I just heard this song on the radio - I don't generally go in for main-stream country but once in awhile a real zinger rears its head and this is an absolutely beautiful song. It bought tears to my eyes.
[begin lyrics]
Forgive, sounds good.
Forget, I'm not sure I could.
They say time heals everything,
But I'm still waiting
I'm through, with doubt,
There's nothing left for me to figure out,
I've paid a price,
and i'll keep paying
I'm not ready to make nice,
I'm not ready to back down,
I'm still mad as hell And I don't have time
To go round and round and round
It's too late to make it right
I probably wouldn't if I could
Cause I'm mad as hell Can't bring myself to do what it is
You think I should
I know you said
Why can't you just get over it,
It turned my whole world around and i kind of like it
I made by bed, and I sleep like a baby,
With no regrets and I don't mind saying,
It's a sad sad story
That a mother will teach her daughter that she ought to hate a perfect stranger.
And how in the world Can the words that I said
Send somebody so over the edge
That they'd write me a letter
Saying that I better shut up and sing
Or my life will be over...
I'm not ready to make nice,
I'm not ready to back down,
I'm still mad as hell And I don't have time
To go round and round and round
It's too late to make it right
I probably wouldn't if I could
Cause I'm mad as hell
Can't bring myself to do what it is
You think I should
I'm not ready to make nice,
I'm not ready to back down,
I'm still mad as hell
And I don't have time
To go round and round and round
It's too late to make it right
I probably wouldn't if I could
Cause I'm mad as hell
Can't bring myself to do what it is
You think I should
Forgive, sounds good.
Forget, I'm not sure I could.
They say time heals everything,
But I'm still waiting.
[end lyrics]
I particularly like the direct confrontation of the hypocrits who will preach and teach hatred. This is a wonderful angry song that sums up a lot of emotion in just a few words. Beautiful beautiful beautiful!
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Turning the Corner
Insurgent Acne
I woke up on Sunday morning like I usually do. I stumbled out of bed and took a hot shower. I brushed my teeth and shaved my face. As I examined my face in the mirror I noticed that there was a small zit starting to form on my cheek a few inches beneath my right eye. There wasn’t much happening with it yet but it looked suspicious. I decided that it was imperative that I took action before the zit grew and caused more problems in the region.
I decided on the tried and true method of squeezing the zit between my thumbs in order to pop it and drain its accumulating juice. I clenched my teeth and maneuvered my thumbs into position and then pinched the skin surrounding the offending zit in the hopes of driving it to the surface and then annihilating it.
I ran into immediate problems though. It turned out that I had failed to adequately understand just what I was dealing with. The zit was subcutaneous – buried underneath the surface of my face – and as a result my initial efforts were totally ineffective. In fact the pressure I applied to the skin surrounding the zit seemed to cause new damage. Now an area about a half inch in diameter around the zit was irritated – angry and reddened.
I probably should have just left it alone but at this point I felt committed. No stupid zit was going to get the best of me! I thought about my next move and figured that perhaps if I put one thumb in my mouth and the other on the outside of my cheek – on the area of the zit – I could squeeze it from inside and out and therefore smoosh it and cause it to recede.
I attempted this tactic but its futility quickly became apparent. It also resulted in a great deal of pain and now tears were streaming down my face in addition to the redness and irritation. I needed a better strategy.
I decided on a surgical strike. I retrieved a needle from the sewing box and began poking at the zit. I drew a lot of blood and caused a lot more pain to myself, but the zit was still there; it seemed to be mocking me. Now I was really mad and I stabbed at it several times with the needle – opening up a series of small wounds in the area surrounding the zit. Blood streamed down my face in a series of rivulets.
Time to re-access; I stepped back rubbing my cheek and then took my hand away to look at the results. I was horrified at what I saw. The entire side of my face was now bruised and bleeding. From where the zit was centered there emanated a swatch of purple and red flesh; pin pricks surrounded it; and the worst part of it was that the zit still existed – bigger and brighter than ever.
I turned away and thought about it. Obviously the physical approach wasn’t working. I turned on the hot water and applied hot compresses to it. I soaked my face and washed it with soap, and then I applied some acne cream to it.
My wife gasped when she saw my face on Sunday morning. I mean it was really bad.
But as I write this it is Wednesday and things are looking up! My face is still bruised but the redness has subsided. The zit has emerged as a big round white-head surrounded in a little ocean of damaged flesh but I’m not willing to do any more squeezing – I’m content to let it run its course and just keep applying ointments and balms.
You know what – my face is really starting to get better! I think I’m starting to turn the corner!
RIP George Carlin
I’m getting really tired of noting the passing of important, vibrant personalities. We are in such trying times right now and we need the guidance and wisdom of the voices of people like George Carlin and Tim Russert.
George Carlin was most well-known for his famous “Seven Words you Can’t Say on the Radio” routine that landed him in the Supreme Courthouse but for my money his scathing political and social commentary was really where his brilliance shone brightest. He used comedy for precisely its most important function – to shine a light into the areas of society that otherwise would be too dark and terrifying for us to be able to focus our attention on without losing it and going completely insane.
Send your thoughts to madbob@madbob.com
I woke up on Sunday morning like I usually do. I stumbled out of bed and took a hot shower. I brushed my teeth and shaved my face. As I examined my face in the mirror I noticed that there was a small zit starting to form on my cheek a few inches beneath my right eye. There wasn’t much happening with it yet but it looked suspicious. I decided that it was imperative that I took action before the zit grew and caused more problems in the region.
I decided on the tried and true method of squeezing the zit between my thumbs in order to pop it and drain its accumulating juice. I clenched my teeth and maneuvered my thumbs into position and then pinched the skin surrounding the offending zit in the hopes of driving it to the surface and then annihilating it.
I ran into immediate problems though. It turned out that I had failed to adequately understand just what I was dealing with. The zit was subcutaneous – buried underneath the surface of my face – and as a result my initial efforts were totally ineffective. In fact the pressure I applied to the skin surrounding the zit seemed to cause new damage. Now an area about a half inch in diameter around the zit was irritated – angry and reddened.
I probably should have just left it alone but at this point I felt committed. No stupid zit was going to get the best of me! I thought about my next move and figured that perhaps if I put one thumb in my mouth and the other on the outside of my cheek – on the area of the zit – I could squeeze it from inside and out and therefore smoosh it and cause it to recede.
I attempted this tactic but its futility quickly became apparent. It also resulted in a great deal of pain and now tears were streaming down my face in addition to the redness and irritation. I needed a better strategy.
I decided on a surgical strike. I retrieved a needle from the sewing box and began poking at the zit. I drew a lot of blood and caused a lot more pain to myself, but the zit was still there; it seemed to be mocking me. Now I was really mad and I stabbed at it several times with the needle – opening up a series of small wounds in the area surrounding the zit. Blood streamed down my face in a series of rivulets.
Time to re-access; I stepped back rubbing my cheek and then took my hand away to look at the results. I was horrified at what I saw. The entire side of my face was now bruised and bleeding. From where the zit was centered there emanated a swatch of purple and red flesh; pin pricks surrounded it; and the worst part of it was that the zit still existed – bigger and brighter than ever.
I turned away and thought about it. Obviously the physical approach wasn’t working. I turned on the hot water and applied hot compresses to it. I soaked my face and washed it with soap, and then I applied some acne cream to it.
My wife gasped when she saw my face on Sunday morning. I mean it was really bad.
But as I write this it is Wednesday and things are looking up! My face is still bruised but the redness has subsided. The zit has emerged as a big round white-head surrounded in a little ocean of damaged flesh but I’m not willing to do any more squeezing – I’m content to let it run its course and just keep applying ointments and balms.
You know what – my face is really starting to get better! I think I’m starting to turn the corner!
RIP George Carlin
I’m getting really tired of noting the passing of important, vibrant personalities. We are in such trying times right now and we need the guidance and wisdom of the voices of people like George Carlin and Tim Russert.
George Carlin was most well-known for his famous “Seven Words you Can’t Say on the Radio” routine that landed him in the Supreme Courthouse but for my money his scathing political and social commentary was really where his brilliance shone brightest. He used comedy for precisely its most important function – to shine a light into the areas of society that otherwise would be too dark and terrifying for us to be able to focus our attention on without losing it and going completely insane.
Send your thoughts to madbob@madbob.com
Monday, June 9, 2008
No Tolerance
Girl-O-Rama! Hurray!
Well apparently I can’t drink alcohol any more – at least not in the vast quantities I used to imbibe. For the last couple months or so I have been cutting way back on my consumption. That being said on Saturday night the girlie show was in town and I decided it would be a good night to go ahead and tie one on. That turned out to be erroneous. As of this writing it is Tuesday morning and I am still not a hundred percent.
The evening was pure entertainment. 2 Drink and I rolled into Nick’s around 10:30 and caught the last song and a half of the Baghdad Batteries set. Is it just me or are shows starting a helluva lot earlier than they ever used to? The Shankers did what they do so well and in between the bands and afterwards wonderfully glamorous women performed classic burlesque numbers. There was nothing wrong with the evening that a couple of purposefully placed brightly sequined tassles spinning in opposite directions couldn’t take care of.
Anyway – after getting my fill of ear and eye candy I just didn’t want the evening to end and so I followed a small entourage across the street to a lively after-party. In retrospect I would have been better off just going home. I recall talking to some very nice people but I don’t remember a word of what was said. I recall meeting several very nice dogs as well. I recall drinking at least a couple of beers but I don’t recall how I got home. It isn’t more than four blocks to my house so I am assuming I walked but you never know.
“I woke up Sunday morning with no way to hold my head that didn’t hurt.”
-Kris Kristofferson
Never have truer words been spoken. I woke up in a serious pain haze with food smeared on my shirt and, inexplicably, a towel on the floor soaking up some sort of mystery liquid. I was an absolute wreck. The day was misery. I dragged ass over to 2 Drink’s (who had the foresight and wisdom to go straight home after the show was over) where I “helped” him set up his swimming pool. I also helped him drink a 12-pack of beer and that was about the only thing that saved me.
Of course “hair of the dog” is often just a way of prolonging the inevitable but at least it took a bit of the edge off of my pain. I semi-staggered the block back to my house and ran into City Council-member Maureen Kirk who was just leaving a wine and dine fundraiser being held at and for the ARC of Butte County. She told me they had an assortment of good food and wine tasting but when I told her I liked wine she told me sure, but not at 2 in the afternoon. I didn’t explain to her that I’d just guzzled five beers in order to stave off a vicious hangover. I’m not sure she would have appreciated that. She did tell me the food was excellent.
How Do You Know if a Politician is Lying?
I’m sorry – last week I said I’d get off politics but I lied. Barrack Obama has secured the delegates needed in order to be the Democratic Party’s Presidential nominee. It’s a pretty huge deal and I will tell you something; I just heard a re-broadcast of Obama’s speech following this news and that son of a gun can speak! I had tears in my eyes by the time he was done.
I’m immensely excited by this Presidential race as I’ve never been in the past. It isn’t just the compelling stories of some of the candidates – I think it has more to do with the feeling that, as a country, we are perched on a precipice. Depending on who we elect and then how they perform their duties and obligations there is the feeling that things could get much better or much worse than they are right now. Status-quo is not a possibility; and so it feels like this election is intensely meaningful.
There’s No Government Like No Government!
Ultimately though the responsibility doesn’t lie with our leaders; it rests with us. The more we rely on government to make things better and to solve our problems for us the more we justify the perpetuation of government. If we really want smaller government interference in our lives then we need to act like we can take care of ourselves.
Vote for yourself in 2008!
e-mail madbob@madbob.com
Well apparently I can’t drink alcohol any more – at least not in the vast quantities I used to imbibe. For the last couple months or so I have been cutting way back on my consumption. That being said on Saturday night the girlie show was in town and I decided it would be a good night to go ahead and tie one on. That turned out to be erroneous. As of this writing it is Tuesday morning and I am still not a hundred percent.
The evening was pure entertainment. 2 Drink and I rolled into Nick’s around 10:30 and caught the last song and a half of the Baghdad Batteries set. Is it just me or are shows starting a helluva lot earlier than they ever used to? The Shankers did what they do so well and in between the bands and afterwards wonderfully glamorous women performed classic burlesque numbers. There was nothing wrong with the evening that a couple of purposefully placed brightly sequined tassles spinning in opposite directions couldn’t take care of.
Anyway – after getting my fill of ear and eye candy I just didn’t want the evening to end and so I followed a small entourage across the street to a lively after-party. In retrospect I would have been better off just going home. I recall talking to some very nice people but I don’t remember a word of what was said. I recall meeting several very nice dogs as well. I recall drinking at least a couple of beers but I don’t recall how I got home. It isn’t more than four blocks to my house so I am assuming I walked but you never know.
“I woke up Sunday morning with no way to hold my head that didn’t hurt.”
-Kris Kristofferson
Never have truer words been spoken. I woke up in a serious pain haze with food smeared on my shirt and, inexplicably, a towel on the floor soaking up some sort of mystery liquid. I was an absolute wreck. The day was misery. I dragged ass over to 2 Drink’s (who had the foresight and wisdom to go straight home after the show was over) where I “helped” him set up his swimming pool. I also helped him drink a 12-pack of beer and that was about the only thing that saved me.
Of course “hair of the dog” is often just a way of prolonging the inevitable but at least it took a bit of the edge off of my pain. I semi-staggered the block back to my house and ran into City Council-member Maureen Kirk who was just leaving a wine and dine fundraiser being held at and for the ARC of Butte County. She told me they had an assortment of good food and wine tasting but when I told her I liked wine she told me sure, but not at 2 in the afternoon. I didn’t explain to her that I’d just guzzled five beers in order to stave off a vicious hangover. I’m not sure she would have appreciated that. She did tell me the food was excellent.
How Do You Know if a Politician is Lying?
I’m sorry – last week I said I’d get off politics but I lied. Barrack Obama has secured the delegates needed in order to be the Democratic Party’s Presidential nominee. It’s a pretty huge deal and I will tell you something; I just heard a re-broadcast of Obama’s speech following this news and that son of a gun can speak! I had tears in my eyes by the time he was done.
I’m immensely excited by this Presidential race as I’ve never been in the past. It isn’t just the compelling stories of some of the candidates – I think it has more to do with the feeling that, as a country, we are perched on a precipice. Depending on who we elect and then how they perform their duties and obligations there is the feeling that things could get much better or much worse than they are right now. Status-quo is not a possibility; and so it feels like this election is intensely meaningful.
There’s No Government Like No Government!
Ultimately though the responsibility doesn’t lie with our leaders; it rests with us. The more we rely on government to make things better and to solve our problems for us the more we justify the perpetuation of government. If we really want smaller government interference in our lives then we need to act like we can take care of ourselves.
Vote for yourself in 2008!
e-mail madbob@madbob.com
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
Crumbling Faith...
“I’m an anarchist – I don’t make rules for other people. I make rules for myself.”
-Utah Phillips
Utah Phillips, legendary songwriter and labor activist, passed away last week at the age of 73. Phillips was born in 1935 and as a young man he served in the army. The gore and human waste he witnessed during combat duty in the Korean War left him angry and deeply disturbed and when he returned to America Phillips feel into a life of destitution and alcoholism. He hopped freight trains and moved from state to state and shelter to shelter; then, in his later career as a folk-singer and songwriter, Phillips wove the characters he met along with the anarchist philosophy he’d adopted to create meaningful music that shone a light on injustice and hinted at a better method of structuring society.
Fingers in the Dyke
All around us we are seeing an erosion of this particular “capitalist” system. Similarly as to how I feel about communism or socialism, I don’t believe there is anything innately wrong with capitalism. All three systems work fine on paper because they are essentially theoretical. The problem is the people and the inevitability of corruption. That’s what we’re seeing today. It’s taken longer than it did to rot out communism but corruption is devouring our own political and economic system from within.
Consumer capitalism is an economic belief system built primarily on faith. If we all believe things will get better, and keep on spending accordingly, then the system will persist into perpetuity. The economy has been floating on credit cards for the last twenty years. I used to have a problem with the credit cards and I am telling you it’s the same thing as gambling. You are spending money you don’t have assuming that eventually your personal financial situation will catch-up with your spending lifestyle.
But once we lose our faith and decide to hold onto our money instead of sacrificing it on the altar of consumerism then the system breaks down. This “economic down-turn” is ultimately a monster of our own creation – we’ve allowed our faith to crumble.
A Long Retirement
Scott McClellan, the former Press Secretary for the White House, has just released a scathing documentation of his time served with President Bush called “What Happened.” In it he paints a grim portrait of an intellectualy incurious President whose policies are based more on instinct than intellect. More ominously McClellan portrays Bush as a man capable of subtle self-deceptions that allow him to justify and rationalize any wrong-doing.
Of course on cue the administration has sent out their attack dogs and circled the wagons. The memoir of a man who worked with Bush for seven years has been dismissed as a hatchet-job from a disgruntled former employee. That right there is the Achilles Heel of the Bush Presidency. One of Bush’s most loyal supporters essentially defects and the Bush instinct – instead of reflecting on the defection and asking why it happened – is to block and counter-attack. It is an Old Testament eye for an eye reaction and I believe it is in the Bush genes. They are a clan seemingly incapable of self-reflection. They espouse their love of Jesus while practicing the preaching of Moses and Mohammed. Pre-emptive war, overwhelming force, destroy dissent, shock and awe; there’s never even the consideration of turning the other cheek.
Well George W. is still a relatively young man as far as soon to be ex-Presidents come. He will have plenty of time to reflect on his decisions rocking in his chair out on the ranch.
Politics, Ugh…
I don’t know where I fall politically anymore. I’m so disillusioned with it all - I just want the government to leave me alone. It seems though that we have to have leaders. That being the case could we get anyone in office capable of honest self-reflection? Or is it a pre-requisite of higher office that one has to believe them self incapable of wrong-doing?
Enough Faith Already
So I guess I’ve had enough of all this “faith.” Here’s what I want. Ideally I want a shift of power back to the states and local governments. On top of that I want a government that is ruthlessly pragmatic. I want policies determined on feasibility – not ideology. If the bastards have to take my money then I want it to be used – not wasted.
Summer is Here!
Anyway – summer is here and the students are gone. I’m gonna get off all this depressing politics and economic bullshit. It’s put me in a funk and I’m starting to bore myself. Until next week:
Madbob@madbob.com
-Utah Phillips
Utah Phillips, legendary songwriter and labor activist, passed away last week at the age of 73. Phillips was born in 1935 and as a young man he served in the army. The gore and human waste he witnessed during combat duty in the Korean War left him angry and deeply disturbed and when he returned to America Phillips feel into a life of destitution and alcoholism. He hopped freight trains and moved from state to state and shelter to shelter; then, in his later career as a folk-singer and songwriter, Phillips wove the characters he met along with the anarchist philosophy he’d adopted to create meaningful music that shone a light on injustice and hinted at a better method of structuring society.
Fingers in the Dyke
All around us we are seeing an erosion of this particular “capitalist” system. Similarly as to how I feel about communism or socialism, I don’t believe there is anything innately wrong with capitalism. All three systems work fine on paper because they are essentially theoretical. The problem is the people and the inevitability of corruption. That’s what we’re seeing today. It’s taken longer than it did to rot out communism but corruption is devouring our own political and economic system from within.
Consumer capitalism is an economic belief system built primarily on faith. If we all believe things will get better, and keep on spending accordingly, then the system will persist into perpetuity. The economy has been floating on credit cards for the last twenty years. I used to have a problem with the credit cards and I am telling you it’s the same thing as gambling. You are spending money you don’t have assuming that eventually your personal financial situation will catch-up with your spending lifestyle.
But once we lose our faith and decide to hold onto our money instead of sacrificing it on the altar of consumerism then the system breaks down. This “economic down-turn” is ultimately a monster of our own creation – we’ve allowed our faith to crumble.
A Long Retirement
Scott McClellan, the former Press Secretary for the White House, has just released a scathing documentation of his time served with President Bush called “What Happened.” In it he paints a grim portrait of an intellectualy incurious President whose policies are based more on instinct than intellect. More ominously McClellan portrays Bush as a man capable of subtle self-deceptions that allow him to justify and rationalize any wrong-doing.
Of course on cue the administration has sent out their attack dogs and circled the wagons. The memoir of a man who worked with Bush for seven years has been dismissed as a hatchet-job from a disgruntled former employee. That right there is the Achilles Heel of the Bush Presidency. One of Bush’s most loyal supporters essentially defects and the Bush instinct – instead of reflecting on the defection and asking why it happened – is to block and counter-attack. It is an Old Testament eye for an eye reaction and I believe it is in the Bush genes. They are a clan seemingly incapable of self-reflection. They espouse their love of Jesus while practicing the preaching of Moses and Mohammed. Pre-emptive war, overwhelming force, destroy dissent, shock and awe; there’s never even the consideration of turning the other cheek.
Well George W. is still a relatively young man as far as soon to be ex-Presidents come. He will have plenty of time to reflect on his decisions rocking in his chair out on the ranch.
Politics, Ugh…
I don’t know where I fall politically anymore. I’m so disillusioned with it all - I just want the government to leave me alone. It seems though that we have to have leaders. That being the case could we get anyone in office capable of honest self-reflection? Or is it a pre-requisite of higher office that one has to believe them self incapable of wrong-doing?
Enough Faith Already
So I guess I’ve had enough of all this “faith.” Here’s what I want. Ideally I want a shift of power back to the states and local governments. On top of that I want a government that is ruthlessly pragmatic. I want policies determined on feasibility – not ideology. If the bastards have to take my money then I want it to be used – not wasted.
Summer is Here!
Anyway – summer is here and the students are gone. I’m gonna get off all this depressing politics and economic bullshit. It’s put me in a funk and I’m starting to bore myself. Until next week:
Madbob@madbob.com
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
Hearts and Minds
The Incredible Terrible Saga of Sami al-Hajj
During the first phase of Bush’s “War on Terror” a host of suspected dissidents were rounded up and sent to the U.S. military’s secretive detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Guantanamo Bay is U.S. territory leased from Cuba; though the Cuban government has never cashed the U.S. checks for that land. The reason a military prison was constructed and harbored in that unlikely location is because attorneys for the Bush administration felt that the legal status of Guantanamo Bay was ambiguous and as such prisoners held there would not be subject to the normal regulations that govern the capture, holding, and interrogation of foreign POW’s. As a result of this legal ambiguity Guantanamo has been a haven for incredible abuse of both the prisoners and the legal system in general.
One of the early stated goals in the “War on Terror” was to win the “hearts and minds” of the Afghani, Iraqi, and by extension the citizens of the whole Middle East. Now I understand perfectly well that when you go to war there is going to be a lot of what they call “collateral damage” – meaning innocent civilians, women and children, will be killed. It is an inevitable consequence of dropping bombs and shooting bullets. Collateral damage is one of those calculated risks. The bad guys are so bad that it behooves us in the long run to blow up civilians to get to them. I don’t agree with the logic – but I understand it.
But every so often another story pops up that makes me shake my head and say “really? That’s how we’re going about winning the hearts and minds of the people whose countries we are invading?” I just learned the details of one of these stories. It involves a man named Sami al-Hajj who has spent the last six years at Guantanamo Bay. You might ask what al-Hajj’s crime was? It turns out that he was captured because he was a cameraman for Al-Jazeera – the most popular Arab-based news outlet in the world. The U.S. at the time was working under the assumption that Al-Jazeera was actually in cahoots with Al Queada and they interrogated al-Hajj on dozens of separate occasions in order to try and get him to confess this link. He never would because, according to al-Hajj, there is no link between Al Queada and Al-Jazeera.
Nevermind the truth though – let’s assume Al-Jazeera actually was tied in some way to Al Queada. Was capturing a cameraman and holding him without charge for six years the right thing to do in order to win hearts and minds of the Al-Jazeera viewers? Keep in mind Al-Jazeera is essentially the CNN of the Arab world. While I had never really paid attention to al-Hajj’s story until I heard a recent report on his release you can bet that every Al Jazeera viewer knew it inside and out; backwards and forth. This is because Al-Jazeera ran an hourly update on the captured cameraman. Every single hour of every single day for six years Al-Jazeera viewers were reminded that a cameraman had been locked up on an island 7,900 miles away on an island in the middle of the Carribean Ocean.
Can you imagine the damage that was done because of the obstinance and lethargy of the U.S. system of – of what? Military justice I guess, illegal detentions, “non-lawful combatants.”
Because We Can
Is there no one in charge with an iota of common sense? This guy knew nothing – he was just a regular working guy doing his job. We got no valuable information from him. We handed our “enemies” a powerful and compelling tool of propaganda and even when we realized, and we must have realized fairly quickly, that Al-Jazeera was going to bombard the middle east with this story we essentially flew world opinion the bird and said “we’re holding him anyway because we can.” That’s all this exercise is – a big old “because we can.” We’re big and we’re bad and we’re powerful and we will do whatever we want and then we’ll pay our lawyers to tie everything up in court while we pat ourselves on the backs and say “hurray for the red white and blue.”
Incidentally Sami al-Hajj was released from Guantanamo Bay. He was never charged with any crime and he was never tried by any tribunal. They just picked him up, took away six years of his life, and then let him go.
If this is the best we can come up with in order to win the hearts and minds of the people of the Middle-East then we need to get some better brains in D.C. pronto.
[Or, is this all part of “the Plan?”]
e-mail: madbob@madbob.com
During the first phase of Bush’s “War on Terror” a host of suspected dissidents were rounded up and sent to the U.S. military’s secretive detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Guantanamo Bay is U.S. territory leased from Cuba; though the Cuban government has never cashed the U.S. checks for that land. The reason a military prison was constructed and harbored in that unlikely location is because attorneys for the Bush administration felt that the legal status of Guantanamo Bay was ambiguous and as such prisoners held there would not be subject to the normal regulations that govern the capture, holding, and interrogation of foreign POW’s. As a result of this legal ambiguity Guantanamo has been a haven for incredible abuse of both the prisoners and the legal system in general.
One of the early stated goals in the “War on Terror” was to win the “hearts and minds” of the Afghani, Iraqi, and by extension the citizens of the whole Middle East. Now I understand perfectly well that when you go to war there is going to be a lot of what they call “collateral damage” – meaning innocent civilians, women and children, will be killed. It is an inevitable consequence of dropping bombs and shooting bullets. Collateral damage is one of those calculated risks. The bad guys are so bad that it behooves us in the long run to blow up civilians to get to them. I don’t agree with the logic – but I understand it.
But every so often another story pops up that makes me shake my head and say “really? That’s how we’re going about winning the hearts and minds of the people whose countries we are invading?” I just learned the details of one of these stories. It involves a man named Sami al-Hajj who has spent the last six years at Guantanamo Bay. You might ask what al-Hajj’s crime was? It turns out that he was captured because he was a cameraman for Al-Jazeera – the most popular Arab-based news outlet in the world. The U.S. at the time was working under the assumption that Al-Jazeera was actually in cahoots with Al Queada and they interrogated al-Hajj on dozens of separate occasions in order to try and get him to confess this link. He never would because, according to al-Hajj, there is no link between Al Queada and Al-Jazeera.
Nevermind the truth though – let’s assume Al-Jazeera actually was tied in some way to Al Queada. Was capturing a cameraman and holding him without charge for six years the right thing to do in order to win hearts and minds of the Al-Jazeera viewers? Keep in mind Al-Jazeera is essentially the CNN of the Arab world. While I had never really paid attention to al-Hajj’s story until I heard a recent report on his release you can bet that every Al Jazeera viewer knew it inside and out; backwards and forth. This is because Al-Jazeera ran an hourly update on the captured cameraman. Every single hour of every single day for six years Al-Jazeera viewers were reminded that a cameraman had been locked up on an island 7,900 miles away on an island in the middle of the Carribean Ocean.
Can you imagine the damage that was done because of the obstinance and lethargy of the U.S. system of – of what? Military justice I guess, illegal detentions, “non-lawful combatants.”
Because We Can
Is there no one in charge with an iota of common sense? This guy knew nothing – he was just a regular working guy doing his job. We got no valuable information from him. We handed our “enemies” a powerful and compelling tool of propaganda and even when we realized, and we must have realized fairly quickly, that Al-Jazeera was going to bombard the middle east with this story we essentially flew world opinion the bird and said “we’re holding him anyway because we can.” That’s all this exercise is – a big old “because we can.” We’re big and we’re bad and we’re powerful and we will do whatever we want and then we’ll pay our lawyers to tie everything up in court while we pat ourselves on the backs and say “hurray for the red white and blue.”
Incidentally Sami al-Hajj was released from Guantanamo Bay. He was never charged with any crime and he was never tried by any tribunal. They just picked him up, took away six years of his life, and then let him go.
If this is the best we can come up with in order to win the hearts and minds of the people of the Middle-East then we need to get some better brains in D.C. pronto.
[Or, is this all part of “the Plan?”]
e-mail: madbob@madbob.com
Thursday, May 15, 2008
Keep on Drinking...
A Long History of Stupid
I’ve just started reading a biography of long-time FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover and as a result I’m learning quite a lot about the history of this country and the tradition of our government cracking down on dissent. This latest episode of our history is far from the first time the Bill of Rights has been superseded and suspended in the name of “security.” I have yet to grasp the logic of suspending freedoms to ensure security when I thought that the whole thing we are trying to secure in the first place is freedom; but I digress.
Anyway here are some interesting factoids I’ve picked up thus far. Remember when in protest of the French dissent against the “War on Terror” our Congress made the brilliant move of re-naming French Fries “Freedom Fries?” Seems like a pretty creative manifestation of nationalistic stupidity, right? Wrong. During World War One our Congress re-named Sauerkraut “Liberty Cabbage.” Our current stupidity isn’t even original! How do you like that?
Think the threat of terrorism is a new thing? Wrong. Just prior to and then after World War One the Red Scare developed. Anarchists and Communists were on the rise and there were actually a series of letter bombs and bomb attacks that riddled the nation’s capitol and industrial power figures.
These attacks lead to a complete abridgement of the freedoms granted in the Bill of Rights. Anyone suspected of being a communist, a socialist, or a sympathizer; essentially any Russian factory worker, was rounded up in mass arrests and many were unceremoniously deported so quickly that there wasn’t even time for an appeal.
Prior to these post-WWI round-ups, in the year 1901, William McKinley, the nation’s 25th President, was assassinated by an anarchist named Leon Czolgosz. The assassin was upset because McKinley had been touring the country talking about prosperity and Czolgosz felt that the prosperity in America was enjoyed by the wealthy but built on the exploitation of the working class.
Today I can’t help feeling that we’ve farmed out that exploitation and as a result the threat to our government isn’t coming as directly from within the country but instead from foreign enemies who see American foreign policy as the implement of exploitation. But it is the same dynamic – wealth being built on the backs of the poor.
There has always been the argument that increasing wealth increases prosperity for everyone – from the CEO on down to the factory worker. I vacillate on this argument. Sometimes I think it’s better to make some money than no money. But then I also think hell, I’d rather be poor and jobless than poor and working in a factory for 16 hours a day.
Graduation – Keep on Drinking
So graduation is coming up; an exciting time in the life of any young student. The whole world is one big possibility. In America many of us are told from a very young age that we can do or be whatever we want. Essentially there is a lot of truth in that statement. We need only look to our current President George W. Bush or our 29th President Warren G. Harding to see that mediocrity is no impedance when it comes to attaining the position as the country’s highest-ranking administrator.
In Bush’s case the boy from Connecticut spent a good deal of his young adult-hood staring at the bottom of a whiskey bottle. In fact it wasn’t until he was 37 years old that he gave up drinking. Since then he went on to be the Governor of Texas and the President of the United States for the last seven and a half years. He’s managed to start two wars, mangle a handful of governments, scuttle the economy, waste the goodwill of the rest of the world, and generate an animosity abroad towards Americans that is unparalleled in the short history of our country.
Jeez – it makes you wish the guy had just kept drinking.
To sum up; while you certainly can do and be whatever you want it is not necessarily beneficial for everyone to realize that potential. Be it destiny or free will there are those amongst us who might do the rest of society a favor by staying on the couch, taking bong rips and playing the latest version of Grand Theft Auto.
How’s that for inspiration?
e-mail: madbob@madbob.com
I’ve just started reading a biography of long-time FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover and as a result I’m learning quite a lot about the history of this country and the tradition of our government cracking down on dissent. This latest episode of our history is far from the first time the Bill of Rights has been superseded and suspended in the name of “security.” I have yet to grasp the logic of suspending freedoms to ensure security when I thought that the whole thing we are trying to secure in the first place is freedom; but I digress.
Anyway here are some interesting factoids I’ve picked up thus far. Remember when in protest of the French dissent against the “War on Terror” our Congress made the brilliant move of re-naming French Fries “Freedom Fries?” Seems like a pretty creative manifestation of nationalistic stupidity, right? Wrong. During World War One our Congress re-named Sauerkraut “Liberty Cabbage.” Our current stupidity isn’t even original! How do you like that?
Think the threat of terrorism is a new thing? Wrong. Just prior to and then after World War One the Red Scare developed. Anarchists and Communists were on the rise and there were actually a series of letter bombs and bomb attacks that riddled the nation’s capitol and industrial power figures.
These attacks lead to a complete abridgement of the freedoms granted in the Bill of Rights. Anyone suspected of being a communist, a socialist, or a sympathizer; essentially any Russian factory worker, was rounded up in mass arrests and many were unceremoniously deported so quickly that there wasn’t even time for an appeal.
Prior to these post-WWI round-ups, in the year 1901, William McKinley, the nation’s 25th President, was assassinated by an anarchist named Leon Czolgosz. The assassin was upset because McKinley had been touring the country talking about prosperity and Czolgosz felt that the prosperity in America was enjoyed by the wealthy but built on the exploitation of the working class.
Today I can’t help feeling that we’ve farmed out that exploitation and as a result the threat to our government isn’t coming as directly from within the country but instead from foreign enemies who see American foreign policy as the implement of exploitation. But it is the same dynamic – wealth being built on the backs of the poor.
There has always been the argument that increasing wealth increases prosperity for everyone – from the CEO on down to the factory worker. I vacillate on this argument. Sometimes I think it’s better to make some money than no money. But then I also think hell, I’d rather be poor and jobless than poor and working in a factory for 16 hours a day.
Graduation – Keep on Drinking
So graduation is coming up; an exciting time in the life of any young student. The whole world is one big possibility. In America many of us are told from a very young age that we can do or be whatever we want. Essentially there is a lot of truth in that statement. We need only look to our current President George W. Bush or our 29th President Warren G. Harding to see that mediocrity is no impedance when it comes to attaining the position as the country’s highest-ranking administrator.
In Bush’s case the boy from Connecticut spent a good deal of his young adult-hood staring at the bottom of a whiskey bottle. In fact it wasn’t until he was 37 years old that he gave up drinking. Since then he went on to be the Governor of Texas and the President of the United States for the last seven and a half years. He’s managed to start two wars, mangle a handful of governments, scuttle the economy, waste the goodwill of the rest of the world, and generate an animosity abroad towards Americans that is unparalleled in the short history of our country.
Jeez – it makes you wish the guy had just kept drinking.
To sum up; while you certainly can do and be whatever you want it is not necessarily beneficial for everyone to realize that potential. Be it destiny or free will there are those amongst us who might do the rest of society a favor by staying on the couch, taking bong rips and playing the latest version of Grand Theft Auto.
How’s that for inspiration?
e-mail: madbob@madbob.com
Monday, May 5, 2008
Breakdowns and a Potentially Meaningless Race
Eight Bells Silenced
The 134th running of the Kentucky Derby, America’s longest continuous-running competition, turned out to be a major bummer. The 5-2 favorite Big Brown won with ease and looks to be a serious threat to win the Triple Crown for the first time in decades. The only filly in the race Eight Bells ran her heart out to finish second. Unfortunately she also ran her legs out, breaking both of her front ankles as she galloped a quarter mile past the finish; she was euthanized on the track. I suppose that’s part of the allure of horse racing – triumph and tragedy all rolled up into one big ball of mint julep and horse-shit; the salt of the earth mingling for one day with the old-money elite and the new-money celebrity. The Kentucky Derby is an incredible spectacle but I don’t know if I can stomach horse-racing any more.
It was Barbaro’s breakdown in the Preakness two years ago that put me off eating meat and now this. To me there is nothing better than a good race but from now on I think I’ll just follow races between humans. At least in auto-racing only the hillbilly drivers get killed. My wife points out also that it is the choice of the human drivers to risk their lives but I think fate or destiny could be sited as well. Did Dale Earnhardt Jr. ever really have a choice whether or not to get behind the wheel? What would he be doing instead - Plumbing? No, in my mind those madmen behind the wheels of those over-powered vehicles have as much choice as I do when I get up at 6:30 on a Monday morning to go punch a clock in a warehouse big enough to fit all of Jay Leno’s cars along with Imelda Marcos’ shoe collection. Sure, I could do something else – but the consequences would be staggering.
A Horse Race of a Whole Different Color
I tuned into the Kentucky Derby thinking it would be a nice distraction from politics and the wars we’re involved in. Hillary Clinton’s recent remarks on “obliterating Iran” are getting some attention in the media. Those with a semblance of foresight are pointing out that these kinds of comments end up galvanizing the Iranian public behind the regime that is in power. (See 2004 U.S. election for an example of perceived threats unifying a population behind a failed leader).
It’s interesting this notion that Iran is threatening our troops. If one takes the time to look at a map of the Middle East it becomes clear that we are the ones doing the threatening. Iran is a large country with a number of countries sharing borders including Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Iraq. Iran is literally surrounded by foreign troops and sympathizers. Imagine if we had been declared a member of an “axis of evil” and then found foreign troops amassed on the borders in Mexico, Canada, and Cuba. It is impossible for us here to really understand this kind of justified paranoia. A sneak attack by a handful of nut-jobs is one thing; but the world’s most powerful and technologically savvy army, that has already completely ruined a thriving metropolis and sent two and arguably three countries spiraling into chaos and violence, is sitting on your borders and even their potential future leaders are threatening nuclear obliteration – well that’s a whole another story.
Enter the Fear
This is one of the single scariest moments in our brief history that I have witnessed. We have a lame duck President in office who has staked his legacy on transformation through military means of the Middle East. He and his advisors believe with a faith most of us don’t understand (or share) that what they are doing is true and right and for the greater good of America and the world. The most likely successors to the Presidency are talking about dismantling these manipulations in the Middle East before they even have a chance to take hold. All that Bush Incorporated has worked for going back to the Nixon administration could be for naught.
But there is one last Hail Mary that the President could toss to keep the plans and dreams of the neo-conservative movement alive and that is an invasion of Iran. Assuming the next President is a democrat it would tie them up in an economic and military mess for their entire first term and likely they won’t get a second. If McCain gets the nod it just gives him a nice running start on what he’s already agreed are sound policies.
These final eight months of Bush’s eight years are treacherous. If it goes a certain way it could make this whole zany roller coaster of a Presidential race we’ve been watching essentially meaningless.
Let’s hope that’s not the case.
As always e-mail me your thoughts and notions. Madbob@madbob.com.
The 134th running of the Kentucky Derby, America’s longest continuous-running competition, turned out to be a major bummer. The 5-2 favorite Big Brown won with ease and looks to be a serious threat to win the Triple Crown for the first time in decades. The only filly in the race Eight Bells ran her heart out to finish second. Unfortunately she also ran her legs out, breaking both of her front ankles as she galloped a quarter mile past the finish; she was euthanized on the track. I suppose that’s part of the allure of horse racing – triumph and tragedy all rolled up into one big ball of mint julep and horse-shit; the salt of the earth mingling for one day with the old-money elite and the new-money celebrity. The Kentucky Derby is an incredible spectacle but I don’t know if I can stomach horse-racing any more.
It was Barbaro’s breakdown in the Preakness two years ago that put me off eating meat and now this. To me there is nothing better than a good race but from now on I think I’ll just follow races between humans. At least in auto-racing only the hillbilly drivers get killed. My wife points out also that it is the choice of the human drivers to risk their lives but I think fate or destiny could be sited as well. Did Dale Earnhardt Jr. ever really have a choice whether or not to get behind the wheel? What would he be doing instead - Plumbing? No, in my mind those madmen behind the wheels of those over-powered vehicles have as much choice as I do when I get up at 6:30 on a Monday morning to go punch a clock in a warehouse big enough to fit all of Jay Leno’s cars along with Imelda Marcos’ shoe collection. Sure, I could do something else – but the consequences would be staggering.
A Horse Race of a Whole Different Color
I tuned into the Kentucky Derby thinking it would be a nice distraction from politics and the wars we’re involved in. Hillary Clinton’s recent remarks on “obliterating Iran” are getting some attention in the media. Those with a semblance of foresight are pointing out that these kinds of comments end up galvanizing the Iranian public behind the regime that is in power. (See 2004 U.S. election for an example of perceived threats unifying a population behind a failed leader).
It’s interesting this notion that Iran is threatening our troops. If one takes the time to look at a map of the Middle East it becomes clear that we are the ones doing the threatening. Iran is a large country with a number of countries sharing borders including Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Iraq. Iran is literally surrounded by foreign troops and sympathizers. Imagine if we had been declared a member of an “axis of evil” and then found foreign troops amassed on the borders in Mexico, Canada, and Cuba. It is impossible for us here to really understand this kind of justified paranoia. A sneak attack by a handful of nut-jobs is one thing; but the world’s most powerful and technologically savvy army, that has already completely ruined a thriving metropolis and sent two and arguably three countries spiraling into chaos and violence, is sitting on your borders and even their potential future leaders are threatening nuclear obliteration – well that’s a whole another story.
Enter the Fear
This is one of the single scariest moments in our brief history that I have witnessed. We have a lame duck President in office who has staked his legacy on transformation through military means of the Middle East. He and his advisors believe with a faith most of us don’t understand (or share) that what they are doing is true and right and for the greater good of America and the world. The most likely successors to the Presidency are talking about dismantling these manipulations in the Middle East before they even have a chance to take hold. All that Bush Incorporated has worked for going back to the Nixon administration could be for naught.
But there is one last Hail Mary that the President could toss to keep the plans and dreams of the neo-conservative movement alive and that is an invasion of Iran. Assuming the next President is a democrat it would tie them up in an economic and military mess for their entire first term and likely they won’t get a second. If McCain gets the nod it just gives him a nice running start on what he’s already agreed are sound policies.
These final eight months of Bush’s eight years are treacherous. If it goes a certain way it could make this whole zany roller coaster of a Presidential race we’ve been watching essentially meaningless.
Let’s hope that’s not the case.
As always e-mail me your thoughts and notions. Madbob@madbob.com.
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Wright, Dude, STFU!
Reverend Wright and the Death of the Original Day Tripper
Believe me I desperately want to stop writing about politics as much as you probably want to stop reading about them but everyday I listen to another outrage or episode on the news and my fingers just take over and start doing their little politics tap-dance on these black plastic keys! I am not in control here! I’m a junkie and I’ve got it bad. I’m shaking and slobbering like a dog, vibrating and contorting, there’s a twitch, a spasm. Damn these fits! There’s only one fix for the political junkie and right now a fresh new batch of the good strong stuff has hit the streets. So politics it is my fine friends – bend over and get ready for another five swipes with the paddle – or maybe the switch grass. Corporal punishment is alive and well here in the Immaculate Infection.
Reverend Wright and the National Media Launch Torpedo Attack
A couple of weeks ago I wrote an article in support of the Reverend Jeremiah Wright. I stand by what I said; I think the Reverend is accurate when he says our nation was founded on racism and that our foreign policy has very much to do with our current “terrorism” woes. I also denounced the national media for taking his quotes out of context and replaying them on endless loop in order to paint the man as a radical zealot.
Unfortunately it seems that Reverend Jeremiah Wright has taken a liking to the national media spotlight. Apparently a combination of failure to grasp the way this national media machine works and an ego-driven need for attention have rendered in him an inability to understand a fundamental fact.
Right now every time Reverend Jeremiah Wright opens his mouth it will only hurt Senator Barack Obama’s chance to get into the White House. The story has already been framed by the national media – all they are looking for now is a handful of seven second quotes to color their paint by numbers picture. The Revered has obliged willingly – stepped into the oncoming train that is the National Press Club and unleashed another political firestorm for Obama’s camp to try and desperately extinguish. My sources tell me that Hillary Clinton came as close as she has in decades to having an orgasm while she watched Wright roll his eyes, flippantly dismiss the intrusive media questions, and deliver a Sunday style sermon to a cynical godless media ready and waiting to pounce on any hyperbole that might be twisted to fit a landscape littered with but thirsting for more blood. On the other side of the aisle John McCain witnessed the spectacle and politely dismissed himself and went to the restroom to jack himself off. Rush Limbaugh was so happy he popped a half-dozen oxys and washed them down with a half a pint of whiskey.
So Reverend Jeremiah Wright – while I agree with much of what you have to say, if you want Obama in the White House then it is time for you to SHUT THE FUCK UP!!!
That being said isn’t it amazing that the best they can come up with to hobble Obama with is the comments of his pastor? Obama is having to defend things he’s never even said! And to make matters even more implausible this desperate attack is actually working.
R.I.P. Albert Hoffman
The man who discovered the psychedelic compound Lysergic Acid (a.k.a. L.S.D., acid, trip, blotter acid, window pane, dots, mellow yellow*) and took a mystifying bicycle ride while under the influence of the first (massive) dose of it has died in Switzerland at the age of 102. Hoffman had hoped the drug would eventually be used successfully for psychiatric treatment – and studies I have read show that it extremely effective in treating addiction (maybe I can use it to kick this politics habit I’ve acquired). Instead the drug became popular recreationally and was banned by the U.S. Government in 1966.
Speaking of; the local television news just ran a story suggesting that teens buy Salvia Divnorum over the internet before it is outlawed by the State government. A “friend of mine” has tried this Salvia and tells me it creates some unique visuals and is a ball to listen to music with while also on nitrous; but that it leaves a nasty psychic hangover that lasts for weeks.
My “friend” tells me he’d stick with clean L.S.D. any day of the week!
*I’m not sure about “mellow yellow” as a term for acid, I always thought that referred to scraped and dried banana peels, but I got these slang terms from the DEA website.
Believe me I desperately want to stop writing about politics as much as you probably want to stop reading about them but everyday I listen to another outrage or episode on the news and my fingers just take over and start doing their little politics tap-dance on these black plastic keys! I am not in control here! I’m a junkie and I’ve got it bad. I’m shaking and slobbering like a dog, vibrating and contorting, there’s a twitch, a spasm. Damn these fits! There’s only one fix for the political junkie and right now a fresh new batch of the good strong stuff has hit the streets. So politics it is my fine friends – bend over and get ready for another five swipes with the paddle – or maybe the switch grass. Corporal punishment is alive and well here in the Immaculate Infection.
Reverend Wright and the National Media Launch Torpedo Attack
A couple of weeks ago I wrote an article in support of the Reverend Jeremiah Wright. I stand by what I said; I think the Reverend is accurate when he says our nation was founded on racism and that our foreign policy has very much to do with our current “terrorism” woes. I also denounced the national media for taking his quotes out of context and replaying them on endless loop in order to paint the man as a radical zealot.
Unfortunately it seems that Reverend Jeremiah Wright has taken a liking to the national media spotlight. Apparently a combination of failure to grasp the way this national media machine works and an ego-driven need for attention have rendered in him an inability to understand a fundamental fact.
Right now every time Reverend Jeremiah Wright opens his mouth it will only hurt Senator Barack Obama’s chance to get into the White House. The story has already been framed by the national media – all they are looking for now is a handful of seven second quotes to color their paint by numbers picture. The Revered has obliged willingly – stepped into the oncoming train that is the National Press Club and unleashed another political firestorm for Obama’s camp to try and desperately extinguish. My sources tell me that Hillary Clinton came as close as she has in decades to having an orgasm while she watched Wright roll his eyes, flippantly dismiss the intrusive media questions, and deliver a Sunday style sermon to a cynical godless media ready and waiting to pounce on any hyperbole that might be twisted to fit a landscape littered with but thirsting for more blood. On the other side of the aisle John McCain witnessed the spectacle and politely dismissed himself and went to the restroom to jack himself off. Rush Limbaugh was so happy he popped a half-dozen oxys and washed them down with a half a pint of whiskey.
So Reverend Jeremiah Wright – while I agree with much of what you have to say, if you want Obama in the White House then it is time for you to SHUT THE FUCK UP!!!
That being said isn’t it amazing that the best they can come up with to hobble Obama with is the comments of his pastor? Obama is having to defend things he’s never even said! And to make matters even more implausible this desperate attack is actually working.
R.I.P. Albert Hoffman
The man who discovered the psychedelic compound Lysergic Acid (a.k.a. L.S.D., acid, trip, blotter acid, window pane, dots, mellow yellow*) and took a mystifying bicycle ride while under the influence of the first (massive) dose of it has died in Switzerland at the age of 102. Hoffman had hoped the drug would eventually be used successfully for psychiatric treatment – and studies I have read show that it extremely effective in treating addiction (maybe I can use it to kick this politics habit I’ve acquired). Instead the drug became popular recreationally and was banned by the U.S. Government in 1966.
Speaking of; the local television news just ran a story suggesting that teens buy Salvia Divnorum over the internet before it is outlawed by the State government. A “friend of mine” has tried this Salvia and tells me it creates some unique visuals and is a ball to listen to music with while also on nitrous; but that it leaves a nasty psychic hangover that lasts for weeks.
My “friend” tells me he’d stick with clean L.S.D. any day of the week!
*I’m not sure about “mellow yellow” as a term for acid, I always thought that referred to scraped and dried banana peels, but I got these slang terms from the DEA website.
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Schizos, Green Lips, and Shiny Legs
"...Democracy is a poor system; the only thing that can be said for it is that it's eight times as good as any other method. Its worst fault is that its leaders reflect their constituents..."
- Jubal Harshaw from Robert Heinlein's Science Fiction Classic "Stranger in a Strange Land."
Here is an amazing factoid. President George W. Bush holds the record for both the highest and the lowest approval ratings since the inception of the Gallup Poll. In the days following 911 his ratings were in the 90's - now they have sunk down to the 20's. Do you ever imagine he must scratch his head sometimes and think "what the hell do these people want?" To me this doesn't represent any dramatic shift in the man or his policies but rather the fickle and schizoid temperament of a population so focused on the zen of immediate gratification and the satisfaction of every conceivable urge that consequence has become not just an after-thought but a non-thought. Then we wake up and look around at the wasteland gross consumption has made of the world around us and go "hey, what the fuck? This sucks!"
So as we sow so shall we reap... I read that someplace or another. Fuck it, pop another pill, pour another drink, shovel some more processed food into our ever-fattening faces - its all going over the cliff now anyway. Everything under the sun is "green" but our level of CO2 emissions hasn't gone down an iota since Al Gore's eye-opening climate change documentary "An Inconvenient Truth" came out two years ago. Lip service and clever marketing campaigns are all we have to show for an awful lot of good intentions and even a little bit of hard work.
I'm starting to think this whole thing is bullshit. The ones talking the most about climate change seem to overlap neatly with the same ones leaving the largest "carbon footprints" - the globe-trotting celebrities, the politicians in their private jets, the educated upper-middle class with their air-conditioned McMansions and their ever intact sense of entitlement. Sure it’s a lovely idea to actually cut our consumption - but that would mean we might actually sweat and feel hungry once in awhile! Intolerable. Doesn't fit in with the whole "satisfy every craving immediately" philosophy that defines the American existence in this year of our Lord 2008.
The Thing That Would Not Die
Hillary Clinton is decidedly still in the race after what is looking like a decisive 10 point victory in Pennsylvania. I don't know what I think about that. Ask me now and again in five minutes and I'll likely give you two completely contradictory answers. I like that this primary is actually up for grabs but I also can't stomach the idea of a continuation of the policies of the last eight years and it seems like the longer the democrats squabble over the nomination the more likely it is no matter who gets it will end up being defeated by another stodgy old white dude in a dark suit bowing down to the gods of corporate enterprise and industry. Wonderful.
On that note I am more than a little mystified by Hillary Clinton's latest comments that, were Iran to attack Israel she, as Commander in Chief, would not hesitate to strike back at them and that "we have the power to obliterate them." She's talking nukes folks. It all sounds groovy but the people of Iran are not all that unified behind their leader (it's the economy stupid) and the last I checked our nukes still don't have the ability to distinguish "civilian" from "terrorist." I know Hillary wants to demonstrate her toughness but is this really the way to go about courting democratic voters during the primary election? Save the saber rattling for the swing voters during the national game.
Take My Wives... Please!
Apparently there is nothing like a good polygamy story to get the media's attention off of the Presidential race and, oh yeah, those pesky little wars. The national news has run a piece on some stupid Texas religious sect every day for two weeks now. I must have missed the segment where Katie Couric explained that the military is now accepting serious felons into the armed forces. At last count 18% of new recruits have had serious run-ins with the law including but not limited to: burglary, rape, assault, and inappropriate conduct with a minor. Neato. Luckily for us the ethics displayed by our soldiers in uniform up until this point has been so exemplary that I'm sure the new recruits will catch on quick and change their ways.
Oh yeah, and of course there is the global food shortage - I guess I was going to the bathroom when old Shiny-Legs was talking about that.
- Jubal Harshaw from Robert Heinlein's Science Fiction Classic "Stranger in a Strange Land."
Here is an amazing factoid. President George W. Bush holds the record for both the highest and the lowest approval ratings since the inception of the Gallup Poll. In the days following 911 his ratings were in the 90's - now they have sunk down to the 20's. Do you ever imagine he must scratch his head sometimes and think "what the hell do these people want?" To me this doesn't represent any dramatic shift in the man or his policies but rather the fickle and schizoid temperament of a population so focused on the zen of immediate gratification and the satisfaction of every conceivable urge that consequence has become not just an after-thought but a non-thought. Then we wake up and look around at the wasteland gross consumption has made of the world around us and go "hey, what the fuck? This sucks!"
So as we sow so shall we reap... I read that someplace or another. Fuck it, pop another pill, pour another drink, shovel some more processed food into our ever-fattening faces - its all going over the cliff now anyway. Everything under the sun is "green" but our level of CO2 emissions hasn't gone down an iota since Al Gore's eye-opening climate change documentary "An Inconvenient Truth" came out two years ago. Lip service and clever marketing campaigns are all we have to show for an awful lot of good intentions and even a little bit of hard work.
I'm starting to think this whole thing is bullshit. The ones talking the most about climate change seem to overlap neatly with the same ones leaving the largest "carbon footprints" - the globe-trotting celebrities, the politicians in their private jets, the educated upper-middle class with their air-conditioned McMansions and their ever intact sense of entitlement. Sure it’s a lovely idea to actually cut our consumption - but that would mean we might actually sweat and feel hungry once in awhile! Intolerable. Doesn't fit in with the whole "satisfy every craving immediately" philosophy that defines the American existence in this year of our Lord 2008.
The Thing That Would Not Die
Hillary Clinton is decidedly still in the race after what is looking like a decisive 10 point victory in Pennsylvania. I don't know what I think about that. Ask me now and again in five minutes and I'll likely give you two completely contradictory answers. I like that this primary is actually up for grabs but I also can't stomach the idea of a continuation of the policies of the last eight years and it seems like the longer the democrats squabble over the nomination the more likely it is no matter who gets it will end up being defeated by another stodgy old white dude in a dark suit bowing down to the gods of corporate enterprise and industry. Wonderful.
On that note I am more than a little mystified by Hillary Clinton's latest comments that, were Iran to attack Israel she, as Commander in Chief, would not hesitate to strike back at them and that "we have the power to obliterate them." She's talking nukes folks. It all sounds groovy but the people of Iran are not all that unified behind their leader (it's the economy stupid) and the last I checked our nukes still don't have the ability to distinguish "civilian" from "terrorist." I know Hillary wants to demonstrate her toughness but is this really the way to go about courting democratic voters during the primary election? Save the saber rattling for the swing voters during the national game.
Take My Wives... Please!
Apparently there is nothing like a good polygamy story to get the media's attention off of the Presidential race and, oh yeah, those pesky little wars. The national news has run a piece on some stupid Texas religious sect every day for two weeks now. I must have missed the segment where Katie Couric explained that the military is now accepting serious felons into the armed forces. At last count 18% of new recruits have had serious run-ins with the law including but not limited to: burglary, rape, assault, and inappropriate conduct with a minor. Neato. Luckily for us the ethics displayed by our soldiers in uniform up until this point has been so exemplary that I'm sure the new recruits will catch on quick and change their ways.
Oh yeah, and of course there is the global food shortage - I guess I was going to the bathroom when old Shiny-Legs was talking about that.
Friday, April 18, 2008
A thought on Global Warming...
There are people today who are refuting the idea that global warming is happening. As evidence they take a survey of a short span of time and say there has been no rise in temperature and therefore there is no global warming. I read one headline that said temperatures were actually going down. I tend to believe this in the short term. I believe this because the polar ice caps are the planets natural cooling system and these ice caps are breaking apart, falling into the ocean, and cooling the sea temperature.
The problem is that the ice caps are melting - if they melt away completely there will be no more cooling system. Then this planet will really start heating up in earnest.
So yes, in the short term temperatures may actually drop. But that will only be temporary.
Those are my thoughts anyway.
What do you think?
The problem is that the ice caps are melting - if they melt away completely there will be no more cooling system. Then this planet will really start heating up in earnest.
So yes, in the short term temperatures may actually drop. But that will only be temporary.
Those are my thoughts anyway.
What do you think?
Democratic Shoot-out Annie Oakley Style
The democratic primary has really heated up on the heels of a handful of badly-worded remarks by the two candidates, Senator Hillary Clinton and Senator Barack Obama. Hillary took a big ding after her claims that she was greeted by sniper-fire on a trip to Bosnia during the 1990’s were revealed to be gross exaggerations. In fact it was the comedian Sinbad who was also on the junket who blew holes in the Senator and former first lady’s story. Clinton is continuing to take a beating in polls on trustworthiness as a result of that incident and probably also due to the fact that her last name is Clinton – synonymous in some circles with the ability to lie effortlessly and do anything to win elections.
But Barack Obama has his own problems after a scratchy tape recording emerged of remarks he made at a closed fund-raising event in San Francisco. In a speech he addressed the frustrations of many small town Americans with the loss of jobs and how those frustrations have been channeled into religion, racism, and guns. Both Senators Clinton and the Republican nominee John McCain have jumped on those remarks and their attacks are gaining traction. It has become that rare chink in Obama’s otherwise gleaming armor.
But the fear amongst Clinton insiders is that, with very few maneuvers left to make, Hillary could overplay her hand and cause a backlash amongst voters who are growing increasingly tired of what is developing into an inter-party slug-fest. (These two are supposed to be on the same team, right?) Clinton has been running attack ads featuring Obama’s remark and bringing it up during rallies. Signs of voters’ frustrations with these tactics have already manifested themselves and Clinton has found herself being booed for the attacks as voters are hungry for ideas and policies.
Clinton has exposed her own flank by drinking beers and whiskey with the locals in a Pennsylvania pub and talking about growing up shooting with her father. For anyone else this might come off as chummy but again, when your last name is Clinton, it is easy to view these actions and statements as calculated ploys. Hillary is always going to have trouble with this aspect of her public personae. I shudder to think of the carnage that will be drudged to the surface in a national campaign between Clinton and McCain. Both Senators have a long record of public service and there is a lot of room for vicious attack. Another part of me relishes the idea just for the sheer jaw-dropping spectacle of this political blood-fight.
The Pope and the Dalai Lama Walk into a Bar…
Pope Benedict is currently here in the United States. I don’t know what to make of him. I appreciate that Benedict has seized on his opportunity to write about love and hope. Many expected him to focus more on the conservative ideology of Catholocism so that came as a pleasant surprise. My wife had tremendous respect for the last Pope – maybe a left-over from her Catholic up-bringing. There has also been a lot of hero-worship of the Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama. They both seem like alright guys, gentle and peaceful men. We certainly could use a few more of them in the public eye. Myself my religious beliefs fall somewhere between Deism and Atheism so I’m not impressed by these religious figures.
In fact I am a bit annoyed by the worship of these men. The Dalai Lama is considered by many to be a reincarnation of an enlightened soul and as such he is divorced from the cycle of life and death that the rest of us are mired in. The thought follows that the Dalai Lama chose to be incarnated in this time and place in order to teach us compassion. Hey I love the concept, don’t get me wrong, but I can’t help but think it must be a nice little ego-boost to have people worshipping you like the living incarnation of a god. Of course the truly enlightened have no use for ego so what the hell do I know pecking away at my keys and spewing my caustic toxins into this world of eternal beauty and sadness.
Global Food Crisis
Relatively unreported here in the United States of Obesity is the fact that the world is in the midst of a massive global food crisis. People are rioting in the streets because they can not afford to eat. Ah we’ve come so far in this year of our Lord 2008.
Bush Doesn’t Speak for Me
Our sitting President George W. Bush greeted the Pope by telling him that “America is a nation that welcomes religion in the public square.” Well once again Mr. Bush, you are not speaking for this American.
But Barack Obama has his own problems after a scratchy tape recording emerged of remarks he made at a closed fund-raising event in San Francisco. In a speech he addressed the frustrations of many small town Americans with the loss of jobs and how those frustrations have been channeled into religion, racism, and guns. Both Senators Clinton and the Republican nominee John McCain have jumped on those remarks and their attacks are gaining traction. It has become that rare chink in Obama’s otherwise gleaming armor.
But the fear amongst Clinton insiders is that, with very few maneuvers left to make, Hillary could overplay her hand and cause a backlash amongst voters who are growing increasingly tired of what is developing into an inter-party slug-fest. (These two are supposed to be on the same team, right?) Clinton has been running attack ads featuring Obama’s remark and bringing it up during rallies. Signs of voters’ frustrations with these tactics have already manifested themselves and Clinton has found herself being booed for the attacks as voters are hungry for ideas and policies.
Clinton has exposed her own flank by drinking beers and whiskey with the locals in a Pennsylvania pub and talking about growing up shooting with her father. For anyone else this might come off as chummy but again, when your last name is Clinton, it is easy to view these actions and statements as calculated ploys. Hillary is always going to have trouble with this aspect of her public personae. I shudder to think of the carnage that will be drudged to the surface in a national campaign between Clinton and McCain. Both Senators have a long record of public service and there is a lot of room for vicious attack. Another part of me relishes the idea just for the sheer jaw-dropping spectacle of this political blood-fight.
The Pope and the Dalai Lama Walk into a Bar…
Pope Benedict is currently here in the United States. I don’t know what to make of him. I appreciate that Benedict has seized on his opportunity to write about love and hope. Many expected him to focus more on the conservative ideology of Catholocism so that came as a pleasant surprise. My wife had tremendous respect for the last Pope – maybe a left-over from her Catholic up-bringing. There has also been a lot of hero-worship of the Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama. They both seem like alright guys, gentle and peaceful men. We certainly could use a few more of them in the public eye. Myself my religious beliefs fall somewhere between Deism and Atheism so I’m not impressed by these religious figures.
In fact I am a bit annoyed by the worship of these men. The Dalai Lama is considered by many to be a reincarnation of an enlightened soul and as such he is divorced from the cycle of life and death that the rest of us are mired in. The thought follows that the Dalai Lama chose to be incarnated in this time and place in order to teach us compassion. Hey I love the concept, don’t get me wrong, but I can’t help but think it must be a nice little ego-boost to have people worshipping you like the living incarnation of a god. Of course the truly enlightened have no use for ego so what the hell do I know pecking away at my keys and spewing my caustic toxins into this world of eternal beauty and sadness.
Global Food Crisis
Relatively unreported here in the United States of Obesity is the fact that the world is in the midst of a massive global food crisis. People are rioting in the streets because they can not afford to eat. Ah we’ve come so far in this year of our Lord 2008.
Bush Doesn’t Speak for Me
Our sitting President George W. Bush greeted the Pope by telling him that “America is a nation that welcomes religion in the public square.” Well once again Mr. Bush, you are not speaking for this American.
Over-Population
I tend to believe that the world is over-populated right now. My evidence to this proposition isn’t the number of people – it has more to do with the worsening condition of the environment. Things are out of balance. Everything “pollutes,” meaning every living thing consumes resources and excretes waste. But there is a balance. We inhale oxygen and we exhale carbon dioxide. Plants and trees inhale carbon dioxide and exhale oxygen. Whether you believe it to be the work of God, gods, or evolution the environment is set up sublimely. It is such an amazing feat of cosmic engineering and the fact that you are alive to read this and I am alive to write it just boggles the mind. An incredible number of amazing events and coincidences have collided to create our existence.
That balance is revealing itself to be more tenuous that we may ever have understood prior to this year 2008. The latest indication of this is trace amounts of our excreted pharmaceuticals showing up in the water supply; never mind the consistent die-offs of bees, fish, and fowl.
Take a Look at the Dump
A more immediate example of this is right down the road from Chico. Head south from Chico on Highway 99 and look to your left right around Neal Road. See that big hill with tires and plastic covering it? That was not a hill when I moved here eight years ago. It was a valley. That is the collective garbage that we, the residents of Butte County, have generated in less than a decade. Incredible.
Now I believe our gross consumption and materialism is a huge societal problem that needs to be corrected but I don’t think that alone will relieve the strain human-kind is placing on the environment. Frankly I just think there are plain too many of us.
Alarming Population Growth
One hundred years ago the world’s population was estimated to be a bit more than 88 million people. That’s a lot of folks to be sure. But as of this writing the world population is estimated to be 6.66 Billion people. The population of the U.S. alone is over 300 million people.
In only one hundred years the population has increased about 75 times. We are a weed, or maybe a tenacious spreading mold.
It is interesting to me that the world’s weather is turning more dramatic. As far as shaking off a parasite goes it makes great sense. Creating extreme temperatures on the high and low end of the thermometer is a good tactic for getting rid of pesky critters.
Jonestown Revisited
We watched a documentary last night on the rise and fall of the People’s Church. For those of you who are unfamiliar the People’s Church was started in the 1950’s in Indianapolis by a charismatic but dark and troubled preacher named Jim Jones. The church was an incredible feat when it started. They really had managed to bridge the racial divide. It was one of the very first de-segregated churches and as such it drew the wrath of many. Jones moved the church west to Ukiah, California and the church’s membership grew. Then in 1977 the People’s Church moved to Guyana in South America and there the members managed to carve their own little piece of Eden out of the jungle. But things were not right. Along with his increasing power and prestige Jones’ dark side emerged. Paranoia set in. When Congressman Leo Ryan came to visit the enclave he and four other members of his entourage were gunned down. Then horror transpired. Knowing the church that had morphed into a cult would not be allowed to continue after this murder of the Congressman’s party Jim Jones encouraged his followers to drink Kool-aid laced with cyanide. On November 18th, 1978 nine hundred and nine members of the People’s Church, men, women, and children, drank poison and died together in the jungle.
It is an incredibly sad story, not just because of the horror of the ending, but because the People’s Church had so much incredible potential for real social change. Not only race but also class distinctions were completely broken down.
But the church rose and fell on the back of its one flawed leader. Is this the Achilles heel of leadership? None of us are perfect – so does the concentration of so much power in the hands of so few necessarily put too much strain on those breaking points?
Democracy is a system that is supposed to disseminate the power to the masses but it can be improved upon. How can we make our voices louder?
The environment – physical, natural, and political – is crying out to us for change. But where do we go from here?
Any ideas? Madbob@madbob.com.
That balance is revealing itself to be more tenuous that we may ever have understood prior to this year 2008. The latest indication of this is trace amounts of our excreted pharmaceuticals showing up in the water supply; never mind the consistent die-offs of bees, fish, and fowl.
Take a Look at the Dump
A more immediate example of this is right down the road from Chico. Head south from Chico on Highway 99 and look to your left right around Neal Road. See that big hill with tires and plastic covering it? That was not a hill when I moved here eight years ago. It was a valley. That is the collective garbage that we, the residents of Butte County, have generated in less than a decade. Incredible.
Now I believe our gross consumption and materialism is a huge societal problem that needs to be corrected but I don’t think that alone will relieve the strain human-kind is placing on the environment. Frankly I just think there are plain too many of us.
Alarming Population Growth
One hundred years ago the world’s population was estimated to be a bit more than 88 million people. That’s a lot of folks to be sure. But as of this writing the world population is estimated to be 6.66 Billion people. The population of the U.S. alone is over 300 million people.
In only one hundred years the population has increased about 75 times. We are a weed, or maybe a tenacious spreading mold.
It is interesting to me that the world’s weather is turning more dramatic. As far as shaking off a parasite goes it makes great sense. Creating extreme temperatures on the high and low end of the thermometer is a good tactic for getting rid of pesky critters.
Jonestown Revisited
We watched a documentary last night on the rise and fall of the People’s Church. For those of you who are unfamiliar the People’s Church was started in the 1950’s in Indianapolis by a charismatic but dark and troubled preacher named Jim Jones. The church was an incredible feat when it started. They really had managed to bridge the racial divide. It was one of the very first de-segregated churches and as such it drew the wrath of many. Jones moved the church west to Ukiah, California and the church’s membership grew. Then in 1977 the People’s Church moved to Guyana in South America and there the members managed to carve their own little piece of Eden out of the jungle. But things were not right. Along with his increasing power and prestige Jones’ dark side emerged. Paranoia set in. When Congressman Leo Ryan came to visit the enclave he and four other members of his entourage were gunned down. Then horror transpired. Knowing the church that had morphed into a cult would not be allowed to continue after this murder of the Congressman’s party Jim Jones encouraged his followers to drink Kool-aid laced with cyanide. On November 18th, 1978 nine hundred and nine members of the People’s Church, men, women, and children, drank poison and died together in the jungle.
It is an incredibly sad story, not just because of the horror of the ending, but because the People’s Church had so much incredible potential for real social change. Not only race but also class distinctions were completely broken down.
But the church rose and fell on the back of its one flawed leader. Is this the Achilles heel of leadership? None of us are perfect – so does the concentration of so much power in the hands of so few necessarily put too much strain on those breaking points?
Democracy is a system that is supposed to disseminate the power to the masses but it can be improved upon. How can we make our voices louder?
The environment – physical, natural, and political – is crying out to us for change. But where do we go from here?
Any ideas? Madbob@madbob.com.
Thursday, April 3, 2008
Beauty
J. Edgar Hoover
J. Edgar Hoover was the former head of the FBI and a severely sinister and creepy individual. He was twisted and power-hungry and would stop at nothing to increase his own influence and prestige. He built the FBI into a potent law enforcement tool but he also used that potency to achieve his own selfish and strange gains.
One of the suspect activities the FBI indulged in under Hoover’s watch was to secretly wiretap figures within the Civil Rights movement. As a result the FBI accumulated hours upon hours of clandestine footage of Civil Rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. While the practice is dubious and illegal historians today are absolutely ecstatic to have this treasure trove of information that shines a light into the personality of such a dynamic public figure.
It turns out that the Martin Luther King Jr. revealed in those tapes is even more selfless and righteous than his public personae. He was not an attention-seeker; in fact he consistently bemoaned the public role that was thrust upon him. King spoke often of being tired, of just wanting to go back to being a preacher – which he felt was what God had called upon him to do. But, with the encouragement of the people with whom he had surrounded himself, he pushed on until the fateful day he was assassinated in April of 1968. Incidentally there is more than a little suspicion that Hoover’s FBI was involved in that incident.
Listening through these tapes Hoover did not take away the beauty and selflessness of the man in question. Instead he focused his attention on King’s imperfections. The tapes revealed that King was an adulterer and Hoover quickly labeled him a sexual deviant and a hypocrite. He found every avenue he could to dehumanize and tear down a great man.
It is difficult for me to explain this but I feel badly for J. Edgar Hoover. How could a man have so much hatred in their heart that they fail to see the brilliance of a once in a lifetime figure like Martin Luther King Jr.?
Withdrawing the Benefit of the Doubt
It is jading but helpful to understand that there are people out there very much like this – people whose hearts are so hardened and filled with cynicism that they would miss the beauty that surrounds them. The truth of the matter is that the establishment is fundamentally afraid of change. It makes sense – if one has power they will do whatever they have to do in order to hold onto it. This is why you will never see the Federal Government choosing to de-centralize its power and shift it to states and local government. This is why the establishment was afraid to let blacks and women vote. This is why the Chinese army drove tanks into Tiananmen Square and this is why more recently the Burmese Government slaughtered monks. This is why the establishment crucified a man for speaking a new philosophy and causing agitation amongst the populace.
So anyway – I have a tendency to give people the benefit of the doubt. For years I have, in my head, reconciled George W. Bush’s actions with the unique pressures and situations he finds himself in. I have said to myself. “Well, I’m sure that his intentions are good.” I formally withdraw that benefit of the doubt. I have come to the conclusion that people like Bush and Cheney simply don’t see the beauty in this world. Bush may see beauty in some perceived afterlife and as for Cheney I am not convinced he sees beyond dollars and cents and beyond the limitations of his own lifetime. My conclusion is that these guys are in it for their life-spans and then they’ll leave the mess for generations after them to deal with. It’s a sinister world view but actions don’t lie. You don’t break laws, establish a secretive cabal-like government, drop bombs, consistently increase military spending and wage pre-emptive warfare because you’re trying to create a peaceful and tolerant future. It is pure and simple retention of power.
Black Holes and Cosmic Lessons
It goes on and on. But we can find pertinent patterns in nature. A black hole sucks everything into it until – as the theory goes, it reaches critical mass. Then all the accumulated centralized energy and power bursts forth and is once again disseminated to the universe.
Power centers will crumble, establishments will fall.
Come on people – send me your thoughts and ideas. Madbob@madbob.com
J. Edgar Hoover was the former head of the FBI and a severely sinister and creepy individual. He was twisted and power-hungry and would stop at nothing to increase his own influence and prestige. He built the FBI into a potent law enforcement tool but he also used that potency to achieve his own selfish and strange gains.
One of the suspect activities the FBI indulged in under Hoover’s watch was to secretly wiretap figures within the Civil Rights movement. As a result the FBI accumulated hours upon hours of clandestine footage of Civil Rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. While the practice is dubious and illegal historians today are absolutely ecstatic to have this treasure trove of information that shines a light into the personality of such a dynamic public figure.
It turns out that the Martin Luther King Jr. revealed in those tapes is even more selfless and righteous than his public personae. He was not an attention-seeker; in fact he consistently bemoaned the public role that was thrust upon him. King spoke often of being tired, of just wanting to go back to being a preacher – which he felt was what God had called upon him to do. But, with the encouragement of the people with whom he had surrounded himself, he pushed on until the fateful day he was assassinated in April of 1968. Incidentally there is more than a little suspicion that Hoover’s FBI was involved in that incident.
Listening through these tapes Hoover did not take away the beauty and selflessness of the man in question. Instead he focused his attention on King’s imperfections. The tapes revealed that King was an adulterer and Hoover quickly labeled him a sexual deviant and a hypocrite. He found every avenue he could to dehumanize and tear down a great man.
It is difficult for me to explain this but I feel badly for J. Edgar Hoover. How could a man have so much hatred in their heart that they fail to see the brilliance of a once in a lifetime figure like Martin Luther King Jr.?
Withdrawing the Benefit of the Doubt
It is jading but helpful to understand that there are people out there very much like this – people whose hearts are so hardened and filled with cynicism that they would miss the beauty that surrounds them. The truth of the matter is that the establishment is fundamentally afraid of change. It makes sense – if one has power they will do whatever they have to do in order to hold onto it. This is why you will never see the Federal Government choosing to de-centralize its power and shift it to states and local government. This is why the establishment was afraid to let blacks and women vote. This is why the Chinese army drove tanks into Tiananmen Square and this is why more recently the Burmese Government slaughtered monks. This is why the establishment crucified a man for speaking a new philosophy and causing agitation amongst the populace.
So anyway – I have a tendency to give people the benefit of the doubt. For years I have, in my head, reconciled George W. Bush’s actions with the unique pressures and situations he finds himself in. I have said to myself. “Well, I’m sure that his intentions are good.” I formally withdraw that benefit of the doubt. I have come to the conclusion that people like Bush and Cheney simply don’t see the beauty in this world. Bush may see beauty in some perceived afterlife and as for Cheney I am not convinced he sees beyond dollars and cents and beyond the limitations of his own lifetime. My conclusion is that these guys are in it for their life-spans and then they’ll leave the mess for generations after them to deal with. It’s a sinister world view but actions don’t lie. You don’t break laws, establish a secretive cabal-like government, drop bombs, consistently increase military spending and wage pre-emptive warfare because you’re trying to create a peaceful and tolerant future. It is pure and simple retention of power.
Black Holes and Cosmic Lessons
It goes on and on. But we can find pertinent patterns in nature. A black hole sucks everything into it until – as the theory goes, it reaches critical mass. Then all the accumulated centralized energy and power bursts forth and is once again disseminated to the universe.
Power centers will crumble, establishments will fall.
Come on people – send me your thoughts and ideas. Madbob@madbob.com
Thursday, March 27, 2008
The Revolution Starts Now
It’s all well and good to call for a social revolution – but when it comes right down to it what can you or I, as a single individual, do to really inspire change? It is not a simple question to answer. I often feel powerless against what seem like irreversible forces that wield power and have their own agendas. There’s no way I can talk to George W. Bush directly, much less the ultra-powerful heads of private industry who are even less transparent than our politicians. It feels like I’m in a card game playing with twos and threes while the dealer is playing with all the face cards and aces.
But revolution can start with each of us if we’re willing to take some small steps. Myself I have become a proponent of radical de-centralization of power. The closer we can keep our tax dollars to home the more likely we are to get accurate representation from our elected officials. Here are a few ideas.
You are What You Eat
One of the easiest and most essential things you can do is start paying careful attention to what and where you eat and drink. Make a point of frequenting locally owned eateries. Better yet eat at locally owned restaurants that get their food from local growers and suppliers. There is a growing slow food movement and we could not live in a better place to eat local produce. Everything grows here in this rich river loam!
Go Veggie!
I gave up eating meat a few years ago for a variety of reasons. First and foremost I feel badly for the animals that spend their lives living in squalor only to be slaughtered. But secondly I am skeptical about the safety of our national meat industries. Scathing books and exposes have been written on the subject but there is so much commotion that they are easily dismissed. But consider for a moment what has to happen with thousands upon thousands of animals living in impacted quarters. Antibiotics and steroids are used in tremendous quantities in order to keep the animals growing fast enough, large enough, and to keep them “healthy” enough to get from birth to slaughter. The antibiotics are what scare me. Without them diseases would decimate these herds and flocks of caged animals. It isn’t a natural way for animals to live and the common sense part of my brain tells me that cannot be healthy down the line for those of us who consume this industry –created product.
Think About It!
Sometimes we have to put on our blinders to deal with a society that is increasingly ethically out of whack. We have enough to worry about in our day to day life without having to ponder how the kid who sewed our underpants together lives or where the hamburger we just ate really came from. We don’t want to recognize that rain forest is being cut down to the tune of 80,000 acres per day in order to make grazing land for cattle. But this “necessity” to not think about things is just plain and simple avoidance. Think about how you live, make sacrifices where you can, and lead a more integrated and ethical lifestyle. Small changes will create a greater sense of well-being and balance.
Drive Less
We can talk bio-fuels and hybrids and carbon emission capturing until the cows come home but in the mean-time a very simple thing we can almost all do is drive less. Also keep your car tuned up and the oil changed. This increases mileage.
Cash is King
Buy locally and trade whenever you can. Deal in cash. I’m not saying you should avoid paying your taxes; that would be illegal. But our taxes are financing a dubious war and a renegade Federal Government. Now if only we could convince the Feds to stop spending money they don’t have.
Write Your Congressperson!
I write to Congressman Wally Herger on a regular basis and have also written to assemblyman Rick Keene, as well as Senators Barbara Boxer, John McCain, and Nancy Pelosi. I don’t even count the e-mails I’ve fired off to the White House – they don’t even pretend to care. But our local representatives have been very good about getting back to me in a timely manner. I don’t always agree with what they have to say but I appreciate that someone on their staff actually reads and takes the time to respond to my letters.
They’ll never hear you if you don’t make some noise!
Got any ideas? E-mail madbob@madbob.com
But revolution can start with each of us if we’re willing to take some small steps. Myself I have become a proponent of radical de-centralization of power. The closer we can keep our tax dollars to home the more likely we are to get accurate representation from our elected officials. Here are a few ideas.
You are What You Eat
One of the easiest and most essential things you can do is start paying careful attention to what and where you eat and drink. Make a point of frequenting locally owned eateries. Better yet eat at locally owned restaurants that get their food from local growers and suppliers. There is a growing slow food movement and we could not live in a better place to eat local produce. Everything grows here in this rich river loam!
Go Veggie!
I gave up eating meat a few years ago for a variety of reasons. First and foremost I feel badly for the animals that spend their lives living in squalor only to be slaughtered. But secondly I am skeptical about the safety of our national meat industries. Scathing books and exposes have been written on the subject but there is so much commotion that they are easily dismissed. But consider for a moment what has to happen with thousands upon thousands of animals living in impacted quarters. Antibiotics and steroids are used in tremendous quantities in order to keep the animals growing fast enough, large enough, and to keep them “healthy” enough to get from birth to slaughter. The antibiotics are what scare me. Without them diseases would decimate these herds and flocks of caged animals. It isn’t a natural way for animals to live and the common sense part of my brain tells me that cannot be healthy down the line for those of us who consume this industry –created product.
Think About It!
Sometimes we have to put on our blinders to deal with a society that is increasingly ethically out of whack. We have enough to worry about in our day to day life without having to ponder how the kid who sewed our underpants together lives or where the hamburger we just ate really came from. We don’t want to recognize that rain forest is being cut down to the tune of 80,000 acres per day in order to make grazing land for cattle. But this “necessity” to not think about things is just plain and simple avoidance. Think about how you live, make sacrifices where you can, and lead a more integrated and ethical lifestyle. Small changes will create a greater sense of well-being and balance.
Drive Less
We can talk bio-fuels and hybrids and carbon emission capturing until the cows come home but in the mean-time a very simple thing we can almost all do is drive less. Also keep your car tuned up and the oil changed. This increases mileage.
Cash is King
Buy locally and trade whenever you can. Deal in cash. I’m not saying you should avoid paying your taxes; that would be illegal. But our taxes are financing a dubious war and a renegade Federal Government. Now if only we could convince the Feds to stop spending money they don’t have.
Write Your Congressperson!
I write to Congressman Wally Herger on a regular basis and have also written to assemblyman Rick Keene, as well as Senators Barbara Boxer, John McCain, and Nancy Pelosi. I don’t even count the e-mails I’ve fired off to the White House – they don’t even pretend to care. But our local representatives have been very good about getting back to me in a timely manner. I don’t always agree with what they have to say but I appreciate that someone on their staff actually reads and takes the time to respond to my letters.
They’ll never hear you if you don’t make some noise!
Got any ideas? E-mail madbob@madbob.com
Winter Soldier
War on Truth
In totalitarian countries what people can say is controlled by the government. Here we have the flag-waving nationalistic “patriotic” mob and a complacent media casually conspiring to censor unpopular speech.
I am frustrated by the backlash levied against Senator Barack Obama’s pastor Reverend Jeremiah Wright for speaking truth. America is a country that was founded on racism. We came to this country, slaughtered and imprisoned the native population, then kidnapped people from Africa in order to do the dirty work. In this manner we accumulated more wealth and power than any nation in the world. It’s ugly but it is truth.
We are still practicing imperialism under the code name “globalism.” We still pay dark-skinned people pennies per day to do the work Americans refuse.
Reverend Wright says we bought the events of 911 on ourselves. There is accuracy in that statement. Our foreign policy has serious flaws. Things are being done in our names of which we have only vague awareness. This is the crux of democracy. Unlike a monarchy or a dictatorship America is meant to work as a “bottom-up” system of representation. We can’t shrug off the decisions of our leaders and claim we have nothing to do with them. We are the ones who put those people into a position of power and gave them the authority to represent us. So when our foreign policy is flawed it is valid for people to hold the American population accountable. Like it or not that’s the responsibility that comes with a democratic system of power. As such our duty does not stop at the voting box. We need to carefully follow the actions of our leaders and take them to task when they act irresponsibly in our names.
I’m not ashamed of America – but there are shameful episodes throughout our history. If we ignore them or deny them we will never be able to reconcile them.
Winter Soldier
A phenomenal conference was recently held called “Winter Soldier.” The first winter soldier took place during the Vietnam War when soldiers came forward to tell of what they did and witnessed while serving. Atrocities were exposed. Now we have a similar coming out with hundreds of veterans of the Iraq War coming forward to describe their experiences. I’ve been following some of the testimony and it is horrifying. The most disturbing thing is the callousness of our military command. As in any war the enemy is framed as sub-human and similar to Vietnam the drag-net term “enemy” is essentially expanded to include anyone we capture or kill. Soldiers testified of unloading hundreds of rounds into cars on the roads, being given order to take out any and all taxi cabs, and detaining Iraqi men even when they knew they were not the suspects they were looking for. It’s brutal, awful stuff. We can use all the clinical sounding terms we like: “enhanced interrogation,” “non-lawful combatant,” “counter-insurgency.” Terms obscure the bloody truth on the ground – the truth that we have invaded a country, killed hundreds of thousands of its citizens, and driven anyone with means out of the country. The truth is blood and body parts litter the streets and our soldiers are going to come back from this conflict all screwed up in their heads from killing civilians in a half-baked conflict dreamed up by ideologues in Washington D.C.
How many times do we have to enter into the same follies before we rise up as a people and say “ENOUGH?” Obviously someone is benefiting from these impossible conflicts but it isn’t you and I. There is an oligarchy in place, a small powerful group of incredibly wealthy people who are cynically using nationalism, religion, and racism to pit regular working people against one another. They are using fear to keep us complacent. Fear of war, fear of economic woe, fear of the other, the alien, the end. They keep our heads spinning so fast from one crisis to another that we never have the ability to unify and rise.
The Rising of the Moon
On Saint Patrick’s Day I sat on a barstool and drank Guiness with a woman from Northern Ireland. She talked about growing up in the sights of British guns. The Irish know how it feels to be on the receiving end of imperialism all too well. The Irish rose up.
It won’t happen of its own accord. If change is going to come about in this entrenched system that favors those who set it up it is going to take activism on the part of the many. It is going to take awareness and a conscious spirit of social revolution.
Here’s to the rebels.
Revolutionary ideas? E-mail me at madbob@madbob.com.
In totalitarian countries what people can say is controlled by the government. Here we have the flag-waving nationalistic “patriotic” mob and a complacent media casually conspiring to censor unpopular speech.
I am frustrated by the backlash levied against Senator Barack Obama’s pastor Reverend Jeremiah Wright for speaking truth. America is a country that was founded on racism. We came to this country, slaughtered and imprisoned the native population, then kidnapped people from Africa in order to do the dirty work. In this manner we accumulated more wealth and power than any nation in the world. It’s ugly but it is truth.
We are still practicing imperialism under the code name “globalism.” We still pay dark-skinned people pennies per day to do the work Americans refuse.
Reverend Wright says we bought the events of 911 on ourselves. There is accuracy in that statement. Our foreign policy has serious flaws. Things are being done in our names of which we have only vague awareness. This is the crux of democracy. Unlike a monarchy or a dictatorship America is meant to work as a “bottom-up” system of representation. We can’t shrug off the decisions of our leaders and claim we have nothing to do with them. We are the ones who put those people into a position of power and gave them the authority to represent us. So when our foreign policy is flawed it is valid for people to hold the American population accountable. Like it or not that’s the responsibility that comes with a democratic system of power. As such our duty does not stop at the voting box. We need to carefully follow the actions of our leaders and take them to task when they act irresponsibly in our names.
I’m not ashamed of America – but there are shameful episodes throughout our history. If we ignore them or deny them we will never be able to reconcile them.
Winter Soldier
A phenomenal conference was recently held called “Winter Soldier.” The first winter soldier took place during the Vietnam War when soldiers came forward to tell of what they did and witnessed while serving. Atrocities were exposed. Now we have a similar coming out with hundreds of veterans of the Iraq War coming forward to describe their experiences. I’ve been following some of the testimony and it is horrifying. The most disturbing thing is the callousness of our military command. As in any war the enemy is framed as sub-human and similar to Vietnam the drag-net term “enemy” is essentially expanded to include anyone we capture or kill. Soldiers testified of unloading hundreds of rounds into cars on the roads, being given order to take out any and all taxi cabs, and detaining Iraqi men even when they knew they were not the suspects they were looking for. It’s brutal, awful stuff. We can use all the clinical sounding terms we like: “enhanced interrogation,” “non-lawful combatant,” “counter-insurgency.” Terms obscure the bloody truth on the ground – the truth that we have invaded a country, killed hundreds of thousands of its citizens, and driven anyone with means out of the country. The truth is blood and body parts litter the streets and our soldiers are going to come back from this conflict all screwed up in their heads from killing civilians in a half-baked conflict dreamed up by ideologues in Washington D.C.
How many times do we have to enter into the same follies before we rise up as a people and say “ENOUGH?” Obviously someone is benefiting from these impossible conflicts but it isn’t you and I. There is an oligarchy in place, a small powerful group of incredibly wealthy people who are cynically using nationalism, religion, and racism to pit regular working people against one another. They are using fear to keep us complacent. Fear of war, fear of economic woe, fear of the other, the alien, the end. They keep our heads spinning so fast from one crisis to another that we never have the ability to unify and rise.
The Rising of the Moon
On Saint Patrick’s Day I sat on a barstool and drank Guiness with a woman from Northern Ireland. She talked about growing up in the sights of British guns. The Irish know how it feels to be on the receiving end of imperialism all too well. The Irish rose up.
It won’t happen of its own accord. If change is going to come about in this entrenched system that favors those who set it up it is going to take activism on the part of the many. It is going to take awareness and a conscious spirit of social revolution.
Here’s to the rebels.
Revolutionary ideas? E-mail me at madbob@madbob.com.
Perjury
Another week another powerful democrat is under fire on charges of inappropriate sexual conduct. This time the target is Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick. Kilpatrick is charged with the ubiquitous charge of “perjury” stemming from an alleged cover-up of a romantic affair with a co-worker. Like disgraced New York City Mayor Eliot Spitzer Kilpatrick is considered a rising star within the Democratic party.
Could it be just a coincidence that these powerful democratic figures are being charged by administration-appointed prosecutors during the death throes of the Bush regime? Or is this a final cynical ploy on the part of the RNC to take out as many powerful democrats as possible as their own party crumbles after nearly two decades in power. If these are really politically motivated prosecutions I suppose the good news is that even the republicans aren’t convinced they can retain power during the next election.
I don’t know who to vote for this next go around but I know I am not voting for a continuation of the current policies because, from my simplistic point of view, they are not working very well. People say voting for Barack Obama is like rolling the dice but at this point I’m thinking “give me the damn dice!”
Hillary Melt-Down
The horror! The horror! In an incredible moment of hubris and incompetence Hillary Clinton has apparently completely fabricated an event in Bosnia that was meant to bolster her foreign policy experience. She claimed to have been dodging bullets on the tarmac after landing. It is a harrowing story but unfortunately it is completely false! Apparently Sinbad, the c-list comedian, outed the former first lady when he stated that the only thing he was scared of while on the same trip was where the next meal was coming from. It is never good when Sinbad is able to refute your story and in this case the damage could be insurmountable.
In about the only come-back available to her Clinton claimed she mad a mistake and that it showed she was human, which she added would be a revelation to some people. I personally think its too late to play that card but Clinton’s campaign has been in damage control (and some might say “damage affliction”) for the past couple of months and it is starting to look more and more like free-fall.
Politics is a Gross Game
Politics is one of the awful insidious toxins. I am a certified politics junkie. I can’t stand it and I can’t stay away from it. I know its toxic but I wallow in the slime anyway. I can’t help myself – maybe there will be a new rehab for my type someday. Imagine the meetings – oh my god.
Whoops, Our Bad!
Wow – now I’m reading that we “mistakenly” sent four electrical fuses to Taiwan that are manufactured to trigger the Minuteman strategic nuclear missile. This sounds like a leak to me – probably with the intention of letting China know that Taiwan may or may not have nuclear material.
Holy crap – to cap this thoroughly depressing run-down of the week’s politics it turns out that nearly 1 in 10 Ohioans are currently receiving food-stamps from the government.
The Tonya Harding Strategy
One politico has labeled Hillary’s only hope of taking out Barack Obama the “Tonya Harding Strategy.” It involves destroying Obama thoroughly, portraying him as an absolutely unacceptable candidate. The politico extends the analogy to include the fact that the tactic will destroy both candidates in the Presidential election – neither candidate would “get the gold.” Is Hillary willing to go to these extremes to win?
Have politics gotten to that point where the candidates on both sides are willing to sacrifice the good of the country for the good of their own party, ideology, and egos? Or maybe its always been this way. Personally I think we’ve reached a new and troubling low with the Bush administration’s willingness to play fast and loose with the letter of the law. They have demonstrated that no ethic is immutable when it comes to achieving their ambitions.
Hopefully whomever takes over control of the White House understands just how far we have started down that precarious slippery slope and pulls us back. We will need to tighten up restrictions on power for a time – put some handcuffs on whomever is sitting in the Oval Office. Things are out of control now but the beauty of our political system is that, as long as we do not succumb to complacency, things can change very rapidly.
Could it be just a coincidence that these powerful democratic figures are being charged by administration-appointed prosecutors during the death throes of the Bush regime? Or is this a final cynical ploy on the part of the RNC to take out as many powerful democrats as possible as their own party crumbles after nearly two decades in power. If these are really politically motivated prosecutions I suppose the good news is that even the republicans aren’t convinced they can retain power during the next election.
I don’t know who to vote for this next go around but I know I am not voting for a continuation of the current policies because, from my simplistic point of view, they are not working very well. People say voting for Barack Obama is like rolling the dice but at this point I’m thinking “give me the damn dice!”
Hillary Melt-Down
The horror! The horror! In an incredible moment of hubris and incompetence Hillary Clinton has apparently completely fabricated an event in Bosnia that was meant to bolster her foreign policy experience. She claimed to have been dodging bullets on the tarmac after landing. It is a harrowing story but unfortunately it is completely false! Apparently Sinbad, the c-list comedian, outed the former first lady when he stated that the only thing he was scared of while on the same trip was where the next meal was coming from. It is never good when Sinbad is able to refute your story and in this case the damage could be insurmountable.
In about the only come-back available to her Clinton claimed she mad a mistake and that it showed she was human, which she added would be a revelation to some people. I personally think its too late to play that card but Clinton’s campaign has been in damage control (and some might say “damage affliction”) for the past couple of months and it is starting to look more and more like free-fall.
Politics is a Gross Game
Politics is one of the awful insidious toxins. I am a certified politics junkie. I can’t stand it and I can’t stay away from it. I know its toxic but I wallow in the slime anyway. I can’t help myself – maybe there will be a new rehab for my type someday. Imagine the meetings – oh my god.
Whoops, Our Bad!
Wow – now I’m reading that we “mistakenly” sent four electrical fuses to Taiwan that are manufactured to trigger the Minuteman strategic nuclear missile. This sounds like a leak to me – probably with the intention of letting China know that Taiwan may or may not have nuclear material.
Holy crap – to cap this thoroughly depressing run-down of the week’s politics it turns out that nearly 1 in 10 Ohioans are currently receiving food-stamps from the government.
The Tonya Harding Strategy
One politico has labeled Hillary’s only hope of taking out Barack Obama the “Tonya Harding Strategy.” It involves destroying Obama thoroughly, portraying him as an absolutely unacceptable candidate. The politico extends the analogy to include the fact that the tactic will destroy both candidates in the Presidential election – neither candidate would “get the gold.” Is Hillary willing to go to these extremes to win?
Have politics gotten to that point where the candidates on both sides are willing to sacrifice the good of the country for the good of their own party, ideology, and egos? Or maybe its always been this way. Personally I think we’ve reached a new and troubling low with the Bush administration’s willingness to play fast and loose with the letter of the law. They have demonstrated that no ethic is immutable when it comes to achieving their ambitions.
Hopefully whomever takes over control of the White House understands just how far we have started down that precarious slippery slope and pulls us back. We will need to tighten up restrictions on power for a time – put some handcuffs on whomever is sitting in the Oval Office. Things are out of control now but the beauty of our political system is that, as long as we do not succumb to complacency, things can change very rapidly.
Zen and the Art of Punk Rock
South America Opts-in on the Fun of War!
There are some strange rumblings from South America these days. Columbia and Venezuela may be on the brink of open warfare depending upon who you talk to. Venezuelan President and general firebrand Hugo Chavez has compared Columbia to the “Israel of South America” after Columbian forces carried out an assassination in neighboring Ecuador. Columbian President Alvaro Uribe countered by accusing the revolutionary or terrorist organization (depending on your political POV) FARC of attempting to acquire nuclear material to create a “dirty bomb” and also accused Chavez of “funding genocide.”
I just feel like I’ve heard all this before.
Our own fear-mongering President George W. Bush then threw his hat in with Uribe and in bizarre irony stated that destabilization of the region is unacceptable. I don’t understand why it was perfectly okay to destabilize Iraq but the President isn’t returning my phone calls and now tough looking men in dark suits, sunglasses, and SUV’s with blackened windows have started making frequent drive-bys of my house. It drives the dogs crazy.
Will the Real Punk Rocker Please Stand Up?!?
The upcoming CAMMIE awards for local music have re-ignited the decades old argument of what really constitutes punk rock. It’s a fun debate but ultimately pointless –like arguing religion or politics. But I write about religion and politics all the time so here goes nothing!
For my two cents punk rock can’t be divorced from the time in which it arose. To understand the emergence of such a vial form of music you’ll have to take a ride with me back to the middle-1970’s. The “summer of love” was a fading memory and rock and roll had become a bloated parody of itself. Bands like Crosby Stills and Nash who had made their mark singing songs of peace, love, and idealism had grown into ultra-rich pampered and fat rock stars. The Rolling Stones were playing on stages so large you could barely see them with binoculars and the ticket prices were spiraling upward as every promoter and record executive grabbed a slice of the money-pie rock and roll had become. Disco emerged as a bizarre counter-balance to rock and roll. Don’t think about anything, just snort a lot of blow and dance the night away. Hang out with the beautiful people in the Studio 54. Everywhere you turned greed, complacency, and escapism had set in.
But then out seeping over the din of mediocrity crept the grinding buzzsaw of guitars, the guttural screams and shouts, banging drums, flying spit. It was coming from the rust-belt from bands like MC5 and the Stooges. It was coming from Cleveland, Ohio from the Dead Boys. It was coming from New York City in the form of the Ramones and it was coming from London, England in the form of the Clash and the infamous Sex Pistols. And that was just for starters. Bands from all over the place were getting on stage with minimal talent and minimal gear and singing songs about alienation and resentment. They created a scene for kids that didn’t fit in anywhere else and in the process they created a new style of music that has carried on from 1976 to this year 2008.
I have talked to many people from that time (I was only a small child when that screaming brat that is punk was born) and they all talk about the mind-altering experience that punk created. They talk about finally having a sense of acceptance where before there had only been ostracization. Whether seeing the bands play live or hearing them on underground radio stations punk was something new and refreshing to a music-craving audience that was being spoon-fed commercialized crap from a jaded industry.
Punk was a reaction – a powerful sucking boil in the river of music.
Punks before Punk was Punk
There have always been “punks” in the arts – artists and musicians that defied categorization and re-defined the rules. The jazz musicians from the 1930’s and 40’s were pretty punk, the flappers and the ex-patriots during the 1920’s, hell Mozart was pretty punk rock back in his day! There are too many “punk” artists to go into but just about everyone after David was breaking rules right and left. Van Gogh cut his ear off and mailed it to a girl he was in love with! Tell me that’s not punk rock!!!
Whenever there is an “establishment” there is bound to be a punk lurking in the shadows waiting for the opportunity to unsettle it.
But for now we may have to wait – the world is in so much chaos there’s hardly a clear establishment to rile against. Things will eventually settle down and then people will get conservative and complacent again and that will be when the next “punk rock” will emerge.
There are some strange rumblings from South America these days. Columbia and Venezuela may be on the brink of open warfare depending upon who you talk to. Venezuelan President and general firebrand Hugo Chavez has compared Columbia to the “Israel of South America” after Columbian forces carried out an assassination in neighboring Ecuador. Columbian President Alvaro Uribe countered by accusing the revolutionary or terrorist organization (depending on your political POV) FARC of attempting to acquire nuclear material to create a “dirty bomb” and also accused Chavez of “funding genocide.”
I just feel like I’ve heard all this before.
Our own fear-mongering President George W. Bush then threw his hat in with Uribe and in bizarre irony stated that destabilization of the region is unacceptable. I don’t understand why it was perfectly okay to destabilize Iraq but the President isn’t returning my phone calls and now tough looking men in dark suits, sunglasses, and SUV’s with blackened windows have started making frequent drive-bys of my house. It drives the dogs crazy.
Will the Real Punk Rocker Please Stand Up?!?
The upcoming CAMMIE awards for local music have re-ignited the decades old argument of what really constitutes punk rock. It’s a fun debate but ultimately pointless –like arguing religion or politics. But I write about religion and politics all the time so here goes nothing!
For my two cents punk rock can’t be divorced from the time in which it arose. To understand the emergence of such a vial form of music you’ll have to take a ride with me back to the middle-1970’s. The “summer of love” was a fading memory and rock and roll had become a bloated parody of itself. Bands like Crosby Stills and Nash who had made their mark singing songs of peace, love, and idealism had grown into ultra-rich pampered and fat rock stars. The Rolling Stones were playing on stages so large you could barely see them with binoculars and the ticket prices were spiraling upward as every promoter and record executive grabbed a slice of the money-pie rock and roll had become. Disco emerged as a bizarre counter-balance to rock and roll. Don’t think about anything, just snort a lot of blow and dance the night away. Hang out with the beautiful people in the Studio 54. Everywhere you turned greed, complacency, and escapism had set in.
But then out seeping over the din of mediocrity crept the grinding buzzsaw of guitars, the guttural screams and shouts, banging drums, flying spit. It was coming from the rust-belt from bands like MC5 and the Stooges. It was coming from Cleveland, Ohio from the Dead Boys. It was coming from New York City in the form of the Ramones and it was coming from London, England in the form of the Clash and the infamous Sex Pistols. And that was just for starters. Bands from all over the place were getting on stage with minimal talent and minimal gear and singing songs about alienation and resentment. They created a scene for kids that didn’t fit in anywhere else and in the process they created a new style of music that has carried on from 1976 to this year 2008.
I have talked to many people from that time (I was only a small child when that screaming brat that is punk was born) and they all talk about the mind-altering experience that punk created. They talk about finally having a sense of acceptance where before there had only been ostracization. Whether seeing the bands play live or hearing them on underground radio stations punk was something new and refreshing to a music-craving audience that was being spoon-fed commercialized crap from a jaded industry.
Punk was a reaction – a powerful sucking boil in the river of music.
Punks before Punk was Punk
There have always been “punks” in the arts – artists and musicians that defied categorization and re-defined the rules. The jazz musicians from the 1930’s and 40’s were pretty punk, the flappers and the ex-patriots during the 1920’s, hell Mozart was pretty punk rock back in his day! There are too many “punk” artists to go into but just about everyone after David was breaking rules right and left. Van Gogh cut his ear off and mailed it to a girl he was in love with! Tell me that’s not punk rock!!!
Whenever there is an “establishment” there is bound to be a punk lurking in the shadows waiting for the opportunity to unsettle it.
But for now we may have to wait – the world is in so much chaos there’s hardly a clear establishment to rile against. Things will eventually settle down and then people will get conservative and complacent again and that will be when the next “punk rock” will emerge.
Dystopia Weekend
Brave New World
I had a very strange weekend thanks to a couple of tremendous artists. The first was Aldous Huxley, the visionary author of “The Doors of Perception” (a gripping account of Huxley’s experience with mescaline) and “Brave New World.” I was supposed to have read “Brave New World” in high school but for whatever reason it didn’t stick. This may have been the first time I have read the book in over a decade and it blew my mind. Huxley’s vision of complete stability through “feelies” (pornographic movies), creating a fear of being alone with one’s thoughts, destruction of the family and encouragement of rampant promiscuity, and a healthy dose of a mind-altering substance called “soma” hits on about every point that George Orwell misses in the darker but no more terrifying “1984.”
Coincidentally the day I’d finished “Brave New World” Fritz Lang’s classic dystopian film “Metropolis” arrived in the mail. In spite of the fact that I spent four years of my life studying film this is another classic that somehow I managed to miss. If my mind was blown before it was decapitated by this incredible spectacle of silent film making. It confronts head-on the slavery and soul destruction of the industrial revolution and contrasts the lifestyle of the factory workers who live and work below ground and the ruling class who wear white and participate in games of sport and generally have a ball living in skyscrapers high above the bleak cityscape. The only thing Lang got wrong is that he ultimately ties the film up with a cobbled happy ending wherein the factory workers and the oligarchy end up shaking hands and reconciling their differences.
Lang’s film was produced in 1927 and Huxley wrote Brave New World in 1932. It is frightening how relevant both of these pieces are to our “modern” world. In fact it seems as though we are living in a dystopia that falls somewhere between the three visions of Lang, Orwell, and Huxley. On the one hand we have the paranoia, constant war, and government omniscience of 1984; while on the other we have the gross consumerism, the all-importance of immediate self-gratification, and the constant medication of Huxley’s Brave New World. And of course we have half the world living in utter poverty so that a small percentage can live like kings and queens. It is bananas.
The End of Porn as We Know It
Speaking of brave new worlds 2 Drink and I were lucky enough to get to perform at a going away party for Manny Gonzalez and “Paradise Lost.” The party bought all the freaks out of the woodworks. The entire “Gurp City” crew was in attendance including a three-fisting MC Oroville who performed a nice Karaoke-style rendition of his own material. Dr. Becky Sagers PHD took the mics and Handsome Gorgeous sat in with metal deities the Makai – how’s that for post-modernism? Speaking of the Makai those fellas are currently somewhere in Europe. Front-man Brandon Squyres gave me a run-down of all the various countries they are scheduled to hit but all I can remember is the Czech Republic and Amsterdam. I am exceedingly jealous. Someday I will go to Amsterdam and the odds are about 50-50 that I won’t come back.
A highlight of the evening for me was a conversation I had with Gurp City all-star Lord Facials a.k.a. former Synthesis contributor Corey Bloom. Corey is continuing his writing career and apparently having a bit of success writing for assorted magazines and maintaining an award-winning blog. Good job man. Let me know how that awards ceremony turns out.
I Love Writing
I really do. I also love talking about writing. A lot of people approached me last Friday to talk about this column and about writing in general. Hey if you out there reading this have any ideas or question or comments – please, drop me a line. My personal e-mail address is an easy one to remember – madbob@madbob.com.
Mosquitoes
Spring is springing and along with the warmer weather and the blooming bulbs I am being eaten alive by fat slow-moving mosquitoes. These pesky blood-suckers are buzzing around my home and office. No big deal – I’ll take the warmer weather even with the blood-suckers. I got enough of the red stuff to go around.
Here’s a fun little quote I just heard on a BBC radio program: “war is God’s way of teaching Americans geography.”
Have a great week!
I had a very strange weekend thanks to a couple of tremendous artists. The first was Aldous Huxley, the visionary author of “The Doors of Perception” (a gripping account of Huxley’s experience with mescaline) and “Brave New World.” I was supposed to have read “Brave New World” in high school but for whatever reason it didn’t stick. This may have been the first time I have read the book in over a decade and it blew my mind. Huxley’s vision of complete stability through “feelies” (pornographic movies), creating a fear of being alone with one’s thoughts, destruction of the family and encouragement of rampant promiscuity, and a healthy dose of a mind-altering substance called “soma” hits on about every point that George Orwell misses in the darker but no more terrifying “1984.”
Coincidentally the day I’d finished “Brave New World” Fritz Lang’s classic dystopian film “Metropolis” arrived in the mail. In spite of the fact that I spent four years of my life studying film this is another classic that somehow I managed to miss. If my mind was blown before it was decapitated by this incredible spectacle of silent film making. It confronts head-on the slavery and soul destruction of the industrial revolution and contrasts the lifestyle of the factory workers who live and work below ground and the ruling class who wear white and participate in games of sport and generally have a ball living in skyscrapers high above the bleak cityscape. The only thing Lang got wrong is that he ultimately ties the film up with a cobbled happy ending wherein the factory workers and the oligarchy end up shaking hands and reconciling their differences.
Lang’s film was produced in 1927 and Huxley wrote Brave New World in 1932. It is frightening how relevant both of these pieces are to our “modern” world. In fact it seems as though we are living in a dystopia that falls somewhere between the three visions of Lang, Orwell, and Huxley. On the one hand we have the paranoia, constant war, and government omniscience of 1984; while on the other we have the gross consumerism, the all-importance of immediate self-gratification, and the constant medication of Huxley’s Brave New World. And of course we have half the world living in utter poverty so that a small percentage can live like kings and queens. It is bananas.
The End of Porn as We Know It
Speaking of brave new worlds 2 Drink and I were lucky enough to get to perform at a going away party for Manny Gonzalez and “Paradise Lost.” The party bought all the freaks out of the woodworks. The entire “Gurp City” crew was in attendance including a three-fisting MC Oroville who performed a nice Karaoke-style rendition of his own material. Dr. Becky Sagers PHD took the mics and Handsome Gorgeous sat in with metal deities the Makai – how’s that for post-modernism? Speaking of the Makai those fellas are currently somewhere in Europe. Front-man Brandon Squyres gave me a run-down of all the various countries they are scheduled to hit but all I can remember is the Czech Republic and Amsterdam. I am exceedingly jealous. Someday I will go to Amsterdam and the odds are about 50-50 that I won’t come back.
A highlight of the evening for me was a conversation I had with Gurp City all-star Lord Facials a.k.a. former Synthesis contributor Corey Bloom. Corey is continuing his writing career and apparently having a bit of success writing for assorted magazines and maintaining an award-winning blog. Good job man. Let me know how that awards ceremony turns out.
I Love Writing
I really do. I also love talking about writing. A lot of people approached me last Friday to talk about this column and about writing in general. Hey if you out there reading this have any ideas or question or comments – please, drop me a line. My personal e-mail address is an easy one to remember – madbob@madbob.com.
Mosquitoes
Spring is springing and along with the warmer weather and the blooming bulbs I am being eaten alive by fat slow-moving mosquitoes. These pesky blood-suckers are buzzing around my home and office. No big deal – I’ll take the warmer weather even with the blood-suckers. I got enough of the red stuff to go around.
Here’s a fun little quote I just heard on a BBC radio program: “war is God’s way of teaching Americans geography.”
Have a great week!
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