unheard-of trick, challenges that not even Federer could repeat such a phenomenon. Roger called upon Kuerten to serve him another lob, whereupon Federer hit exactly the same shot with exactly the same result.
Early on in London, though he never lost a set, one could not be certain if one were watching an impostor -- albeit a very, very good impersonator -- or the real Roger. In one match he was winning points launched by 88 mph first serves, causing his opponent to break several racquets in frustration, but suggesting either an impersonator or a refabricated Federer who used wile and spin rather than matchless skill.
Turns out it was the real Roger, but one with wile and spin and tricks the younger Super Roger may or may not have had, but never needed. Like the drop overhead.
The real Roger won the championship match, 6-3, 3-6, 6-1, granting the world's best player a glimmer of hope in the second set, then slamming the door with forehand winners, backhand winners, Edburgian volleys and Samprasian serves -- the kind of performance that only the maestro of the most complete game in tennis history could have mustered. Once, after breaking to win the second set, Nadal would have attacked Federer's backhand with massive topspin forehand drives until Roger's weaker stroke broke down. Nadal chose exactly that strategy again Sunday. Federer met the nuclear energy of Nadal's attack with topspin backhands even stronger than the missiles Nadal launched against him.
"This," the rueful and ever classy Nadal said afterward, "was Federer at his best on his favorite surface. Not much you can do against that, no?"
No. The ruling young monarch of tennis was only second best this day. The once and possibly future king has made it a rivalry again.
We need them both. Each is magnificent in his own way. Nadal's youth and raw power. Federer's grace and mastery of every nuance. Both of them gracious and charming in victory or defeat.
And oh, such tennis. Such wonderful, wonderful tennis.
Welcome back, Roger.
"I cannot have spoiled Rafa's vacation today, " Federer said when accepting his trophy. "He has had a year most players only dream about."
One more very important tournament fast approaches: the first Grand Slam of 2011, the Australian Open.
Bring it on.
Somewhere flags are flying, and somewhere children smile; life's worth living somewhere, and somewhere toil's worthwhile.
For a few brief shining moments Sunday, somewhere was London and what was well was tennis.
On the banks of the Thames, in a big muffin of a building punctured with toothpicks to see if it was done, they staged a world championship of significant sorts, a round-robin shoot-out among the ten best players on the planet to see who'd be the last man standing at the end of the year.
Appropriately, the No. 1 ranked player in the world stood on one side of the court. His name is Rafael Nadal and at 24, he's as boyish and naively charming as he was when, at 19 and wearing knickers, he first burst on the scene beating men many years his senior and supposedly many points his better.
Even more appropriately, the man on the other side of the court was named Roger Federer, and this was the real Roger Federer, the man whose grace and gifts had transformed tennis from sport to art form. This was not the shabby impostor who had sunk to No. 3 in the world during a dismal 2010. Some angel, it turned out, had rolled back the stone sealing his crypt and from it had emerged, after the U.S. Open, the man who floated like a butterfly, stung like a bee and did things on the tennis court that no man had done before him. These things included winning more Grand Slam championships than anyone and doing so while pulling off on the fly shots so improbable that neither names for nor descriptions of them existed.
In a tense, important Grand Slam match against a Top Five opponent, he ran back for a lob so deep that not even the world's fastest human, Usain Bolt, would have tried to run it down. Federer not only got there, but hit a shot back between his legs. A shot that not only cleared the net, but did so with enough pace, spin and accuracy to score a clean winner. He did this in a tense, important Grand Slam match not once, but twice -- in successive years.
Once I watched him practicing on a side court at Indian Wells, CA. He was playing points against a favorite practice partner, Gustavo Kuerten, himself once one of the top three players in the game. Kuerten, still no slouch, ran down a penetrating Federer approach shot to the backhand corner and launched a good defensive lob. At what seemed like the last second, Federer decided to try something I had never seen before, and have not seen since, which I can only describe as an overhead drop shot. Rather than kicking into the stratosphere, as most good overheads do, this one struck the court and died a quiet but brilliant death. Neither Kuerten, nor Maria Sharapova, who was waiting to take the court next, nor any member of her entourage, nor any of Federer's, nor any of the tennis aficianados watching, nor I, had ever seen anything like it. Shouts of amazement ensued, catcalls at the audacity of this unheard-of trick, challenges that not even Federer could repeat such a phenomenon. Roger called upon Kuerten to serve him another lob, whereupon Federer hit exactly the same shot with exactly the same result.
Early on in London, though he never lost a set, one could not be certain if one were watching an impostor -- albeit a very, very good impersonator -- or the real Roger. In one match he was winning points launched by 88 mph first serves, causing his opponent to break several racquets in frustration, but suggesting either an impersonator or a refabricated Federer who used wile and spin rather than matchless skill.
Turns out it was the real Roger, but one with wile and spin and tricks the younger Super Roger may or may not have had, but never needed. Like the drop overhead.
The real Roger won the championship match, 6-3, 3-6, 6-1, granting the world's best player a glimmer of hope in the second set, then slamming the door with forehand winners, backhand winners, Edburgian volleys and Samprasian serves -- the kind of performance that only the maestro of the most complete game in tennis history could have mustered. Once, after breaking to win the second set, Nadal would have attacked Federer's backhand with massive topspin forehand drives until Roger's weaker stroke broke down. Nadal chose exactly that strategy again Sunday. Federer met the nuclear energy of Nadal's attack with topspin backhands even stronger than the missiles Nadal launched against him.
"This," the rueful and ever classy Nadal said afterward, "was Federer at his best on his favorite surface. Not much you can do against that, no?"
No. The ruling young monarch of tennis was only second best this day. The once and possibly future king has made it a rivalry again.
We need them both. Each is magnificent in his own way. Nadal's youth and raw power. Federer's grace and mastery of every nuance. Both of them gracious and charming in victory or defeat.
And oh, such tennis. Such wonderful, wonderful tennis.
Welcome back, Roger.
"I cannot have spoiled Rafa's vacation today, " Federer said when accepting his trophy. "He has had a year most players only dream about."
One more very important tournament fast approaches: the first Grand Slam of 2011, the Australian Open.
Bring it on.
Can We talk Turkey About Big Oil and Our Military?
A most pleasant holiday in the company of the journalist who covers Oil, Big and Small, for a major news organization set me to musing.
Is there such a thing as Small Oil?
Having proved his mettle as the journalist covering the industry that extracts methane gas from coal beds, our Thanksgiving guest had been recently immersed in learning how his new field works.
Fortunately, he didn't talk much shop over the turkey and stuffing. If he had, it would have been like having Stephen Hawking across the table talking quantum physics. A bit over my head.
I know, for example, that a barrel of crude today costs $82.34 US, down 21 cents from the day before. But that's about it until the stuff, having been refined into fuel for my old pick-up truck, reaches the local gas pump, where it costs $2.61 per US gallon. These things I understand even if they do involve numbers. Everything else is a mystery and involves other, bigger numbers; enormous numbers; staggering numbers. I do not handle big numbers well, which is one reason why I have never invited Stephen Hawking to dine with me on Thanksgiving Day.
My clumsy musings after our guest's occasional remarks about the Awl Bidness raised a plethora of questions.
The United States military is by far the world's largest consumer of petroleum. The largest by so far that if you stood on the flight deck of the USS George Washington in the Yalu Sea and looked toward the second biggest user, you'd need the Hubble telescope to see it as a speck in a nebula dwarfed by a black hole. U.S. military consumption of oil is a very big number indeed.
Now, if you consider that each barrel consumed by the U.S. military costs $82.34, and do the multiplication, the result is a number so large that. . . . oh, my, that what? I suppose if you transmogrified the dollars into inches and imagined a coil of rope that long, you could dangle it from the tops of all the peaks in the Himalayas and still have enough rope left over to dangle from the highest building in Texas, which happens to be where our journalist friend works.
What kind of contracts do they have for all that military oil? They must have contracts. The captain of the George Washington doesn't just park next to a pump off the coast of South Korea and fill 'er up. Somebody, probably in the Pentagon, has worked up a contract with somebody, probably in Texas, to determine how much of our tax money will be involved in filling up the aircraft carrier, and all the other things the military uses that run on gas, not to mention the oil to lubricate them and generate the energy that lights the Pentagon, and all sorts of other stuff.
What are all those contracts worth? Who, if anyone, oversees the guy who negotiates them? What relationship do they have, say, with the kind of money that Texicans like Tom DeLay launder? Does Texas have a secret laundering process that cleanses money without leaving it all soggy and yukky? Or is this all funny money, like derivatives and toxic assets and Monopoly? Sometimes in places where lots and lots of money is involved, some people are tempted to do things that are, well, you might say, a wee bit shady. Might that happen every now and then with military oil contracts? Just asking. Then there's the entire matter of our foreign policy and whether there's a sort of Tinker to Evers to Chance connection between, oh, pick one . . . launching wars in the Middle East and the quantity of oil our military uses. Just meandering, not even asking. Back to smaller matters and numbers I can deal with.
I have concluded that there is such a thing as Small Oil, but it's relative. Small Oil is the gas that I pump into my pick-up. I used to pump it from a place on Highway 28 near the Interstate. It was the highest-priced gas in town but it was convenient. Then a discount outfit moved in down the block and began selling gas 20 cents a gallon cheaper than my station. Now my station has the cheapest gas in town, always beating the price of the discount guy down the street by a penny.
The company that makes the gas for my station had profits -- profits, mind you, not sales -- of 600 million dollars last year, which is Small Oil. Big Oil doesn't even begin counting profits until they reach a billion or so. Yet my station didn't even flinch when it cranked down its prices to match the discount competitor's. What's 20 or 30 lousy pennies per gallon among friends?
If Small Oil has that much pricing leeway, and still makes a tidy profit (the CEO got a huge bonus last month), how much pricing leeway does Big Oil have? Exxon Mobil is, after all, the most profitable corporation in the history of profit. As certified patriots with Support Our Troops stickers on all their tanker trucks, does Big Oil knock 20 or 30 cents a gallon off the going price for their military customers? Probably not.
Oil contracts must be different from other military contracts. Buying three or four hundred Stealth airplanes that will be obsolete in 10 or 12 years is one thing. You can always recycle the scrap metal, or whatever they're made of. Sure, you get the occasional $1,000 hammer or $10,000 toilet seat but who, other than Russ Feingold, ever blinked an eye? Small spuds, bud.
But when you talk about the biggest consumer of petroleum products on the whole bloody planet, and you're talking about $82.34 per barrel at the wellhead, you are talking serious money.
How serious? Maybe our journalist friend will explain it next Thanksgiving. Or the one after.
Is there such a thing as Small Oil?
Having proved his mettle as the journalist covering the industry that extracts methane gas from coal beds, our Thanksgiving guest had been recently immersed in learning how his new field works.
Fortunately, he didn't talk much shop over the turkey and stuffing. If he had, it would have been like having Stephen Hawking across the table talking quantum physics. A bit over my head.
I know, for example, that a barrel of crude today costs $82.34 US, down 21 cents from the day before. But that's about it until the stuff, having been refined into fuel for my old pick-up truck, reaches the local gas pump, where it costs $2.61 per US gallon. These things I understand even if they do involve numbers. Everything else is a mystery and involves other, bigger numbers; enormous numbers; staggering numbers. I do not handle big numbers well, which is one reason why I have never invited Stephen Hawking to dine with me on Thanksgiving Day.
My clumsy musings after our guest's occasional remarks about the Awl Bidness raised a plethora of questions.
The United States military is by far the world's largest consumer of petroleum. The largest by so far that if you stood on the flight deck of the USS George Washington in the Yalu Sea and looked toward the second biggest user, you'd need the Hubble telescope to see it as a speck in a nebula dwarfed by a black hole. U.S. military consumption of oil is a very big number indeed.
Now, if you consider that each barrel consumed by the U.S. military costs $82.34, and do the multiplication, the result is a number so large that. . . . oh, my, that what? I suppose if you transmogrified the dollars into inches and imagined a coil of rope that long, you could dangle it from the tops of all the peaks in the Himalayas and still have enough rope left over to dangle from the highest building in Texas, which happens to be where our journalist friend works.
What kind of contracts do they have for all that military oil? They must have contracts. The captain of the George Washington doesn't just park next to a pump off the coast of South Korea and fill 'er up. Somebody, probably in the Pentagon, has worked up a contract with somebody, probably in Texas, to determine how much of our tax money will be involved in filling up the aircraft carrier, and all the other things the military uses that run on gas, not to mention the oil to lubricate them and generate the energy that lights the Pentagon, and all sorts of other stuff.
What are all those contracts worth? Who, if anyone, oversees the guy who negotiates them? What relationship do they have, say, with the kind of money that Texicans like Tom DeLay launder? Does Texas have a secret laundering process that cleanses money without leaving it all soggy and yukky? Or is this all funny money, like derivatives and toxic assets and Monopoly? Sometimes in places where lots and lots of money is involved, some people are tempted to do things that are, well, you might say, a wee bit shady. Might that happen every now and then with military oil contracts? Just asking. Then there's the entire matter of our foreign policy and whether there's a sort of Tinker to Evers to Chance connection between, oh, pick one . . . launching wars in the Middle East and the quantity of oil our military uses. Just meandering, not even asking. Back to smaller matters and numbers I can deal with.
I have concluded that there is such a thing as Small Oil, but it's relative. Small Oil is the gas that I pump into my pick-up. I used to pump it from a place on Highway 28 near the Interstate. It was the highest-priced gas in town but it was convenient. Then a discount outfit moved in down the block and began selling gas 20 cents a gallon cheaper than my station. Now my station has the cheapest gas in town, always beating the price of the discount guy down the street by a penny.
The company that makes the gas for my station had profits -- profits, mind you, not sales -- of 600 million dollars last year, which is Small Oil. Big Oil doesn't even begin counting profits until they reach a billion or so. Yet my station didn't even flinch when it cranked down its prices to match the discount competitor's. What's 20 or 30 lousy pennies per gallon among friends?
If Small Oil has that much pricing leeway, and still makes a tidy profit (the CEO got a huge bonus last month), how much pricing leeway does Big Oil have? Exxon Mobil is, after all, the most profitable corporation in the history of profit. As certified patriots with Support Our Troops stickers on all their tanker trucks, does Big Oil knock 20 or 30 cents a gallon off the going price for their military customers? Probably not.
Oil contracts must be different from other military contracts. Buying three or four hundred Stealth airplanes that will be obsolete in 10 or 12 years is one thing. You can always recycle the scrap metal, or whatever they're made of. Sure, you get the occasional $1,000 hammer or $10,000 toilet seat but who, other than Russ Feingold, ever blinked an eye? Small spuds, bud.
But when you talk about the biggest consumer of petroleum products on the whole bloody planet, and you're talking about $82.34 per barrel at the wellhead, you are talking serious money.
How serious? Maybe our journalist friend will explain it next Thanksgiving. Or the one after.
Sunday, November 28, 2010
Wherein Dwells the Last Smidgeon of Hope for America
Hope springs eternal. Could 2011 be "our" year? I feel like a fan of the old Brooklyn Dodgers, who could reach the World Series but not win it. "Wait Till Next Year" was a headline the Brooklyn Eagle published every October.
Now we have an historic opportunity to end the two-party system that has failed us so miserably. Not only should we form a true party of the left in the United States, but our liberal class should rally around its perfect choice to run for president: Russ Feingold of Wisconsin. Russ, like millions of other Americans, needs a job and he's a perfect fit for the one in the Oval Office.
The only non-millionaire in the U.S. Senate lost his seat in the craziness that we called the mid-term elections. The only potential Presidential candidate since John F. Kennedy who can't be bought, Feingold has the experience, integrity and temperament not just to be President, but to to be very good at it. When Kennedy stoked up his Presidential ambitions, he was so rich in his own right that no outside interest could afford to try to buy him. Feingold, like Guernica, simply isn't for sale. Don't even bother trying. Not that anyone would. The richest, the most powerful, the most greedy among us are already devoted to bringing down Barrack Obama. No serious money will go to any other cause. Under the two-party system, all those dollars mean that the Republican nominee will be elected in 2012, even if the Republican nominee is someone as spectacularly ignorant, arrogant and unqualified as Sarah What's-Her-Name, the machine-gun Mama, wolf-killer and Murdoch-made TV star.
And so the last, best hope for reviving democracy in America is to form a third party now, nominate Russ Feingold and then put together something nationwide that clones what Russ did on his first Senate run. He had no money. He wasn't for sale to raise any. So he walked all over the state of Wisconsin knocking on doors and introducing himself to real voters. If they elected him, he told them, he would be beholden only to their best interests. Sometimes, like a parent, he would he would have to give them medicine that didn't taste very good, but it would always be in their best interests. Always. Alas, after the planes flew into the twin towers, Americans lost all sense of decency, logic and fairness. They stopped swallowing Russ's good medicine that tasted bad and booted his ass out of Washington.
Perhaps Wisconsin's loss will be the country's gain. Perhaps a handful of wealthy progressives like George Soros will put up the seed money to create a new political party, then bow out and turn it over to real people to build upon, doorbell by doorbell and penny by penny. Perhaps all those little people, real citizens who unlike most of their fellow Murkins have retained the capacity to think, folks who realize that it's not the taste of the medicine but its healing powers that matter, individual and marginalized and near terminal frustration with their impotence against corporate wealth and greed, the jobless, the millions still without health care, the recent graduates staggering under a load of student debt and the flesh-pecking of decadent lenders, the once middle-class workers whose homes have been plunged into foreclosure by the very bankers who ruined the economy, betrayed by both political parties and weeping with no one to hear, cynics now who once believed in something called The American Dream, bled dry and impoverished by endless war that endangers them rather than making them safer, aggrieved and angry with no one to tell their stories to, homeless, helpless. . .
Perhaps these millions of little people will decide not to take it any more, to join the doorbell-ringers for Russ, to squeeze nickels and dimes out of already thin budgets for food and medicine and essentials, add them to the pennies in the treasury of the new party of the left, and stage one last desperate populist movement to save American democracy.
Perhaps.
I tried the other day, in vain, to remember where I first saw the Zen-like slogan whose perspicacious ambivalence I have treasured for more than half a century. "There is no solution," it said. "Seek it lovingly."
Now I remember. It was on a bumper sticker. In Wisconsin.
Now we have an historic opportunity to end the two-party system that has failed us so miserably. Not only should we form a true party of the left in the United States, but our liberal class should rally around its perfect choice to run for president: Russ Feingold of Wisconsin. Russ, like millions of other Americans, needs a job and he's a perfect fit for the one in the Oval Office.
The only non-millionaire in the U.S. Senate lost his seat in the craziness that we called the mid-term elections. The only potential Presidential candidate since John F. Kennedy who can't be bought, Feingold has the experience, integrity and temperament not just to be President, but to to be very good at it. When Kennedy stoked up his Presidential ambitions, he was so rich in his own right that no outside interest could afford to try to buy him. Feingold, like Guernica, simply isn't for sale. Don't even bother trying. Not that anyone would. The richest, the most powerful, the most greedy among us are already devoted to bringing down Barrack Obama. No serious money will go to any other cause. Under the two-party system, all those dollars mean that the Republican nominee will be elected in 2012, even if the Republican nominee is someone as spectacularly ignorant, arrogant and unqualified as Sarah What's-Her-Name, the machine-gun Mama, wolf-killer and Murdoch-made TV star.
And so the last, best hope for reviving democracy in America is to form a third party now, nominate Russ Feingold and then put together something nationwide that clones what Russ did on his first Senate run. He had no money. He wasn't for sale to raise any. So he walked all over the state of Wisconsin knocking on doors and introducing himself to real voters. If they elected him, he told them, he would be beholden only to their best interests. Sometimes, like a parent, he would he would have to give them medicine that didn't taste very good, but it would always be in their best interests. Always. Alas, after the planes flew into the twin towers, Americans lost all sense of decency, logic and fairness. They stopped swallowing Russ's good medicine that tasted bad and booted his ass out of Washington.
Perhaps Wisconsin's loss will be the country's gain. Perhaps a handful of wealthy progressives like George Soros will put up the seed money to create a new political party, then bow out and turn it over to real people to build upon, doorbell by doorbell and penny by penny. Perhaps all those little people, real citizens who unlike most of their fellow Murkins have retained the capacity to think, folks who realize that it's not the taste of the medicine but its healing powers that matter, individual and marginalized and near terminal frustration with their impotence against corporate wealth and greed, the jobless, the millions still without health care, the recent graduates staggering under a load of student debt and the flesh-pecking of decadent lenders, the once middle-class workers whose homes have been plunged into foreclosure by the very bankers who ruined the economy, betrayed by both political parties and weeping with no one to hear, cynics now who once believed in something called The American Dream, bled dry and impoverished by endless war that endangers them rather than making them safer, aggrieved and angry with no one to tell their stories to, homeless, helpless. . .
Perhaps these millions of little people will decide not to take it any more, to join the doorbell-ringers for Russ, to squeeze nickels and dimes out of already thin budgets for food and medicine and essentials, add them to the pennies in the treasury of the new party of the left, and stage one last desperate populist movement to save American democracy.
Perhaps.
I tried the other day, in vain, to remember where I first saw the Zen-like slogan whose perspicacious ambivalence I have treasured for more than half a century. "There is no solution," it said. "Seek it lovingly."
Now I remember. It was on a bumper sticker. In Wisconsin.
Friday, November 19, 2010
Why Ol' Doc Randall Is Suing Janet Napolitano
Cousin Lige hadn't been out of Haysi in 15 years, nor out of sight of Big A mountain in more than 40.
You could wait another 40 and hitch up wild horses and you still couldn't drag Lige back into the outside world again. Lige gets the hives when he's greatly agitated and Doc Randall says the current case is the worst Lige has ever had.
Blame Cousin Rhett, whose idea it was to haul Lige to the airport to fly out to California for Cousin Henry's funeral. Lige and Henry were best friends growing up together over on Skillet Branch. Which is the only reason Lige would even consider getting into an airplane, since his favorite form of transportation is Grandpa''s old haywagon with his grand-niece, Bethandra, driving the team and Lige consoling himself in the back from a Ball jar of "recipe."
But I digress.
"He's your best friend, Lige!" Rhett said over and over again on the way to the airport. Lige grumbled a lot at first, but finally clammed up and settled for silent sulking. When they entered the terminal the first sign of hives showed up on his left forearm. ""What the dam' hell is all these folks lined up fer?" he demanded. "They givin' away free chickens up there?"
"They're lined up for the security check, Lige," Rhett said soothingly. "Gonna make sure your airplane is safe from tare-ists." Since Lige has no photo ID per se, Rhett had arranged for Sheriff Prosper to use his brand-new pre-owned Xerox machine to create a letter bearing Lige's image and Pros's signed statement that the Lige pictured on it was the same Lige who wanted to fly to California for his cousin's funeral and please let him pass even if he don't have a driver's license for the good and simple reason that he don't drive. After only a brief hassle with the first security officer they encountered, Lige and Rhett were allowed to continue to the next step in the security procedure.
"Put yer satchel on that there movin' belt," Rhett said. "What fer?" Lige asked. "So's they can take a pitcher of it and make sure there's no tare-ist weapons in there." "Why don't they jist ast me?" Lige said. "I know dam' well what's in there and what ain't." "It's gummint rules," Rhett said. "My Great Grampaw fit with Warshington at Valley Forge!" Lige sputtered. "If the dam' gummint can't trust the word of a Sunderman, what the hell KIN they trust?"
A female security agent scuttled up to Lige with a little tray. "Please empty your pockets and place the contents on this tray along with your shoes," she said mechanically.
The hives busted out all over Lige's arms, face and neck. ""I'm going to a goldam' funeral," he barked, "and I ain't gonna dishonor Cousin Henry by goin' there barefoot. Besides, these costed $16 from the Sears catalogue and I ain't trustin' 'em to no damned stranger!"
The woman blew a whistle. Four male security agents, each of whom looked like a first-round draft choice for the Steelers' defensive line, appeared from nowhere. Soon they were joined by three soldiers armed with machine guns, hand guns, night scopes, day scopes, radar, hand grenades, walkie-talkies, riot masks and batons.
Turns out one of the soldiers was from Abington. "Let me handle this," he said, and helped Lige to his feet. "This-here stuff," he told Lige, in a conspiratorial tone of voice, "is sort of like the new rules about no guns in the tavern over to Clinchville." The soldier winked. "Gotta humor them if you wanna sip the 'shine. Now, let's see what's in them pockets."
Reluctantly, Lige emptied his pockets: 42 cents in coin, jacknife, sharpening stone, the key to the rusty gate at the family cemetery on Buck Mountain. . . .
"Oops," the soldier said, taking the knife. "They don't allow knives on airplanes no more, old-timer," he said. "Jes' like no guns in the tavern."
"What the Sam Hell am I gonna do on that airplane if I can't whittle?" Lige asked the soldier, but his voice lacked conviction. He knew they were outnumbered. "Take a long nap," the soldier advised.
"Good idee," Lige said. "Kin I git on the dam' airplane now?"
One of the security guys answered: "You still have to pass through the metal detector, have your security photograph taken. . ."
"Y'all just seen my pitcher on Sheriff Prosper's letter!" he bellowed. Meaning to be helpful, the Virginia soldier explained, "This here is a special picture, Old Timer. It shows you without clothes so they can be sure you ain't smuggling tare-ist weapons on board."
"BUCK FUCKIN' NEKKID!!" Lige screeched. "What kinda preeverts are you!" Now his hives had hives.
"Calm down," the soldier said. One of the security hulks spoke up. "If you don't want an x-ray picture, we can do a hand search." He grabbed Lige's crotch with his NFL-sized hand.
You could have heard Lige's scream all the way back in Haysi. "Get this goddam queer offen me," he bellowed, over and over again.
They set his bond at $10,000. Rhett finally met it by letting them hold the title to his brand-new Buick.
Doc Randall doubts he'll ever completely cure Lige's hives. Problem is, just about the time they start to clear up, somebody asks Lige about his airport experience.
"You know, Medicare don't cover this," Doc keeps reminding Lige. "Don't pester me about it," Lige comes back. "Pester them damned preeverts at the airport what started it."
You could wait another 40 and hitch up wild horses and you still couldn't drag Lige back into the outside world again. Lige gets the hives when he's greatly agitated and Doc Randall says the current case is the worst Lige has ever had.
Blame Cousin Rhett, whose idea it was to haul Lige to the airport to fly out to California for Cousin Henry's funeral. Lige and Henry were best friends growing up together over on Skillet Branch. Which is the only reason Lige would even consider getting into an airplane, since his favorite form of transportation is Grandpa''s old haywagon with his grand-niece, Bethandra, driving the team and Lige consoling himself in the back from a Ball jar of "recipe."
But I digress.
"He's your best friend, Lige!" Rhett said over and over again on the way to the airport. Lige grumbled a lot at first, but finally clammed up and settled for silent sulking. When they entered the terminal the first sign of hives showed up on his left forearm. ""What the dam' hell is all these folks lined up fer?" he demanded. "They givin' away free chickens up there?"
"They're lined up for the security check, Lige," Rhett said soothingly. "Gonna make sure your airplane is safe from tare-ists." Since Lige has no photo ID per se, Rhett had arranged for Sheriff Prosper to use his brand-new pre-owned Xerox machine to create a letter bearing Lige's image and Pros's signed statement that the Lige pictured on it was the same Lige who wanted to fly to California for his cousin's funeral and please let him pass even if he don't have a driver's license for the good and simple reason that he don't drive. After only a brief hassle with the first security officer they encountered, Lige and Rhett were allowed to continue to the next step in the security procedure.
"Put yer satchel on that there movin' belt," Rhett said. "What fer?" Lige asked. "So's they can take a pitcher of it and make sure there's no tare-ist weapons in there." "Why don't they jist ast me?" Lige said. "I know dam' well what's in there and what ain't." "It's gummint rules," Rhett said. "My Great Grampaw fit with Warshington at Valley Forge!" Lige sputtered. "If the dam' gummint can't trust the word of a Sunderman, what the hell KIN they trust?"
A female security agent scuttled up to Lige with a little tray. "Please empty your pockets and place the contents on this tray along with your shoes," she said mechanically.
The hives busted out all over Lige's arms, face and neck. ""I'm going to a goldam' funeral," he barked, "and I ain't gonna dishonor Cousin Henry by goin' there barefoot. Besides, these costed $16 from the Sears catalogue and I ain't trustin' 'em to no damned stranger!"
The woman blew a whistle. Four male security agents, each of whom looked like a first-round draft choice for the Steelers' defensive line, appeared from nowhere. Soon they were joined by three soldiers armed with machine guns, hand guns, night scopes, day scopes, radar, hand grenades, walkie-talkies, riot masks and batons.
Turns out one of the soldiers was from Abington. "Let me handle this," he said, and helped Lige to his feet. "This-here stuff," he told Lige, in a conspiratorial tone of voice, "is sort of like the new rules about no guns in the tavern over to Clinchville." The soldier winked. "Gotta humor them if you wanna sip the 'shine. Now, let's see what's in them pockets."
Reluctantly, Lige emptied his pockets: 42 cents in coin, jacknife, sharpening stone, the key to the rusty gate at the family cemetery on Buck Mountain. . . .
"Oops," the soldier said, taking the knife. "They don't allow knives on airplanes no more, old-timer," he said. "Jes' like no guns in the tavern."
"What the Sam Hell am I gonna do on that airplane if I can't whittle?" Lige asked the soldier, but his voice lacked conviction. He knew they were outnumbered. "Take a long nap," the soldier advised.
"Good idee," Lige said. "Kin I git on the dam' airplane now?"
One of the security guys answered: "You still have to pass through the metal detector, have your security photograph taken. . ."
"Y'all just seen my pitcher on Sheriff Prosper's letter!" he bellowed. Meaning to be helpful, the Virginia soldier explained, "This here is a special picture, Old Timer. It shows you without clothes so they can be sure you ain't smuggling tare-ist weapons on board."
"BUCK FUCKIN' NEKKID!!" Lige screeched. "What kinda preeverts are you!" Now his hives had hives.
"Calm down," the soldier said. One of the security hulks spoke up. "If you don't want an x-ray picture, we can do a hand search." He grabbed Lige's crotch with his NFL-sized hand.
You could have heard Lige's scream all the way back in Haysi. "Get this goddam queer offen me," he bellowed, over and over again.
They set his bond at $10,000. Rhett finally met it by letting them hold the title to his brand-new Buick.
Doc Randall doubts he'll ever completely cure Lige's hives. Problem is, just about the time they start to clear up, somebody asks Lige about his airport experience.
"You know, Medicare don't cover this," Doc keeps reminding Lige. "Don't pester me about it," Lige comes back. "Pester them damned preeverts at the airport what started it."
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
How the Democrats Killed Democracy
With the death of the political left in the United States, the death of democracy became inevitable. Democracy, after all, is not just a liberal idea, but a radically liberal one; it cannot endure absent a viable political left.
Twenty-five centuries ago, governments were by dynastic monarchies, shamanistic religious dictatorships or warlords. The Athenians came up with the radical liberal notion of government of, by and for its citizens. Even this revolutionary improvement on previous systems was not without flaw. When Rome succeeded Greece as the dominant power in the civilized world, it replaced direct democracy with another radical liberal concept: representative democracy.
Guided by the Enlightenment philosophers they so admired, the founders of the American democracy sought to establish a republic in which the spectrum of political thought could endure not just as a system of checks and balances upon themselves, but also one which inherently militated against the excesses of power that could plunge it into anarchy, oligarchy, monarchy or military dictatorship. It was a system that borrowed much from Rousseau's Social Contract, which itself can only function under a rule of law.
The two-party system that evolved within the republic of the founding fathers mandated a left, a right and a center of fluctuating but roughly equal strength. The balance of power would always lie with the center, but balance could exist only if both left and right remained viable.
But the Democratic party deserted its base on the left and the base failed to reassemble around a new political organization. (The fatal weakness of a two-party democracy.) Today, the dwindling handful of liberal Democrats holding public office are not merely powerless within their party; they are treated with contempt by their party and its man in the White House.
The man in the White house wears a different party label than his predecessor, but his presidency is merely a continuation of most of the worst of the far right policies of the Bush II administration.
When the Republican House of Representatives has finished with Dr. Kidglove and the Timidocrats of the Senate two years hence, perhaps even the American electorate will realize that the democratic republic of the Founding Fathers is no more, its Constitution reduced to the status of, say, the Oath of the Tennis Court.
The democratic rule of law began with the Athenian shift from law as something "imposed" --thesmoi -- to something rooted in the people's social traditions and ideals -- nomoi . It came to us through the Enlightenment via the Magna Carta and our mother country's system of common law. Talk about radical liberal documents! The Magna Carta, as Winston Churchill put it, gave us "a law which is above the King and which even he must not break."
In the United States, the framers passed on to us the idea of a "Supreme Law of the Land," which was above everyone -- President, Chief Justice, member of Congress. It brought us, directly from the Magna Carta, the supreme laws of habeas corpus, posse comitatus and, enshrined in the Fifth Amendment, due process.
But the Democrats of Congress, most of whom had long since abandoned the liberal principles of government in which our republic was born, ceded to George W. Bush powers that even the King of England doesn't have: superiority over the law itself. Now the president could order warrantless surveillance of citizens; detention without charge or trial (due process), and criminal torture of detainees. He could boast about it in print without fear of being brought to justice. His successor could take his imperial presidency to new extremes and arrogate to himself the right to order the extrajudicial assassination of American citizens.
Dr. Kidglove has, in the name of "compromise," extended many other violations of the Social Contract in both domestic and foreign affairs. He will permit continuation of tax policies that favor the very rich over the other 98 per cent of the citizenry. He will allow further corruption of an already bad "health care reform" law. He will preside over the devastation of Social Security, further empowerment of huge corporations and the elimination of only those "earmarks" that help people rather than business, supposedly to reduce the government's fiscal deficit. He will continue to fight the illegal wars that caused the deficit and will ask for more and more funds to fight them and more and more American toops to bleed and die in them.
He will do all of these things, and more, because there is no political left in the United States to contest him.
There is no democracy here.
Twenty-five centuries ago, governments were by dynastic monarchies, shamanistic religious dictatorships or warlords. The Athenians came up with the radical liberal notion of government of, by and for its citizens. Even this revolutionary improvement on previous systems was not without flaw. When Rome succeeded Greece as the dominant power in the civilized world, it replaced direct democracy with another radical liberal concept: representative democracy.
Guided by the Enlightenment philosophers they so admired, the founders of the American democracy sought to establish a republic in which the spectrum of political thought could endure not just as a system of checks and balances upon themselves, but also one which inherently militated against the excesses of power that could plunge it into anarchy, oligarchy, monarchy or military dictatorship. It was a system that borrowed much from Rousseau's Social Contract, which itself can only function under a rule of law.
The two-party system that evolved within the republic of the founding fathers mandated a left, a right and a center of fluctuating but roughly equal strength. The balance of power would always lie with the center, but balance could exist only if both left and right remained viable.
But the Democratic party deserted its base on the left and the base failed to reassemble around a new political organization. (The fatal weakness of a two-party democracy.) Today, the dwindling handful of liberal Democrats holding public office are not merely powerless within their party; they are treated with contempt by their party and its man in the White House.
The man in the White house wears a different party label than his predecessor, but his presidency is merely a continuation of most of the worst of the far right policies of the Bush II administration.
When the Republican House of Representatives has finished with Dr. Kidglove and the Timidocrats of the Senate two years hence, perhaps even the American electorate will realize that the democratic republic of the Founding Fathers is no more, its Constitution reduced to the status of, say, the Oath of the Tennis Court.
The democratic rule of law began with the Athenian shift from law as something "imposed" --thesmoi -- to something rooted in the people's social traditions and ideals -- nomoi . It came to us through the Enlightenment via the Magna Carta and our mother country's system of common law. Talk about radical liberal documents! The Magna Carta, as Winston Churchill put it, gave us "a law which is above the King and which even he must not break."
In the United States, the framers passed on to us the idea of a "Supreme Law of the Land," which was above everyone -- President, Chief Justice, member of Congress. It brought us, directly from the Magna Carta, the supreme laws of habeas corpus, posse comitatus and, enshrined in the Fifth Amendment, due process.
But the Democrats of Congress, most of whom had long since abandoned the liberal principles of government in which our republic was born, ceded to George W. Bush powers that even the King of England doesn't have: superiority over the law itself. Now the president could order warrantless surveillance of citizens; detention without charge or trial (due process), and criminal torture of detainees. He could boast about it in print without fear of being brought to justice. His successor could take his imperial presidency to new extremes and arrogate to himself the right to order the extrajudicial assassination of American citizens.
Dr. Kidglove has, in the name of "compromise," extended many other violations of the Social Contract in both domestic and foreign affairs. He will permit continuation of tax policies that favor the very rich over the other 98 per cent of the citizenry. He will allow further corruption of an already bad "health care reform" law. He will preside over the devastation of Social Security, further empowerment of huge corporations and the elimination of only those "earmarks" that help people rather than business, supposedly to reduce the government's fiscal deficit. He will continue to fight the illegal wars that caused the deficit and will ask for more and more funds to fight them and more and more American toops to bleed and die in them.
He will do all of these things, and more, because there is no political left in the United States to contest him.
There is no democracy here.
Sunday, November 14, 2010
Iowa, Apple Pie, Heroism and a Book of Lies
George W. Bush is making the rounds of talk shows peddling his book.
On Tuesday, Bush's successor will place the Congressional Medal of Honor around the neck of Sgt. Salvatore Giunta, the first living American to receive the nation's highest award for valor since the Vietnam war.
What webs we weave.
As for Bush's book, I can only endorse a friend's suggestion that we all go into a local bookstore and move a copy or two from its display shelf to the place where it belongs -- the crime section.
I don't know Sgt. Giunta but I know his grandfather, Bob Judge. Someone had to coin the phrase "as American as apple pie" just to describe Bob Judge.
High school football hero, married a cheerleader. Worked his entire life at the absolutely typical American middle class occupation -- barber (just like the father of "Charlie Brown" of the comic strip, "Peanuts.") Loved baseball, steak, riding horses (in blue jeans across dusty roads next to cornfields and apple groves, not the fancy-pants kind of riding that's called "equestrian.")
Bob's a lung cancer survivor, like me. He wasn't a smoker. What, I asked, when I called to wish him well, caused the cancer? "The doctors don't know," he said. "They're intrigued to find out. Personally, I think it's from all the ribs I've broken falling off horses in my lifetime." Tough guy. What would you expect from someone who was an all-conference tackle -- on offense and defense -- in high school? Guy who lifted weights to stay fit and loved to play "burn out," and if you didn't grow up in the midwest half a century ago, that's a version of "having a catch" where you throw the ball back and forth as hard as you can, trying to make the other fellow's hand sting like hell when he catches it.
Bob is a lifelong resident of Clinton, Iowa, a town that, like Bob, is apple pie American. His wife, Molly, was the town's women's tennis champion in her younger years. Won the tournament on the old high school courts before the high school burned down.
Bob and Molly raised six fine kids, worked hard to educate them. Rosemary, Sgt. Giunta's mother, is a school teacher in Hiawatha, Iowa, although Salvatore was born when she and Steven still lived in Clinton (1985).
Just over three years ago, in a place in Afghanistan nicknamed "death valley," Sal Giunta ran through a hail of gunfire to rescue two wounded comrades. One of the men he rescued, Sgt. Joshua Brennan, and another comrade, Spec. Hugo Mendoza, died in the action.
"I didn't try to be a hero," Sal told an embedded reporter with his unit. "I ran to the front because Brennan was there. All of my feelings are with my friends. I have sweat more, cried more, bled more in this country than in my own."
"Death valley's" real name is Korengal. "These people," Sal said of the Korengalis, "will never leave this valley. They were here long before I could even fathom an Afghanistan."
The war George Bush started had been dragging on for seven long years when Salvatore Giunta did the deed that won him the nation's highest military honor. Now, more than three years later, American forces have withdrawn from the Korengali, but elsewhere in Iraq and Afghanistan other young Americans continue to sweat, to cry and to bleed.
Brennan. Mendoza. Giunta. Cunningham. Gallardo. Eckrode. None will ever hold high office in this land. But it's their tears, their sweat, their blood that fuels the wars Bush started.
And it's the taxes of Bob Judge, Steve Giunta and their children and their children's children that will pay down, ever so slowly if at all, the enormous monetary debt of these wars, still dragging on in their 11th year.
Somebody paid George Bush $9 million in advance for his book. That's probably more than the combined lifetime earnings of Bob Judge and Steve Giunta.
But not enough to pay for the tears, the sweat and the blood of Sal Giunta and his comrades in arms. Not even the Medal of Honor can pay that toll.
On Tuesday, Bush's successor will place the Congressional Medal of Honor around the neck of Sgt. Salvatore Giunta, the first living American to receive the nation's highest award for valor since the Vietnam war.
What webs we weave.
As for Bush's book, I can only endorse a friend's suggestion that we all go into a local bookstore and move a copy or two from its display shelf to the place where it belongs -- the crime section.
I don't know Sgt. Giunta but I know his grandfather, Bob Judge. Someone had to coin the phrase "as American as apple pie" just to describe Bob Judge.
High school football hero, married a cheerleader. Worked his entire life at the absolutely typical American middle class occupation -- barber (just like the father of "Charlie Brown" of the comic strip, "Peanuts.") Loved baseball, steak, riding horses (in blue jeans across dusty roads next to cornfields and apple groves, not the fancy-pants kind of riding that's called "equestrian.")
Bob's a lung cancer survivor, like me. He wasn't a smoker. What, I asked, when I called to wish him well, caused the cancer? "The doctors don't know," he said. "They're intrigued to find out. Personally, I think it's from all the ribs I've broken falling off horses in my lifetime." Tough guy. What would you expect from someone who was an all-conference tackle -- on offense and defense -- in high school? Guy who lifted weights to stay fit and loved to play "burn out," and if you didn't grow up in the midwest half a century ago, that's a version of "having a catch" where you throw the ball back and forth as hard as you can, trying to make the other fellow's hand sting like hell when he catches it.
Bob is a lifelong resident of Clinton, Iowa, a town that, like Bob, is apple pie American. His wife, Molly, was the town's women's tennis champion in her younger years. Won the tournament on the old high school courts before the high school burned down.
Bob and Molly raised six fine kids, worked hard to educate them. Rosemary, Sgt. Giunta's mother, is a school teacher in Hiawatha, Iowa, although Salvatore was born when she and Steven still lived in Clinton (1985).
Just over three years ago, in a place in Afghanistan nicknamed "death valley," Sal Giunta ran through a hail of gunfire to rescue two wounded comrades. One of the men he rescued, Sgt. Joshua Brennan, and another comrade, Spec. Hugo Mendoza, died in the action.
"I didn't try to be a hero," Sal told an embedded reporter with his unit. "I ran to the front because Brennan was there. All of my feelings are with my friends. I have sweat more, cried more, bled more in this country than in my own."
"Death valley's" real name is Korengal. "These people," Sal said of the Korengalis, "will never leave this valley. They were here long before I could even fathom an Afghanistan."
The war George Bush started had been dragging on for seven long years when Salvatore Giunta did the deed that won him the nation's highest military honor. Now, more than three years later, American forces have withdrawn from the Korengali, but elsewhere in Iraq and Afghanistan other young Americans continue to sweat, to cry and to bleed.
Brennan. Mendoza. Giunta. Cunningham. Gallardo. Eckrode. None will ever hold high office in this land. But it's their tears, their sweat, their blood that fuels the wars Bush started.
And it's the taxes of Bob Judge, Steve Giunta and their children and their children's children that will pay down, ever so slowly if at all, the enormous monetary debt of these wars, still dragging on in their 11th year.
Somebody paid George Bush $9 million in advance for his book. That's probably more than the combined lifetime earnings of Bob Judge and Steve Giunta.
But not enough to pay for the tears, the sweat and the blood of Sal Giunta and his comrades in arms. Not even the Medal of Honor can pay that toll.
Sunday, November 7, 2010
Pay No Attention to the Tacky Draperies
There's a lot not to miss about the ol' whorehouse. I look in on it every now and then to make certain this is still true.
It is.
Take the Old Gray Lady herself, the one that boasts about having all the news that's fit to print.
Here are the headline and first paragraph of the lead article in her Sunday national edition:
When sales of Domino’s Pizza were lagging, a government agency stepped in with
Is this the weightiest issue you could find for Page One? The next couple of paragraphs read like a commercial for the pizza chain.
C'mon man!
But it strikes me as unrealistic to try to hold propagandists to the same standards as journalists. When I was reporting or editing news, I made it a point of pride in my craft not to donate to politicians, political parties, or special interests. I honestly don't recall if such donations were prohibited by the organizations I worked for.
Some of my colleagues went so far as to refuse to register by party affiliation; some even refused to vote. But we were doing our best to do real journalism, which virtually nobody on television even attempts any more. So what's the fuss? Are we supposed to be surprised and shocked to learn that Keith supports Democrats? Or that what Fox offers as "news" is pure Republican propaganda?
C'mon man!
C'mon man!
C'mon man.
It is.
Take the Old Gray Lady herself, the one that boasts about having all the news that's fit to print.
Here are the headline and first paragraph of the lead article in her Sunday national edition:
While Warning About Fat,
U.S. Pushes Cheese Sales
U.S. Pushes Cheese Sales
advice: more cheese. This is the same government that, for health reasons, is advising
less cheese.
Is this the weightiest issue you could find for Page One? The next couple of paragraphs read like a commercial for the pizza chain.
C'mon man!
* * *
The other big flap in the media for the last couple of days is the suspension, without pay, of Keith Olbermann by MSNBC. The suspension was imposed ostensibly because, by contributing to the campaign funds of three Democratic candidates in the recent election, Olbermann violated a policy of NBC News. I never for a moment believed that what Keith Olbermann does (or Rachel Maddow, or that matter, even though I am a fan of both) is "news." What they do is provide an antidote to what Fox News does --which isn't "news" either. All of these people are entertainers with propagandist agendas. Contemporary events provide a framework for their entertainments. It's all in good fun and some of the opinions expressed by Olbermann and Maddow, in particular, have merit intellectually and ethically.But it strikes me as unrealistic to try to hold propagandists to the same standards as journalists. When I was reporting or editing news, I made it a point of pride in my craft not to donate to politicians, political parties, or special interests. I honestly don't recall if such donations were prohibited by the organizations I worked for.
Some of my colleagues went so far as to refuse to register by party affiliation; some even refused to vote. But we were doing our best to do real journalism, which virtually nobody on television even attempts any more. So what's the fuss? Are we supposed to be surprised and shocked to learn that Keith supports Democrats? Or that what Fox offers as "news" is pure Republican propaganda?
C'mon man!
* * *
The news columns of the Wall Street Journal once contained some of the best print journalism around, as if to compensate for the distortions and dishonesty of the paper's editorial and op-ed pages. But in the days before this election, the Journal's news department joined those of the New York Times and other media in serious treatments of the Tea Party as a spontaneous grassroots movement. Unlimited funding by the Koch Brothers (big oil), and a blueprint drawn up by Frank Luntz and Fred Malek (big lies) -- this is grassroots?C'mon man!
* * *
One of the Sunday talk shows featured a discussion, presented as "journalism," with Republican Congressman Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, author of what the GOP calls "tax reform." Under this plan, the taxes of the 20 per cent of Americans with the lowest incomes would increase 12.3%. The 20% of Americans with the next-lowest incomes would increase by 7.7%. The next 20%, in ascending order, of American incomes would be taxed at a 4.5% higher rate. The next 20% would see see their tax rates rise by 2% (people in roughly the $50,000 to $90,000 a year bracket). Got that? The eight out of ten Americans with incomes under $100,000 would have their taxes increased. But the next wealthiest 5% of Americans, who average $148,000 per year income, would have their tax rate cut by 1.6%. The four per cent of Americans who earn between $178,000 and $400,000 per year, would get a 4.2 per cent tax cut. And the wealthiest one per cent of Americans, whose average income is $1.4 million per year, would receive a 15% tax cut. Nobody on the panel of "journalists" talking with Mr. Ryan found anything exceptional in all of this. C'mon man.
The Mother Country Raises the Bar
My London correspondent reports that a recent election for a seat in Parliament has been invalidated and will be re-run. The reason is that an investigating commission found that some of the things the winning candidate said about his opponent were untrue!
Your Pianist and a band of co-conspirators have begun their own investigation to determine how many of the recent election contests in the United States would pass such an honesty test.
Apparently the same question about the colonies came up in England, too, because our London correspondent suggested looking at a city council race in Minneapolis, where it was rumoured that neither candidate had lied about the other.
That contest, in the city's 11th ward, was won by a former marketing services consultant named John Quincy. Your Pianist is skeptical that anyone trained in American marketing techniques could go an entire day, let alone an entire election campaign, without uttering a falsehood. However, the investigation continues and no smoking gun has yet been found.
Later reports from London hinted that it wasn't Minneapolis but Cleveland that had a city council race in which no lies were told. Once again, however, skepticism is in order. A centerpiece of the Cleveland council's 2010-2011 programme is to expand the city's automated trash collection system to another 25,000 residents. In a city with that much trash to collect, surely it's likely that at least some of the waste would be leftover lies from the electioneering. Political billboards alone could account for the excess garbage.
If not Minneapolis or Cleveland, then where in American might there have been an election in which the candidates uttered only truth about their opponents (or themselves)? We can immediately rule out Chicago, Detroit and the entire state of Texas. (In El Paso they even falsified the wording of an initiative question.) Add Iowa, where they tossed out three judges who ruled that gay and lesbian citizens have the same rights as heterosexual ones.
As a resident of New Mexico, I can attest that no lie-free race took place here. And since the prevailing winds are from the west, the foul odors prior to Nov. 2 erased any doubt about Arizona, as well.
As word spread of the Pianist's Diogenes Commission and its hunt for an American election free of falsehoods, tips from citizens poured in. So far the most promising one is that an election in Murdock, Neb., took place without so much as a fib being uttered. Our investigators will look into this as soon as they find Murdock, Neb.
Lawyers for party organizations in several states have issued challenges to the findings of the Diogenes Commission even before there are any findings. "One man's lie is another man's Texas textbook," a Little Rock Republican lawyer said. "We're splitting etymological hairs here. Politicians in Arkansas can't even agree on what the definition of 'is' is."
You can see what we're up against.
Your Pianist and a band of co-conspirators have begun their own investigation to determine how many of the recent election contests in the United States would pass such an honesty test.
Apparently the same question about the colonies came up in England, too, because our London correspondent suggested looking at a city council race in Minneapolis, where it was rumoured that neither candidate had lied about the other.
That contest, in the city's 11th ward, was won by a former marketing services consultant named John Quincy. Your Pianist is skeptical that anyone trained in American marketing techniques could go an entire day, let alone an entire election campaign, without uttering a falsehood. However, the investigation continues and no smoking gun has yet been found.
Later reports from London hinted that it wasn't Minneapolis but Cleveland that had a city council race in which no lies were told. Once again, however, skepticism is in order. A centerpiece of the Cleveland council's 2010-2011 programme is to expand the city's automated trash collection system to another 25,000 residents. In a city with that much trash to collect, surely it's likely that at least some of the waste would be leftover lies from the electioneering. Political billboards alone could account for the excess garbage.
If not Minneapolis or Cleveland, then where in American might there have been an election in which the candidates uttered only truth about their opponents (or themselves)? We can immediately rule out Chicago, Detroit and the entire state of Texas. (In El Paso they even falsified the wording of an initiative question.) Add Iowa, where they tossed out three judges who ruled that gay and lesbian citizens have the same rights as heterosexual ones.
As a resident of New Mexico, I can attest that no lie-free race took place here. And since the prevailing winds are from the west, the foul odors prior to Nov. 2 erased any doubt about Arizona, as well.
As word spread of the Pianist's Diogenes Commission and its hunt for an American election free of falsehoods, tips from citizens poured in. So far the most promising one is that an election in Murdock, Neb., took place without so much as a fib being uttered. Our investigators will look into this as soon as they find Murdock, Neb.
Lawyers for party organizations in several states have issued challenges to the findings of the Diogenes Commission even before there are any findings. "One man's lie is another man's Texas textbook," a Little Rock Republican lawyer said. "We're splitting etymological hairs here. Politicians in Arkansas can't even agree on what the definition of 'is' is."
You can see what we're up against.
Thursday, November 4, 2010
Pacifying a Disputatious Tummy -- Up to a Point
The late Satchel Paige, baseball pitcher, was perhaps better known for his aphorisms than for his considerable prowess throwing baseballs.
One of his rules for living went something like this: "If your stomach disputes you, lie down and pacify it with cool thoughts."
I've had a sour stomach since Tuesday. It's sunny here on the patio and the chaise is a right comfortable place to lie down.
So here goes:
Chocolate ice cream.
Sea breezes.
Mountain streams.
Brubeck, Mulligan, Baker . . . .
Federer' s fluid style.
A real martini. (One olive.)
Montana's grace under pressure.
Kennedy's White House parties.
Sondheim lyrics.
Real vichyssoise.
The cubism of Picasso, Braque or Feininger.
Key lime pie.
Chicken at a pre-concert picnic on the grass.
Ansel Adams photographs.
Symphony orchestras playing Beatles music, especially Hey, Jude.
Barefoot in the sand at evening.
The Maine coast.
Porter.
The Oregon coast, especially on the last good surfing day in October.
A president who doesn't sweat, once again extending the hand of compromise to. . . .
Jessie, fetch me the Tums! Ol' Satch should have stuck to baseball.
One of his rules for living went something like this: "If your stomach disputes you, lie down and pacify it with cool thoughts."
I've had a sour stomach since Tuesday. It's sunny here on the patio and the chaise is a right comfortable place to lie down.
So here goes:
Chocolate ice cream.
Sea breezes.
Mountain streams.
Brubeck, Mulligan, Baker . . . .
Federer' s fluid style.
A real martini. (One olive.)
Montana's grace under pressure.
Kennedy's White House parties.
Sondheim lyrics.
Real vichyssoise.
The cubism of Picasso, Braque or Feininger.
Key lime pie.
Chicken at a pre-concert picnic on the grass.
Ansel Adams photographs.
Symphony orchestras playing Beatles music, especially Hey, Jude.
Barefoot in the sand at evening.
The Maine coast.
Porter.
The Oregon coast, especially on the last good surfing day in October.
A president who doesn't sweat, once again extending the hand of compromise to. . . .
Jessie, fetch me the Tums! Ol' Satch should have stuck to baseball.
Wednesday, November 3, 2010
Alas, Prof. Fehring, We Still Play the Same Sour Notes
Prof. Rudolph Fehring of the University of Cincinnati music school was a perfectionist. If, say, the oboe hit a particularly bad clunker, he'd hold his head in his hands to fight back the tears. "And they shot men like Lincoln!" he would wail.
The professor came to mind after all these years as I reviewed the election returns this morning. No particular surprises. "And they defeated men like Feingold!" Same idea.
Not much will change in Washington, D.C. There'll be a tide of clunkers, and not just from the oboes. The names in the roll call will change, especially in the House, but the same people are still running the country and none of them received a single vote yesterday. They simply bought the election and the candidates who won it.
We still have a kakistocracy; it is simply a bit stronger now.
I leave it to the historians to debate exactly when we crossed the line from republic to kakistocracy. That would be important only if we were a people who learned from history rather than dooming ourselves to repeat it.
As the shrug du jour in the losers' locker rooms of American sport puts it, "It is what it is." We are what we are.
You think the Bush Bust was bad? Soon it will be 1930 all over again.
Think the Bill of Rights has been heavily trod upon? Soon it will be 1984 --the book, not the year.
Thought it was a real kick poking fun at Obamacare? Wait till you get a taste of Boehnercare, Grandma.
After ten years of spilt blood and spiraling debt, are you a wee bit tired of war? Try forever on for size.
The very rich will get very much richer. The poor will get poorer. Our kids will sit in the rickety rocker on the front porch of their sagging shack and ask, "Remember when there was a middle class?" Millions of Americans will die needlessly because they couldn't afford basic health care. Our teeth will rot and so will our society.
One nation, under surveillance. Don't even think about building a new mosque . . . anywhere. Love it or leave it. Support our troops. Taxed enough already. Climate change? "Them ain't facts. Give us facts."
Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose.
The professor came to mind after all these years as I reviewed the election returns this morning. No particular surprises. "And they defeated men like Feingold!" Same idea.
Not much will change in Washington, D.C. There'll be a tide of clunkers, and not just from the oboes. The names in the roll call will change, especially in the House, but the same people are still running the country and none of them received a single vote yesterday. They simply bought the election and the candidates who won it.
We still have a kakistocracy; it is simply a bit stronger now.
I leave it to the historians to debate exactly when we crossed the line from republic to kakistocracy. That would be important only if we were a people who learned from history rather than dooming ourselves to repeat it.
As the shrug du jour in the losers' locker rooms of American sport puts it, "It is what it is." We are what we are.
You think the Bush Bust was bad? Soon it will be 1930 all over again.
Think the Bill of Rights has been heavily trod upon? Soon it will be 1984 --the book, not the year.
Thought it was a real kick poking fun at Obamacare? Wait till you get a taste of Boehnercare, Grandma.
After ten years of spilt blood and spiraling debt, are you a wee bit tired of war? Try forever on for size.
The very rich will get very much richer. The poor will get poorer. Our kids will sit in the rickety rocker on the front porch of their sagging shack and ask, "Remember when there was a middle class?" Millions of Americans will die needlessly because they couldn't afford basic health care. Our teeth will rot and so will our society.
One nation, under surveillance. Don't even think about building a new mosque . . . anywhere. Love it or leave it. Support our troops. Taxed enough already. Climate change? "Them ain't facts. Give us facts."
Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose.
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