NET POLITIK

Dorli Rainey

2011-11-21T23:30:00.002-06:00

Modern Life

2011-04-07T08:56:00.002-05:00

Boycott PayPal

2010-12-04T10:17:00.000-06:00

PayPal has now gone over to the dark side in bending to pressure to boot Wikileaks. Let's all join the effort to boycott PayPal!

Sign of the times

2010-08-28T19:16:00.000-05:00

Spiegel Online has a good article on the erosion of the U.S. middle class.

The Corruption of Empire

2009-09-02T15:27:00.000-05:00

By Philip Giraldi (August 31, 2009)

Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz predicted in 2003 that the cost of the Iraq war would be covered by Iraqi oil revenue, which would also pay for reconstruction. The Iraq war has in fact cost the United States more than $900 billion, including more than $145 billion US and Iraqi dollars for rebuilding and local contracting to support US forces. Six years of reconstruction has been a failure, with most projects unfinished or so poorly built that they have been abandoned. Water and electricity has not been restored to the level enjoyed under Saddam Hussein. Even those inclined to look on the bright side acknowledge that at least $13 billion has been lost to fraud, theft, and waste. Most would put the number much higher, possibly as much as $125 billion if one includes both American and Iraqi money.

Just as the United States is winding down its reconstruction of Iraq, the largest nation building project in history, President Obama wants to do the same for Afghanistan only do it better and bigger. Before he gets in too deep, he should listen to the non-partisan Government Accountability Office (GAO) which is sounding alarm bells over concerns that the White House is not sharing with it plans for the reconstruction. GAO envisions massive multi-billion dollar shortfalls bringing projects crippled by corruption and waste grinding to a halt. Government auditors note that more than $5 billion in reconstruction funds already cannot be accounted for in Afghanistan.

Obama is gambling that the pervasive corruption in Iraq can somehow be avoided. It is a risky bet, both because corruption is a genie that is hard to return to the bottle and because bribery in Afghanistan, like in Iraq, is a bedfellow of government. And, tragically, it has taken hold among the American occupiers. When American military officers ran the Iraqi Defense Ministry in 2004-5, an entire year’s procurement budget of $1.3 billion disappeared on "contracts" signed in Poland and Pakistan for materiel that was never delivered. As as the New York Times’ Frank Rich put it astutely, in Iraq "corruption has been at the center of the entire mission," possibly even a primary factor in the failure of the reconstruction program, a calamity that has hitherto been blamed on inadequate planning and a high level of violence.

The United States has never lacked for war profiteers aided and abetted by dishonest officials but the Iraq War has elevated corruption to a new level. In an environment in which many billions of unaccountable dollars were stacked in shrinkwrap pallets or floating around without any real oversight, it was perhaps inevitable that corruption would establish a new gold standard. Efforts to overcome fraud and waste might eventually become, as one observer has put it, the "second war" in that unhappy land. It was also inevitable that the corruption involving Iraqis would sooner or later ensnare the Americans involved, demonstrating once again that war produces "blowback" that damages the institutions of victor and vanquished alike.

The United States has spent $145 billion on reconstruction and military support projects in Iraq. The reconstruction money, which is twice what was spent on rebuilding post-World War II’s devastated much larger and more populous Japan, has mostly been wasted. Numerous American officials, particularly those involved in contracting, have been investigated for corruption. There have been twenty-nine convictions, several suicides, and the investigations and trials promise to drag on. It is reported that more than two dozen indictments of Americans are pending.

Army contracting officer Major Gloria Davis and Air Force procurement officer Charles Riechers both committed suicide over contracting fraud while Colonel Ted Westhusing shot himself after sending an accusatory letter to General David Petraeus concluding "I cannot support a mission that leads to corruption, human rights abuse and liars." Some believe that Westhusing was murdered because he was about to turn whistle blower.

Robert Stein, the former US Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) controller for South Central Iraq, was one of the first successful prosecutions for corruption. Stein diverted $8.6 million through a business run by Californian Philip Bloom. Bloom admitted paying more than $2 million in bribes to US officials including four Army Colonels—Curtis Whiteford, Bruce Hopfengardner, Debra Harrison, and Michael Wheeler. Army Major John Cockerham accepted nearly $10 million in bribes while in Kuwait and his successor Army Major James Momon received $5.8 million. Army Major Christopher Murray, Army Lt. Col. Levonda Selph, Army Major John Rivard, Captain Michael Dung Nguyen, and Captain Bryant Williams have all been imprisoned for taking bribes. In Iraq’s Anbar province, local Iraqis report that US officers routinely demand 15% of all reconstruction project funds.

One corruption whistleblower might even have been killed. American businessman Dale Stoffel went to the US authorities in Baghdad to complain that US military officers had been taking bribes in pizza boxes stuffed with hundred dollar bills at the contracting offices to conceal the payments. The use of dead drop points for leaving cash in paper bags was common throughout the green zone. Stoffel was threatened and was murdered in December 2004. Two US military officers, Army Colonel Anthony Bell and Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Ronald Hirtle, were identified by Stoffel before his death and are currently reported to be under investigation.

Particularly disturbing is the growing evidence of widespread involvement of senior US military officers and civil servants in the corruption, which was driven by windfall profits on contracts requiring little or no work. Apart from the Army and Air Force officers who have gone to prison, reports from Kuwait suggest that at least sixteen American flag officers, generals and admirals, are currently under investigation by the Justice Department, the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (Sigir), or by the Department of Defense. Sigir alone has carried out 300 investigations and more than 250 audits. Government sources report that 154 criminal investigations are still open.

The assumption that Afghanistan will somehow be different than Iraq might actually mean that it will be worse. Where Iraq had a recent history of functioning governments Afghanistan does not. Where Iraq had a decent infrastructure of roads and tradition of the government providing services, Afghanistan does not. What Afghanistan does share with Iraq is pervasive corruption at all levels of government at all times. A total of $32 billion have already been largely wasted on reconstruction projects in Afghanistan, making potential donors nervous about further engagement where there is so little to show. The Europeans have already made it clear that they want out at the first opportunity.

So as the US presence in Iraq winds down there is a lesson to be learned. Military occupation inevitably corrupts the occupier. Many US military officers involved in managing the billions of dollars spent on reconstruction and support of allied forces have succumbed to temptation. Afghanistan might well be different, but there is no reason to assume that to be the case. Indeed, given the harsh physical environment and pervasive corruption in Afghanistan itself everything might well be worse. If it is not too late to halt the march of the juggernaut, it might be wise for the Obama Administration to step back and consider what it is doing. The nation building exercise in Iraq was brought to its knees at least in part by corruption which has spread alarmingly among US government officials eager to take their share of the easy money and that experience will likely be repeated in Afghanistan. Is it worth repeated that experience in support of a war that makes no sense and that is surely being lost? Undoubtedly, no.

Copyright © 2009 Campaign for Liberty

Guns at political events

2009-08-19T10:32:00.003-05:00

Howard Friel points out the interesting contrast between the treatment of protestors with signs and t-shirts at Bush rallies and the treatment of protestors with guns at Obama rallies. An excerpt:

From the standpoint of the U.S. Constitution, the heavy-handed treatment of liberal school teachers, librarians, and county supervisors and the more deferential approach to armed right-wing protestors, makes no sense. While there would be no threat to the Constitution in the months and years ahead if dozens or hundreds of school teachers showed up at Republican political events wearing T-shirts with political messages that did not incite violence, the threat of violence would be extreme if as many armed right-wing protestors appeared at Democratic events. Even in the absence of actual violence, the implicit threat of violence by the appearance of armed right-wing protestors represents an unacceptable chilling effect on the First Amendment rights of Americans.

D:

2009-08-03T20:53:00.001-05:00

What's with this Vitamin D deficiency in children? Kids need to turn off the video game and get some sun.

Document 199-I

2007-04-05T12:32:00.000-05:00

Document 199-I and The FBI’s Words to Chill The Soul by Greg Palast

On November 9, 2001, when you could still choke on the dust in the air near Ground Zero, BBC Television received a call in London from a top-level US intelligence agent. He was not happy. Shortly after George W. Bush took office, he told us reluctantly, the CIA, the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and the FBI, “were told to back off the Saudis.”

We knew that. In the newsroom, we had a document already in hand, marked, “SECRET” across the top and “199-I” - meaning this was a national security matter.

The secret memo released agents to hunt down two members of the bin Laden family operating a “suspected terrorist organization” in the USA. It was dated September 13, 2001 — two days too late for too many. What the memo indicates, corroborated by other sources, was that the agents had long wanted to question these characters … but could not until after the attack. By that time, these bin Laden birds had flown their American nest.

Back to the high-level agent. I pressed him to tell me exactly which investigations were spiked. None of this interview dance was easy, requiring switching to untraceable phones. Ultimately, the insider said, “Khan Labs.” At the time, our intelligence agencies were on the trail of Pakistan’s Dr. Strangelove, A.Q. Khan, who built Pakistan’s bomb and was selling its secrets to the Libyans. But once Bush and Condoleeza Rice’s team took over, the source told us, agents were forced to let a hot trail go cold. Specifically, there were limits on tracing the Saudi money behind this “Islamic bomb.”

Then we made another call, this time to an arms dealer in the Mideast. He confirmed that his partner attended a meeting in 1995 at the 5-star Hotel Royale Monceau in Paris where, allegedly, Saudi billionaires agreed to fund Al Qaeda fanatics. We understood it to be protection money, not really a sign of support for their attacks. Nevertheless, rule number one of investigation is “follow the money” — but the sheiks’ piggy banks were effectively off-limits to the US agents during the Bush years. One of the men in the posh hotel’s meeting of vipers happens to have been a Bush family business associate.

Before you jump to the wrong conclusion, let me tell you that we found no evidence — none, zero, no kidding — that George Bush knew about Al Qaeda’s plan to attack on September 11. Indeed, the grim joke at BBC is that anyone accusing George Bush of knowing anything at all must have solid evidence. This is not a story of what George Bush knew but rather of his very-unfunny ignorance. And it was not stupidity, but policy: no asking Saudis uncomfortable questions about their paying off roving packs of killers, especially when those Saudis are so generous to Bush family businesses.

Yes, Bill Clinton was also a bit too tender toward the oil men of Arabia. But this you should know: In his last year in office, Clinton sent two delegations to the Gulf to suggest that the Royal family crack down on “charitable donations” from their kingdom to the guys who blew up our embassies.

But when a failed Texas oil man took over the White House in January 2001, demands on the Saudis to cut off terror funding simply stopped.

And what about the bin Laden “suspected terrorist organization”? Called the World Assembly of Muslim Youth, the group sponsors soccer teams and summer camps in Florida. BBC obtained a video of one camp activity, a speech exhorting kids on the heroism of suicide bombings and hostage takings. While WAMY draws membership with wholesome activities, it has also acted as a cover or front, say the Dutch, Indian and Bosnian governments, for the recruitment of jihadi killers.

Certainly, it was worth asking the bin Laden boys a few questions. But the FBI agents couldn’t, until it was too late.

In November 2001, when BBC ran the report on the spike of investigations of Saudi funding of terror, the Bush defenders whom we’d invited to respond on air dismissed the concerns of lower level FBI agents who’d passed over the WAMY documents. No action was taken on the group headed by the bin Ladens.

Then, in May this year, fifty FBI agents surrounded, invaded and sealed off WAMY’s Virginia office. It was like a bad scene out of the ‘Untouchables.’ The raid took place three years after our report and long after the bin Ladens had waved bye-bye. It is not surprising that the feds seized mostly empty files and a lot of soccer balls.

Why now this belated move on the bin Laden’s former operation? Why not right after the September 11 attack? This year’s FBI raid occurred just days after an Islamist terror assault in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Apparently, messin’ with the oil sheiks gets this Administration’s attention. Falling towers in New York are only for Republican convention photo ops.

The 199-I memo was passed to BBC television by the gumshoes at the National Security News Service in Washington. We authenticated it, added in our own sleuthing, then gave the FBI its say, expecting the usual, “It’s baloney, a fake.” But we didn’t get the usual response. Rather, FBI headquarters said, “There are lots of things the intelligence community knows and other people ought not to know.”

Ought not to know?

What else ought we not to know, Mr. President? And when are we supposed to forget it?

**************

Greg Palast’s reports for BBC Television Newsnight and The Guardian paper of Britain (with David Pallister) on White House interference in the investigation of terrorism won a 2002 California State University Journalism School ‘Project Censored’ Award.

The BBC television reports, expanded and updated, will be released this month in the USA as a DVD, “Bush Family Fortunes,” produced by BBC’s Meirion Jones.

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Being Forced to Spy for the Government

2007-03-23T19:19:00.000-05:00

WaPo recently printed an anonymous editorial by a recipient of a possibly illegal yet somehow binding FBI Security Letter.

It is the policy of The Washington Post not to publish anonymous pieces. In this case, an exception has been made because the author -- who would have preferred to be named -- is legally prohibited from disclosing his or her identity in connection with receipt of a national security letter. The Post confirmed the legitimacy of this submission by verifying it with the author's attorney and by reviewing publicly available court documents.

Three years ago, I received a national security letter (NSL) in my capacity as the president of a small Internet access and consulting business. The letter ordered me to provide sensitive information about one of my clients. There was no indication that a judge had reviewed or approved the letter, and it turned out that none had. The letter came with a gag provision that prohibited me from telling anyone, including my client, that the FBI was seeking this information. Based on the context of the demand -- a context that the FBI still won't let me discuss publicly -- I suspected that the FBI was abusing its power and that the letter sought information to which the FBI was not entitled.

I resent being conscripted as a secret informer for the government and being made to mislead those who are close to me, especially because I have doubts about the legitimacy of the underlying investigation.

I recognize that there may sometimes be a need for secrecy in certain national security investigations. But I've now been under a broad gag order for three years, and other NSL recipients have been silenced for even longer. At some point -- a point we passed long ago -- the secrecy itself becomes a threat to our democracy. In the wake of the recent revelations, I believe more strongly than ever that the secrecy surrounding the government's use of the national security letters power is unwarranted and dangerous. I hope that Congress will at last recognize the same thing.

Impeachment by the People

2007-03-09T09:52:00.000-06:00

The following article recently appeared in The Progressive:

Courage is in short supply in Washington, D.C. The realities of the Iraq War cry out for the overthrow of a government that is criminally responsible for death, mutilation, torture, humiliation, chaos. But all we hear in the nation’s capital, which is the source of those catastrophes, is a whimper from the Democratic Party, muttering and nattering about “unity” and “bipartisanship,” in a situation that calls for bold action to immediately reverse the present course.

These are the Democrats who were brought to power in November by an electorate fed up with the war, furious at the Bush Administration, and counting on the new majority in Congress to represent the voters. But if sanity is to be restored in our national policies, it can only come about by a great popular upheaval, pushing both Republicans and Democrats into compliance with the national will.

The Declaration of Independence, revered as a document but ignored as a guide to action, needs to be read from pulpits and podiums, on street corners and community radio stations throughout the nation. Its words, forgotten for over two centuries, need to become a call to action for the first time since it was read aloud to crowds in the early excited days of the American Revolution: “Whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it and institute new government.”

The “ends” referred to in the Declaration are the equal right of all to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” True, no government in the history of the nation has been faithful to those ends. Favors for the rich, neglect of the poor, massive violence in the interest of continental and world expansion—that is the persistent record of our government.

Still, there seems to be a special viciousness that accompanies the current assault on human rights, in this country and in the world. We have had repressive governments before, but none has legislated the end of habeas corpus, nor openly supported torture, nor declared the possibility of war without end. No government has so casually ignored the will of the people, affirmed the right of the President to ignore the Constitution, even to set aside laws passed by Congress.

The time is right, then, for a national campaign calling for the impeachment of President Bush and Vice President Cheney. Representative John Conyers, who held extensive hearings and introduced an impeachment resolution when the Republicans controlled Congress, is now head of the House Judiciary Committee and in a position to fight for such a resolution. He has apparently been silenced by his Democratic colleagues who throw out as nuggets of wisdom the usual political palaver about “realism” (while ignoring the realities staring them in the face) and politics being “the art of the possible” (while setting limits on what is possible).

know I’m not the first to talk about impeachment. Indeed, judging by the public opinion polls, there are millions of Americans, indeed a majority of those polled, who declare themselves in favor if it is shown that the President lied us into war (a fact that is not debatable). There are at least a half-dozen books out on impeachment, and it’s been argued for eloquently by some of our finest journalists, John Nichols and Lewis Lapham among them. Indeed, an actual “indictment” has been drawn up by a former federal prosecutor, Elizabeth de la Vega, in a new book called United States v. George W. Bush et al, making a case, in devastating detail, to a fictional grand jury.

There is a logical next step in this development of an impeachment movement: the convening of “people’s impeachment hearings” all over the country. This is especially important given the timidity of the Democratic Party. Such hearings would bypass Congress, which is not representing the will of the people, and would constitute an inspiring example of grassroots democracy.

These hearings would be the contemporary equivalents of the unofficial gatherings that marked the resistance to the British Crown in the years leading up to the American Revolution. The story of the American Revolution is usually built around Lexington and Concord, around the battles and the Founding Fathers. What is forgotten is that the American colonists, unable to count on redress of their grievances from the official bodies of government, took matters into their own hands, even before the first battles of the Revolutionary War.

In 1772, town meetings in Massachusetts began setting up Committees of Correspondence, and the following year, such a committee was set up in Virginia. The first Continental Congress, beginning to meet in 1774, was a recognition that an extralegal body was necessary to represent the interests of the people. In 1774 and 1775, all through the colonies, parallel institutions were set up outside the official governmental bodies.

Throughout the nation’s history, the failure of government to deliver justice has led to the establishment of grassroots organizations, often ad hoc, dissolving after their purpose was fulfilled. For instance, after passage of the Fugitive Slave Act, knowing that the national government could not be counted on to repeal the act, black and white anti-slavery groups organized to nullify the law by acts of civil disobedience. They held meetings, made plans, and set about rescuing escaped slaves who were in danger of being returned to their masters.

In the desperate economic conditions of 1933 and 1934, before the Roosevelt Administration was doing anything to help people in distress, local groups were formed all over the country to demand government action. Unemployed Councils came into being, tenants’ groups fought evictions, and hundreds of thousands of people in the country formed self-help organizations to exchange goods and services and enable people to survive.

More recently, we recall the peace groups of the 1980s, which sprang up in hundreds of communities all over the country, and provoked city councils and state legislatures to pass resolutions in favor of a freeze on nuclear weapons. And local organizations have succeeded in getting more than 400 city councils to take a stand against the Patriot Act.

Impeachment hearings all over the country could excite and energize the peace movement. They would make headlines, and could push reluctant members of Congress in both parties to do what the Constitution provides for and what the present circumstances demand: the impeachment and removal from office of George Bush and Dick Cheney. Simply raising the issue in hundreds of communities and Congressional districts would have a healthy effect, and would be a sign that democracy, despite all attempts to destroy it in this era of war, is still alive.

Flynt Leverett

2007-02-14T11:59:00.000-06:00

I hear that the Bush administration is trying to silence Flynt Leverett. Which is why I've posted this here:

Since leaving government service in 2003, I have been publicly critical of the Bush administration's mishandling of America's Iran policy -- in two op-eds published in the New York Times, another published in the Los Angeles Times, an article published earlier this year in The American Prospect, and a monograph just published by The Century Foundation, as well as in numerous public statements, television appearances, and press interviews. All of my publications on Iran -- and, indeed, on any other policy matter on which I have written since leaving government -- were cleared beforehand by the CIA's Publication Review Board to confirm that I would not be disclosing classified information.

Until last week, the Publication Review Board had never sought to remove or change a single word in any of my drafts, including in all of my publications about the Bush administration's handling of Iran policy. However, last week, the White House inserted itself into the prepublication review process for an op-ed on the administration's bungling of the Iran portfolio that I had prepared for the New York Times, blocking publication of the piece on the grounds that it would reveal classified information.

This claim is false and, I have come to believe, fabricated by White House officials to silence an established critic of the administration's foreign policy incompetence at a moment when the White House is working hard to fend off political pressure to take a different approach to Iran and the Middle East more generally.

The op-ed is based on the longer paper I just published with The Century Foundation -- which was cleared by the CIA without modifying a single word of the draft. Officials with the CIA's Publication Review Board have told me that, in their judgment, the draft op-ed does not contain classified material, but that they must bow to the preferences of the White House. The White House is demanding, before it will consider clearing the op-ed for publication, that I excise entire paragraphs dealing with matters that I have written about (and received clearance from the CIA to do so) in several other pieces, that have been publicly acknowledged by Secretary Rice, former Secretary of State Colin Powell, and former Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, and that have been extensively covered in the media.

These matters include Iran's dialogue and cooperation with the United States concerning Afghanistan in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks and Iran's offer to negotiate a comprehensive "grand bargain" with the United States in the spring of 2003.

There is no basis for claiming that these issues are classified and not already in the public domain. For the White House to make this claim, with regard to my op-ed and at this particular moment, is nothing more than a crass effort to politicize a prepublication review process -- a process that is supposed to be about the protection of classified information, and nothing else -- to limit the dissemination of views critical of administration policy. Within the last two week, the CIA found the wherewithal to approve an op-ed -- published in the New York Times on December 8, 2006 -- by Kenneth Pollack, another former CIA employee. This op-ed includes the statement that "Iran provided us with extensive assistance on intelligence, logistics, diplomacy, and Afghan internal politics."

Similar statements by me have been deleted from my draft op-ed by the White House. But Kenneth Pollack is someone who presented unfounded assessments of the Iraqi WMD threat -- the same assessments expounded by the Bush White House -- to make a high-profile public case for going to war in Iraq.

Mr. Pollack also supports the administration's reluctance to engage with Iran, in contrast to my consistent and sharp criticism of that position. It would seem that, if one is expounding views congenial to the White House, it does not intervene in prepublication censorship, but, if one is a critic, White House officials will use fraudulent charges of revealing classified information to keep critical views from being heard.

My understanding is that the White House staffers who have injected themselves into this process are working for Elliott Abrams and Megan O'Sullivan, both politically appointed deputies to President Bush's National Security Adviser, Stephen Hadley.

Their conduct in this matter is despicable and un-American in the profoundest sense of that term. I am also deeply disappointed that former colleagues at the Central Intelligence Agency have proven so supine in the face of tawdry political pressure. Intelligence officers are supposed to act better than that.

The Wider War to Come

2006-08-07T08:30:00.000-05:00

Here's an article by Reagan's Treasury Secretary, about the planning of the present wars.

We're Being Set Up for Wider War in the Middle East
by Paul Craig Roberts

The old adage, "fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me" does not apply to Americans, who have shown that they can be endlessly fooled.

Neoconservatives deceived Americans into an illegal attack and debilitating war in Iraq. American neoconservatives are closely allied with Israel's Likud Party. In the past, some neocons lost their security clearances because of "mishandling" of classified information. According to In sight magazine, "the Pentagon has banned security clearance to Americans with relatives in Israel. Government sources and attorneys said the Pentagon has sought and succeeded in removing security clearance from dozens of Americans, mostly Jews, who either lived, worked, or have relatives in Israel."

Despite questions of dual loyalties, neocons hold high positions in the Bush regime. Ten years ago these architects of American foreign and military policy spelled out how they would use deception to achieve "important Israeli strategic objectives" in the Middle East. First, they would focus "on removing Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq." This would open the door for Israel to provoke attacks from Hezbollah. The attacks would let Israel gain American sympathy and permit Israel to seize the strategic initiative by "engaging Hezbollah, Syria, and Iran as the
principal agents of aggression in Lebanon."

Today, this neoconservative plan is unfolding before our eyes. Israel has used the capture of two of its soldiers in Lebanon as an excuse for an all-out air and naval bombardment against Lebanese civilian targets. However, a number of commentators have pointed out that such a massive attack requires weeks if not months of preparation that could not be done overnight in response to the capture of the soldiers.

Regardless, in the first two days of the Israeli military attack on Lebanon more than a hundred civilians, including Canadians, have been killed by Israeli bombs (gifts from U.S. taxpayers).

The Beirut International Airport has been repeatedly bombed, as have residential neighborhoods, roads, bridges, ports, and power stations. Soldiers are a legitimate military target. Civilians, civilian neighborhoods, tourists, and international airports are not.

Under the Nuremberg standard used to sentence Nazi war criminals to death, the Israeli government is clearly guilty of war crimes. Meanwhile, the Israelis are committing identical war crimes in Gaza. Again Israel's excuse is the capture of an Israeli soldier.

However, the distinguished Israeli professor Ran HaCohen said that the Israeli army "had been demanding a massive attack on Gaza long before the Israeli soldier was kidnapped." . . .

Zizek, 2004

2006-06-21T03:33:00.000-05:00

This 2004 excerpt, penned by Zizek reflecting on Shrub's relection, rings very true even today:

However, the main advantage has to do with international politics. If Kerry had won, liberals would have had to face up to the consequences of the Iraq war, and the Bush camp would have been able to ascribe to them the results of its own catastrophic decisions.

We still must wonder when conservatives (en masse) will start "facing up to" the consequences of the war.

In 1979, in her essay "Dictators and Double Standards", Jeanne Kirkpatrick elaborated the distinction between "authoritarian" and "totalitarian" regimes which served as the justification for the US policy of collaborating with rightist dictators while attempting to destabilise Communist regimes: authoritarian dictators are pragmatic rulers who care about their power and wealth and are indifferent to ideological issues, even if they pay lip service to some big idea. In contrast, totalitarian leaders are selfless ideological fanatics who are ready to put everything at stake for their ideals. Authoritarian rulers react rationally and predictably to material and military threats - they can be dealt with. Totalitarian leaders are much more dangerous and have to be confronted directly. The irony is that this distinction perfectly encapsulates what went wrong with the US occupation of Iraq: Saddam was a corrupt authoritarian dictator guided by brutal pragmatic considerations. The US intervention has generated a much more uncompromising, "fundamentalist" opposition which rejects pragmatic compromises.

And this is where we now find ourselves, spending billions (eventually, a trillion?!) on a fundamentally flawed policy which is not in our own interests.

The Bush Stamp

2006-03-27T12:33:00.000-06:00

The Postal Service created a stamp with a picture of President Bush. The stamp was not sticking to envelopes. This enraged the President, who demanded a full investigation. After a month of testing, a special Presidential commission presented the following findings:

The stamp is in perfect order.
There is nothing wrong with the applied adhesive.
People are spitting on the wrong side.

America Abandoned by Alex Sabbeth

2006-02-18T18:29:00.000-06:00

The following article, penned by Alex Sabbeth, appeared in Consortium News on February 16, 2006. Sabbeth provides an excellent look back at the Bush Administration's "accomplishments."

Article : Editor’s Note: As an investigative news Web site, we often concentrate on the details of some very interesting trees and thus can be accused at times of missing the full panorama of the forest. Indeed, we do focus on specific facts, in part, because we believe that if our readers are armed with enough reliable information, they can reach their own wise judgments. We also trust in the old news axiom, “show, don’t tell.” But there are times when an overview can be helpful in recognizing patterns or coming to broader conclusions. In this guest essay, author Alex Sabbeth applies a wider lens to America’s present political crisis:

Take a look at New Orleans today. It resembles the burned out blocks of Detroit, not rebuilt since riots decades ago, testifying to a basic truth. America's wealth and power are not directed towards our well-being and security. Maybe it's easier to grasp this when pondering Sept 11. Our vaunted military did not protect us from low-tech attacks. America has over 800 military bases strung across the globe, but the fact is New York and Washington were not protected.

Doubtful? We were warned about Katrina for years. Newt Gingrich is right when he asks how we can think we're safe when New Orleans was destroyed under our noses. [Fox News, Sept. 6, 2005]Before continuing, I want to point out an obvious fact. The Bush administration purveys falsehoods as a matter of policy. Those who prove this are disparaged as the "reality community." [Boston Globe, quoting writer Ron Suskind, Nov. 5, 2004] These obvious falsehoods are directed to the administration’s political base, which either doesn't realize this, or doesn’t care. A few examples of very significant deceptions are in order. Bush claimed he invaded Iraq because Saddam refused to allow inspectors into Iraq (while they were there). Also, Bush said Saddam refused to disarm. [Nationwide radio address, Feb. 21, 2004, Office of the Press Sec. July 14, 2003] It's well documented that the inspectors were in Iraq from November of 2002 to just before the invasion, when Bush warned them to leave. CBS publicized their reaction to Powell's speech while in Iraq, in a story called “The Man Who Knew.” Also, our own inspectors say Saddam disarmed in the early 1990s, and was left with idle programs. [CBS Oct. 17, 2003, Associated Press, Feb. 13, 2004] Bush traveled the country, repeatedly emphasizing that warrants were required for government wiretaps, while he had been wiretapping without them for years. [AFP, Dec. 12, 2005]

Regarding Sept. 11, do you remember Condoleezza Rice telling us the August 2001 Presidential Brief was mostly “historical” in nature, vague, not concerned with an impending attack? The brief warned that Osama bin-Laden was preparing an attack in America, using planes, activating cells already here. [Los Angeles Times, April 12, 2004] You get the point.

America Hurt

I want to show that Bush’s policies hurt America and our national interests. Despite detailed warnings of both Sept. 11 and Katrina, we were unprepared and unprotected. We invaded Iraq, although our intelligence officers warned that terrorism would increase as a result. [The Guardian, Feb. 24, 2003] While we were told that the invasion made Iraq and the world safer, the State Department issued a warning of increased al-Qaeda activity against U.S. personnel and interests worldwide. [State Department Worldwide Caution] The invasion was supposed to make Israel more secure, but their security officers have recently warned the chaos in Iraq makes the region more unstable and dangerous. [Guardian, Feb. 9, 2006] All this was foretold by U.S. and British intelligence.Military resources were redeployed away from the hunt for al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, to a country that absolutely was no threat to us. Former Sen. Bob Graham, D-Florida, wrote that Saudi Arabia’s role in financing the Sept. 11 attacks was covered up, as proved in the deleted pages of the Congressional report about Sept 11. [Graham’s “Intelligence Matters”] Our budget deficits have private-sector and government analysts warning of a genuine financial meltdown. Even the mellifluous Alan Greenspan has been warning these deficits are not sustainable.Our country's safety has been neglected, according to the Sept. 11 Commission, which issued failing grades to the government's response to its recommendations. In 2004, undercover teams slipped weapons past security barriers in 15 U.S. airports. [USA Today, Sept. 23, 2004] In 2005, a mock attack in Boston revealed complete disarray among the terror response units. [AP, Dec. 27, 2005]

Government scientists warning about climate change, mercury and soot levels, and contaminants at Ground Zero, were overruled by political managers. Fifty Nobel prize winners signed a complaint that science is corrupted by this Administration. As a result, we miss out on the benefit of scientific guidance. [Reuters, June 20, 2004]

Our military and intelligence officers warned that an invasion of Iraq would harm our international standing just when cooperation was most needed to coordinate information and responses to terrorist threats.

Military Stress

Also, our troops would be endangered by incompetent assault planning, and our economy would be stressed dangerously. The Army itself would be stretched to breaking because of repeated tours, morale-crunching stop-loss orders, insufficient protective armor, etc. [Los Angeles Times, July, 4, 2004; Washington Post, Jan. 13, 2004] We’re told our troops will begin to leave Iraq because of improvements in security. The attacks continue daily, and the real reason, admitted by Colin Powell, is that current troop levels can’t be sustained without serious damage to the Army, including recruitment problems. [AP, Dec. 18, 2005] When undercover agents are most needed in the war on terror, Valerie Plame was outed for political sport, showing that our agents are not safe from their own government. Would you risk your life overseas knowing that?

To those who believe in the President, I say you live in a dream world. The President routinely does the opposite of what he says. Therefore, you have no idea what it is you support. Mr. Bush campaigned in 2000 on a “humble” foreign policy, deriding nation-building. But he clearly planned the Iraq invasion before Sept 11, and Condi Rice testified that the administration decided to remake the entire Middle East. [UPI, Oct. 19, 2005; Richard Clarke, Paul O’Neill, Judicial Watch Web site, March 2004] How humble is that? How do you think they're doing so far? Does Katrina make you pretty confident? They are enacting goals written in 1992 by Paul Wolfowitz, long before Bush was elected. [Carnegie Endowment for Peace, March 19, 2003] Did you know that during the 2000 campaign?

Bush was going to restore honor and integrity to the White House. Have you ever heard of Abramoff? Did you see articles reporting how Rove is threatening Republicans if they revolt against NSA wiretaps? [Taegan Goddard’s Political Wire, Feb. 7, 2006] How about the Medicare actuary threatened if he revealed the true cost of the seniors' drug benefit? [CBS, March 16, 2004, “Medicare administrator warns actuary, Rick Foster to not tell Congress the price tag.”] Bush traveled the country assuring us that court warrants are still required for wiretaps. He guaranteed that. Yet years before, he had ordered wiretaps contrary to the FISA requirements. Who still has faith in what Bush says? Why listen at all? Bush scared us with dire threats of WMDs in Iraq. Wolfowitz slipped up by saying WMDs were only a bureaucratic device to gain agreement among individual planners. [AP, May 30, 2003] But Bush, faced with absence of WMDs, told Fox News he would have ordered the invasion knowing they weren't there. [Fox News, anchor Brit Hume, Dec. 14, 2005] They didn't matter at all!

Mushroom Cloud

Remember the mushroom cloud? Scott Ritter, the lead U.N. inspector, reported the U.S. knew Iraq had no WMDs since 1995! [Newsday, June 4, 2004] Blair's minister, Robin Cook, wrote that he was told by the chief of British intelligence that Saddam had no usable WMDs before the invasion. [Guardian, July 12, 2004] Our top CIA analyst in the Middle East (Paul Pillar) just wrote that the Administration corrupted the intelligence on Iraq, and invaded for entirely different reasons. [AFP, Feb. 10. 2006]We’re told Bush needs wiretaps to keep us safe. Did you know that he permitted the evacuation of dozens of Saudis, without proper interviews, right after Sept. 11, while commercial planes were grounded? [NYT, quoted in AFP, March 28, 2005] Or that hundreds of hours of Arabic language intercepts remain untranslated? [Justice Department inspector general's report released in September 2004] Who knows what’s on those tapes. Does that make you feel safe?I want to draw the obvious conclusion underlying these few examples. Bush has been governing like a King, not a democratically elected President. He lied to Congress about the weapons in Iraq, and then said their absence made no difference. He lied to all of us by assuring that warrants were required for wiretaps, while he was wiretapping thousands of innocent citizens with no court order. [NYT, Jan. 17, 2006] He has devised a veto of Congressionally enacted statutes by signing statements, which declare his refusal to honor the clear intent of the law. [Boston Globe, Jan. 4, 2006] He claims authority to ignore explicit laws under theories which caused Justice Department officers to resign, and which Gonzales admitted Congress would not have granted. [Newsweek, Feb. 6, 2006; Council on Foreign Relations Feb. 3, 2006] Republican senators have pointed this out, but have no stomach for forcing him to follow the law. They enact a charade of hearings, according Mr. Gonzales credence while he lied about existing wiretaps. [Washington Post, Jan. 31, 2006] Instead of censuring Gonzales, they continue the theatrics, knowing full well he’ll say whatever is needed to distract attention from the criminality of the secret surveillance. Most importantly, the lie is given to the “everything changed after Sept. 11” canard. New York Times reporter James Risen writes that these wiretaps were established right after Mr. Bush’s inauguration, eight months before Sept. 11. [Risen’s State of War] After the attacks, thousands of innocents were tapped, causing the FBI to be flooded with useless information. Does this sound like a “highly targeted” tap on only U.S. to overseas communications?

Dear readers, the truth doesn’t matter today in Washington. The Administration assumes nobody pays attention, cares, or notices the bulk of its disinformation. If we don’t wake up, the America we learned about in school will remain only a shimmering dream. The British magazine, The Economist, is right for calling Bush incompetent. [The Economist, Oct. 28, 2004] But worse, he’s dangerous, and has harmed America and the world.

Author Alex Sabbeth acts as an informal researcher and organizer for several retired intelligence officers who share his concerns about America's future.

A Journey That Ended in Anguish

2005-11-30T14:48:00.000-06:00

I guess this could have been a suicide . . . but it sounds very suspicious:

Col. Ted Westhusing, a military ethicist who volunteered to go to Iraq, was upset by what he saw. His apparent suicide raises questions.
By T. Christian Miller, Times Staff Writer

"War is the hardest place to make moral judgments."

Col. Ted Westhusing, Journal of Military Ethics

WASHINGTON — One hot, dusty day in June, Col. Ted Westhusing was found dead in a trailer at a military base near the Baghdad airport, a single gunshot wound to the head. The Army would conclude that he committed suicide with his service pistol. At the time, he was the highest-ranking officer to die in Iraq. The Army closed its case. But the questions surrounding Westhusing's death continue.

Westhusing, 44, was no ordinary officer. He was one of the Army's leading scholars of military ethics, a full professor at West Point who volunteered to serve in Iraq to be able to better teach his students. He had a doctorate in philosophy; his dissertation was an extended meditation on the meaning of honor.

So it was only natural that Westhusing acted when he learned of possible corruption by U.S. contractors in Iraq. A few weeks before he died, Westhusing received an anonymous complaint that a private security company he oversaw had cheated the U.S. government and committed human rights violations. Westhusing confronted the contractor and reported the concerns to superiors, who launched an investigation.

In e-mails to his family, Westhusing seemed especially upset by one conclusion he had reached: that traditional military values such as duty, honor and country had been replaced by profit motives in Iraq, where the U.S. had come to rely heavily on contractors for jobs once done by the military.

His death stunned all who knew him. Colleagues and commanders wondered whether they had missed signs of depression. He had been losing weight and not sleeping well. But only a day before his death, Westhusing won praise from a senior officer for his progress in training Iraqi police.

His friends and family struggle with the idea that Westhusing could have killed himself. He was a loving father and husband and a devout Catholic. He was an extraordinary intellect and had mastered ancient Greek and Italian. He had less than a month before his return home. It seemed impossible that anything could crush the spirit of a man with such a powerful sense of right and wrong.

On the Internet and in conversations with one another, Westhusing's family and friends have questioned the military investigation.

A note found in his trailer seemed to offer clues. Written in what the Army determined was his handwriting, the colonel appeared to be struggling with a final question.

How is honor possible in a war like the one in Iraq?

Even at Jenks High School in suburban Tulsa, one of the biggest in Oklahoma, Westhusing stood out. He was starting point guard for the Trojans, a team that made a strong run for the state basketball championship his senior year. He was a National Merit Scholarship finalist. He was an officer in a fellowship of Christian athletes.

Joe Holladay, who coached Westhusing before going on to become assistant coach of the University of North Carolina Tarheels, recalled Westhusing showing up at the gym at 7 a.m. to get in 100 extra practice shots.

"There was never a question of how hard he played or how much effort he put into something," Holladay said. "Whatever he did, he did well. He was the cream of the crop."

When Westhusing entered West Point in 1979, the tradition-bound institution was just emerging from a cheating scandal that had shamed the Army. Restoring honor to the nation's preeminent incubator for Army leadership was the focus of the day.

Cadets are taught to value duty, honor and country, and are drilled in West Point's strict moral code: A cadet will not lie, cheat or steal — or tolerate those who do.

Westhusing embraced it. He was selected as honor captain for the entire academy his senior year. Col. Tim Trainor, a classmate and currently a West Point professor, said Westhusing was strict but sympathetic to cadets' problems. He remembered him as "introspective."

Westhusing graduated third in his class in 1983 and became an infantry platoon leader. He received special forces training, served in Italy, South Korea and Honduras, and eventually became division operations officer for the 82nd Airborne, based at Ft. Bragg, N.C.

He loved commanding soldiers. But he remained drawn to intellectual pursuits.

In 2000, Westhusing enrolled in Emory University's doctoral philosophy program. The idea was to return to West Point to teach future leaders.

He immediately stood out on the leafy Atlanta campus. Married with children, he was surrounded by young, single students. He was a deeply faithful Christian in a graduate program of professional skeptics.

Plunged into academia, Westhusing held fast to his military ties. Students and professors recalled him jogging up steep hills in combat boots and camouflage, his rucksack full, to stay in shape. He wrote a paper challenging an essay that questioned the morality of patriotism.

"He was as straight an arrow as you would possibly find," said Aaron Fichtelberg, a fellow student and now a professor at the University of Delaware. "He seemed unshakable."

In his 352-page dissertation, Westhusing discussed the ethics of war, focusing on examples of military honor from Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee to the Israeli army. It is a dense, searching and sometimes personal effort to define what, exactly, constitutes virtuous conduct in the context of the modern U.S. military.

"Born to be a warrior, I desire these answers not just for philosophical reasons, but for self-knowledge," he wrote in the opening pages.

As planned, Westhusing returned to teach philosophy and English at West Point as a full professor with a guaranteed lifetime assignment. He settled into life on campus with his wife, Michelle, and their three young children.

But amid the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, he told friends that he felt experience in Iraq would help him in teaching cadets. In the fall of 2004, he volunteered for duty.

"He wanted to serve, he wanted to use his skills, maybe he wanted some glory," recalled Nick Fotion, his advisor at Emory. "He wanted to go."

In January, Westhusing began work on what the Pentagon considered the most important mission in Iraq: training Iraqi forces to take over security duties from U.S. troops.

Westhusing's task was to oversee a private security company, Virginia-based USIS, which had contracts worth $79 million to train a corps of Iraqi police to conduct special operations.

In March, Gen. David Petraeus, commanding officer of the Iraqi training mission, praised Westhusing's performance, saying he had exceeded "lofty expectations."

"Thanks much, sir, but we can do much better and will," Westhusing wrote back, according to a copy of the Army investigation of his death that was obtained by The Times.

In April, his mood seemed to have darkened. He worried over delays in training one of the police battalions.

Then, in May, Westhusing received an anonymous four-page letter that contained detailed allegations of wrongdoing by USIS.

The writer accused USIS of deliberately shorting the government on the number of trainers to increase its profit margin. More seriously, the writer detailed two incidents in which USIS contractors allegedly had witnessed or participated in the killing of Iraqis.

A USIS contractor accompanied Iraqi police trainees during the assault on Fallouja last November and later boasted about the number of insurgents he had killed, the letter says. Private security contractors are not allowed to conduct offensive operations.

In a second incident, the letter says, a USIS employee saw Iraqi police trainees kill two innocent Iraqi civilians, then covered it up. A USIS manager "did not want it reported because he thought it would put his contract at risk."

Westhusing reported the allegations to his superiors but told one of them, Gen. Joseph Fil, that he believed USIS was complying with the terms of its contract.

U.S. officials investigated and found "no contractual violations," an Army spokesman said. Bill Winter, a USIS spokesman, said the investigation "found these allegations to be unfounded."

However, several U.S. officials said inquiries on USIS were ongoing. One U.S. military official, who, like others, requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case, said the inquiries had turned up problems, but nothing to support the more serious charges of human rights violations.

"As is typical, there may be a wisp of truth in each of the allegations," the official said.

The letter shook Westhusing, who felt personally implicated by accusations that he was too friendly with USIS management, according to an e-mail in the report.

"This is a mess … dunno what I will do with this," he wrote home to his family May 18.

The colonel began to complain to colleagues about "his dislike of the contractors," who, he said, "were paid too much money by the government," according to one captain.

"The meetings [with contractors] were never easy and always contentious. The contracts were in dispute and always under discussion," an Army Corps of Engineers official told investigators.

By June, some of Westhusing's colleagues had begun to worry about his health. They later told investigators that he had lost weight and begun fidgeting, sometimes staring off into space. He seemed withdrawn, they said.

His family was also becoming worried. He described feeling alone and abandoned. He sent home brief, cryptic e-mails, including one that said, "[I] didn't think I'd make it last night." He talked of resigning his command.

Westhusing brushed aside entreaties for details, writing that he would say more when he returned home. The family responded with an outpouring of e-mails expressing love and support.

His wife recalled a phone conversation that chilled her two weeks before his death.

"I heard something in his voice," she told investigators, according to a transcript of the interview. "In Ted's voice, there was fear. He did not like the nighttime and being alone."

Westhusing's father, Keith, said the family did not want to comment for this article.

On June 4, Westhusing left his office in the U.S.-controlled Green Zone of Baghdad to view a demonstration of Iraqi police preparedness at Camp Dublin, the USIS headquarters at the airport. He gave a briefing that impressed Petraeus and a visiting scholar. He stayed overnight at the USIS camp.

That night in his office, a USIS secretary would later tell investigators, she watched Westhusing take out his 9-millimeter pistol and "play" with it, repeatedly unholstering the weapon.

At a meeting the next morning to discuss construction delays, he seemed agitated. He stewed over demands for tighter vetting of police candidates, worried that it would slow the mission. He seemed upset over funding shortfalls.

Uncharacteristically, he lashed out at the contractors in attendance, according to the Army Corps official. In three months, the official had never seen Westhusing upset.

"He was sick of money-grubbing contractors," the official recounted. Westhusing said that "he had not come over to Iraq for this."

The meeting broke up shortly before lunch. About 1 p.m., a USIS manager went looking for Westhusing because he was scheduled for a ride back to the Green Zone. After getting no answer, the manager returned about 15 minutes later. Another USIS employee peeked through a window. He saw Westhusing lying on the floor in a pool of blood.

The manager rushed into the trailer and tried to revive Westhusing. The manager told investigators that he picked up the pistol at Westhusing's feet and tossed it onto the bed.

"I knew people would show up," that manager said later in attempting to explain why he had handled the weapon. "With 30 years from military and law enforcement training, I did not want the weapon to get bumped and go off."

After a three-month inquiry, investigators declared Westhusing's death a suicide. A test showed gunpowder residue on his hands. A shell casing in the room bore markings indicating it had been fired from his service revolver.

Then there was the note.

Investigators found it lying on Westhusing's bed. The handwriting matched his.

The first part of the four-page letter lashes out at Petraeus and Fil. Both men later told investigators that they had not criticized Westhusing or heard negative comments from him. An Army review undertaken after Westhusing's death was complimentary of the command climate under the two men, a U.S. military official said.

Most of the letter is a wrenching account of a struggle for honor in a strange land.

"I cannot support a msn [mission] that leads to corruption, human rights abuse and liars. I am sullied," it says. "I came to serve honorably and feel dishonored.

"Death before being dishonored any more."

A psychologist reviewed Westhusing's e-mails and interviewed colleagues. She concluded that the anonymous letter had been the "most difficult and probably most painful stressor."

She said that Westhusing had placed too much pressure on himself to succeed and that he was unusually rigid in his thinking. Westhusing struggled with the idea that monetary values could outweigh moral ones in war. This, she said, was a flaw.

"Despite his intelligence, his ability to grasp the idea that profit is an important goal for people working in the private sector was surprisingly limited," wrote Lt. Col. Lisa Breitenbach. "He could not shift his mind-set from the military notion of completing a mission irrespective of cost, nor could he change his belief that doing the right thing because it was the right thing to do should be the sole motivator for businesses."

One military officer said he felt Westhusing had trouble reconciling his ideals with Iraq's reality. Iraq "isn't a black-and-white place," the officer said. "There's a lot of gray."

Fil and Petraeus, Westhusing's commanding officers, declined to comment on the investigation, but they praised him. He was "an extremely bright, highly competent, completely professional and exceedingly hard-working officer. His death was truly tragic and was a tremendous blow," Petraeus said.

Westhusing's family and friends are troubled that he died at Camp Dublin, where he was without a bodyguard, surrounded by the same contractors he suspected of wrongdoing. They wonder why the manager who discovered Westhusing's body and picked up his weapon was not tested for gunpowder residue.

Mostly, they wonder how Col. Ted Westhusing — father, husband, son and expert on doing right — could have found himself in a place so dark that he saw no light.

"He's the last person who would commit suicide," said Fichtelberg, his graduate school colleague. "He couldn't have done it. He's just too damn stubborn."

Westhusing's body was flown back to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware. Waiting to receive it were his family and a close friend from West Point, a lieutenant colonel.

In the military report, the unidentified colonel told investigators that he had turned to Michelle, Westhusing's wife, and asked what happened.

She answered:

"Iraq."

Colin Powell's deputy on Iraq and Oil

2005-11-09T15:45:00.000-06:00

Robert Parry recently wrote the following article that frankly tells us why the U.S. is really in Iraq.

When Colin Powell’s former chief of staff Lawrence Wilkerson publicly decried the Bush administration’s bungling of U.S. foreign policy, the focus of the press coverage was on Wilkerson’s depiction of a “cabal” headed by Vice President Dick Cheney that had hijacked the decision-making process.

Largely overlooked were Wilkerson’s frank admissions about the importance of oil in justifying a long-term U.S. military intervention in Iraq. “The other thing that no one ever likes to talk about is SUVs and oil and consumption,” the retired Army colonel said in a speech on Oct. 19.

Who would Jesus bomb?

2005-10-12T06:42:00.000-05:00

And you thought that "Who Would Jesus Bomb" bumper sticker would never get a response...

Someone has actually written a book (No More Christian Nice Guy) advising Christian men to be more macho and manly. Now, instead of attacking the infidel wherever he roams, we can all bare out chests as we drop the bombs on his villages.

For Your Reflection

2005-09-15T14:53:00.000-05:00

Tax Havens hold nearly one-third of the world's assets.

Now ask yourself: Do you personally know anyone with money in a tax haven? Who are these people? Isn't it amazing to think that many of us may never even rub shoulders with a class of people (1% of the world population) who monopolizes 1/3 of all the world's wealth?

The Tax Justice Network Report has listed some of the things we could purchased if this wealth were subject to taxation (quoted below):

• Fund Gordon Brown’s request for an additional US $50 billion a year in aid to the developing world over the next decade, in just two years;

• At US $30-40 per head, cover what the World Health Organisation classifies minimum financing needs for health services for every single person on the planet; and

• If US $255 billion had been given in aid every year from 2002, by the end of 2015, global poverty would be permanently eradicated, way beyond the goals of the international targets on halving global poverty by 2015, known as the Millennium Development Goals.

North Korean Talks

2005-07-27T23:31:00.000-05:00

Talks with North Korea have started up again. This time, the conference table is lined with carrots--to include a very generous electricity offer from the South along with a U.S. offer to work towards diplomatic relations. There's debate within the academic community over whether the North Korean regime plans to open up its economy, following the Chinese example, but the general consensus is that North Korea is seeking a different path: opening up just enough to ensure the regime's economic viability. Of course, hand-outs become addictive so it's to be seen whether the regime will really be able to reign in all liberalizing tendencies once they begin.

Testing Ground for Nonviolent Resistance

2005-07-13T23:35:00.000-05:00

The right is constantly saying that the Palestinians should protest peacefully instead of resorting to violence to achieve their political objectives. Recent nonviolent protest in the village of Bilin provide a good testing ground for rightwing rhetoric. Isreal is clearly in the wrong. The villagers aren't resorting to violence as they seek political support for their cause. What's the right's reaction?

Thanks to Doug Ireland (via Empire Notes) for this story.

Administration's Offenses Impeachable

2005-07-04T12:08:00.000-05:00

from an article by Robert Shetterly:

Let's consider an item from the news of about two weeks ago:

A British citizen leaked a memo to London's Sunday Times. The memo was of the written account of a meeting that a man named Richard Dearlove had with the Bush administration in July 2002. Dearlove was the head of the England's MI-6, the equivalent of the CIA. On July 23, 2002, Dearlove briefed Tony Blair about the meeting. He said that Bush was determined to attack Iraq. He said that Bush knew that U.S. intelligence had no evidence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and no links to foreign terrorists, that there was no imminent danger to the U.S. from Iraq. But, since Bush was determined to go to war, "Intelligence and facts are being fixed around the policy." "Fixed" means faked, manufactured, conjured, hyped - the product of whole cloth fabrication.

So we got aluminum tubes, mushroom clouds imported from Niger, biological weapons labs in weather trucks, fear and trembling, the phony ultimatums to Saddam Hussein to turn over the weapons he didn't have and thus couldn't. We got the call to arms, the stifling of dissent, the parade of retired generals strategizing on the "news" shows, with us or against us, flags in the lapel, a craven media afraid to look for a truth that might disturb their corporate owners who would profit from the war. Shock and Awe. Fallujah. Abu Ghraib.

It was all a lie. Many of us have said for a long time it was a lie. But here it is in black and white: Lies from a president who has taken a sacred trust to uphold the Constitution of the United States.

So, what does it mean? It means that our president and all of his administration are war criminals. It's as simple as that. They lied to the American people, have killed and injured and traumatized thousands of American men and women doing their patriotic duty, killed at least 100,000 Iraqi civilians, destroyed Iraq's infrastructure and poisoned its environment, squandered billions and billions of our tax dollars, made a mockery of American integrity in the world, changed the course of history, tortured Iraqi prisoners, and bound us intractably to an insane situation that they have no idea how to fix because they had no plan but greed and empire in the first place.

What does it mean? It means that everyone in this administration should be impeached. It means that our Maine Sens. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins and our Congressmen Tom Allen and Mike Michaud should call for immediate impeachment. They were lied to by their president, voted for war, and are thus complicit in the multiply betrayals of the American people unless they stand up now for the truth.

Richard Nixon was impeached for a cover-up of a two-bit break-in. William Cohen, a young Maine Republican, played an important role for the prosecution in those proceedings. Bill Clinton was impeached for lying about sex with an intern. Now we have the irrefutable evidence that George W. Bush lied about the reasons for taking the United States to war. The intelligence wasn't flawed. The weapons weren't hidden. Our elected leaders were lying.

Democracy, like any sound relationship between people, is built on trust. We trust our leaders to tell the truth so that the consent that we give them is honestly informed. If the consent is won through manipulation, propaganda, fear or lies, the basis of our democracy has been subverted. It is no longer democracy at all, but we continue to call it that because we have not the courage or stamina to demand its overhaul.

We live a lie when we fail to hold leaders accountable for their lies. By not calling now for impeachment, we are saying that we condone hypocrisy, pseudo-democracy, and murdering thousands of Americans and Iraqis for strategic control of energy resources that we have no right to. Patriotism demands that we insist on the ideals of democracy, not that we support the "leaders" who cynically destroy them.

What's curious is why anyone like me should have to even point this out. Don't our senators and congressmen feel betrayed? Are they content to continue the murdering rather than do what truth demands? Do they think they can lie to history, too? Do they think that this little Iraq problem will somehow just go away, that the courageous resistance to the United States occupation will give up and hand Bush the keys to the oil wells? Do they think that any of the grave crises facing the world now - energy consumption, global warming, species extinction - can be solved by lying about them?

We are living in an age of no accountability. It's also an age upon which may hang the survival of human life on this earth. One should not bet one's future on people who abjure responsibility. The first courageous step is to come to terms with what we know is true: America's president lied to America's people to create an unnecessary war. I ask Sens. Snowe and Collins, Reps. Allen and Michaud to take that step. Begin impeachment proceedings. It's really no more or less than their duty. It's also the first step toward restoring America's integrity.

Robert Shetterly is a writer and artist who lives in Brooksville, Maine.

Safe from Tree Huggers and Puppy Lovers

2005-04-21T09:20:00.000-05:00

I realize that old news isn't technically "news" at all, but it's sometimes interesting to step back and marvel at our government's consistency. According to TBO, the Homeland Security Department is still focusing on possible terror threats from radical environmental and animal rights activists while ignoring the risks that might be posed by right-wing extremists. Reading this, we'll all sleep better tonight knowing we are safe from the antics of redwood tree squatters and rabid puppy lovers. At the same time, America can rest assured that we will not violate the rights of the Timothy McVeighs of the world.

This rabid hatred of the left, contrary to all reason, has a long history. Many years ago (beyond the memory limits of the collective psyche), the U.S. government decided to support a strong leader in Iraq who could unify the country, harrass Iran, and massacre the leftist commies running around the Middle East. This great leader then set out killing his opponents, many of whom were Communist, using lists that were partly provided by the U.S. CIA. Unfortunately, this man that the U.S. fell in love with happened to be a genocidal maniac. But what can you expect? People do what they are hired to do.

Of course, vilification of the left has a long history in the U.S. Years ago, our tax dollars were being spent to pay FBI agents to constantly tail a very threatening figure by the name of Martin Luther King, Jr. who was spreading (gasp!) the teachings of non-violence. I wonder how many FBI agents are currently tailing Charlton Heston or Jerry Falwell.

You're free to choose (if you choose us)

2005-04-18T08:20:00.000-05:00

In a follow up to my previous post, The Washington Post today has a story titled Terrorism Tempers National Moves to Openness." One segment of the article discusses Kuwaiti political movements, and discusses (somewhat inadvertently) the severe repression of the people by the current government (which was put back in power by the U.S.) The article talks about the conservative Islamic movements (e.g., the Kuwait University Student Union and the Muslim Brotherhood) that are leading factions pushing for democratic involvement in the country. Since the U.S. put the current regime back into power, the only conclusion possible is that the U.S. supports democracy only when it happens to support the U.S. government's agenda. When it doesn't, dictatorship and oppression are considered to be preferrable.

In Kuwait, Who are We Rooting For?

2005-03-30T17:52:00.000-06:00

The Washington Post yesterday had an interesting article about Kuwaitis (including many women) using text messaging on their cell phones to organize sudden underground protests. What the article failed to mention was the irony that the current Kuwaiti dictatorship was placed back in power by the U.S.! Of course, Shrub and co. would have us believe that the current regime-changes in the Middle East are all inspired by the altruistic hopes that them dagnab A-rabs will convert to more democratic ways. But what could have been simpler than to simply hold elections in Kuwait after the liberation? The current royal family could have been held in Guantanamo pending torture charges while the U.S. left the country in the hands of the phone-messaging democratic mobs. In this case, the U.S. could have had its "bastion of democracy" in the Middle East with the sign of a pen.

Perhaps them wacko physicists are right and there truly are separate universes out there. On the one hand, we have the idealistic universe of the Quiet American, willing to do anything to make the world safe for civilization (=Christianity =Capitalism). In this world, Kuwait has been rescued from a terrible Hitler-wannabe who is later pulled out of his hole in the sand; the dust-speckled bearded poppy-growers of Afghanistan have been conquered by blue-eyed Green Berets.

But in a parallel universe, we watch fundamentalist regimes (Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Egypt) being propped up by American money and intelligence, a growing fundamentalist movement in Afghanistan (the Taliban) and Iraq, both of whom rose to power based on U.S. support, and sky-rocketing drug-exports that seem to coincide with the first American boot touching down in a country (e.g., Panama and Afghanistan.)

So who are we supposed to root for? The Kuwaiti dictators and their henchmen that our tax dollars and military placed in power? Or those mad mobs of middle-eastern text-messagers dodging secret police as they insist on radical notions such as female suffrage?

If i only had a heart...

2005-02-08T09:35:00.000-06:00

Rightwing radio and TV never tire of talking about the American "heartland." Through the sheer force of repetition, the term is now being served up as standard fare in the mainstream media. In the popular imagination, the term conjures up warm images of the "real" America in its pristine state, away from the kalifornication and moral grayness of the fringe coastal states. Has anyone noticed how the American heartland, by some strange coincidence, seems to coincide with predominantly white areas of the U.S. Evidently, the black jazz musician playing his music (one of the only true American art-forms) at a bar in D.C. has no "heart." Nor does the ethnic Vietnamese person living in L.A. Such psuedo-Americans live on the heartless fringe of society.

This being the case, the Democratic Party, we are led to believe, must get back to its roots in the American heartland and stop listening to all these heartless fringe-people. Only then will it be able to channel the American spirit--and manifest America's higher purpose and destiny.

Actually, this heartland rhetoric is nothing new. It's simply racism with a refurbished, shiny exterior. And like those self-replicating demonic robots in science-fiction lore, racism will keep reinventing itself with each succeeding generation. It is up to us to continually discredit it.

For a related post, check out Democrats Aren't Serious on the PBA site.

Our Alienable Rights

2005-01-25T11:46:00.000-06:00

In the dark halls of the blogosphere, Joe Patriotism and Jane Rights can be seen necking in the corner of every rightwing blog. When we look askance at the two lovers, we are sternly told that the inherent compatibility of the two is beyond question. The truth is that the two can smooch all they want—they’ll never make it as a couple. You see, they’re actually from different families. (Joe Patriotism actually comes from across the tracks.)

Of course, any nation that recognizes basic human rights (quaint ideas such as opposition to torture and equality before the law) is wise to do so. But this doesn’t mean we should let Joe drag Jane down the aisle. There are some irreconcilable differences from the onset. The fact is the idea of a right being “inalienable” and the idea of it being bestowed on us by a benign government go together like mustard on apple pie. For that matter, the very ideals that underlie the noble concepts of human rights and fundamental human dignity are intrinsically at odds with parochial notions such as tribe or nation.

There’s little to hope for in the forced marriage of this incompatible couple. After all, once we thank daddy government for giving us our “inalienable” rights, these rights suddenly become much more alienable. It isn’t long before our daddy is telling us that he has to temporarily (?!) take away our rights in order to protect us, that the rights really aren’t rights at all but are instead a privilege, or that the rights are only for those holding a passport. So I say we send dirty ol’ Patriotism away. He can marry Ms. Jingoism or that flashy divorcee Ms. Fascism over there on his side of the tracks. We need to save Ms. Rights for the right sort of man.

It is with sadness . . .

2005-01-17T14:34:00.000-06:00

. . . that I feel I must leave Net Politik. It is important to me that I be as responsible a person as I can be. Since I do not have the time to devote to the future of Net Politik, it would be irresponsible for me to continue as member of the Fellowship.

Thank you all for your support over the months. I hope you will visit us at P!.

Why the Arts Aren't Welcome in Our Schools

2005-01-11T15:55:00.000-06:00

Those of us involved with or appreciative of the arts and cognizant of their value to enriching the human spirit have wondered for years what's behind their inherent fragility in our educational system. It's true that when public education began it had to fight long-standing religious and agrarian beliefs that education was frivolous, an 'extra' that got in the way of the 'real' purposes of life: working and child-rearing. It's also true that beneath that layer of hard-nosed simplicity lurked something darker--a lingering distaste for and distrust of the human spirit itself. To a people with Calvinist and Lutheran ancestors who lived close to the land, 'art' represented the ultimate debauchery of hedonistic impulses, a descent into the abyss of selfishness and emotional narcissism that was a fundamental enemy of civilization as they conceived it, a return to the animal magnetism they had fought for a thousand years.

All that is true as far as it goes, and important to understanding the American disdain for 'eggheads' and intellectualism, but it doesn't explain why, after almost 150 years of compulsory education, the most educated populace in the world, and decades of lip-service intended to verify the glories of an education and its necessity to modern human beings, we still maintain that bedrock core of barely-disguised hatred for and disgust with any part of education not directly related to getting a job. Some have labored mightily over the last five or six decades to foster an understanding of the importance of a well-rounded education, and while their efforts have been somewhat successful, they have been concentrated on teachers while parents and school administrators tend to remain at least passively hostile: starting an arts program, even as an extra-curricular activity, still always involves a fight with administrators and sharp questions from many parents about whether or not it's really 'necessary' and how exactly learning to play the violin is going to help Susie get a job as an investment banker when she grows up.

Through the 90's, I tried to build a career for myself as an acting and writing teacher--my only genuine skills. I'm very good, paritcularly with adolescents--that most troublesome of school groups--but I don't have a college degree, which meant that I had to find work in the cracks: teaching night classes, for instance, or as an artist in residence, or directing the school play and turning the rehearsals into de facto classes. Before Junior's tax giveaway to the rich, manufactured deficit, and costly but unnecessary war eliminated all the 'extra' Federal money that was paying for such things, I spent ten years on the outskirts of the educational system. It proved to be a particularly valuable experience for the purpose of understanding the way Americans split their belief in education into two parts: the crucial and the dispensable.

At the time it all fell apart, I was on the point of formulating what I thought was a fairly radical explanation that went beyond the simplistic 'It's our Puritan heritage' slogan and got closer to the heart of what was really going on: the arts challenge our basic American assumptions about life whereas we conceive of schools as the place where those assumptions are reinforced. In other words, learning to make your inner life richer and to express your emotions invariably makes you question those very emotions and everything in your life that gave rise to them. That's bad enough, but the idea of 'questions' alone goes against everything we think schools ought to be: the place where you get answers, and the simpler the better.

It turns out I'm not the only one who's noticed this. In last week's LAT (sorry about the delay but it took that long to percolate), Elliot W. Eisner, a professor of education and art at Stanford University, published an article in which somebody people will listen to finally tries to face the facts.

One of the casualties of our preoccupation with test scores is the presence — or should I say the absence — of the arts in our schools. When they do appear they are usually treated as ornamental rather than substantive aspects of our children's school experience. The arts are considered nice but not necessary. Just what do the arts have to offer to our children? Are they really important? Put most directly, what do the arts have to teach? Join me on a brief excursion.

First, the arts teach children to exercise that most exquisite of capacities, the ability to make judgments in the absence of rules. There is so much in school that emphasizes fealty to rules. The rules that the arts obey are located in our children's emotional interior; children come to feel a rightness of fit among the qualities with which they work. There is no rule book to provide recipes or algorithms to calculate conclusions. They must exercise judgment by looking inside themselves.

A second lesson the arts teach children is that problems can have more than one solution. This too is at odds with the use in our schools of multiple choice tests in which there are no multiple correct answers. The tacit lesson is that there is, almost always, a single correct answer. It's seldom that way in life.

A third lesson is that aims can be held flexibly; in the arts the goal one starts with can be changed midway in the process as unexpected opportunities arrive. Flexibility yields opportunities for surprise. "Art loves chance. He who errs willingly is the artist," Aristotle said. Creative thinking abhors routine. Routines may be good for the assembly line, where surprise is the last thing you want. As our schools become increasingly managed by an industrial ethos that pre-specifies and then measures outcomes, there is an increased need for the arts as a counterbalance.

The arts also teach that neither words nor numbers define the limits of our cognition; we know more than we can tell. There are many experiences and a multitude of occasions in which we need art forms to say what literal language cannot say. When we marry and when we bury, we appeal to the arts to express what numbers and literal language cannot. Reflect on 9/11 and recall the shrines that were created by those who lost their loved ones — and those who didn't. The arts can provide forms of communication that convey to others what is ineffable.

Finally, the arts are about joy. They are about the experience of being moved, of having one's life enriched, of discovering our capacity to feel. If that was all they did, they would warrant a generous place at our table.
(emphasis added)

Read over that list again and you'll see that each and every one of Eisner's 'lessons' is in direct conflict with everything else the school is teaching:

Schools function by rules; art teaches you to break them.

Schools work hard to dampen or kill emotions because emotions are dangerous to proper 'order' and control; art lets them loose.

'Teaching to the test' means inculcating students with a blind acceptance of the 'There's only one right answer to any question' approach to education; art teaches you just how limited--if not utterly bogus and bereft of essential human truth--such an approach is.

And so on.

In other words, the arts are antithetical to the style of education we've decided to favor. They oppose it, undermine it, and often show it up as a fraud. Teenagers are drawn to the arts not just because they're 'glamorous' although that's certainly part of the attraction, but because they confirm what many of the kids feel: that high school doesn't have a whole lot to do with their real lives or the issues they struggle with every day. Arts don't make rebellion more manageable, they give it teeth and sharp claws. If you can keep the arts off in a corner somewhere, like a sort of educational leper colony, you can keep them from infecting the rest of the system with their loathsome openness and endless questioning.

The proof is in the lack of dialectical tension you usually find in a charter school built around the arts. Worcester has one, and a project I did there gave me a chance to see how it operated. It was a revelation.

In the arts schools, the whole pattern and teaching methodology is different, starting with the way the school day itself is arranged: it's looser, more flexible, less rigidly controlled by the infamous 'bell' (or actually, these days, more normally a really annoying buzzer). There are a few more minutes between classes and teachers can extend their class a bit in order to bring at least temporary closure to a lively discussion. Everything else follows the same pattern: more flexibility. Curricula flow as much from the directions class discussions take as from the course syllabus; literature classes may include discussions of biology and science classes may require the reading of novels. All the usual strict compartmentalization of knowledge fields on which standard American education is based is thrown out the window and replaced by a synthesis that acknowledges that nothing exists in a vacuum and that there are multiple possible answers to any given question, depending on the variables involved.

Do I have to tell you that not only is there a long waiting list of kids wanting to get accepted but an even longer waiting list of teachers who want to work there?

The reason the arts aren't an integral part of the American educational system is simpler and more basic than inherited Puritanism or latent anti-intellectualism: the whole system would have to be reformed to accomodate them because if it wasn't, they would ultimately destroy it. That may be a desirable result for some of us but reactionaries and conservatives get nervous and/or outraged at the very notion of change, however minor. A from-the-ground-up sea-change from a focus on solid, simple, single answers to constant questioning and the instability of doubt would make them apoplectic, and they're the ones administrators worry about; they're noisy. Living in fear does that to you.

Yet such a change is exactly what the new generations will need. The simple answers that have defined American ignorance are what created George Bush, the neocons, and enormous corporate power, as well as allowing SUV's and the Iraq war for oil. Such thinking is, as we are learning every day, NOT helpful. What we need to survive the final--and necessary--loss of our innocence is generations of kids trained to think around corners, make complicated decisions after weighing convoluted options, and face uncomfortable facts--exactly the skills art teaches and standard education avoids. So what are we doing instead? Killing arts programs all over the country and concentrating on teaching a style of thinking that virtually guarantees our demise as a great power. Naturally.

Maybe we should re-think that decision. Oh wait-- That's right, I forgot: we don't know how.

(Special thanks to Kath for igniting this whole line of thought.)

P! Launch

2005-01-07T09:17:00.000-06:00

The eagerly anticipated new progressive populist blog (aka "P-Bang") launches this Sunday.

We're an action-oriented collective, managed by consensus, and will be highly action-oriented.

We're also seeking Contributing Editors: feminists, people of color, and gay/lesbian/bisexual/transgendered persons to balance and diversify the currently all-white-male editorial team.

See you there!

Closed Door Government

2005-01-03T15:44:00.000-06:00

As the Bush administration starts its second term, its intolerance of dissent hasn't abated. The Department of Homeland Security continues to restrict access to vast amounts of information--even when the information is clearly unclassified. This attitude has led Steven Aftergood, a government secrecy expert at the Federation of American Scientists, to declare that "A huge door is closing within our government" sending out a clear message that the administration doesn't "want you talking to anybody outside of government." As with so many of Bush's policies, the moves are significant for their ability to establish ugly precedents that will continue to haunt American democracy in the future. These measures have been praised by the American right. Secrecy, we are told, is necessary to build a "strong America," to protect the homeland which is constantly beseiged by bearded foreigners and their liberal ideological brethren.

It's difficult to follow the twists and turns of the right wing's logic. We're told that private ownership of guns is absolutely essential--in spite of any possible drawbacks in terms of crime or gun accidents--in order to counter a possible government take over. And yet the same rabid NRA members are found kneeling prostate when the king declares that even basic information be placed under a shroud of secrecy. Myself, I'd like to know where our tax dollar is going. Is it going to create coups in democratic countries? Is it being used to put people like Saddam in power? Is it being used to corrupt democratic processes by providing secret funding for foreign elections? Is it being used to pay bribes overseas? Our Republican sisters and brothers tell us that great countries are built on trust. They couldn't be more wrong. Great countries are places where the people have power, and this power rests on access to information.

Dumbfounded . . .

2004-12-30T13:36:00.000-06:00

Sometimes, all I can manage is a slow, weary shake of the head -

"It's a time of sorrow and sadness when we lose a loss of life."
Doubleduh, Washington, D.C., Dec. 21, 2004

Ah, yes . . . around $6B per month to slaughter Iraqis (and Americans, and Brits, and everyone else we can jam into that place), but the SOB had to be shamed into adding $10M to the original, sinfully shameful $35M he coughed up a couple of days ago.

Lookee here, lefties, if we can't stand up to this worm on moral values, we ain't worth nothin' but a few sorry lines of bad HTML and a busted javascript.

By the way, Eric and Screwy and John and I are still looking for women left-feminists and people of color to join us as Contributing Editors for P!, a hard-left, action-oriented, progressive-populist blog launching in about a month. If you're interested, go to the site and leave us a note in the comments section of the introductory post.

Dead or Alive??

2004-12-21T14:27:00.000-06:00

I'm the only one who's posted here since early December. If anyone on the Fellowship list wants to keep Net Politik going, leave a comment and I'll keep the site up. If there are no positive responses by January 1, I'll shut the place down.

Leave Rummy Alone!!

2004-12-20T10:11:00.000-06:00

For the umpteenth time in the past three years, everybody's jumping on the bandwagon aimed at Donald "Tuff Shit" Rumsfeld, our Secretary of Offense.

Don't you get it? The Dumbocrats see him as the easiest target; the Repoobs see him as an embarrassment. The fact is that Rummy was hired to carry out the core military policies of PNAC and the Doubleduh-Cheney Gang, i.e. fight wars cheaply, make the military unattractive to all but the hardest-core Rambo wannabes, develop as many high-tech meta-weapons as possible (seen the DARPA site lately?), encourage privatization of ALL military functions (including soldiering).

None of this stuff was created by Rummy ('tho he absolutely LOVES it). So we fire the stupid SOB - what then? My point, of course, is that we can change all the faces, but the dicks are still there.

Do you believe?

2004-12-13T14:48:00.000-06:00

If you believe that we are in a State of Emergency . . .

If you believe that the United States' government is now controlled by anti-democratic interests determined to bring the country to economic, political, and social collapse . . .

If you believe that the political system is fundamentally broken and that "adjustments" within the two-party system will not prevent further decay . . .

If you believe in the potential for democracy only through empowerment and nonviolent, sustained movement toward fundamental systemic change . . .

If you sense that liberalism and neoliberalism are as improverished as conservatism and neoconservatism . . .

(read more)

The Electoral College: Moment of Truth

2004-12-12T13:59:00.000-06:00

There has been a lot of discussion over the years about the role and relevancy of the Electoral College, that odd invention, unique to America. Why bother, one wonders? What's it good for? It's a rubber stamp, a formality. Technically there is no president until the EC meets and votes but that hasn't stopped Bush--or any other president-elect--from acting as if it's a done deal.

And why not? The parties control the electors and have since they were formed early in the 19th century. The electors do as they're told, a system that resulted in the first known case of presidential election-theft (by Republicans, naturally) in the infamous Hayes/Tilden campaign of 1876. Why should anyone take the EC seriously?

The Constitution, that's why.

Article II, which established the EC, says nothing about the electors having to follow the popular will, the party's will, or anybody else's but their own. They cast their votes in secret and they can vote for whoever. The decision is entirely theirs, and so is the responsibility. They are America's electoral jury--the law may guide them but in the end they can do whatever they want to do.

Now, one of the arguments advanced to justify the EC came from the conservative Hamiltonian wing who were nervous about popular elections. They thought that allowing the hoi-polloi to vote for their representatives was quite enough of a risk to take with the governance of a new country under a new system that hadn't been tried since the fall of Ancient Greece. Letting them vote for president was, they thought, tantamount to granting liberty to chaos. The EC, populated, they figured, by men of rank, breeding, and power in the community, would act as a check on what they feared most: the rise of a charismatic populist figure--a demogogue--who would lead the masses in a revolt against the men of rank, breeding and power in the community.

Parenthetically, it has always been hard for people who worship money to believe that there are people who don't. They are absolutely convinced that, deep in our hearts, we have the same greedy dreams they have and--given half a chance--would be just as unscrupulous as they have been to achieve them. The Hamiltonians, all of whom were heavily schooled in Roman history, had the lesson of the Gracchi before them, the populist uprising that terrified the Roman plutocrats even more than the slave rebellion led by Spartacus. All the slaves wanted was freedom, but the Gracchi wanted land distribution. The plutocrats then--just as do the ones currently surrounding Emperor Jr--thought that though the slaves might murder them in their beds, the Gracchis would steal their money which was much worse. Servants of Moloch throughout history have maintained, in the teeth of all available evidence, their steadfast conviction that everybody is as greedy and ruthless as they are; that beliefs of honor, spirituality, generosity, tolerance, equality and brotherhood only go as deep as the first available drachma.

But though their belief was based on their hysterical fear of an unlikely eventuality, still, they had a point. Psychology--and the history of the last century--have demonstrated pretty conclusively that, as Goering said, the masses can be easily led to the most outrageous excesses, much more easily than individuals can be led there. To some extent, the idea that a body should exist for the express purpose of putting the brakes on when the masses are being led over a cliff is a good one.

Since there is no other possible excuse for their existence these days, one is entitled to demand that they live up to the one duty they have left: to protect us from ourselves.

I therefore call upon the EC to do its Constitutional duty and reject, in the name of The People, the election of the worst president in US history. The Kool Aid Drinkers and Bush Cultuists will hate you but your grandchildren will honor your name for centuries.

What d'ya say? Do it for posterity. Do it because it's the right thing to do and you know it. Do it just because you can. But do it.

You're our last hope.

Later Gators

2004-12-07T21:44:00.000-06:00

I've taken my name off the Fellowship of Punditry list, seeing as this page is whithering upon the vine. I would hand over the classic line..."It's been real," but I'd be lying, because it hasn't been real. Virtually so, perhaps...

A few of you I respect a great deal and will continue to interact/guest post for, some of you I merely respect in voluminous quantities, but then there are still others whom I've never interacted with... At any rate, if you perservere on this site, I wish you much verbosity. Regardless of what paths we all take, good will between bloggers is a necessity. Till then...Sadie is out.

Realizing what we’re up against…

2004-12-05T02:45:00.000-06:00

To be honest, I assumed that my thoughts on how the Democrats can start winning elections again would get most of its comments from any conservatives that happened to stroll on by (as they do from time to time). I figured the comments would be on the order of Craig Harmon from The Left Ain't Right (and who has now started a new blog called the Continuum: from Left to Right). I assumed that the harshest words would come from conservatives that like to believe the far left are "radicals" or even "moonbats". Apparently I was wrong.

William Li (a friend of my brother-in-law Dave I think) has been the only one to leave comments about my thoughts about why the Democrats need to embrace the far left. He hasn't stated explicitly that he is a Democrat, but he did say "we" when referring to the Democrats. He's also made it clear that he isn't interested in the policies of the far left or the far right. From what he's written, I've concluded that he is a fiscally conservative socially liberal Democrat who would feel quite comfortable with Clinton, Lieberman, Gore, the Johns, or just about anyone from the DLC as President. William has been back to at ease at least twice so I also am assuming that he won't mind clarifying his position on there if I'm wrong.

So at any rate, let's just say that William Li isn't much interested in debate. He's more interested in chastizing me for how "silly, siller, and silliest" my thoughts are in his opinion and how wrong and "wronger" my arguments are. His arguments are clearly compelling to him so he doesn't feel the need to elaborate. He offers only anecdotes to try and illustrate how wrong I am.

That's fair enough, I can't claim to always be right. And to be certain, William Li's tactics and logic aren't anything new to a person who goes on a lot of different blogs and bulletin boards. Let's just say that I wasn't expecting this vile of an attack from the Democrats. William Li's argument essentially boils down to the Democrats adopt positions that help the country economically and create a rising tide and that the far left, the "lunatic fringe", should rightfully be marginalized. Furthermore, there is no shift to the right only an attempt to get power. All of this is wrapped up in a short, to the point analogies with just a hint of patronizing thrown in for good measure. Not just you're wrong and here's why statements, but more like you- are- so- unbelievably- stupidly- wrong- I- can't- believe- it- and- I'm- going- to- keep- telling- you kind of thing.

I'm really not worried about what William Li thinks of me or my arguments, I certainly wouldn't blog about politics if it bothered me that people thought I was wrong or stupid. My point here is that it really didn't occur to me that the most virulent attacks would come from a Democrat. But the more that I think about it, maybe I should have expected it. Democrats are just as likely to buy into the idea that the far left are crazy or radicals as anyone else. The far left insists that there are more important things than our country's GDP, that in fact if we were to do certain things that would actually reduce the GDP we and the world would be much better off. That isn't fiscal conservatism, that wouldn't result in the booming Clinton-era economy that has become the milestone for any President to live up to (I even subscribed to that theory before the election), and it may even increase other countries' standing compared to the US. That is just down right stupid to William Li and the more I look into it, the more Democrats I find that seem to agree.

William Li doesn't think the Democrats need the far left to win elections. He thinks that by wooing certain groups (farmers or IT pros specifically) that the Dems can come out on top without ever having to deal with the far left again. Everyone is entitled to their opinion of course; however, the results of the 2000 and 2004 elections would indicate otherwise.

The Democrats are and forever will be hopelessly intertwined with those on the far left. Like it or not, no matter how much the Dems bash Nader, shun Michael Moore, embrace pro-war, pro-free trade, anti-gay agendas, or deny being a liberal the GOP will always tie them in with those on the far left. We've reached a point where people don't even have to know what the goals of the far left are to hate them. The words "Left" and "Liberal" have become equivalent to "Bad", "Terrorist", and "Evil". And what are the Democrats trying to do to prevent that? Nothing. The DLC has made a direct effort to make it clear that they would rather not have anything to do with the far left by adopting stances that are anathema to the far left. When the party that according to the popular culture is intertwined with the far left tries to distance itself from the far left by adopting the policies of the far right it only solidifies people's distrust for the far left and strengthens the case against the party. In short, by not legitimizing the far left, the Democrats are shooting themselves in the foot.

Moreover, those on the far left are going to be more than happy to widen the divide. Oliver Willis's "Brand Democrat" campaign has already been Ad Jammed for instance and let's not forget the massive political protests against the Democrats in 2000. This year the far left fell in line in much greater numbers to vote Bush out of office but the negative campaigning required to get the Anybody But Bush crowd's vote actually drove in more votes for Bush than it did for Kerry. And now we on the far left feel as if we are pawns in this game, and maybe that's all we are. My call to the far left is to vote your consciousness from this point forward. The Dems know they can't win without our votes and if we can make them understand that they can't get our votes without adopting our policies, we will all come out on top in the future. After all, you can't win without your pawns.

So thanks to William Li, I think I finally get it. It is now clear exactly what needs to be done to move this country back to the left and why it needs to happen. I also know that it won't happen just because I want it to or because of my lone voice and it won't happen any time soon. So I challenge William Li and any other Democrat that agrees with him to do it your way, try and get the farmer and the IT Pro vote. See how far that gets you. At a certain point, stop, look at what the country stands for, look at the state of the world and ask yourself, "is this really what I wanted?"

On Saying Goodbye to Netpolitik

2004-12-03T22:49:00.000-06:00

Tis a bittersweet ending to my time at Netpolitik. I'm afraid my responsibilites must now reside elseware; in particular, at the Progressive Blog Alliance's HQ. I shall continue to blog, but I simply no longer have any time to keep this blog up. My new homeblog residence is here: Nick Lewis's Blog. Tomorrow, I shall do my best to make it look more like my own.

Dear Pundits, Netpolitik is now yours to let die or live. I've given all of you full control over this blogs design, and the ability to invite new pundits. We've had good times here, and if this blog continues to live, than I will continue to post here occassionally as Pundit Emertis. Besides, its not as though I am going to disappear. I'm just disappearing off of blogspot. IN addition, this will now give me a chance to once again wallow in Mirth, and once again play hardball at the yard. Farewell.

Nick Lewis is now a blogger in residence at the Progressive Blog Alliance HQ.

New direction for the Democrats...

2004-12-03T11:03:00.000-06:00

So there are about as many different ideas of how the Democrats can start winning elections again as there are people. The DLC's pro-war pro-business way didn't exactly produce results. They got a massive boost from the Anybody-But-Bush crowd (which, dear readers, your author humbly admits to belonging to) and Kerry got more votes than any other person in history except the guy he was running against.

The DLC (including Clinton and the current minority leadership in Washington) clearly wants to push the party to the right. As we've heard over and over again, the moderate voters are the key. The Republicans are all too happy to agree with the DLC, they'd have the Democrats embrace the right's policies until there was no difference in the two parties. The right will in fact try to make it sound as if any turn toward the left will spell doom and gloom for the Democrats which means that the Democrats should embrace the Zell Millers and Evan Bayhs and the Joe Liebermans. Zell spoke at the Republican National Convention, is that where Democrats should feel comfortable? Of course not. The Republicans aren't interested in saving the noble Democrat party, they (like Adam "Curb Stomp the Bastards" Yoshida) want to see it disappear forever and leading the Democrats by the collar to the right is exactly how they plan on doing that.

This has been something that I've been saying on this blog and other places since my post-election coming to terms with reality. It wasn't until now that I've gotten independent confirmation of that from other places on the internet. Over at Counter Punch Joshua Frank and Merlin Chowkwanyun argue that the very reason that we lost is because of the DLC's turn toward the right. It was this turn that made the Democrat's positions contradictory, Kerry with his legendarily unclear war positions, Dean with his "anti-war position" that would have been pro-war with UN approval and inspections, and the surprisingly anti-homosexual agenda of Clinton.

Even the last best hope, Dennis Kucinich, who at one point pledged to stay in the race until the Democratic National Convention, ultimately backed down to a solid member of the Anybody But Bush party when he vocalized his support of and asked that his supporters vote for John Kerry. It was ultimately the backstabbing and in-fighting within the Democratic party that squelched the anti-war sentiment and solidified the re-election of George W. Bush.

What Frank and Chowkwanyun argue, and I wholeheartedly agree with, is that this problem obviously cannot be solved from within the Democratic party. Those of us in the Anybody But Bush crowd, the anti-war, anti-globalism lefties out there need to make a clean break from the Democratic party and start voting on their priniples once again. The Democrats cannot win without us and we can't let The Democrats get us to vote against our morals ever again no matter who the candidate is. If we continue on the path of the party that has nominated an anti-gay, anti-choice, pro-war, staunch Mormon in the highest Democratic seat in the land, we are succumbing to the rightward shift of the Democratic party and the nation as a whole. We have already seen what this shift means, unilateral wars of choice, globalism gone wild, polluters writing laws that affect them, religion in the schools, and so on. We on the left have to prevent this movement to the right and that won't happen from inside the Democratic party.

(Hat tip: Cursor)

The Ukrainization of America

2004-12-02T20:53:00.000-06:00

The Opposition In Permanent Tent Cities?

Watching the events in Ukraine (gets the award for worst choice of flag colors – sky blue and yellow?) I am on one hand heartened to see and hear that there has been a minimum of violence and confrontation over the Presidential vote outcome. Except for one brief flare-up at the parliament building earlier this week, reporters from around the world are explaining that the mood in the gatherings and small tent clusters is, in many cases, actually festive.

And it looks like there may be resolution in due course as the legal machinations start to ratchet up. Most Ukraine-watchers are now fairly convinced there will be some form of re-vote and that foreign observers will probably be called in to assure the election is fair and free of the intimidation and fraud the government’s opponents are claiming “stole” the original election.

Which reminds me that there was talk of having foreign observers here in America to oversee the fairness of our own recent national polling. And, also, that there is currently a rather pathetic attempt still trying to make an issue out of the Ohio results being advanced by Democratic Party functionaries masquerading as non-hacks and ersatz champions of “the truth” (cue important music) – most recently supported by the increasingly irrelevant Rev. Jesse Jackson.

Heck, guys, my candidate didn’t win any electoral votes, but I have already moved on to the Christmas season – I have tons of gifts to buy.

Which leads me to my other point…

I can well imagine post-election challenges from here on out in America for the foreseeable future. The composition of political life in America being so splintered, the tenor so mean-spirited, and neither side willing to admit they played as much a part in creating that mood as the other side did; I can easily see the creation of a new Office of The Deputy of the Election Challenge being created one way or another in the hierarchy of both major parties.

But if “tent cities” didn’t spring up over the 2000 election results – which seemed more open to legitimate challenge than any national election my old eyes can recall – they sure aren’t going to spring up now.

The Right would never go that route because it might hurt the value of their IRAs, and the Left would never go that route because they wouldn’t be able to fit it into their social schedules. Anyway movie-stars in tent cities and placards and calls for “Bread, Land, Peace” aren’t likely to spring up with all these holiday parties going on. Especially in the colder states. It might happen after the winter – at least until Spring Break is done. Then of course there’s summer. But once the weather turns again it’s either back to school for the paper chase or time to get serious about your career. Then Christmas again.

Next thing you know it’s 2008.

Yeah… the Office of The Deputy of the Election Challenge makes more sense.

I'm Feeding the Monster

2004-12-01T17:13:00.000-06:00

You will not find me here at the moment. Currently all of my time is being devoted to building the new Progressive Blog Alliance site. It runs on civicspace, which is perhaps some of the coolest software I have ever seen. Pundits, give this blog no mercy. Readers, check out the mega-aggregator I'm beginning to construct.

Know Your Communist!

2004-11-30T02:55:00.000-06:00

Okay, I better just come clean on this one. I was looking for a photo of some bubbha-looking-fellow to go along with the gas station in the lower right hand corner, when suddenly, I came across this odd man. As soon as I saw him, everything went dark. When I recovered conciousness, I found this fake ad for a fake internet militia exported as a .gif on macromedia fireworks. Its kind of scary how real it looks... Sometimes I wonder, am I crazy? or is everyone else crazy?

An Original Netpolitik Brand

2004-11-29T21:10:00.000-06:00

Netpolitik's Fellowship of Punditry is pleased to announce this unvailing of "Brand Illusion". Unlike certain bad partisans, some of whom are very bad, we wanted our brand to be "non-partisan"; we wanted our brand to highlight our similitites as Americans, not our differences. Brand Illusion hopes to be a shining symbol of national unity and healing. Brand Illusion Excelsior! Let the Eagle Soar from Rocky Coast to Sandy Shores! Let that Eagle, oh yeah, that Eagle Soar!*

God Bless America, our families, our loved ones, and especially Poland,
Nicholas Lewis
Chairmain of the Netpolitik Fellowship

*I mixed up there for those kids who like rap stars. Hey kids: you can't touch this. Brand Illusion is dizizown, yo. Tupac 4ever.

Ossia Cadenza from Rachmaninoff's Third Piano Concerto

2004-11-28T18:58:00.000-06:00

Sergei Rachmaninoff: Ossia Cadenza from Piano Concerto No. 3 in d-minor Op. 30
Performed by Nick Lewis

Listen in MP3 Format

Notes: Since the release of the movie Shine, Sergei Rachmaninoff's Third Piano Concerto has enjoyed the reputation as "The Mount Everest of Piano Literature". The “Rach 3” runs about 45 minutes, and requires a full orchestra. On average, it contains more notes per second than any other piano concerto. In this recording, I play the Ossia Cadenza from the first movement. A cadenza is a section in a concerto where the orchestra stops playing; the idea is to give the soloist the full stage to show off.

Rachmaninoff wrote two cadenzas for his third piano concerto; the first cadenza is shorter, softer, and fluid; in contrast, the ossia cadenza (played here) is longer, grander, and more difficult. Rachmaninoff did not play the Ossia Cadenza. Somewhere, I read that he thought the ossia cadenza sounded too much like an ending, and was thus inappropriate for the first movement. It's also rumored that he muttered, "and it's too damn hard..."

Since I am a self-taught pianist, my recording of the Ossia Cadenza contains numerous errors. I hope the listeners will forgive me for them; at some points in this cadenza, there are literally over 70 notes per measure. I consider this recording a first draft. However, in the interest of educating the listeners, I have provided recordings of both cadenzas by two of the 20th Century's greatest piano virtuosos: Sergei Rachmaninoff, and Vladimir Ashkenazy.

Original Cadenza: Performed by Sergei Rachmaninoff
Ossia Cadenza: Performed by Vladimir Ashkenazy

Stand on the Shoulders of Giants

2004-11-28T16:32:00.000-06:00

Check out Google Scholar!

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Though Scholar is still in beta, it is already my new homepage.

NEW WORDS (1940)

2004-11-28T04:51:00.000-06:00

At present the formation of new words is a slow process (I have read somewhere that English gains about six and losses about four words a year) and no new words are deliberately coined except as names for material objects. Abstract words are never coined at all, though old words (e.g. ‘condition’. ‘reflex’, etc.) are sometimes twisted into new meanings for scientific purposes. What I am going to suggest here is that it would be quite feasible to invent a vocabulary, perhaps amounting to several thousands of words, which would deal with parts of our experience now practically unmeanable to language. There are several objections to the idea, and I will deal with these as they arise. The first step is to indicate the kind of purpose for which new words are needed.

Everyone who thinks at all has noticed that our language is practically useless for describing anything that goes on inside the brain. This is so generally recognized that writers of high skill (e.g. Trollope and Mark Twain) will start their autobiographies by saying that they do not intend to describe their inner life, because it is of its nature indescribable. So soon as we are dealing with anything that is not concrete or visible (and even there to a great extent — look at the difficulty of describing anyone’s appearance) we find that words are no like to the reality than chessmen to living beings. To take an obvious case which will not raise side-issues, consider a dream. How do you describe a dream? Clearly you never describe it, because no words that convey the atmosphere of dreams exist in out language. Of course, you can give a crude approximation of some of the facts in a dream. You can say ‘I dreamed that I was walking down Regent Street with a porcupine wearing a bowler hat’ etc., but this is no real description of the dream. And even if a psychologist interprets your dream in terms of ‘symbols’, he is still going largely by guesswork; for the real quality of the dream, the quality that gave the porcupine its sole significance, is outside the world of words. In fact, describing a dream is like translating a poem into the language of one of Bohn’s cribs; it is a paraphrase which is meaningless unless one knows the original.

I chose dreams as in instance that would not be disputed, but if were only dreams that were indescribable, the matter might not be worth bothering about. But, as has been pointed out over and over again, the waking mind is not so different from the dreaming mind as it appears — or as we like to pretend that it appears. It is true that most of our waking thoughts are reasonable’ — that is, there exists in our minds a kind of chessboard upon which thoughts move logically and verbally; we use this part of our minds for any straightforward intellectual problem, and we get into the habit of thinking (i.e. thinking in our chessboard moments) that it is the whole of the mind. But obviously it is not the whole. The disordered, un-verbal world belonging to dreams I never quite absent from our minds, and if any calculation were possible I dare say it would be found that quite half the volume of our waking thoughts were of this order. Certainly the dream-thoughts take a hand even when we are trying to think verbally, they influence the verbal thoughts, and it is largely they that make our inner life valuable. Examine your thought at any casual moment. The main movement in it will be a stream of nameless things — so nameless that one hardly knows whether to call them thoughts, images or feelings. In the first place there are the objects you see and the sounds you hear, which are in themselves describable in words, but which as soon as they enter your mind become something quite different and totally indescribable.[1] And besides this there is the dream-life which your mind unceasingly creates for itself — and though most of this is trivial and soon forgotten, it contains things which are beautiful, funny, etc. beyond anything that ever gets into word. In a way this un-verbal part of your mind is even the most important part for it is the source of nearly all motives. All likes and dislikes, all aesthetic feeling, all notions of right and wrong (aesthetic and moral considerations are in any case inextricable) spring from feelings which are generally admitted to be subtler than words. When you are asked ‘Why do you do, or not do, so and so?’ you are invariably ware that your real reason will not go into words, even when you have no wish to conceal it; consequently you rationalize your conduct, more or less dishonestly. I don’t know whether everyone would admit this, and it is a fact that some people seem unaware of being influenced by their inner life, or even of having any inner. I notice that many people never laugh when they are alone and I suppose that if a man doesn’t laugh when he is alone his inner life must be relatively barren. Still, every at all individual man has an inner life, and is aware of the practical impossibility of understanding others or being understood — in general, of the star-like isolation in which human beings live. Nearly all literature is an attempt to escape from this isolation by round — about means the direct means (words in their primary meanings) being almost useless.

‘Imaginative’ writing is as it were a flank-attack upon positions that are impregnable from the front. A writer attempting anything that is not coldly ‘intellectual’ can do very little with words in their primary meanings. He gets his effect, if at all, by using words in a tricky roundabout way, relying on their cadences and so forth, as in speech he would rely upon tone and gesture. In the case of poetry this is too well known to be worth arguing about. No one with the smallest understanding of poetry supposed that.

The mortal moon bath her eclipse endured, And the sad augurs mock their own presage really means what the words ‘mean’ in their dictionary-sense. (The couplet is said to refer to Queen Elizabeth having got over her grand climacteric safely.) The dictionary-meaning has, as nearly always, something to do with the real meaning, but not more than the ‘anecdote’ of a picture has to do with its design. And it is the same with prose, mutatis mutandis. Consider a novel, even a novel which has ostensibly nothing to do with the inner life — what is called a ‘straight story’. Consider Manon Lescaut. Why does the author invent this long rigmarole about an unfaithful girl and a runaway abbé? Because he has a certain feeling, vision, whatever you like to call it, and knows, possibly after experiment, that it is no use trying to convey this vision by describing it as one would describe a crayfish for a book of zoology. But by not describing it, by inventing something else (in this case a picaresque novel: in another age he would choose another form) he can convey it, or part of it. The art of writing is in fact largely the perversion of words, and I would even say that the less obvious this perversion is, the more thoroughly it has been done. For a writer who seems to twist words out of their meanings (e.g. Gerard Manley Hopkins) is really, if one looks closely, making a desperate attempt to use them straight forwardly. Whereas a writer who seems to have no tricks whatever, for instance the old ballad writers, is making an especially subtle flank-attack, though, in the case of the ballad writers, this is no doubt unconscious. Of course one hears a lot of cant to the effect that all good art is ‘objective’ and every true artist keeps his inner life to himself. But the people who say this do not mean it. All they mean is that they want the inner life to be expressed by an exceptionally roundabout method, as in the ballad or the ‘straight story’.

The weakness of the roundabout method, apart from its difficulty, is that it usually fails. For anyone who is not a considerable artist (possibly for them too) the lumpishness of words results in constant falsification. Is there anyone who has ever written so much as a love letter in which he felt that he had said exactly what he intended? A writer falsifiers himself both intentionally and unintentionally. Intentionally, because the accidental qualities of words constantly tempt and frighten him away from his true meaning. He gets an idea, begins trying to express it, and then in the frightful mess of words that generally results, a pattern begins to form itself more or less accidentally. It is not by any means the pattern he wants, but it is at any rate not vulgar or disagreeable; it is ‘good art’. He takes it, because ‘good art’ is a more or less mysterious gift from heaven, and it seems a pity to waste it when it presents itself. Is not anyone with any degree of mental honesty conscious of telling lies all day long, both in talking and writing, simply because lies will fall into artistic shape when truth will not? Yet if word represented meaning as fully and accurately as height multiplied by base represents the area of a parallelogram, at least the necessity for lying would never exist. And in the mind of reader or hearer there are further falsifications, because, words not being a direct channel of thought, he constantly sees meanings which are not there. A good illustration of this is our supposed appreciation of foreign poetry. We know from the Vie Amoureuse du Docteur Watson stuff of foreign critics, that true understanding of foreign literature is almost impossible; yet quite ignorant people profess to get, do get, vast pleasure out of poetry in foreign and even dead languages. Clearly the pleasure they derive may come from something the writer never intended, possibly from something that would make him squirm in his grave if he knew it was attributed to him. I say to myself Vixi puellis nuper idoneus, and I repeat this over and over for five minutes for the beauty of the word idoneus. Yet, considering the gulf of time and culture, and my ignorance of Latin, and the fact that no one even knows how Latin was pronounced, is it possible that the effect I am enjoying is the effect Horace was trying for? It is as though I were in ecstasies over the beauty of a picture, and all because of some splashes of paint which had accidentally got on to the canvas two hundred years after it was painted. Notice, I am not saying that art would necessarily improve if words conveyed meaning more reliably. For all I know art thrives on the crudeness and vagueness of language. I am only criticizing words in their supposed function as vehicles of thought. And it seems to me that from the point of view of exactitude and expressiveness our language has remained in the Stone Age.

The solution I suggest is to invent new words as deliberately as we would invent new parts for a motor-car engine. Suppose that a vocabulary existed which would accurately express the life of the mind, or a great part of it. Suppose that there need be no stultifying feeling that life is inexpressible, no jiggery-pokery with artistic tricks; expressing one’s meaning simply (being) a matter of taking the right words and putting them in place, like working out an equation in algebra. I think the advantages of this would be obvious. It is less obvious, though, than to sit down and deliberately coin words in a common-sense proceeding. Before indicating a way in which satisfactory words might be coined, I had better deal with the objections which are bound
to arise.

If you say to any thinking person ‘Let us form a society for the invention of new and subtler words’, he will first of all object that it is the idea of a crank, and then probably say that our present words, properly handled, will meet all difficulties. (This last, of course, is only a theoretical objection. In practice everyone recognizes the inadequacy of language — consider such expressions as ‘Words fail’, ‘It wasn’t what he said, it was the way he said it’, etc.) but finally he will give you an answer something like this: ‘Things cannot be done in that pedantic way. Languages can only grow slowly, like flowers; you can’t patch them up like pieces of machinery. Any made-up language must be characterless and lifeless — look at Esperanto, etc. The whole meaning of a word is in its slowly-acquired associations’, etc.

In the first place, this argument, like most of the arguments produced when one suggests changing anything, is a long-winded away of saying that what is must be. Hitherto we have never set ourselves to the deliberate creation of words, and all living languages have grown slowly and haphazard; therefore language cannot grow otherwise. At present, when we want to say anything above the level of a geometrical definition, we are obliged to do conjuring trick with sounds, associations, etc.; therefore this necessity is inherent in the nature of words. The non sequitur is obvious. And notice that when I suggest abstract words I am only suggesting an extension of our present practice. For we do now coin concrete words. Airplanes and bicycles are invented, and we invent names for them, which is the natural thing to do. It is only a step to coining names for the now unnamed things that exist in the mind. You say to me ‘Why do you dislike Mr Smith?’ and I say ‘Because he is a liar, coward, etc.’, and I am almost certainly giving the wrong reason. In my own mind the answer runs ‘Because he is a — kind of man’, — standing for something which I understand, and you would understand if I could tell it you. Why not find a name for ——? The only difficulty is to agree about what we are naming. But long before this difficulty raised, the reading, thinking type of man will have recoiled from such as ideas as the invention of words. He will produce argument like the one I indicated above, or others of a more or less sneering, question-begging kind. In reality all these arguments are humbug. The recoil comes from a deep unreasoned instinct, superstitious in origin. It is the feeling that any direct rational approach to one’s difficulties, any attempt to solve the problems of life as one would solve an equation, can lead nowhere — more, is definitely unsafe. One can see this idea expressed everywhere in a roundabout way. All the bosh that is talked about our national genius for ‘muddling through’, and all the squashy godless mysticism that is urged against any hardness and soundness of intellect, mean au fond that it is safer not to think. This feeling starts, I am certain, in the common belief of children that the air is full of avenging demons waiting to punish presumption.[2] In adults the belief survives as a fear of too rational thinking. I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, pride comes before a fall, etc. — and the most dangerous pride is the false pride of the intellect. David was punished because he numbered the people — i.e. because he used his intellect scientifically. Thus such an idea as, for instance, ectogenesis, apart from its possible effects upon the health of the race, family life, etc., is felt to be in itself blasphemous. Similarly any attack on such a fundamental thing as language, an attack as it were on the very structure of our own minds, is blasphemy and therefore dangerous. To reform language is practically an interference with the work of God — though I don’t say that anyone would put it quite in these words. This objection is important, because it would prevent most people from even considering such an idea as the reform of language. And of course the idea is useless unless undertaken by large numbers. For one man, or a clique, to try and make up a language, as I believe James Joyce is now doing, is as absurd as one man trying to play football alone. What is wanted is several thousands of gifted but normal people who would give themselves to word-invention as seriously as people now give themselves to Shakespearean research. Given these, I believe we could work wonders with language.

Now as to the means. One sees an instance of the successful invention of words, though crude and on small scale, among the members of large families. All large families have two or three words peculiar to themselves — words which they have made up and which convey subtilized, non-dictionary meanings. They say ‘Mr Smith is a — kind of man’. Using some home-made word, and the others understand perfectly; here then, within the limits of the family, exists an adjective filling one of the many gaps left by the dictionary. What makes it possible for the family to invent these words is the basis of their common experience. Without common experience, of course, no word can mean anything. If you say to me ‘What does bergamot smell like?’ I say ‘Something like verbena’. And so long as you know the smell of verbena you are somewhere near understanding me. The method of inventing words, therefore, is the method of analogy based on unmistakable common knowledge; one must have standards that can be referred to without any chance of misunderstanding, as one can refer to a physical thing like the smell of verbena. In effect it must come down to giving words a physical (probably visible) existence. Merely talking about definitions is futile; one can see this whenever it is attempted to define one of the words used by literary critics (e.g. ‘sentimental’[3] ‘vulgar’. Morbid’, Etc.). All meaningless — or rather, having a different meaning for everyone who uses them. What is needed is to show a meaning in some unmistakable form, and then, when various people have identified it in their own minds and recognized it as worth naming, to give it a name. The question is simply of finding a way in which one can give thought an objective existence.

The thing that suggests itself immediately is the cinematograph. Everyone must have noticed the extraordinary powers that are latent in the film — the powers of distortion, of fantasy, in general of escaping the restrictions of the physical world. I suppose it is only from commercial necessity that the film has been used chiefly for silly imitations of stage plays, instead of concentrating as it ought on things that are beyond the stage. Properly used, the film is the one possible medium for conveying mental processes. A dream, for instance, as I said above, is totally indescribable in words, but it can quite well be represented on the screen. Years ago I saw a film of Douglas Fairbanks’, part of which was a representation of a dream. Most of it, of course, was silly joking about the dream where you have no clothes on in public, but for a few minutes it really was like a dream, in a manner that would have been impossible in words, or even in a picture, or, I imagine, in music. I have seen the same kind of thing by flashes in other films. For instance in Dr Caligari — a film, however, which was for the most part merely silly, the fantastic element being exploited for its own sake and not to convey any definite meaning. If one thinks of it there is very little in the mind that could not somehow be represented by the strange distorting powers of the film. A millionaire with a private cinematograph, all the necessary props and a troupe of intelligent actors could, if he wished, make practically all of his inner life known. He could explain the real reasons of his actions instead of telling rationalized lies, point out the things an ordinary man has to keep locked up because there are no words to express them. In general, he could make other people understand him. Of course, it is not desirable that any one man, short of a genius, should make a show of his inner life. What is wanted is to discover the now nameless feelings that men have in common. All the powerful motives which will not go into words and which are a cause of constant lying and misunderstanding, could be tracked down, given visible form, agreed upon, and named. I am sure that the film, with its almost limitless powers of representation, could accomplish this in the hands of the right investigators, though putting thoughts into visible shape would not always be easy — in fact, at first it might be as difficult as any other art.

A note on the actual form new words ought to take. Suppose that several thousands of people with the necessary time, talents and money undertook to make additions to language; suppose that they managed to agree upon a number of new and necessary words; they would still have to guard against producing a mere Volapuk which would drop out of use as soon as it was invented. It seems to me probable that a word, even a not yet existing word, has as it were a natural form — or rather, various natural forms in various languages. If languages were truly expressive there would be no need to play upon the sounds of words as we do now, but I suppose there must always be some correlation between the sound of a word and its meaning. An accepted (I believe) and plausible theory of the origin of language is this. Primitive man, before he had words, would naturally rely upon gesture, and like any other animal he would cry out at the moment of gesticulating, in order to attract attention. Now one instinctively makes the gesture that is appropriate to one’s meaning, and all parts of the body follow suit including the tongue. Hence, certain tongue-movements — i.e. certain sounds — would come to be associated with certain meanings. In poetry one can point to words which, apart from their direct meanings, regularly convey certain ideas by their sound. Thus: ‘Deeper than did ever plummet sound’ (Shakespeare — more than once I think). ‘Past the plunge of plummet’ (A. E. Housman). ‘the unplumbed, salt, estranging sea’ (Matthew Arnold), etc. Clearly, apart from direct meanings, the sound plum- or plun- has something to do with bottomless oceans. Therefore in forming new words one would have to pay attention to appropriateness of sound as well as exactitude of meaning. It would not do, as at present, to clip a new word of any real novelty by making it out of old ones, but it also would not do to make it out of a mere arbitrary collection of letters. One would have to determine the natural form of the word. Like agreeing upon the actual meanings of the words, this would need the cooperation of a large number of people.

I have written all this down hastily, and when I read through it I see that there are weak patches in my argument and much of it is commonplace. To most people in any case the whole idea of reforming language would seem either dilettantish or crankish. Yet it is worth considering what utter incomprehension exists between human beings — at least between those who are not deeply intimate. At present, as Samuel Butler said, the best art (i.e. the most perfect thought-transference) must be ‘lived’ from one person to another. It need not be so if our language were more adequate. It is curious that when our knowledge, the complication of our lives and therefore (I think it must follow) our minds, develop so fast, language, the chief means of communication, should scarcely stir. For this reason I think that the idea of the deliberate invention of words is at least worth thinking over.

Notes:
________

[1] ‘The mind, that ocean where each kind Doth straight its own resemblance find, Yet it creates, transcending these, Far other worlds and other seas,’ etc. [back]

[2] The idea is that the demons will come down on you for being too self-confident. Thus children believe that if you hook a fish and say ‘Got him’ before he is landed, he will escape; that if you put your pads on before it is your turn to bat you will be out first ball, etc. Such beliefs often survive in adults. Adults are only less superstitious than children in proportion as they have more power over their environment. In predicaments where everyone is powerless (e.g. war, gambling) everyone is superstitious. [back]

[3] I once began making a list of writers whom the critics called ‘sentimental’. In the end it included nearly every English writer. The word is in fact a meaningless symbol of hatred, like the bronze tripods in Homer which were given to guest as a symbol of friendship. [back]

Thanksgiving Prayer

2004-11-27T14:37:00.001-06:00

Thanks for the wild turkey and the passenger pigeons, destined to be shit out through wholesome American guts.

Thanks for a continent to despoil and poison.

Thanks for Indians to provide a modicum of challenge and danger.

Thanks for vast herds of bison to kill and skin leaving the carcasses to rot.

Thanks for bounties on wolves and coyotes.

Thanks for the American dream, To vulgarize and to falsify until the bare lies shine through.

Thanks for the KKK.

For nigger-killin' lawmen, feelin' their notches.

For decent church-goin' women, with their mean, pinched, bitter, evil faces.

Thanks for "Kill a Queer for Christ" stickers.

Thanks for laboratory AIDS.

Thanks for Prohibition and the war against drugs.

Thanks for a country where nobody's allowed to mind the own business.

Thanks for a nation of finks.

Yes, thanks for all the memories-- all right let's see your arms!

You always were a headache and you always were a bore.

Thanks for the last and greatest betrayal of the last and greatest of human dreams.

New Webzine Launch

2004-11-26T13:22:00.000-06:00

After weeks of talking about this, or so it seems to me, the first issue of my first webzine devoted to highlighting a few of the best blog-posts I could find has finally been published.

Blog Tower will, I hope, serve several purposes. First, it will give people a second chance to read great posts they may have missed the first time around. Second, it will start to call attention to the great writing in blogs that's been going largely unnoticed not just by the general public but by blog readers themselves. And third, it will foster continuing conversations about issues that tend to get picked up and dropped along with the daily news by re-publishing posts on those issues in special sections.

In this first issue, for instance, the Religion page is devoted to posts about the role of faith in public life and includes two posts written by evangelicals--one who still is and opposes an evangelical litmus test, and one who left the movement and talks about why--as well as a centrist's thoughts on the 'Great Awakening' and what it might mean.

But there's lots more: pages on politics, the arts, and humor, as well as a page that will showcase a featured article in every issue. This issue it's a moving, beautifully written piece by a soldier serving in Iraq who finds her father's face in the faces of the Iraqis around her. In a way, it's a meditation on the universality of laugh lines, and how to read them.

I suppose Thanksgiving week wasn't the best time to launch an effort like this. What can I say? I forgot. But I hope when things calm down next week you'll take a few moments to check out the work presented by Blog Tower, and then check out the sites where the pieces come from. A few of them regular readers of the Alley will be familiar with, but quite a few more they may not be, and they're all worth more than one look.

Incidentally, it should be noted that PBA members figure heavily in the make-up of this first issue--about half the contributors belong. That isn't because I was prejudiced, it was because so many of the PBAers write so damn well. If you don't believe me, check it out for yourself.

Finally, if I have been MIA the last few weeks, it's mostly due to the election and getting BT ready, not because I've lost interest in posting here. Plus, Net Politik has so many fine writers now that there's been no dirth of talent hereabouts. I will try to post more often, but I can't promise anything: I'm getting two other zines ready for publication, Aardvark Monthly, a humor zine aimed for a Dec launch containing material written especially for it by some of the funniest bloggers around (including one of the trio from Fafblog--or maybe all three; I don't know yet, they haven't told me--and Lumpenblog's Dan Roentsch debuting a devastating and devastatingly funny take-off of 'The O'Reilly Factor' that I hope will become a regular feature), and a third zine aiming to be the bloggers' equivalent of The Atlantic Monthly or Harper's.

I promise to try to keep you up on everything that's happening, and hope you'll enjoy what we're planning. In the meantime, you can usually find me at the Alley or at Dispatch from the Trenches.

If you want to send a care package, send this...

2004-11-25T23:59:00.000-06:00

(cross posted from at ease and backdated to Thanksgiving:))

Coffee. None of this instant crap either. High quality, fancy ass coffee and lots of it. There was just a live Thanksgiving broadcast on Fox News of a guy (an Air Force Airman with a military working dog) who is in Iraq. Seriously, I'm maybe 1000 feet away from where they did that broadcast. The news anchor ... uh ... whoever it is asked one last question. "What do you guys need over there, a lot of us want to send care packages so what could you guys use?" The doofus said that he wanted handiwipes and some other such nonsense that we can get at the new BX they just opened up. We were all watching this on TV while he was saying this in the dining tent right next door and all the Army guys were yelling "Coffee! Coffee! Tell him you want Coffee!"

Too bad they didn't tell me that earlier, I bet there are an awful lot of people that read this that would love to send some coffee to the troops. You're going to have to hurry if you want it to get to me (although it shouldn't matter much because I don't drink coffee). I'm going to put up my address once again, but don't send anything for me just in case it doesn't get here in time. What I want you to do is put the address down just as I put it here:

Capt. Michael Lane
Or
TFO BCC Battle Captain
Task Force Olympia
APO AE 09334

There are a lot of guys here and they're going to be here for a long time. They have a freezer that they can put stuff in so don't worry about it going bad. Obviously my anti-corporate leanings would prevent me from buying Starbucks. If you are similarly motivated as me, never fear, I've done all the leg work for you. Here are five companies that sell coffee that "have passed [Responsible Shopper's] intensive screening process and/or are clearly on the cutting edge socially and/or environmentally."

Coffee Traders
Counter Culture Coffee
Equal Exchange
Green Mountain Coffee
Thanksgiving Coffee -- how appropriate!

Of course if you think I'm just being a tree-hugging, liberal, pinko, commie and can't stand the thought of buying from a place named "Counter Culture Coffee", you can of course go to:

Peet's Coffee and Tea
Starbucks
Tully's
or even Amazon!

The Founder's Intent

2004-11-24T16:00:00.000-06:00

"The Internet was deliberately designed by hackers to be an innovation commons , a laboratory for collaboratively creating better technologies. They knew that some community of hackers in the future would know more about networks than the original creators, so the designers of the Internet took care to avoid technical obstacles to future innovation. The creation of the Internet was a community enterprise, and the media that the original hackers created were meant to support communities of creators. To this end, several of the most essential software programs that make the Internet possible are not owned by any commercial enterprise - a hybrid of intellectual property and public good, invented by hackers."

-Howard Rheingold, Smart Mobs, p. 15 (Tip of the hat to Jon Lebkowsky)

A Salutation to the Slaves of Maricopa's Blackboard

2004-11-24T14:44:00.000-06:00

I couldn't help but notice a sudden influx of traffic from a Maricopa Community College's blackboard. As a blogger, I'm quite the nosey-nancy when it comes to who is visiting Net Politik; I follow all strange links at least once. Anyhow, I followed a link to blackboard, and alas, was unable to find what context this blog had been cited. This makes me endlessly nervous. I don't trust them darn rhetoric professors; I consider them to be more dangerous than communists. Their ranks brainwash our youth with "make your argument sound", "write to communicate", "clear language=clear thinking" witchcraft... And no, to the best of my knowledge, I do not know your professor.

Anyhow, let the noble students of Maricopa Community College rest assured that their assignment appears to only take 15 mins to complete. Note to students: if your parlor-pinko professor has assigned a "describe how blogging differs from other forms of communication" worksheet, let me set the record straight:

The mainstream media, scholars, and entrepenuers have gone to great lenghts to define the "blog". Don't listen to them; I'll tell you exactly what a blog is: A blog is a place where an author writes words for an audience to read. The blog's "trick", as an economists would say, is that it enables anyone to publish their writing, with no limits on distribution, distance, or materials. The truly exciting speculation regarding blogs, such as their potential to harness the internet's collective intelligence; or how blogs will effect the way we construct our world, in a post-TV age America are far beyond the scope of this rambling introduction. That said, just remember that one cannot say anymore about blogs as a whole, than could be said about books as a whole. (they got pages, and words) Anyhow, best of luck; drop me a comment if you're feeling gregarious.

Oh, and I pity the fool who does drugs. Be somebody, or be somebody's fool.

The Net Politik Award for Highly Caffeinated Blogging

2004-11-24T03:15:00.000-06:00

Tomorrow I will announce the three winners of this prestigious award. If you win, you get a freakin' chicklet. Got it buddy? You’ll also get a plaque at Net Politik. Just take the chicklet, look at the plaque, and leave…

History Lesson: Democratic-Republicans who were Federalism-Sympathizing Anti-Federalists

2004-11-24T03:01:00.000-06:00

So Willis calls his blog ad campaign "Brand Democrat"... Now, call me a cynic, but I feel any brand which associates itself with the word "Democrat" will fail. First off, the word "democrat" evokes the color brown... I said it, just accept it. In addition, the appeal to tradition tagline, "since 1794", begs for clarification. Thus, I do declare that the history of our giant voter block; which through the ages has been known as "anti-federalists", "republicans", "democratic-republicans", and finally "democrats" would make an excellent topic for a blog post.

"Since 1794" implies that the Democratic party was at one time "the Republican party". Founded in 1794 by Thomas Jefferson, the Republican party (not to be confused with Republicans since Lincoln) was basically a political life-boat for the Anti-Federalists (who lost upon the ratification of our consitution).

The anti-federalists were less of a party and more of a faction. Like the Democrats, their first platform was infested with nuance. They declared centralized government under the articles of confederation as too weak; but the constitution gave the centralized government too much power. They voted for the ratification before they voted against it. In otherwords, they were politcal losers, even before an era of soundbytes. However, they left we Americans with a little legacy in our constitution called "bill of rights". In addition, the last Federalist to get elected was John Adams in 1796.

Until Jackson, both segments, which later became the Democratic and Republican party, resided under one party coincidently known as "the Republicans". Indeed, niether of today's two parties can easily be traced back to the Federalists. An interesting resolution, considering the anti-federalists were straight up losers.

Anyhow, sleepy time... I'll conclude this post tomorrow. Don't worry, next post will cover the Democratic party from Jackson to FDR to John Kerry. Days off good, but now I sleep.

The Power of Nightmares

2004-11-23T18:11:00.000-06:00

The BBC has released a timely documentery entitled "The Power of Nightmares". The film argues that international terrorism is a phantom menace created to prevent society from falling apart. After watching it, I asked the same rhetorical question as the Happy Tutor: "Can you imagine this being aired on US TV?"

Watch pt.1--The Power of Nightmares: Baby Its Cold Outside
Watch Pt. 2--The Power of Nightmares: The Phantom Victory
Watch Pt. 3--The Power of Nightmares: Shadows in the Cave

Hat tip to Michael Benton of Dialogic

My thoughts on Oliver Willis's Brand Democrat

2004-11-23T04:22:00.000-06:00

AdBusting the Democrats' newest PR Campaign...

When I saw Oliver Willis's Brand Dem Campaign, I realized that there was a problem. The campaign is designed to appeal to the center to center-right and is the embodiment of everything that the far left hates: PR Campaigns and Branding. I knew it wouldn't take long for his Brand Dem to get jammed (and judging by the jam posted on this very blog just a few posts ago, I was right). If the Democrats want to woo the centrists, they should do so with the full knowledge that they are alienating the far left. And we know from the 2000 campaign, that is a bad idea.

From my email exchange with Oliver Willis:

--Snip--
Bush has been able to pull those that are on the ultra left toward the middle. I can't think of any other time that I would vote for someone like Kerry who is so committed to things that I despise like the free market. But I did, and my conscience is giving me quite a hangover because of it. I bought into the "hate Bush, vote Kerry" message, but not everyone over in my territory was as moved by it (and I guarantee that I won't vote that way ever again). If the Dems want us, they need to come and find us where we are because right now our only common thread is that Bush is bad. Sorry, but that isn't going to make us vote Democrat in the numbers that the Democrats need.
--Snip--

This all brings me back to my point: The money in politics is skewed toward the radical right which has had the effect of shifting the center towards the right so that even people who support free-trade over universal health care are able to be portrayed as extremely liberal. The ultra left has no corresponding money machine (which is no surprise since we are so aggressive toward the very centers of monetary power in the world) and cannot get out its message like the ultra right can. So the far left will continue to do what they can to jam the messages in an effort to sway the opinions of the public, and if the public as a whole won't be swayed, I guarantee you those on the far left that begrudgingly supported Kerry will be swayed. Reminded of why we need to stick to our guns and why we need to support a candidate that we agree with rather than a candidate that is less bad than another candidate. The Democrats need to regain the trust of the far left. Getting the far left votes by negatively branding the far right didn't quite cut the mustard, and those of us on the far left aren't going to support center to center-right policies forever. The problem is that you can't honestly have an ad in your campaign that says "We don't let corporations tell us what to do" or "Because we spend way too much money on our military" or something that the far left would be comfortable with.

Yeah, I get it, your ad campaign isn't for us, it's for the centrists and the undecideds. And I get that the Dems are in the unfortunate position of repelling the far left when they woo the centrists and repelling the centrists when they woo the far left. Of course my opinion is that the Dems should legitimize the far left to bring the center back to the left. Ultimately, the centrists will follow.

The Comedy Of Politik: Socratic Semantics

2004-11-22T18:44:00.000-06:00

Comedy involves the failure to live up to an accepted standard, a failure which usually elicits a smiling or laughing reaction. In addition, this reaction is subtley maneuvered through careful use of form and content so as to awaken the sense the comic. The recorded history of comic action goes back to the Greek sources, both the philosophers and the playwrights. The relation of comedy to tragedy has, since the Greeks, appeared to be complex. Socrates, in a passage of the Symposium (223 BC) posed the argument that the art of writing comedy is the same process as the art of writing tragedy. Ah Socrates...

There are few other personalities in history that have drawn criticism and praise from the furthest ends of each spectrum. Socrates has been called the inventor of reason and logic, and at the same time has been condemned as a corruptor and a flake. Perhaps he was all of these. Despite this seemingly unavoidable paradox, one thing is certain: Socrates had a very interesting and antimated sense of humor...
The conclusion of this posting can be found over at The Boileryard.

Kevin Sites on the shooting of the wounded insurgent

2004-11-22T16:53:00.000-06:00

Kevin Sites was the Journalist who captured on camera a marine shooting a wounded insurgent in Falluja. In an Open Letter to Devil Dogs of the 3.1, Kevin writes a detailed account of what he saw that day in Falluja. He also writes an explanation of why he decided to report what he saw:

For those who don't practice journalism as a profession, it may be difficult to understand why we must report stories like this at all -- especially if they seem to be aberrations, and not representative of the behavior or character of an organization as a whole.

The answer is not an easy one.

In war, as in life, there are plenty of opportunities to see the full spectrum of good and evil that people are capable of. As journalists, it is our job is to report both -- though neither may be fully representative of those people on whom we're reporting. For example, acts of selfless heroism are likely to be as unique to a group as the darker deeds. But our coverage of these unique events, combined with the larger perspective - will allow the truth of that situation, in all of its complexities, to begin to emerge. That doesn't make the decision to report events like this one any easier. It has, for me, led to an agonizing struggle -- the proverbial long, dark night of the soul.

Read Kevin's Full Post... (Link via Jon Lebkowsky)

Let the Healing Begin

2004-11-22T16:39:00.000-06:00

This portion of the healing process initiated by Harry at Scratchings.

Jim Moore on the success of blog campaigns

2004-11-22T02:27:00.000-06:00

Jim Moore on the success of blog campaigns:

I've been banging my head against a wall for several years, involved in web and blog campaigns that have not succeeded at their highest level objectives: stopping the invasion of Iraq, electing Howard Dean president, and stopping the genocide in Sudan. By campaigns, I mean not just the high traffic blogs that are often highlighted, but the entire community movement, blogs at all traffic levels working together.

I'm not alone, these campaigns engaged millions of people in caring about and becoming active to try to achieve these goals.

So I keep wondering: Did we fail, or succeed? Or more subtly--how did we do either, and what are the lessons?

My hypothesis today is that we succeeded at establishing new memes and new meme-based worldwide communities--and that to the extent our memes were picked up and "established" as topics in the major worldwide media, as well as continuously supported in the blogosphere, we actually made successful social change.

We did not make social change to the extent we hoped, but we did establish important beachheads that can now be built upon.

Perhaps change takes at least these stages: 1. create shared awareness of the problem, and pressure for action, 2. demonstrate the lack of responsiveness in established institutions, 3. create such shared awareness of the lack of responsiveness in established institutions that there is pressure for institutional change, 4. support true reform movements, as well as creative competition, and start to change the status quo, 5. build shared support--super buzz--for the new developments planted in #4, such that these become realities on the world stage.

Mea Culpa

2004-11-20T01:21:00.000-06:00

I'm not so sure I've returned Nick the service he had been looking for from me when he invited me to contribute to NetPolitik. And I have to admit I haven't been *speaking* here much of late because I have not been quite sure of my role.

No matter what else has been said the plain fact of the matter is I have more in sympatico with political liberals than I often let on. When I challenge an assumption of my liberal friends it is probably because I somehow feel that I may have already covered that ground, have found the brickwall in the landscape, and have moved on to a different approach. I have this visceral (and therefore probably irrational) reaction when I hear the arguments and rhetoric I myself once happily spewed in the name of social justice that - one way or another - ended up hollow at some point in the proceedings.

And since when you, my reader friend, hit that brickwall you're not going to remember anyone warned you about it, I don't really feel compelled to sound boring and instructive enough to wag a finger in all my glorious "know-best". Instead, I just break off.

If anything my dilemma in these times is reconciling what I view as actually a gulf's worth of difference between the "classic liberal" and the modern one.

I suppose I can get - or we all can get - too caught up in the distinction involved here, but I wonder...

I hate to sound like a broken record and I have already gotten enough feedback telling me it isn't an issue people want to dwell on... but when I look around and read what people are thinking I have two choices: contribute what I've learned even at the risk of seeming redundant and pointless, or just walking away and letting people stew in their juices a while longer.

I simply can't reconcile how the emphasis has shifted. Maybe it is a function of age but, as has been pointed out to me here, it isn't as if all my fellows here are just out of college. So it must be something more.

It seems to me we somehow went from mistrusting government in our lives to wanting big and involved government in our lives. We went from free speech to correct speech. We moved from the value of unfettered personal conscience to personal conscience so long as it acts within an acceptable range. That a certain amount of national self-loathing is required of us before we discern what our national policies should be.

I keep getting this eerie feeling that we've become a version of the churchlady, only with our prejudices merely inverted from the ones we ran away from, and laughed about.

The dialog between what is known as the classic liberal and the modern one will define a future path. It may be instructive that some of us have found more refuge amongst paleolibertarians than anywhere else.

Outside of that I obviously have no idea what I am talking about any longer. But I will say this - if I run into one more modern liberal who has lost all sense of humor I think I'll just walk altogether.

Sleep="0" Blogging="1"

2004-11-19T03:48:00.000-06:00

Cannot Sleep -- I have this problem often; I have one of those minds that doesn't shut up. It is an incredibly infuriating condition. Lately, when I have slept, I haven't even had normal dreams. I don't know what to call these dreams. I've never met anyone else that has them.

These dreams niether have characters, nor dialogue. All of the images are abstract representations of many different ideas that interconnect and weave with one another. I never seem to be able to remember exactly what happens in these dreams. Often, I'll see shapes interacting with each other. Lines develop between these shapes much in the way that a web develops. As I watch these shapes grow, shrink, and connect with one another, there is a busy din of thought in the background. Obviously, it is me that is thinking, but I'm never in control of what associations seem to flow between these shapes. I'm a silent watcher... as it were. Hope ya'll are having a good rest at the moment...

Dick Smiles for the Camera

2004-11-18T15:26:00.000-06:00

...and a certain special man in white.

Boyd tells it like it is

2004-11-18T13:44:00.000-06:00

The conservative blogger, Texas Native, gave the best two cents I have heard regarding the marine who was caught on tape, shooting a wounded insurgent:

So to both sides I say the same thing: shut up. You don't know what you're talking about. You have limited information, and you can't vouch for the validity or quality of the information you do have. That's the job of Navy investigators and the Marine chain-of-command. They know their jobs, they know how to pursue this issue, they're on the scene, and they'll figure it out. I can guarantee you that this Marine's Commanding Officer isn't going to send him to court martial if it isn't justified (if there is an unjust result of this, it will be in the Marine's favor, which is fine with me. I can (and Americans should) cut a lot of slack to a guy who is out there getting shot at, buddies dying, and being wounded himself. If you haven't been in a situation like that, you can't imagine what it's like.).

Now that is a fair and balanced opinion.

Netpolitik 4.0

2004-11-18T01:20:00.000-06:00

As you can see, Netpolitik has gotten a face-lift today. Tell me what you think... especially if your browser or eyes start having problems. Otherwise, enjoy the fluid center column. I'm in the process of figuring out where to put quotes, and additional resources on this page, so don't panic if something you enjoyed is missing. Anyhow, back to the code...

P.S. If you're using firefox, try it with Internet explorer... I'm trying to workout the firefox bug; anybody out there have a clue as to what issue firefox and explorer might be disagreeing about?

Abe Lincoln was a Republican

2004-11-17T04:14:00.000-06:00

I learned a new thing today. I learned about the most successful Third Political Party in the USA ever—except, of course, for Lincoln's Republican Party (arguably, the Party of Lincoln no longer exists, just the name does): the Know-Nothings. It was a party established to champion the rights and values of White Protestant [male] voters who were feeling threatened in the face of immigrants who might overturn their comfortable applecart. Sound familiar?

Ok, and I learned a new thing yesterday: the word fideism. Dictionary.com's definition is tame enough, at first blush: "Reliance on faith alone rather than scientific reasoning or philosophy in questions of religion". Neat, tidy, and most importantly, well-applied to religion. Good so far.

You'll see around the web all this claptrap about the so-called Party of Lincoln. Back then it was about bringing freedom to those who didn't have it. It was about course-correcting the country in favor of the spirit of the United States Constitution so that later this revised, more splendid spirit could be codified into the letters of the document itself. The Republicans of that day were responsible for the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments, which abolish slavery, guarantee civil rights and also suffrage, respectively. Nice job, guys.

And especially nice job, Mr. Lincoln. Which brings me back to the Know-Nothings. Of them, he wrote:

Our progress in degeneracy appears to me to be pretty rapid. As a nation, we began by declaring that 'all men are created equal.' We now practically read it 'all men are created equal, except Negroes.' When the Know-Nothings get control, it will read 'all men are created equal, except Negroes and foreigners and Catholics.' When it comes to this, I shall prefer emigrating to some country where they make no pretense of loving liberty -- to Russia, for instance, where despotism can be taken pure and without the base alloy of hypocrisy.

This was written before the Civil War, mind you. This was President Lincoln's worldview—regardless of the law. There's an irony here, in that a certain Martin Luther said the exact same thing, only far more tersely: "Sin Bravely."

For you literalist, right-wing moonbats out there, of course the father of Protestantism wasn't advocating sinning. At the least, he was cautioning against claiming self-righteousness. At best, I like to think he was insisting that one not compound a sin by also refusing to take responsibility for the sin in the first place.

The Know-Nothings were not brave in their sinning. They hid behind a curtain of public fear; they undermined good will and individual security just to accomplish their fevered, self-involved goals.

Today's version of the Know-Nothings are, sadly, the Republicans. This is what has become of the Party of Lincoln.

The general populace who support the Republicans these days not only volunteer victimhood to the Republicans in power, they have become their footsoldiers. Look at the arguments those people have made for choosing ineptitude for four more years: "moral values", "I just know he's a good guy" and "he's one of us". All considerations that have nothing to do with, well, consideration. Or with thinking or with reasoning or even with philosophy. They are today's fideists.

They argue that their faith alone is valid to any argument. They don't argue, come to think of it, they merely state. And there is no disagreement, because there is nothing to agree with. You are simply wrong and they're right because Jesus told them so. Jesus also apparently has told President Bush he's doing good work. Hard work.

I cannot underestimate the damage that fideism can do, once its taken root in bureaucratic bodies. Even the Catholics understood this, still understand this:

Fideism owes its origin to distrust in human reason, and the logical sequence of such an attitude is scepticism. It is to escape from this conclusion that some philosophers, accepting as a principle the impotency of reason, have emphasized the need of belief on the part of human nature, either asserting the primacy of belief over reason or else affirming a radical separation between reason and belief, that is, between science and philosophy on the one hand and religion on the other.

Example: witness Andrew Sullivan, a practicing Catholic, prattling about faith and Jesus being valid rhetorical method. He's basically saying that a person's faith is not to be discounted when having an argument (and here I take argument to mean 'a discourse intended to change the nature of a truth') about worldly things. Even the Catholics disagree with this kind of thing.

But if the Know-Nothings have their way this time around, the Catholics won't matter, either.

Faustian Punchline

2004-11-17T03:02:00.000-06:00

Mephisto: "Sancta simplicitas! Who ever thought of that? Just testify, and hang whether it's true!
---Goethe's Faust

Yes, well, perhaps if the lawyer joke appears first, there wont be a need for more. The goal with this is to be slightly constructive, or at least as much as I can manage. So you didn't catch the Scott Peterson posting from yesterday, before you read this, please do peruse the summary of circumstantial evidence that led to the double conviction. This might prevent some indignation, as today I possess no nurturing mood to soothe anyone who freaks out for no apparent reason.

Ultimately, as to the death penalty, 'tis hard for me to take a firm viewpoint for either side. Erring on the side of limiting its use to particularly egregious cases seems the way to go. Human beings are obviously not flawless, and as such, nothing we create can be ultimately perfected...including the criminal trials of those accused of capital murder. Even 1% or less margin of error seems too much, and Blackstone of course brought the following phrase into existence: "It is better for ten guilty people go free than to let an innocent be convicted." Of course, since unfortunately the carnage of Oklahoma City's Murrah Federal Building was close to home, and having visited the memorial a handful of times, justice was served when Timothy McVeigh received the death penalty.

Of course, McVeigh was convicted largely through the use of circumstantial evidence, which led professor Robert Precht to state that "Circumstantial evidence can be, and often is much more powerful than direct evidence." Of course, there's more potency in an ounce of direct evidence as compared to circumstantial evidence, since catching a defendant with his hand in the cookie pot makes the conclusion easier to draw than several haphazard patterns of crumb trails seemingly leading to nowhere. Yet most successful criminal convictions are reached substantially through the use of this indirect evidence that leads to an inference of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.

So as to circumstantial evidence as a concept, this is indeed considered to be a generally effective way to reach a guilty verdict when the facts supporting an inference of guilt are indeed present. The main problem tends to be found inside the jury deliberation room, as far as statutory deconstruction is concerned. Jury instructions are by-and-large too general, largely because lawyers are encouraged to use "form questions" previously nodded towards by appellate courts, so that danger of a reversal of the conviction is less likely.

California, where Peterson now sits in prison, defines murder as "the unlawful killing of a human being, or a fetus, with malice aforethought." It is amazing how few judges take care to make sure juries understand this statute's plain meaning, as well as its legislative intent. It is as if legalese is truly a foreign language, and reacclimating to "American" is just too demanding a task to ask of the men and women in black.

The problem with the definition is that the current definition of malice aforethought has gone far beyond both its common sense and original legal meaning. The resulting conflicts resonate throughout homicide law, warping an entire body of law. One would think that the inclusion of "malice" precludes anything but ill will of the defendant towards his victim, if one thinks of the everyday lay use of the word. Nope. Malice as a legal term of art merely leads one to believe that there was a deliberate intention to kill, whether or not this was precipitated through ill will. Blackstone complicated things with pressing the division towards express and implied malice....but generally, it's relatively accurate to say that Malice Aforethought is akin to premeditation or deliberate planning of the killings. Yet jurors consistently express confusion about this concept due to semantic struggles.

Given the inherent difficulty of instructing juries, and the overriding need for courts to tailor their instructions to conform to the law, criminal statutes should be written in easily understood language. If a crime is defined in terms lay jurors can understand, it will be much easier for courts to give juries understandable instructions that conform to the law.

"Unlawfully" within the statute also causes confusion, because the natural instinct is to consider all killings of a human being to be unlawful. In addition, although within the statute it's included in the state-of-mind of defendant, "unlawful" usually does not do anything but loosely refer to a mental state. Obviously those who murder intentionally and those who kill in self-defense are not precluded by thoughts that killing another human is unlawful. In addition, a myriad of excuses, justirications, and mitigating defenses are up for grabs by the defendant, each with an equally vague set of requisite elements to understand.

To further muddy the waters, in California, first-degree murder consists of three different categories: felony murder, premeditated killing, and murder perpetrated by special means such as torture, poison, or an explosive device. The problem lies with the latter two definitions, which try to separate the most cold-blooded killings for heightened punishment. This creates two problems. First, the requisite ruthlessness is very difficult to define, and second, these types of murders may incur greater punishment, but this not always the case. Depending on the particular means of committing murder and the pain and suffering inflicted on the victim, some killings, such as torture, are more abhorrent than instant death by explosive, so obviously the torturer deserves a more severe punishment.

Of course, I could go on for several more hours about this, and speak of ex post facto laws, concurrence, legality, attempts, imperfect self-defense, mistake of fact or law, but as you can see, this is already getting fairly complicated. This complexity is particularly scary when you trust a jury of "peers" who have no legal training, and also come to the table with their own faults and prejudices...and then they are asked to decide if a defendant is guilty of murder and whether or not he deserves the death penalty. Dangerous stuff...but certainly throwing the use of circumstantial evidence out of the game plan will cause so many of the guilty to go free... So in conclusion, of course, I'm a borderline idiot without the "true answers," but obviously educating the jury seems to be a very hands-on way to enhance the likelihood that justice will be served.

Death of a Salesman?

2004-11-16T07:04:00.000-06:00

This is a follow-up to a recent posting, Begging To Differ, in which this Mirthful One initiated a bit of friendly sparring with the fellas from ISOU and Ratboy's Anvil. The subject, of course, was that wacky Scott Peterson....

As a side note, if you get..um..bored (to borrow Velociman's verbiage), a past Mirth posting, Logical Inconsistencies & The Case of Scott Peterson, detailed the legal history that allowed prosecutors to be charged with double homicide...an excerpt:

"In a twist of irony, Peterson finds himself charged with double homicide. The statute under which he was charged was amended following a case, Keeler v. California, 470 P.2d 617 (1970), where only the fetus (not the mother) died as a result of a violent act committed upon a pregnant woman."

The catalyst for this previous posting was some odd pundit's (who won't get linkage here) indignation at the inconsistency between legal abortions and this Cali statute declaring the killing of a fetus to be murder.

Of course, as always, these things take more blogspace than initially anticipated. As such, to prolong the antici-pation and eagerness of Cul for me to get to the freaking point, today it's a brief statutory elemental thing, and then "just the facts ma'am." This might dispell the rumour of inadequate circumstantial evidence to lead to a proper inference of guilt. Tomorrow will be a more theoretical discussion on the circumstantial evidence/death penalty business. Without further adieu...

Murder is defined as "the killing of another human being with malice aforethought." The California statute specifies that malice may be express (the defendant declared verbally his intention to unlawfully kill someone) by the defendant) or implied (the act was [1] Intentional, [2] Normal consequences of act is death, and [3] Defendant committed act with knowledge or reckless disregard of the danger to human life).

Righto. So to convict for murder, the prosection must prove beyond a reasonable doubt both elements: the actus reus (act) and the requisite mens rea (state-of-mind). The act part is relatively easy to satisfy...basically what must be proven is that the killings happened and that there was a high probability that the defendant committed the act that led to the killings. The tricky part is the state-of-mind, which for murder is malice aforethought, that is, premeditated intent. Now of course thoughts aren't tangible, so either the defendant communicates this intent to kill or it must be inferred through some sort of planning activity consistent with deliberation and premeditation. Ideally direct evidence is present, but more often than not, the mens rea has to be inferred via circumstantial evidence. There really is no way around that stinker.

Now moving on to the Peterson facts: Two dead bodies show the killings happened, and as far as law enforcement is concerned, presumptively there exists a high likelihood that the spouse did it. Concededly, no one saw the killing of Laci and son (which the coronor believes were caused by either strangulation or internal injuries/bleeding from the several broken ribs). No one saw him dump the evidence in the lake. Peterson confessed to nobody, or at least, not to anyone who testified at trial. Still, as husband, he was a prime suspect...even without all the adultery and lying business. So to prove that Peterson had the requisite intent and ability to kill Laci, circumstantial evidence played a huge role in his conviction.

Tons of evidence was presented at trial, which is available over at the Court TV site, in a user-friendly format, to peruse if you so desire. My task at hand is to highlight the particular damning pieces, in my not-so-humble opinion:

The Unwanted Child: Peterson told several people that he was not interested in being a father. Laci's sister testified that, when asked if he was excited about the birth of his first child, Peterson stated that he was “kinda hoping for infertility.” A cousin also testified that Peterson was dismissive of the usual father-and-son games of catch: “I have friends who can do that.” Finally, Peterson told Amber Frey (the mistress) that he was considering a vasectomy and had no desire to father a child.

The Mysterious Boat: Peterson somehow managed to acquire a 14-foot Gamefisher on Dec 9, which he begain shopping for during the same weekend one of his friends threatened to expose Peterson's married state to his mistress. Peterson could not afford to purchase a boat for recreational purposes, as his fertilizer-sales business was in trouble and he already incurred $23,000 in credit card debt. The situation was to a point where he and Laci had pawned jewelry for quick cash a few weeks before she went missing. His parents were known to make generous gifts, including the down-payment for their home and country club memberships, but his parents knew not of the boat purchase. Laci never mentioned the new boat to her relatives, so she probably did not know about the boat either, yet strands of her hair were recovered a pair of pliers found in the boat itself. Hmm.

The Crappy Alibi: Peterson's alibi, of course, was that he decided to go fishing the same day Laci disappeared. In and of itself, this just shows the guy's a prick for leaving his very pregnant wife behind on Christmas Eve to drive 90 miles to San Francisco bay. Although he told detectives this was an impromptu trip, the evidence showed the contrary. Two weeks before the trip, Peterson did online research on currents, boat launches, and fishing grounds int he bay. Four days before, he purchased a fishing license for the days of Dec. 23 and 24.

So why did he make the trip to San Francisco bay? Good question. Peterson had never fished in the bay before, yet despite this fact and the very cold weather, he drove 90 miles past several freshwater reservoirs and lakes. He told the police he went fishing to catch sturgeon or striped bass, which is why he travelled so far. Yet somehow he was unprepared with the wrong types of fishing rod and lures (both purchased in the days leading up to the trip) to catch sturgeon or striped bass. In addition, the shallow, trash-laden location that Peterson fished was completely off base for fisherman looking for these types of fish.

The Bad Timing: The timing of Peterson's fishing trip was questionable, as fishermen generally get an early start to their long days. Yet Peterson arrived at the Berkely Marina around 1 p.m. and only was out on the water for an hour. In addition, Peterson told detectives he left home between 9:30 and 9:45 a.m., but cellphone records state that he drove away at 10:08 a.m. He said when he left, Laci was mopping the floor and had plans to walk their dog, so it seems perhaps he forgot she was under doctor's orders not to do so, as she was too weak, tired, and nauseated to walk the dog. The dog was found running loose at 10:18 a.m. So if his story to be true, a very pregnant Laci had to finish mopping, change clothes, leash the dog, exit and lock the home, and be abducted, all in ten minutes. Not to mention that she left her scarf and coat in the closet, despite the very brisk 40 degree temperature that morning.

The Mopped-Up Cleaning Job: Peterson said Laci was mopping when he left, yet the Petersons' housekeeper testified she had mopped the floors before leaving the home on the previous day. In addition, a friend of the couple (apparently the laundry room is visible from the front door) visited on Dec. 25 and saw Peterson through the window, mopping/vacuuming the laundry room. Finally, for some odd reason, Peterson, who rarely set foot in the laundry room decided to run his fishing clothes through the washer. This is where police found them, although the hamper of dirty clothing in the bedroom was full, and Peterson had removed the dirty rags from the washer that the housekeeper had placed there the day before.

The "Stained" Tarp: Police searched Peterson's truck on Christmas Eve and noticed a large tan tarp in the back of the pickup. They returned with a warrant on Dec. 27 and found what appeared to be the same tarp, drenched in gasoline, in Peterson's backyard shed. Gasoline is known to kill potential biological evidence, including blood and DNA. Hmm indeed.

This evidence doesn't even tough the extramarital affair, or Peterson's odd behavior after the disappearance of Laci. While searches for her body took place, Peterson went shopping and golfing rather than help the volunteers. During a candlelight vigil for his wife, several witnesses saw him smiling with friends during the service. Fifteen days after Laci went missing, Peterson subscribed to the Playboy channel, and then five days later, he opted instead for two "very explicit" adult channels. He traded in Laci's vehicle, and he would have sold the house, but two realtors told him seperately that they could only put the house on the market if he had Laci's signature to sell, or if he produced a death certificate. Then of course, Laci and son washed ashore. Peterson was arrested carrying a fake ID, $15,000 in cash, and camping equipment, and his appearance was... um... blonder and with goatee.

So there are the pieces of circumstantial evidence that leads me to believe that the guilty verdict was proper. In part two, Sadie gets abstract about the death penalty as it relates to circumstantial evidence.

Micro-Investigations: Circus Tents and the World's Worst Website

2004-11-16T01:39:00.000-06:00

Party Tent City was named as "the world's worst website", by some web design blogger. All I can say is that the owner of Party Tent City should "Keep it simple, stupid." See for yourself:

http://www.partytentcity.com/

I didn't link to him, because I'm afraid he'll track me back. The last blogger that linked to him (incidently, for naming his site "the world's worst website"), got a rather long winded reply; here is the TV news sized soundbyte of it:

We do ship to a lot of repeat customers all around the world. If you know what I can move from my home page www.PartyTentCity.com and put it else where let me know. Hey, you should consider my backyard movie screen or my golf driving range shade shelter.

If YOU HAVE a LAWN consider a DOME TENT

DOME TENT is ideal for LARGE GATHERINGS

DOME TENT IS NO 1. CHOICE

5X11: SQUARE FOOT 1.00!

5X11: SQUARE FOOT 2.00 !

7X10: SQUARE FOOT 4.00!

8X14: SQUARE FOOT 7.00!

DOMETENT

Consider DOME TENT for outdoor WEDDINGS,

Click this link to see myBAD HAIRDAYS!Are you confused by my website? Call me with any questions at 718-N0T-A555

(Above: Composite Sketch of World's Worst Website)
However, I learned through further investigation that the owner of "the world's worst website" decided to make it a business opprotunity, and ended up registering:

http://www.the-worlds-worst-website.com/

Now his site has gotten me paranoid... I'm looking around Net Politik wondering if I'm a hypocrite.

Anyhow, what did we learn from this investigation? Anything? I'd say we learned this: The internet is a place where absolutely nothing happens... and I think we should take advantage of that.

The Living Web: An Introduction

2004-11-15T23:02:00.000-06:00

Those who attempt to predict the future generally fall under one of four categories: Technologists, Spiritualists, Futurists, and Historians. The Technologists are opitimized by people like Bill Gates, and Steve Jobs. Technologists are interested in buzzwords, and “killer apps”; they don’t so much predict the future, as much as they attempt to invent it. They enjoy making far reaching claims such as “by 2012, the Home Entertainment Center will be fully controlled by the Personal Computer.” So here at the beginning I tell the reader not to worry: I’m no technologist.

Then there are the Spiritualists. Their predictions are usually based upon an eclectic mixture of metaphysical energies that are focused through crystals, and directed towards the third eye of a psychic. The psychic has a “vision” which provides an astrologer with a “key” to read the stars. The astrologer then reports his findings to a guru who in turn informs the public of “the approaching age of Aquarius”. I never went to wizard school, so I’m not qualified to give such predictions.

The more scientific cousins of the spiritualists are the futurists. When the futurists aren’t attending their weekly Klingon classe, or preparing their Borg costume for the next Star Trek Convention; they will be found creating technologically advanced nowhere lands. However, this group has lost considerable authority since the building of space needles at world fairs went out of style.

I myself fall squarely into the historian camp. In other words, my predictions are made by placing current trends within a frame of historical parallels. So without further delay, here is the summery of this speculative work so far:

1. Blogs wikis and social software are mere prototypes of the mediums which will fuel a rapidly growing “living web”.
2. The long-term consequences of the living web will be comparable to the consequences of the printing press on middle age Europe. We are already seeing the first ripples of the living web’s influence on political campaigns, journalism, and academia.
3. The historical parallels are strong enough to suggest that the consequences of these technologies will be far-reaching, unintended, and above all, unforeseen.

“The living web” is not an abstract concept; yet people fail to make a distinction often enough. The living web is seen on the front pages of blogs, the top of the forums at discussion boards, and the latest revisions of a wiki. The content is created or selected by human beings, and is organized around loose, unorganized communities of similar interests. The content of any given corner of the living web will change on a daily basis. Often these changes are directed by feedback from the audience, breaking news, and the general interests of the folks who typically frequent such a site.

The “dead web” is basically “the world-wide archive”. A blog page becomes part of “the dead web” once it is indexed into monthly archives. Similarly, old wiki-revisions become part of the dead web. However, the plethora of badly coded 1998-era homepages, with big purple and orange letters set against rainbow backgrounds; with a soundblaster-16’s MIDI rendition of “Stars and Stripes forever” as background music; these sites are perhaps the best example of the dead web.

As was stated in the thesis: blogs, wikis, and tools such as drupal are primitive prototypes of the technology which will end up governing “the living web”. The strengths of these tools should be fairly obvious when one considers the success of the dean campaign and wikipedia. What is perhaps less obvious is the actual social function of these tools, and my predictions for the next 5 years are based predominantly on my analysis of these functions.

Anyone who spends more than a month on the web will develop an online persona. I, for example, am currently not “Nick”: the long haired, Rachmaninoff-playing philosophical hippy type known by my friends and family. As far as the Internet is concerned, I’m “Nick Lewis” founder of the progressive blog alliance, and headmaster of the Net Politik Fellowship of Punditry – a prodigal self educated pioneer of the progressive web. Or at least that’s what I’m aiming for.

The point is that the living web is made of people; the quality of the technology that they use to collaborate is the biggest limit upon what the inhabits of the living web can accomplish. What this introduction represents is an attempt to get my own notes in order. About 5 months ago, I lost myself in research; I now find myself in a position that I feel my notes can be brought together. My next post in this series will cover the historical effects of new communication mediums on societies.

Of Note

2004-11-15T02:24:00.000-06:00

Check out Jay Rosen's Blog: Pressthink. Below is an excerpt from the Pressthink manifesto:

We need to keep the press from being absorbed into The Media. This means keeping the word press, which is antiquated. But included under its modern umbrella should be all who do the serious work in journalism, regardless of the technology used. The people who will invent the next press in America--and who are doing it now online--continue an experiment at least 250 years old. It has a powerful social history and political legend attached...

Continue reading...

Existentialism is a Humanism (1946)

2004-11-13T18:51:00.000-06:00

My purpose here is to offer a defense of existentialism against several reproaches that have been laid against it.

First, it has been reproached as an invitation to people to dwell in quietism of despair. For if every way to a solution is barred, one would have to regard any action in this world as entirely ineffective, and one would arrive finally at a contemplative philosophy. Moreover, since contemplation is a luxury, this would be only another bourgeois philosophy. This is, especially, the reproach made by the Communists.

From another quarter we are reproached for having underlined all that is ignominious in the human situation, for depicting what is mean, sordid or base to the neglect of certain things that possess charm and beauty and belong to the brighter side of human nature: for example, according to the Catholic critic, Mlle. Mercier, we forget how an infant smiles. Both from this side and from the other we are also reproached for leaving out of account the solidarity of mankind and considering man in isolation. And this, say the Communists, is because we base our doctrine upon pure subjectivity — upon the Cartesian “I think”: which is the moment in which solitary man attains to himself; a position from which it is impossible to regain solidarity with other men who exist outside of the self. The ego cannot reach them through the cogito.

From the Christian side, we are reproached as people who deny the reality and seriousness of human affairs. For since we ignore the commandments of God and all values prescribed as eternal, nothing remains but what is strictly voluntary. Everyone can do what he likes, and will be incapable, from such a point of view, of condemning either the point of view or the action of anyone else.

It is to these various reproaches that I shall endeavor to reply today; that is why I have entitled this brief exposition “Existentialism is a Humanism.” Many may be surprised at the mention of humanism in this connection, but we shall try to see in what sense we understand it. In any case, we can begin by saying that existentialism, in our sense of the word, is a doctrine that does render human life possible; a doctrine, also, which affirms that every truth and every action imply both an environment and a human subjectivity. The essential charge laid against us is, of course, that of over-emphasis upon the evil side of human life. I have lately been told of a lady who, whenever she lets slip a vulgar expression in a moment of nervousness, excuses herself by exclaiming, ‘I believe I am becoming an existentialist.” So it appears that ugliness is being identified with existentialism. That is why some people say we are “naturalistic,” and if we are, it is strange to see how much we scandalize and horrify them, for no one seems to be much frightened or humiliated nowadays by what is properly called naturalism. Those who can quite well keep down a novel by Zola such as La Terre are sickened as soon as they read an existentialist novel. Those who appeal to the wisdom of the people — which is a sad wisdom — find ours sadder still. And yet, what could be more disillusioned than such sayings as “Charity begins at home” or “Promote a rogue and he’ll sue you for damage, knock him down and he’ll do you homage”? We all know how many common sayings can be quoted to this effect, and they all mean much the same — that you must not oppose the powers that — be; that you must not fight against superior force; must not meddle in matters that are above your station. Or that any action not in accordance with some tradition is mere romanticism; or that any undertaking which has not the support of proven experience is foredoomed to frustration; and that since experience has shown men to be invariably inclined to evil, there must be firm rules to restrain them, otherwise we shall have anarchy. It is, however, the people who are forever mouthing these dismal proverbs and, whenever they are told of some more or less repulsive action, say “How like human nature!” — it is these very people, always harping upon realism, who complain that existentialism is too gloomy a view of things. Indeed their excessive protests make me suspect that what is annoying them is not so much our pessimism, but, much more likely, our optimism. For at bottom, what is alarming in the doctrine that I am about to try to explain to you is — is it not? — that it confronts man with a possibility of choice. To verify — this, let us review the whole question upon the strictly philosophic level. What, then, is this that we call existentialism?

Most of those who are making use of this word would be highly confused if required to explain its meaning. For since it has become fashionable, people cheerfully declare that this musician or that painter is “existentialist.” A columnist in Clartes signs himself “The Existentialist,” and, indeed, the word is now so loosely applied to so many things that it no longer means anything at all. It would appear that, for the lack of any novel doctrine such as that of surrealism, all those who are eager to join in the latest scandal or movement now seize upon this philosophy in which, however, they can find nothing to their purpose. For in truth this is of all teachings the least scandalous and the most austere: it is intended strictly for technicians and philosophers. All the same, it can easily be defined.

The question is only complicated because there are two kinds of existentialists. There are, on the one hand, the Christians, amongst whom I shall name Jaspers and Gabriel Marcel, both professed Catholics; and on the other the existential atheists, amongst whom we must place Heidegger as well as the French existentialists and myself. What they have in common is simply the fact that they believe that existence comes before essence — or, if you will, that we must begin from the subjective. What exactly do we mean by that?

If one considers an article of manufacture as, for example, a book or a paper-knife — one sees that it has been made by an artisan who had a conception of it; and he has paid attention, equally, to the conception of a paper-knife and to the pre-existent technique of production which is a part of that conception and is, at bottom, a formula. Thus the paper-knife is at the same time an article producible in a certain manner and one which, on the other hand, serve a definite purpose, for one cannot suppose that a man would produce a paper-knife without knowing what it was for. Let us say, then, of the paperknife that its essence that is to say the sum of the formulae and the qualities which made its production and its definition possible — precedes its existence. The presence of such — and — such a paper-knife or book is thus determined before my eyes. Here, then, we are viewing the world from a technical standpoint, and we can say that production precedes existence.

When we think of God as the creator, we are thinking of him, most of the time, as a supernal artisan. Whatever doctrine we may be considering, whether it be a doctrine like that of Descartes, or of Leibnitz himself, we always imply that the will follows, more or less, from the understanding or at least accompanies it, so that when God creates he knows precisely what he is creating. Thus, the conception of man in the mind of God is comparable to that of the paper-knife in the mind of the artisan: God makes man according to a procedure and a conception, exactly as the artisan manufactures a paper-knife, following a definition and a formula. Thus each individual man is the realization of a certain conception which dwells in the divine understanding. In the philosophic atheism of the eighteenth century, the notion of God is suppressed, but not, for all that, the idea that essence is prior to existence; something of that idea we still find everywhere, in Diderot, in Voltaire and even in Kant. Man possesses a human nature; that “human nature,” which is the conception of human being, is found in every man; which means that each man is a particular example of a universal conception, the conception of Man. In Kant, this universality goes so far that the wild man of the woods, man in the state of nature and the bourgeois are all contained in the same definition and have the same fundamental qualities. Here again, the essence of man precedes that historic existence which we confront in experience.

Atheistic existentialism, of which I am a representative, declares with greater consistency that if God does not exist there is at least one being whose existence comes before its essence, a being which exists before it can be defined by any conception of it. That being is man or, as Heidegger has it, the human reality. What do we mean by saying that existence precedes essence? We mean that man first of all exists, encounters himself, surges up in the world — and defines himself afterwards. If man as the existentialist sees him is not definable, it is because to begin with he is nothing. He will not be anything until later, and then he will be what he makes of himself. Thus, there is no human nature, because there is no God to have a conception of it. Man simply is. Not that he is simply what he conceives himself to be, but he is what he wills, and as he conceives himself after already existing — as he wills to be after that leap towards existence.

Man is nothing else but that which he makes of himself. That is the first principle of existentialism. And this is what people call its “subjectivity,” using the word as a reproach against us. But what do we mean to say by this, but that man is of a greater dignity than a stone or a table? For we mean to say that man primarily exists — that man is, before all else, something which propels itself towards a future and is aware that it is doing so. Man is, indeed, a project which possesses a subjective life, instead of being a kind of moss, or a fungus or a cauliflower. Before that projection of the self nothing exists; not even in the heaven of intelligence: man will only attain existence when he is what he purposes to be. Not, however, what he may wish to be. For what we usually understand by wishing or willing is a conscious decision taken — much more often than not — after we have made ourselves what we are. I may wish to join a party, to write a book or to marry — but in such a case what is usually called my will is probably a manifestation of a prior and more spontaneous decision. If, however, it is true that existence is prior to essence, man is responsible for what he is. Thus, the first effect of existentialism is that it puts every man in possession of himself as he is, and places the entire responsibility for his existence squarely upon his own shoulders. And, when we say that man is responsible for himself, we do not mean that he is responsible only for his own individuality, but that he is responsible for all men.

The word “subjectivism” is to be understood in two senses, and our adversaries play upon only one of them. Subjectivism means. on the one hand, the freedom of the individual subject and, on the other, that man cannot pass beyond human subjectivity. It is the latter which is the deeper meaning of existentialism. When we say that man chooses himself, we do mean that every one of us must choose himself; but by that we also mean that in choosing for himself he chooses for all men. For in effect, of all the actions a man may take in order to create himself as he wills to be, there is not one which is not creative, at the same time, of an image of man such as he believes he ought to be. To choose between this or that is at the same time to affirm the value of that which is chosen; for we are unable ever to choose the worse. What we choose is always the better; and nothing can be better for us unless it is better for all.

If, moreover, existence precedes essence and we will to exist at the same time as we fashion our image, that image is valid for all and for the entire epoch in which we find ourselves. Our responsibility is thus much greater than we had supposed, for it concerns mankind as a whole. If I am a worker, for instance, I may choose to join a Christian rather than a Communist trade union. And if, by that membership, I choose to signify that resignation is, after all, the attitude that best becomes a man, that man’s kingdom is not upon this earth, I do not commit myself alone to that view. Resignation is my will for everyone, and my action is, in consequence, a commitment on behalf of all mankind. Or if, to take a more personal case, I decide to marry and to have children, even though this decision proceeds simply from my situation, from my passion or my desire, I am thereby committing not only myself, but humanity as a whole, to the practice of monogamy. I am thus responsible for myself and for all men, and I am creating a certain image of man as I would have him to be. In fashioning myself I fashion man. . . .

The existentialist, on the contrary, finds it extremely embarrassing that God does not exist, for there disappears with Him all possibility of finding values in an intelligible heaven. There can no longer be any good a priori, since there is no infinite and perfect consciousness to think it. It is nowhere written that “the good” exists, that one must be honest or must not lie, since we are now upon the plane where there are only men. Dostoyevsky once wrote did God did not exist, everything would be permitted”; and that, for existentialism, is the starting point. Everything is indeed permitted if God does not exist, and man is in consequence forlorn, for he cannot find anything to depend upon either within or outside himself. He discovers forthwith, that he is without excuses.

For if indeed existence precedes essence, one will never be able to explain one’s action by reference to a given and specific human nature; in other words, there is no determinism — man is free, man is freedom. Nor, on the other hand, if God does not exist, are we provided with any values or commands that could legitimize our behavior. Thus we have neither behind us, nor before us in a luminous realm of values, any means of justification or excuse. — We are left alone, without excuse.

That is what I mean when I say that man is condemned to be free. Condemned, because he did not create himself, yet is nevertheless at liberty, and from the moment that he is thrown into this world he is responsible for everything he does. The existentialist does not believe in the power of passion. He will never regard a grand passion as a destructive torrent upon which a man is swept into certain actions as by fate, and which, therefore, is an excuse for them. He thinks that man is responsible for his passion. Neither will an existentialist think that a man can find help through some sign being vouchsafed upon earth for his orientation: for he thinks that the man himself interprets the sign as he chooses. He thinks that every man, without any support or help whatever, is condemned at every instant to invent man. . . .

In the light of all this, what people reproach uswith is not, after all, our pessimism, but the sternness of our optimism. If people condemn our works of fiction, in which we describe characters that are base, weak, cowardly and sometimes even frankly evil, it is not only because those characters are base, weak, cowardly or evil. For suppose that, like Zola, we showed that the behavior of these characters was caused by their heredity, or by the action of their environment upon them, or by determining factors, psychic or organic. People would be reassured, they would say, “You see, that is what we are like, no one can do anything about it.” But the existentialist, when he portrays a coward, shows him as responsible for his cowardice. He is not like that on account of a cowardly heart or lungs or cerebrum, he has not become like that through his physiological organism; he is like that because he has made himself into a cowardly actions. There is no such thing as a cowardly temperament. There are nervous temperaments; there is what is called impoverished blood, and there are also rich temperaments. But the man whose blood is poor is not a coward for all that, for what produces cowardice is the act of giving up or giving way; and a temperament is not an action. A coward is defined by the deed that he has done. What people feel obscurely, and with horror, is that the coward as we present him is guilty of being a coward. What people would prefer would be to be born either a coward or a hero. One of the charges most often laid against the Chemins de la Liberte. is something like this “But, after all, these people being so base, how can you make them into heroes?” That objection is really rather comic, for it implies that people are born heroes: and that is, at bottom, what such people would like to think. If you are born cowards, you can be quite content. you can do nothing about it and you will be cowards all your lives whatever you do; and if you are born heroes you can again be quite content; you will be heroes all your lives eating and drinking heroically. Whereas the existentialist says that the coward makes himself cowardly, the hero makes himself heroic; and that there is always a possibility for the coward to give up cowardice and for the hero to stop being a hero. What counts is the total commitment, and it is not by a particular case or particular action that you are committed altogether.

We have now, I think, dealt with a certain number of the reproaches against existentialism. You have seen that it cannot be regarded as a philosophy of quietism since it defines man by his action; nor as a pessimistic description of man, for no doctrine is more optimistic, the destiny of man is placed within himself. Nor is it an attempt to discourage man from action since it tells him that there is no hope except in his action, and that the one thing which permits him to have life is the deed. Upon this level therefore, what we are considering is an ethic of action and self commitment. . . .

What is at the very heart and center of existentialism, is the absolute character of the free commitment, by which every man realizes himself in realizing a type of humanity — a commitment always understandable, to no matter whom in no matter what epoch — and its bearing upon the relativity of the cultural pattern which may result from such absolute commitment. One must observe equally the relativity of Cartesianism and the absolute character of the Cartesian commitment. In this sense you may say, if you like, that every one of us makes the absolute by breathing, by eating, by sleeping or by behaving in any fashion whatsoever. There is no difference between free being — being as self-committal, as existence choosing its essence — and absolute being. . . .

You can see from these few reflections that nothing could be more unjust than the objections people raise against us. Existentialism is nothing else but an attempt to draw the full conclusions from a consistently atheistic position. Its intention is not in the least that of plunging men into despair. And if by despair one means as the Christians do — any attitude of unbelief, the despair of the existentialists is something different. Existentialism is not atheist in the sense that it would exhaust itself in demonstrations of the non-existence of God. It declares, rather, that even if God existed that would make no difference from its point of view. Not that we believe God does exist, but we think that the real problem is not that of His existence; what man needs is to find himself again and to understand that nothing can save him from himself, not even a valid proof of the existence of God. In this sense existentialism is optimistic. It is a doctrine of action, and it is only by self-deception, by confining their own despair with ours that Christians can describe us as without hope.

Death concentrates the mind

2004-11-13T03:55:00.000-06:00

Bismillah rahman rahim, and my thanks to Nick for the guest blogger, he instills me with courage, the beach landings, there are greeks dying out there, do you want to live forever, or just simply, what the fuck lets do it. First to honour the incarnation life death and the hoped for resurrection of the palestinian people, and their avatar Yasser Arafat (peace be upon him). I have heard americans mock and joke, but only cowards mock dying majesty. Today we rest in Ramallah, but tomorrow in Jerusalem.

The Jews lost any historical claim to Jerusalem in AD70. The right they have to any land as the Americans now demonstrate in Iraq is because they have the bigger guns, the better technology of war. Motorcycle diaries a film for americans using spanish the language of war the second language of the States and yet a film about youth and passion and how dangerous one honest man can be. But only for men who would think.

So Putin the Butcher of Grozny, is he now the inspiration of western democracies, is the plan really to demolish all the cities, turn them into burnt out ruins and let the insurgents run around like latter day scorpion kings. I think that refers to the prehistoric era of Eygpt, before even hieroglyphs. Do i condemn our troops. Do i fuck.

They have always been lions led by donkeys. They don't expect more. Some join up as economic conscripts, some for the glory, none decided to wage war against iraq. That choice was made by a monster who rules america. Whether the elections were fair or foul, your nation was and is divided. In Britain conventions matter a lot more. By convention you can't wage war, ask your citizens to sacrifice their children, unless you have a consensus that this sacrifice is necessary, there is no other way to defend our land or for fuck sake we are no longer prepared to stand by while some bastard is torturing, raping and murdering other people and laughing at us. World War II was different for America. Even Vietnam in the beginning. And when Reagan made you feel good about yourselves as a proud warlike people he picked on tiny countries that couldn't defend themselves.

Bush has no right to wage war when the nation is so divided. If it was legitimate for Jefferson and the founding fathers to take action against tyranny by whatever means necessary then it has become so again. I do not believe that his policy of genocide in Fallujah will work. Its lose lose. Either you will kill every man woman and child, in Grozny they went back later for the young widows they had fucked over because the media started calling them black widows, and their troops were told to finish the job. Or you will let some live and no i don't think they will forgive us.

Certainly i condemn the usurping of the right to kill. We are all under a death sentence. But if you stupid motherfuckers really can't understand what motivates another human being to become a suicide bomber, then it is purely a lack of empathic ability, low intelligence general ignorance possibly exacerbated by in-breeding and food with an unnecessarily high fat content, you call them rednecks, we call them royalty and aristocracy.

But ideology doesn't really make me angry, well actually it can break my heart but i am strange that way, what has really made us angry here in britain this emerald isle , after the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month, they will not grow old as we grow old age will not weary them, with flailing hands they pass the torch on and if we break faith with them they shall not rest though poppies grow and we wear the fucking poppies knowing we have broken faith with them. What really fucks us off, is quite selfish. That 600 working class scots with insufficient armoured support can do the job of 5,000 american marines, of course they think they are better trained and more professional and all that bollocks. But when they give sweets and crayons to children it wasn't immediately after blitzkrieg and the killing of their parents and siblings. You stupid fucking american cunts. Does it really impress the fucking american voter to see how loving fucking soldiers are. Fuck you all.

So to whom am i supposed to make my fucking appeal. You have a whore as an attorney general, Judges who uphold the law are now fucking unamerican is that it. Stop pretending you have or want a democracy you cowardly frightened freaks. Death can set you free. Where is its sting. We will all die motherfuckers. Some of us may live first. Under European law any one who has committed a war crime anywhere in the world can be arrested in Europe and there is no guaranteed immunity from prosecution regardless of their passport. But as i started. Does it matter that in the real world as Ernesto put it a few hundred psychopathic sadistic spanish terrorist replaced macchu picchu with what, with lima, that it's about mindless violence and men who are prepared to wield it. Or does the noumenal matter the city of God, the Dar al Islam, or is that pie in the sky, as the stupid fucking loser the armadillo dancing inside has it, that a right must exist independently of its exercise. If he comes to london will I try to get a warrant issued at a county court. Will i fuck.

The Wall (1939)

2004-11-12T17:41:00.000-06:00

They pushed us into a big white room and I began to blink because the light hurt my eyes. Then I saw a table and four men behind the table, civilians, looking over the papers. They had bunched another group of prisoners in the back and we had to cross the whole room to join them. There were several I knew and some others who must have been foreigners. The two in front of me were blond with round skulls: they looked alike. I supposed they were French. The smaller one kept hitching up his pants: nerves.

It lasted about three hours: I was dizzy and my head was empty; but the room was well heated and I found that pleasant enough: for the past 24 hours we hadn't stopped shivering. The guards brought the prisoners up to the table, one after the other. The four men asked each one his name and occupation. Most of the time they didn't go any further--or they would simply ask a question here and there: "Did you have anything to do with the sabotage of munitions?" Or "Where were you the morning of the 9th and what were you doing?" They didn't listen to the answers or at least didn't seem to. They were quiet for a moment and then looking straight in front of them began to write. They asked Tom if it were true he was in the International Brigade: Tom couldn't tell them otherwise because of the papers they found in his coat. They didn't ask Juan anything but they wrote for a long time after he told them his name.

"My brother Jose is the anarchist," Juan said "You know he isn't here any more. I don't belong to any party. I never had anything to do with politics."

They didn't answer. Juan went on, "I haven't done anything. I don't want to pay for somebody else."

His lips trembled. A guard shut him up and took him away. It was my turn.

"Your name is Pablo Ibbieta?"

"Yes."

The man looked at the papers and asked me "Where's Ramon Gris?"

"I don't know."

"You hid him in your house from the 6th to the 19th."

"No."

They wrote for a minute and then the guards took me out. In the corridor Tom and Juan were waiting between two guards. We started walking. Tom asked one of the guards, "So?"

"So what?" the guard said.

"Was that the cross-examination or the sentence?"

"Sentence" the guard said.

"What are they going to do with us?"

The guard answered dryly, "Sentence will be read in your cell."

As a matter of fact, our cell was one of the hospital cellars. It was terrifically cold there because of the drafts. We shivered all night and it wasn't much better during the day. I had spent the previous five days in a cell in a monastery, a sort of hole in the wall that must have dated from the middle ages: since there were a lot of prisoners and not much room, they locked us up anywhere. I didn't miss my cell; I hadn't suffered too much from the cold but I was alone; after a long time it gets irritating. In the cellar I had company. Juan hardly ever spoke: he was afraid and he was too young to have anything to say. But Tom was a good talker and he knew Spanish well.

There was a bench in the cellar and four mats. When they took us back we sat and waited in silence. After a long moment, Tom said, "We're screwed."

"l think so too," I said, "but I don't think they'll do any thing to the kid.".

"They don't have a thing against him," said Tom. "He's the brother of a militiaman and that's all."

I looked at Juan: he didn't seem to hear. Tom went on, "You know what they do in Saragossa? They lay the men down on the road and run over them with trucks. A Moroccan deserter told us that. They said it was to save ammunition."

"It doesn't save gas." I said.

I was annoyed at Tom: he shouldn't have said that.

"Then there's officers walking along the road," he went on, "supervising it all. They stick their hands in their pockets and smoke cigarettes. You think they finish off the guys? Hell no. They let them scream. Sometimes for an hour. The Moroccan said he damned near puked the first time."

"I don't believe they'll do that here," I said. "Unless they're really short on ammunition."

Day was coming in through four air holes and a round opening they had made in the ceiling on the left, and you could see the sky through it. Through this hole, usually closed by a trap, they unloaded coal into the cellar. Just below the hole there was a big pile of coal dust: it had been used to heat the hospital, but since the beginning of the war the patients were evacuated and the coal stayed there, unused; sometimes it even got rained on because they had forgotten to close the trap.

Tom began to shiver. "Good Jesus Christ, I'm cold," he said. "Here it goes again."

He got up and began to do exercises. At each movement his shirt opened on his chest, white and hairy. He lay on his back, raised his legs in the air and bicycled. I saw his great rump trembling. Tom was husky but he had too much fat. I thought how riffle bullets or the sharp points of bayonets would soon be sunk into this mass of tender flesh as in a lump of butter. It wouldn't have made me feel like that if he'd been thin.

I wasn't exactly cold, but I couldn't feel my arms and shoulders any more. Sometimes I had the impression I was missing something and began to look around for my coat and then suddenly remembered they hadn't given me a coat. It was rather uncomfortable. They took our clothes and gave them to their soldiers leaving us only our shirts--and those canvas pants that hospital patients wear in the middle of summer. After a while Tom got up and sat next to me, breathing heavily.

"Warmer?"

"Good Christ, no. But I'm out of wind."

Around eight o'clock in the evening a major came in with two falangistas. He had a sheet of paper in his hand. He asked the guard, "What are the names of those three?"

"Steinbock, Ibbieta and Mirbal," the guard said.

The major put on his eyeglasses and scanned the list: "Steinbock...Steinbock...Oh yes...You are sentenced to death. You will be shot tomorrow morning." He went on looking. "The other two as well."

"That's not possible," Juan said. "Not me." The major looked at him amazed. "What's your name?"

"Juan Mirbal" he said.

"Well your name is there," said the major. "You're sentenced."

"I didn't do anything," Juan said.

The major shrugged his shoulders and turned to Tom and me.

"You're Basque?"

"Nobody is Basque."

He looked annoyed. "They told me there were three Basques. I'm not going to waste my time running after them. Then naturally you don't want a priest?"

We didn't even answer.

He said, "A Belgian doctor is coming shortly. He is authorized to spend the night with you." He made a military salute and left.

"What did I tell you," Tom said. "We get it."

"Yes, I said, "it's a rotten deal for the kid."

I said that to be decent but I didn't like the kid. His face was too thin and fear and suffering had disfigured it, twisting all his features. Three days before he was a smart sort of kid, not too bad; but now he looked like an old fairy and I thought how he'd never be young again, even if they were to let him go. It wouldn't have been too hard to have a little pity for him but pity disgusts me, or rather it horrifies me. He hadn't said anything more but he had turned grey; his face and hands were both grey. He sat down again and looked at the ground with round eyes. Tom was good hearted, he wanted to take his arm, but the kid tore himself away violently and made a face.

"Let him alone," I said in a low voice, "you can see he's going to blubber."

Tom obeyed regretfully: he would have liked to comfort the kid, it would have passed his time and he wouldn't have been tempted to think about himself. But it annoyed me: I'd never thought about death because I never had any reason to, but now the reason was here and there was nothing to do but think about it.

Tom began to talk. "So you think you've knocked guys off, do you?" he asked me. I didn't answer. He began explaining to me that he had knocked off six since the beginning of August; he didn't realize the situation and I could tell he didn't want to realize it. I hadn't quite realized it myself, I wondered if it hurt much, I thought of bullets, I imagined their burning hail through my body. All that was beside the real question; but I was calm: we had all night to understand. After a while Tom stopped talking and I watched him out of the corner of my eye; I saw he too had turned grey and he looked rotten; I told myself "Now it starts." It was almost dark, a dim glow filtered through the air holes and the pile of coal and made a big stain beneath the spot of sky; I could already see a star through the hole in the ceiling: the night would be pure and icy.

The door opened and two guards came in, followed by a blonde man in a tan uniform. He saluted us. "I am the doctor," he said. "I have authorization to help you in these trying hours."

He had an agreeable and distinguished voice. I said, "What do you want here?"

"I am at your disposal. I shall do all I can to make your last moments less difficult."

"What did you come here for? There are others, the hospital's full of them."

"I was sent here," he answered with a vague look. "Ah! Would you like to smoke?" he added hurriedly, "I have cigarettes and even cigars."

He offered us English cigarettes and puros, but we refused. I looked him in the eyes and he seemed irritated. I said to him, "You aren't here on an errand of mercy. Besides, I know you. I saw you with the fascists in the barracks yard the day I was arrested."

I was going to continue, but something surprising suddenly happened to me; the presence of this doctor no longer interested me. Generally when I'm on somebody I don't let go. But the desire to talk left me completely; I shrugged and turned my eyes away. A little later I raised my head; he was watching me curiously. The guards were sitting on a mat. Pedro, the tall thin one, was twiddling his thumbs, the other shook his head from time to time to keep from falling asleep.

"Do you want a light?" Pedro suddenly asked the doctor. The other nodded "Yes": I think he was about as smart as a log, but he surely wasn't bad. Looking in his cold blue eyes it seemed to me that his only sin was lack of imagination. Pedro went out and came back with an oil lamp which he set on the corner of the bench. It gave a bad light but it was better than nothing: they had left us in the dark the night before. For a long time I watched the circle of light the lamp made on the ceiling. I was fascinated. Then suddenly I woke up, the circle of light disappeared and I felt myself crushed under an enormous weight. It was not the thought of death, or fear; it was nameless. My cheeks burned and my head ached.

I shook myself and looked at my two friends. Tom had hidden his face in his hands. I could only see the fat white nape of his neck. Little Juan was the worst, his mouth was open and his nostrils trembled. The doctor went to him and put his hand on his shoulder to comfort him: but his eyes stayed cold. Then I saw the Belgian's hand drop stealthily along Juan's arm, down to the wrist. Juan paid no attention. The Belgian took his wrist between three fingers, distractedly, the same time drawing back a little and turning his back to me. But I leaned backward and saw him take a watch from his pocket and look at it for a moment, never letting go of the wrist. After a minute he let the hand fall inert and went and leaned his back against the wall, then, as if he suddenly remembered something very important which had to be jotted down on the spot, he took a notebook from his pocket and wrote a few lines. "Bastard," I thought angrily, "let him come and take my pulse. I'll shove my fist in his rotten face."

He didn't come but I felt him watching me. I raised my head and returned his look. Impersonally, he said to me "Doesn't it seem cold to you here?" He looked cold, he was blue.

I'm not cold," I told him.

He never took his hard eyes off me. Suddenly I understood and my hands went to my face: I was drenched in sweat. In this cellar, in the midst of winter, in the midst of drafts, I was sweating. I ran my hands through my hair, gummed together with perspiration: at the same time I saw my shirt was damp and sticking to my skin: I had been dripping for an hour and hadn't felt it. But that swine of a Belgian hadn't missed a thing; he had seen the drops rolling down my cheeks and thought: this is the manifestation of an almost pathological state of terror; and he had felt normal and proud of being alive because he was cold. I wanted to stand up and smash his face but no sooner had I made the slightest gesture than my rage and shame were wiped out; I fell back on the bench with indifference.

I satisfied myself by rubbing my neck with my handkerchief because now I felt the sweat dropping from my hair onto my neck and it was unpleasant. I soon gave up rubbing, it was useless; my handkerchief was already soaked and I was still sweating. My buttocks were sweating too and my damp trousers were glued to the bench.

Suddenly Juan spoke. "You're a doctor?"

"Yes," the Belgian said.

"Does it hurt... very long?"

"Huh? When... ? Oh, no" the Belgian said paternally "Not at all. It's over quickly." He acted as though he were calming a cash customer.

"But I... they told me... sometimes they have to fire twice."

"Sometimes," the Belgian said, nodding. "It may happen that the first volley reaches no vital organs."

"Then they have to reload their rifles and aim all over again?" He thought for a moment and then added hoarsely, "That takes time!"

He had a terrible fear of suffering, it was all he thought about: it was his age. I never thought much about it and it wasn't fear of suffering that made me sweat.

I got up and walked to the pile of coal dust. Tom jumped up and threw me a hateful look: I had annoyed him because my shoes squeaked. I wondered if my face looked as frightened as his: I saw he was sweating too. The sky was superb, no light filtered into the dark corner and I had only to raise my head to see the Big Dipper. But it wasn't like it had been: the night before I could see a great piece of sky from my monastery cell and each hour of the day brought me a different memory. Morning, when the sky was a hard, light blue, I thought of beaches on the Atlantic: at noon I saw the sun and I remembered a bar in Seville where I drank manzanilla and ate olives and anchovies: afternoons I was in the shade and I thought of the deep shadow which spreads over half a bull-ring leaving the other half shimmering in sunlight: it was really hard to see the whole world reflected in the sky like that. But now I could watch the sky as much as I pleased, it no longer evoked anything tn me. I liked that better. I came back and sat near Tom. A long moment passed.

Tom began speaking in a low voice. He had to talk, without that he wouldn't have been able no recognize himself in his own mind. I thought he was talking to me but he wasn't looking at me. He was undoubtedly afraid to see me as I was, grey and sweating: we were alike and worse than mirrors of each other. He watched the Belgian, the living.

"Do you understand?" he said. "I don't understand."

I began to speak in a low voice too. I watched the Belgian. "Why? What's the matter?"

"Something is going to happen to us than I can't understand."

There was a strange smell about Tom. It seemed to me I was more sensitive than usual to odors. I grinned. "You'll understand in a while."

"It isn't clear," he said obstinately. "I want to be brave but first I have to know. . . .Listen, they're going to take us into the courtyard. Good. They're going to stand up in front of us. How many?"

"l don't know. Five or eight. Not more."

"All right. There'll be eight. Someone'll holler 'aim!' and I'll see eight rifles looking at me. I'll think how I'd like to get inside the wall, I'll push against it with my back. . . . with every ounce of strength I have, but the wall will stay, like in a nightmare. I can imagine all that. If you only knew how well I can imagine it."

"All right, all right!" I said. "I can imagine it too."

"lt must hurt like hell. You know they aim at the eyes and the mouth to disfigure you," he added mechanically. "I can feel the wounds already. I've had pains in my head and in my neck for the past hour. Not real pains. Worse. This is what I'm going to feel tomorrow morning. And then what?"

I well understood what he meant but I didn't want to act as if I did. I had pains too, pains in my body like a crowd of tiny scars. I couldn't get used to it. But I was like him. I attached no importance to it. "After," I said. "you'll be pushing up daisies."

He began to talk to himself: he never stopped watching the Belgian. The Belgian didn't seem to be listening. I knew what he had come to do; he wasn't interested in what we thought; he came to watch our bodies, bodies dying in agony while yet alive.

"It's like a nightmare," Tom was saying. "You want to think something, you always have the impression that it's all right, that you're going to understand and then it slips, it escapes you and fades away. I tell myself there will be nothing afterwards. But I don't understand what it means. Sometimes I almost can.... and then it fades away and I start thinking about the pains again, bullets, explosions. I'm a materialist, I swear it to you; I'm not going crazy. But something's the matter. I see my corpse; that's not hard but I'm the one who sees it, with my eyes. I've got to think... think that I won't see anything anymore and the world will go on for the others. We aren't made to think that, Pablo. Believe me: I've already stayed up a whole night waiting for something. But this isn't the same: this will creep up behind us, Pablo, and we won't be able to prepare for it."

"Shut up," I said, "Do you want me to call a priest?"

He didn't answer. I had already noticed he had the tendency to act like a prophet and call me Pablo, speaking in a toneless voice. I didn't like that: but it seems all the Irish are that way. I had the vague impression he smelled of urine. Fundamentally, I hadn't much sympathy for Tom and I didn't see why, under the pretext of dying together, I should have any more. It would have been different with some others. With Ramon Gris, for example. But I felt alone between Tom and Juan. I liked that better, anyhow: with Ramon I might have been more deeply moved. But I was terribly hard just then and I wanted to stay hard.

He kept on chewing his words, with something like distraction. He certainly talked to keep himself from thinking. He smelled of urine like an old prostate case. Naturally, I agreed with him. I could have said everything he said: it isn't natural to die. And since I was going to die, nothing seemed natural to me, not this pile of coal dust, or the bench, or Pedro's ugly face. Only it didn't please me to think the same things as Tom. And I knew that, all through the night, every five minutes, we would keep on thinking things at the same time. I looked at him sideways and for the first time he seemed strange to me: he wore death on his face. My pride was wounded: for the past 24 hours I had lived next to Tom, I had listened to him. I had spoken to him and I knew we had nothing in common. And now we looked as much alike as twin brothers, simply because we were going to die together. Tom took my hand without looking at me.

"Pablo. I wonder... I wonder if it's really true that everything ends."

I took my hand away and said, "Look between your feet, you pig."

There was a big puddle between his feet and drops fell from his pants-leg.

"What is it," he asked, frightened.

"You're pissing in your pants," I told him.

"lt isn't true," he said furiously. "I'm not pissing. I

don't feel anything."

The Belgian approached us. He asked with false solicitude. "Do you feel ill?"

Tom did not answer. The Belgian looked at the puddle and said nothing.

"I don't know what it is," Tom said ferociously. "But I'm not afraid. I swear I'm not afraid."

The Belgian did not answer. Tom got up and went to piss in a corner. He came back buttoning his fly, and sat down without a word. The Belgian was taking notes.

All three of us watched him because he was alive. He had the motions of a living human being, the cares of a living human being; he shivered in the cellar the way the living are supposed to shiver; he had an obedient, well-fed body. The rest of us hardly felt ours--not in the same way anyhow. I wanted to feel my pants between my legs but I didn't dare; I watched the Belgian, balancing on his legs, master of his muscles, someone who could think about tomorrow. There we were, three bloodless shadows; we watched him and we sucked his life like vampires.

Finally he went over to little Juan. Did he want to feel his neck for some professional motive or was he obeying an impulse of charity? If he was acting by charity it was the only time during the whole night.

He caressed Juan's head and neck. The kid let himself be handled, his eyes never leaving him, then suddenly he seized the hand and looked at it strangely. He held the Belgian's hand between his own two hands and there was nothing pleasant about them, two grey pincers gripping this fat and reddish hand. I suspected what was going to happen and Tom must have suspected it too: but the Belgian didn't see a thing, he smiled paternally. After a moment the kid brought the fat red hand to his mouth and tried to bite it. The Belgian pulled away quickly and stumbled back against the wall. For a second he looked at us with horror, he must have suddenly understood that we were not men like him. I began to laugh and one of the guards jumped up. The other was asleep, his wide open eyes were blank.

I felt relaxed and over-excited at the same time. I didn't want to think any more about what would happen at dawn, at death. It made no sense. I only found words or emptiness. But as soon as I tried to think of anything else I saw rifle barrels pointing at me. Perhaps I lived through my execution twenty times; once I even thought it was for good: I must have slept a minute. They were dragging me to the wall and I was struggling; I was asking for mercy. I woke up with a start and looked at the Belgian: I was afraid I might have cried out in my sleep. But he was stroking his moustache, he hadn't noticed anything. If I had wanted to, I think I could have slept a while; I had been awake for 48 hours. I was at the end of my rope. But I didn't want to lose two hours of life; they would come to wake me up at dawn. I would follow them, stupefied with sleep and I would have croaked without so much as an "Oof!"; I didn't want that. I didn't want to die like an animal, I wanted to understand. Then I was afraid of having nightmares. I got up, walked back and forth, and, to change my ideas, I began to think about my past life. A crowd of memories came back to me pell-mell. There were good and bad ones--or at least I called them that before. There were faces and incidents. I saw the face of a little novillero who was gored tn Valencia during the Feria, the face of one of my uncles, the face of Ramon Gris. I remembered my whole life: how I was out of work for three months in 1926, how I almost starved to death. I remembered a night I spent on a bench in Granada: I hadn't eaten for three days. I was angry, I didn't want to die. That made me smile. How madly I ran after happiness, after women, after liberty. Why? I wanted to free Spain, I admired Pi y Margall, I joined the anarchist movement, I spoke in public meetings: I took everything as seriously as if I were immortal.

At that moment I felt that I had my whole life in front of me and I thought, "It's a damned lie." It was worth nothing because it was finished. I wondered how I'd been able to walk, to laugh with the girls: I wouldn't have moved so much as my little finger if I had only imagined I would die like this. My life was in front of me, shut, closed, like a bag and yet everything inside of it was unfinished. For an instant I tried to judge it. I wanted to tell myself, this is a beautiful life. But I couldn't pass judgment on it; it was only a sketch; I had spent my time counterfeiting eternity, I had understood nothing. I missed nothing: there were so many things I could have missed, the taste of manzanilla or the baths I took in summer in a little creek near Cadiz; but death had disenchanted everything.

The Belgian suddenly had a bright idea. "My friends," he told us, "I will undertake--if the military administration will allow it--to send a message for you, a souvenir to those who love you. . . ."

Tom mumbled, "I don't have anybody."

I said nothing. Tom waited an instant then looked at me with curiosity. "You don't have anything to say to Concha?"

"No."

I hated this tender complicity: it was my own fault, I had talked about Concha the night before. I should have controlled myself. I was with her for a year. Last night I would have given an arm to see her again for five minutes. That was why I talked about her, it was stronger than I was. Now I had no more desire to see her, I had nothing more to say to her. I would not even have wanted to hold her in my arms: my body filled me with horror because it was grey and sweating--and I wasn't sure that her body didn't fill me with horror. Concha would cry when she found out I was dead, she would have no taste for life for months afterward. But I was still the one who was going to die. I thought of her soft, beautiful eyes. When she looked at me something passed from her to me. But I knew it was over: if she looked at me now the look would stay in her eyes, it wouldn't reach me. I was alone.

Tom was alone too but not in the same way. Sitting cross-legged, he had begun to stare at the bench with a sort of smile, he looked amazed. He put out his hand and touched the wood cautiously as if he were afraid of breaking something, then drew back his hand quickly and shuddered. If I had been Tom I wouldn't have amused myself by touching the bench; this was some more Irish nonsense, but I too found that objects had a funny look: they were more obliterated, less dense than usual. It was enough for me to look at the bench, the lamp, the pile of coal dust, to feel that I was going to die. Naturally I couldn't think clearly about my death but I saw it everywhere, on things, in the way things fell back and kept their distance, discreetly, as people who speak quietly at the bedside of a dying man. It was his death which Tom had just touched on the bench.

In the state I was in, if someone had come and told me I could go home quietly, that they would leave me my life whole, it would have left me cold: several hours or several years of waiting is all the same when you have lost the illusion of being eternal. I clung to nothing, in a way I was calm. But it was a horrible calm--because of my body; my body, I saw with its eyes, I heard with its ears, but it was no longer me; it sweated and trembled by itself and I didn't recognize it any more. I had to touch it and look at it to find out what was happening, as if it were the body of someone else. At times I could still feel it, I felt sinkings, and fallings, as when you're in a plane taking a nose dive, or I felt my heart beating. But that didn't reassure me. Everything that came from my body was all cockeyed. Most of the time it was quiet and I felt no more than a sort of weight, a filthy presence against me; I had the impression of being tied to an enormous vermin. Once I felt my pants and I felt they were damp; I didn't know whether it was sweat or urine, but I went to piss on the coal pile as a precaution.

The Belgian took out his watch, looked at it. He said, "It is three-thirty."

Bastard! He must have done it on purpose. Tom jumped; we hadn't noticed time was running out; night surrounded us like a shapeless, somber mass. I couldn't even remember that it had begun.

Little Juan began to cry. He wrung his hands, pleaded, "I don't want to die. I don't want to die."

He ran across the whole cellar waving his arms in the air then fell sobbing on one of the mats. Tom watched him with mournful eyes, without the slightest desire to console him. Because it wasn't worth the trouble: the kid made more noise than we did, but he was less touched: he was like a sick man who defends himself against his illness by fever. It's much more serious when there isn't any fever.

He wept: I could clearly see he was pitying himself; he wasn't thinking about death. For one second, one single second, I wanted to weep myself, to weep with pity for myself. But the opposite happened: I glanced at the kid, I saw his thin sobbing shoulders and I felt inhuman: I could pity neither the others nor myself. I said to myself, "I want to die cleanly."

Tom had gotten up, he placed himself just under the round opening and began to watch for daylight. I was determined to die cleanly and I only thought of that. But ever since the doctor told us the time, I felt time flying, flowing away drop by drop.

It was still dark when I heard Tom's voice: "Do you hear them?"

Men were marching in the courtyard.

"Yes."

"What the hell are they doing? They can't shoot in the dark."

After a while we heard no more. I said to Tom, "It's day."

Pedro got up, yawning, and came to blow out the lamp. He said to his buddy, "Cold as hell."

The cellar was all grey. We heard shots in the distance.

"It's starting," I told Tom. "They must do it in the court in the rear."

Tom asked the doctor for a cigarette. I didn't want one; I didn't want cigarettes or alcohol. From that moment on they didn't stop firing.

"Do you realize what's happening," Tom said.

He wanted to add something but kept quiet, watching the door. The door opened and a lieutenant came in with four soldiers. Tom dropped his cigarette.

"Steinbock?"

Tom didn't answer. Pedro pointed him out.

"Juan Mirbal?"

"On the mat."

"Get up," the lieutenant said.

Juan did not move. Two soldiers took him under the arms and set him on his feet. But he fell as soon as they released him.

The soldiers hesitated.

"He's not the first sick one," said the lieutenant. "You two carry him: they'll fix it up down there."

He turned to Tom. "Let's go."

Tom went out between two soldiers. Two others followed, carrying the kid by the armpits. He hadn't fainted; his eyes were wide open and tears ran down his cheeks. When I wanted to go out the lieutenant stopped me.

"You Ibbieta?"

"Yes."

"You wait here: they'll come for you later."

They left. The Belgian and the two jailers left too, I was alone. I did not understand what was happening to me but I would have liked it better if they had gotten it over with right away. I heard shots at almost regular intervals; I shook with each one of them. I wanted to scream and tear out my hair. But I gritted my teeth and pushed my hands in my pockets because I wanted to stay clean.

After an hour they came to get me and led me to the first floor, to a small room that smelt of cigars and where the heat was stifling. There were two officers sitting smoking in the armchairs, papers on their knees.

"You're Ibbieta?"

"Yes."

"Where is Ramon Gris?"

"l don't know."

The one questioning me was short and fat. His eyes were hard behind his glasses. He said to me, "Come here."

I went to him. He got up and took my arms, staring at me with a look that should have pushed me into the earth. At the same time he pinched my biceps with all his might. It wasn't to hurt me, it was only a game: he wanted to dominate me. He also thought he had to blow his stinking breath square in my face. We stayed for a moment like that, and I almost felt like laughing. It takes a lot to intimidate a man who is going to die; it didn't work. He pushed me back violently and sat down again. He said, "It's his life against yours. You can have yours if you tell us where he is."

These men dolled up with their riding crops and boots were still going to die. A little later than I, but not too much. They busied themselves looking for names in their crumpled papers, they ran after other men to imprison or suppress them: they had opinions on the future of Spain and on other subjects. Their little activities seemed shocking and burlesqued to me; I couldn't put myself in their place. I thought they were insane. The little man was still looking at me, whipping his boots with the riding crop. All his gestures were calculated to give him the look of a live and ferocious beast.

"So? You understand?"

I don't know where Gris is," I answered. "I thought he was in Madrid."

The other officer raised his pale hand indolently. This indolence was also calculated. I saw through all their little schemes and I was stupefied to find there were men who amused themselves that way.

"You have a quarter of an hour to think it over," he said slowly. "Take him to the laundry, bring him back in fifteen minutes. If he still refuses he will he executed on the spot."

They knew what they were doing: I had passed the night in waiting; then they had made me wait an hour in the cellar while they shot Tom and Juan and now they were locking me up in the laundry; they must have prepared their game the night before. They told themselves that nerves eventually wear out and they hoped to get me that way.

They were badly mistaken. In the laundry I sat on a stool because I felt very weak and I began to think. But not about their proposition. Of course I knew where Gris was; he was hiding with his cousins, four kilometers from the city. I also knew that I would not reveal his hiding place unless they tortured me (but they didn't seem to be thinking about that). All that was perfectly regulated, definite and in no way interested me. Only I would have liked to understand the reasons for my conduct. I would rather die than give up Gris. Why? I didn't like Ramon Gris any more. My friendship for him had died a little while before dawn at the same time as my love for Concha, at the same time as my desire to live. Undoubtedly I thought highly of him: he was tough. But it was not for this reason that I consented to die in his place; his life had no more value than mine; no life had value. They were going to slap a man up against a wall and shoot at him till he died, whether it was I or Gris or somebody else made no difference. I knew he was more useful than I to the cause of Spain but I thought to hell with Spain and anarchy; nothing was important. Yet I was there, I could save my skin and give up Gris and I refused to do it. I found that somehow comic; it was obstinacy. I thought, "I must be stubborn!" And a droll sort of gaiety spread over me.

They came for me and brought me back to the two officers. A rat ran out from under my feet and that amused me. I turned to one of the falangistas and said, "Did you see the rat?"

He didn't answer. He was very sober, he took himself seriously. I wanted to laugh but I held myself back because I was afraid that once I got started I wouldn't be able to stop. The falangista had a moustache. I said to him again, "You ought to shave off your moustache, idiot." I thought it funny that he would let the hairs of his living being invade his face. He kicked me without great conviction and I kept quiet.

"Well," said the fat officer, "have you thought about it?"

I looked at them with curiosity, as insects of a very rare species. I told them, "I know where he is. He is hidden in the cemetery. In a vault or in the gravediggers' shack."

It was a farce. I wanted to see them stand up, buckle their belts and give orders busily.

They jumped to their feet. "Let's go. Molés, go get fifteen men from Lieutenant Lopez. You," the fat man said, "I'll let you off if you're telling the truth, but it'll cost you plenty if you're making monkeys out of us."

"They left in a great clatter and I waited peacefully under the guard of falangistas. From time to time I smiled, thinking about the spectacle they would make. I felt stunned and malicious. I imagined them lifting up tombstones, opening the doors of the vaults one by one. I represented this situation to myself as if I had been someone else: this prisoner obstinately playing the hero, these grim falangistas with their moustaches and their men in uniform running among the graves; it was irresistibly funny. After half an hour the little fat man came back alone. I thought he had come to give the orders to execute me. The others must have stayed in the cemetery.

The officer looked at me. He didn't look at all sheepish. "Take him into the big courtyard with the others," he said. "After the military operations a regular court will decide what happens to him."

"Then they're not... not going to shoot me?..."

"Not now, anyway. What happens afterwards is none of my business."

I still didn't understand. I asked, "But why...?"

He shrugged his shoulders without answering and the soldiers took me away. In the big courtyard there were about a hundred prisoners, women, children and a few old men. I began walking around the central grass plot, I was stupefied. At noon they let us eat in the mess hall. Two or three people questioned me. I must have known them, but I didn't answer: I didn't even know where I was.

Around evening they pushed about ten new prisoners into the court. I recognized Garcia, the baker. He said, "What damned luck you have! I didn't think I'd see you alive."

"They sentenced me to death," I said, "and then they changed their minds. I don't know why."

"They arrested me at two o'clock," Garcia said.

"Why?" Garcia had nothing to do with politics.

"I don't know," he said. "They arrest everybody who doesn't think the way they do." He lowered his voice. "They got Gris."

I began to tremble. "When?"

"This morning. He messed it up. He left his cousin's on Tuesday because they had an argument. There were plenty of people to hide him but he didn't want to owe anything to anybody. He said, ' I'd go and hide in Ibbieta's place, but they got him, so I'll go hide in the cemetery.'"

"In the cemetery?"

"Yes. What a fool. Of course they went by there this morning, that was sure to happen. They found him in the gravediggers' shack. He shot at them and they got him."

"In the cemetery!"

Everything began to spin and I found myself sitting on the ground: I laughed so hard I cried...

Notes From a Young Existentialist: Part II

2004-11-12T16:25:00.000-06:00

Existence proceeds essence: This is the holy dogma of existentialism. It is Descartes’ sophism backwards: I am, therefore I will think myself to have been. As Sartre tells us, “man first of all exists, encounters himself, surges up in the world – and defines himself afterwards.” Thus, we are nothing more than what we choose to make of ourselves. The ramifications of this are much greater than first meet the eye.

Sartre declares: “Man is nothing else but what he purposes, he exists only in so far as he realizes himself, he is therefore nothing else but the sum of his actions, nothing else but what his life is.” Many people might find such a thought to be horrifying. For it takes away our one excuse: “I am a product of my circumstances.” We begin to lose comfort in deceptive dreams that never were, “I could have written a great symphony, but I had too many other responsibilities.” It helps us remember that we do not define Beethoven by his unwritten symphonies; Beethoven is the sum of what he created, not what he wished to create. Excuses create nothing more than abortive hopes and expectations unfulfilled.

If despair is defined as an acknowledgement of our responsibility alone to create our destiny, than calls us lovers of despair. What emerges from these brief discussions is a picture of a powerful philosophy. Existentialism does not encourage reflective quietism, for it demands that we define ourselves by our actions. It is not enough for the existentialist merely to have “good intentions”, or to “wish for things that are good”. In the next and final part, I will explore the spiritual and moral aspects of the existential philosophy.

Notes From a Young Existentialist: Part I

2004-11-11T17:09:00.000-06:00

I am not an atheist. For the most part, I tend to agree with George Orwell, that the majority of Atheists do not so much disbelieve in God as personally dislike Him. For me, God is nature and the universe. God is a blackhole, god is a virus, god is a sharp rock that severs a spinal chord; God is uncertainty, death, and suffering; and only the living are in a position to be so foolish as to believe otherwise.

I'm often accused of being an atheist because I don't see God as a wise old man with a white beard. I do not speak of God as having human emotions or motivations. God does not need anger; God does not need praise; and God certainly does not need armies of hairless monkeys defending worthless strips of sand in his name.

I severed my relationship with the Christian God at the age of 14. I simply could not worship what appeared to be a bi-polar deity who suffered from low self-esteem. Their jealous and vengeful god, who demands praise for everything , but rationalizes his inaction by claiming to work in "mysterious ways" sounds more like an alcoholic than the creator of all. Indeed, I suppose congregations could be seen as his co-dependent enablers, "God you are pure love, have mercy on us and forgive us, oh great one, I will give my life for you..."

I think the majority of faiths serve the purpose of comforting us with the uncertainty of Death. Indeed, the emergence of Religion is tightly intertwined with ceremonial burial and the first divisions of labor. However, nothing has changed since the ice age; we are still thrown into this world without a clue as to why we are given this brief moment of consciousness which we call "our lives". It's not a surprise that our methods of dealing with that mystery have evolved so little. In the spirit of Voltaire, I think if we did not have a Heaven and Hell it would be necessary to invent then. This is why I believe in no afterlife. For me, it was these affrimations which marked the beginning of my existence.

People often misunderstand Existentialism as a philosophy of despair; an out of date label that was fashionable among the Intelligentsia of post-war Europe. I violently disagree with that judgment: Existentialism is a philosophy of life, and has a great deal to offer people who are living in our times.

Existentialism tells us to live life passionately; it tells us that we are not the labels that others have chosen for us, "ADD", "Stupid", or "alcoholics". The message is that your life is yours to create. You are responsible for you who are. When Sartre says "Man is condemned to be free.", he is not speaking of a tragedy, but rather our individual and collective challenge as human beings. Our world is ours to create; and we must take responsibility for the consequences of our actions. I shall expand on this theme in part two.

SUCH, SUCH WERE THE JOYS (1947)

2004-11-11T04:43:00.000-06:00

BY GEORGE ORWELL
Soon after I arrived at Crossgates (not immediately, but after a week or two, just when I seemed to be settling into routine of school life) I began wetting my bed. I was now aged eight, so that this was a reversion to a habit which I must have grown out of at least four years earlier.

Nowadays, I believe, bed-wetting in such circumstances is taken for granted. It is a normal reaction in children who have been removed from their homes to a strange place. In those days, however, it was looked on as a disgusting crime which the child committed on purpose and for which the proper cure was a beating. For my part I did not need to be told it was a crime. Night after night I prayed, with a fervor never previously attained in my prayers, ‘Please God, do not let me wet my bed! Oh, please God, do not let me wet my bed!’ but it made remarkably little difference. Some nights the thing happened, others not. There was no volition about it, no consciousness. You did not properly speaking do the deed: you were merely woke up in the morning and found that the sheets were wringing wet.

After the second or third offense I was warned that I should be beaten next time, but I received the warning in a curiously roundabout way. One afternoon, as we were filing out from tea, Mrs. Simpson, the headmaster’s wife, was sitting at the head of one of the tables, chatting with a lady of whom I know nothing, except that she was on an afternoon’s visit to the school. She was an intimidating, masculine-looking person wearing a riding habit, or something that I took to be a riding habit. I was just leaving the room when Mrs. Simpson called me back, as though to introduce me to the visitor.

Mrs. Simpson was nicknamed Bingo, and I shall call her by that name for I seldom think of her by any other. (Officially, however, she was addressed as Mum, probably a corruption of the ‘Ma’am’ used by public school boys to their housemasters’ wives.) She was a stocky square-built woman with hard red cheeks, a flat top to her head, prominent brows and deepset, suspicious eyes. Although a great deal of the time she was full of false heartiness, jollying one along with mannish slang (‘Buck up, old chap!’ and so forth), and even using one’s Christian name, her eyes never lost their anxious, accusing look. It was very difficult to look her in the face without feeling guilty, even at moments when one was not guilty of anything in particular.

‘Here is a little boy,’ said Bingo, indicating me to the strange lady, ‘who wets his bed every night. Do you know what I am going to do if you wet your bed again?’ she added, turning to me. ‘I am going to get the Sixth Form to beat you.’

The strange lady put on an air of being inexpressibly shocked, and exclaimed ‘I-should-think-so!’ And here occurred one of those wild, almost lunatic misunderstandings which are part of the daily experience of childhood. The Sixth Form was a group of older boys who were selected as having ‘character’ and were empowered to beat smaller boys. I had not yet learned of their existence, and I mis-heard the phrase ‘the Sixth Form’ as ‘Mrs. Form.’ I took it as referring to the strange lady—I thought, that is, that her name was Mrs. Form. It was an improbable name, but a child has no judgment in such matters. I imagined, therefore, that it was she who was to be deputed to beat me. It did not strike me as strange that this job should be turned over to a casual visitor in no way connected with the school. I merely assumed that ‘Mrs. Form’ was a stern disciplinarian who enjoyed beating people (somehow her appearance seemed to bear this out) and I had an immediate terrifying vision of her arriving for the occasion in full riding kit and armed with a hunting whip. To this day I can feel myself almost swooning with shame as I stood, a very small, round-faced boy in short corduroy knickers, before the two women. I could not speak. I felt that I should die if ‘Mrs. Form’ were to beat me. But my dominant feeling was not fear or even resentment: it was simply shame because one more person, and that a woman, had been told of my disgusting offense.
A little later, I forget how, I learned that it was not after all ‘Mrs. Form’ who would do the beating. I cannot remember whether it was that very night that I wetted my bed again, but at any rate I did wet it again quite soon. Oh, the despair, the feeling of cruel injustice, after all my prayers and resolutions, at once again waking between the clammy sheets! There was no chance of hiding what I had done. The grim statuesque matron, Daphne by name, arrived in the dormitory specially to inspect my bed. She pulled back the clothes, then drew herself up, and the dreaded words seemed to come rolling out of her like a peal of thunder:

‘REPORT YOURSELF to the headmaster after breakfast!’

I do not know how many times I heard that phrase during my early years at Crossgates. It was only very rarely that it did not mean a beating. The words always had a portentous sound in my ears, like muffled drums or the words of the death sentence.

When I arrived to report myself, Bingo was doing something or other at the long shiny table in the ante-room to the study. Her uneasy eyes searched me as I went past. In the study Mr. Simpson, nicknamed Sim, was waiting. Sim was a round-shouldered curiously oafish-looking man, not large but shambling in gait, with a chubby face which was like that of an overgrown baby, and which was capable of good humor. He knew, of course, why I had been sent to him, and had already taken a bone-handled riding crop out of the cupboard, but it was part of the punishment of reporting yourself that you had to proclaim your offense with your own lips. When I had said my say, he read me a short but pompous lecture, then seized me by the scruff of the neck, twisted me over and began beating me with the riding crop. He had a habit of continuing his lecture while he flogged you, and I remember the words ‘you dirty little boy’ keeping time with the blows. The beating did not hurt (perhaps as it was the first time, he was not hitting me very hard), and I walked out feeling very much better. The fact that the beating had not hurt was a sort of victory and partially wiped out the shame of the bed-wetting. I was even incautious enough to wear a grin on my face. Some small boys were hanging about in the passage outside the door of the ante-room.

‘D’you get the cane?’

‘It didn’t hurt,’ I said proudly.

Bingo had heard everything. Instantly her voice came screaming after me:

‘Come here! Come here this instant! What was that you said?’

‘I said it didn’t hurt,’ I faltered out.

‘How dare you say a thing like that? Do you think that is a proper thing to say? Go in and REPORT YOURSELF AGAIN!’

This time Sim laid on in real earnest. He continued for a length of time that frightened and astonished me—about five minutes, it seemed— ending up by breaking the riding crop. The bone handle went flying across the room.

‘Look what you’ve made me do!’ he said furiously, holding up the broken crop.

I had fallen into a chair, weakly sniveling. I remember that this was the only time throughout my boyhood when a beating actually reduced me to tears, and curiously enough I was not even now crying because of the pain. The second beating had not hurt very much either. Fright and shame seemed to have anesthetized me. I was crying partly because I felt that this was expected of me, partly from genuine repentance, but partly also because of a deeper grief which is peculiar to childhood and not easy to convey: a sense of desolate loneliness and helplessness, of being locked up not only in a hostile world but in a world of good and evil where the rules were such that it was actually not possible for me to keep them.

I knew that bed-wetting was (a) wicked and (b) outside my control. The second fact I was personally aware of, and the first I did not question. It was possible, therefore, to commit a sin without knowing that you committed it, without wanting to commit it, and without being able to avoid it. Sin was not necessarily something that you did: it might be something that happened to you. I do not want to claim that this idea flashed into my mind as a complete novelty at this very moment, under the blows of Sim’s cane: I must have had glimpses of it even before I left home, for my early childhood had not been altogether happy. But at any rate this was the great, abiding lesson of my boyhood: that I was in a world where it was not possible for me to be good. And the double beating was a turning-point, for it brought home to me for the first time the harshness of the environment into which I had been flung. Life was more terrible, and I was more wicked, than I had imagined. At any rate, as I sat on the edge of a chair in Sim’s study, with not even the self-possession to stand up while he stormed at me, I had a conviction of sin and folly and weakness, such as I do not remember to have felt before.

In general, one’s memories of any period must necessarily weaken as one moves away from it. One is constantly learning new facts, and old ones have to drop out to make way for them. At twenty I could have written the history of my schooldays with an accuracy which would be quite impossible now. But it can also happen that one’s memories grow sharper after a long lapse of time, because one is looking at the past with fresh eyes and can isolate and, as it were, notice facts which previously existed undifferentiated among a mass of others. Here are two things which in a sense I remembered, but which did not strike me as strange or interesting until quite recently. One is that the second beating seemed to me a just and reasonable punishment. To get one beating, and then to get another and far fiercer one on top of it, for being so unwise as to show that the first had not hurt—that was quite natural. The gods are jealous, and when you have good fortune you should conceal it. The other is that I accepted the broken riding crop as my own crime. I can still recall my feeling as I saw the handle lying on the carpet—the feeling of having done an ill-bred clumsy thing, and ruined an expensive object. I had broken it: so Sim told me, and so I believed. This acceptance of guilt lay unnoticed in my memory for twenty or thirty years.

So much for the episode of the bed-wetting. But there is one more thing to be remarked. That is that I did not wet my bed again—at least, I did wet it once again, and received another beating, after which the trouble stopped. So perhaps this barbarous remedy does work, though at a heavy price, I have no doubt.

All this was thirty years ago and more. The question is: Does a child at school go through the same kind of experiences nowadays?

The only honest answer, I believe, is that we do not with certainty know. Of course it is obvious that the present-day attitude towards education is enormously more humane and sensible than that of the past. The snobbishness that was an integral part of my own education would be almost unthinkable today, because the society that nourished it is dead. I recall a conversation that must have taken place about a year before I left Crossgates. A Russian boy, large and fair-haired, a year older than myself, was questioning me.

‘How much a-year has your father got?’

I told him what I thought it was, adding a few hundreds to make it sound better. The Russian boy, neat in his habits, produced a pencil and a small notebook and made a calculation.

‘My father has over two hundred times as much money as yours,’ he announced with a sort of amused contempt.

That was in 1915. What happened to that money a couple of years later, I wonder? And still more I wonder, do conversations of that kind happen at preparatory schools now?

Clearly there has been a vast change of outlook, a general growth of ‘enlightenment,’ even among ordinary, unthinking middle-class people. Religious belief, for instance, has largely vanished, dragging other kinds of nonsense after it. I imagine that very few people nowadays would tell a child that if it masturbates it will end in the lunatic asylum. Beating, too, has become discredited, and has even been abandoned at many schools. Nor is the underfeeding of children looked on as a normal, almost meritorious act. No one now would openly set out to give his pupils as little food as they could do with, or tell them that it is healthy to get up from a meal as hungry as you sat down. The whole status of children has improved, partly because they have grown relatively less numerous. And the diffusion of even a little psychological knowledge has made it harder for parents and schoolteachers to indulge their aberrations in the name of discipline. Here is a case, not known to me personally, but known to someone I can vouch for, and happening within my own lifetime. A small girl, daughter of a clergyman, continued wetting her bed at an age when she should have grown out of it. In order to punish her for this dreadful deed, her father took her to a large garden party and there introduced her to the whole company as a little girl who wetted her bed: and to underline her wickedness he had previously painted her face black. I do not suggest that Bingo and Sim would actually have done a thing like this, but I doubt whether it would have much surprised them. After all, things do change. And yet—!

The question is not whether boys are still buckled into Eton collars on Sunday, or told that babies are dug up under gooseberry bushes. That kind of thing is at an end, admittedly. The real question is whether it is still normal for a school child to live for years amid irrational terrors and lunatic misunderstandings. And here one is up against the very great difficulty of knowing what a child really feels and thinks. A child which appears reasonably happy may actually be suffering horrors which it cannot or will not reveal. It lives in a sort of alien under-water world which we can only penetrate by memory or divination. Our chief clue is the fact that we were once children ourselves, and many people appear to forget the atmosphere of their own childhood almost entirely. Think for instance of the unnecessary torments that people will inflict by sending a child back to school with clothes of the wrong pattern, and refusing to see that this matters! Over things of this kind a child will sometimes utter a protest, but a great deal of the time its attitude is one of simple concealment. Not to expose your true feelings to an adult seems to be instinctive from the age of seven or eight onwards. Even the affection that one feels for a child, the desire to protect and cherish it, is a cause of misunderstanding. One can love a child, perhaps, more deeply than one can love another adult, but is rash to assume that the child feels any love in return. Looking back on my own childhood, after the infant years were over, I do not believe that I ever felt love for any mature person, except my mother, and even her I did not trust, in the sense that shyness made me conceal most of my real feelings from her. Love, the spontaneous, unqualified emotion of love, was something I could only feel for people who were young. Towards people who were old—and remember that ‘old’ to a child means over thirty, or even over twenty-five—I could feel reverence, respect, admiration or compunction, but I seemed cut off from them by a veil of fear and shyness mixed up with physical distaste. People are too ready to forget the child’s physical shrinking from the adult. The enormous size of grownups, their ungainly, rigid bodies, their coarse wrinkled skins, their great relaxed eyelids, their yellow teeth, and the whiffs of musty clothes and beer and sweat and tobacco that disengage from them at every movement! Part of the reason for the ugliness of adults, in a child’s eyes, is that the child is usually looking upwards, and few faces are at their best when seen from below. Besides, being fresh and unmarked itself, the child has impossibly high standards in the matter of skin and teeth and complexion. But the greatest barrier of all is the child’s misconception about age. A child can hardly envisage life beyond thirty, and in judging people’s ages it will make fantastic mistakes. It will think that a person of twenty-five is forty, that a person of forty is sixty-five, and so on. Thus, when I fell in love with Elsie I took her to be grown up. I met her again, when I was thirteen and she, I think, must have been twenty-three; she now seemed to me a middle-aged woman, somewhat past her best. And the child thinks of growing old as an almost obscene calamity, which for some mysterious reason will never happen to itself. All who have passed the age of thirty are joyless grotesques, endlessly fussing about things of no importance and staying alive without, so far as the child can see, having anything to live for. Only child life is real life. The schoolmaster who imagines he is loved and trusted by his boys is in fact mimicked and laughed at behind his back. An adult who does not seem dangerous nearly always seems ridiculous.

I base these generalizations on what I can recall of my own childhood outlook. Treacherous though memory is, it seems to me the chief means we have of discovering how a child’s mind works. Only by resurrecting our own memories can we realize how incredibly distorted is the child’s vision of the world. Consider this, for example. How would Crossgates appear to me now, if I could go back, at my present age, and see it as it was in 1915? What should I think of Bingo and Sim, those terrible, all-powerful monsters? I should see them as a couple of silly, shallow, ineffectual people, eagerly clambering up a social ladder which any thinking person could see to be on the point of collapse. I would be no more frightened of them than I would be frightened of a dormouse. Moreover, in those days they seemed to me fantastically old, whereas— though of this I am not certain—I imagine they must have been somewhat younger than I am now. And how would Johnny Hall appear, with his blacksmith’s arms and his red, jeering face? Merely a scruffy little boy, barely distinguishable from hundreds of other scruffy little boys. The two sets of facts can lie side by side in my mind, because these happen to be my own memories. But it would be very difficult for me to see with the eyes of any other child, except by an effort of the imagination which might lead me completely astray. The child and the adult live in different worlds. If that is so, we cannot be certain that school, at any rate boarding school, is not still for many children as dreadful an experience as it used to be. Take away God, Latin, the cane, class distinctions and sexual taboos, and the fear, the hatred, the snobbery and the misunderstanding might still all be there. It will have been seen that my own main trouble was an utter lack of any sense of proportion or probability. This led me to accept outrages and believe absurdities, and to suffer torments over things which were in fact of no importance. It is not enough to say that I was ‘silly’ and ‘ought to have known better.’ Look back into your own childhood and think of the nonsense you used to believe and the trivialities which could make you suffer. Of course my own case had its individual variations, but essentially it was that of countless other boys. The weakness of the child is that it starts with a blank sheet. It neither understands nor questions the society in which it lives, and because of its credulity other people can work upon it, infecting it with the sense of inferiority and the dread of offending against mysterious, terrible laws. It may be that everything that happened to me at Crossgates could happen in the most ‘enlightened’ school, though perhaps in subtler forms. Of one thing, however, I do feel fairly sure, and that is that boarding schools are worse than day schools. A child has a better chance with the sanctuary of its home near at hand. And I think the characteristic faults of the English upper and middle classes may be partly due to the practice, general until recently, of sending children away from home as young as nine, eight or even seven.

I have never been back to Crossgates. In a way it is only within the last decade that I have really thought over my schooldays, vividly though their memory has haunted me. Nowadays, I believe, it would make very little impression on me to see the place again, if it still exists. And if I went inside and smelled again the inky, dusty smell of the big schoolroom, the rosiny smell of the chapel, the stagnant smell of the swimming bath and the cold reek of the lavatories, I think I should only feel what one invariably feels in revisiting any scene of childhood: How small everything has grown, and how terrible is the deterioration in myself!

Quanti Angelorum tripudiare possunt

2004-11-10T03:53:00.000-06:00

Keats asked his publisher to add a dedication to one of his poetical works Angelorum Hominorum, he wanted something sweet, of angels and of men, everyone laughed at him, I remember being quite angry when the evangelical preacher weeps to his wife, in the film inherit the wing, they were laughing at me mama, mainly because my cousin the intellectual was mocking him too. Apparently when we laugh mirror neurons fire up giving us our buzz, if you throw a baby in the air (assuming you catch it) after the initial surprise/fear, the relief it feels breaks out into laughter which as Sir James tells us creates all the faeries in the world. What the baby may be saying is I thought that you were dangerous but my laughter is my declaration to the world that you are no danger to me at all. My point, I am just talking

The criticism of asking how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, or the fine point of a needle, is not funny because that's what scholastics debated, and Aquinas and Averroes were the finest of that tradition. In fact I am pretty sure that Aquinas never debated that particular question, he mentioned one about whether an angel has to pass through intermediate points on a journey which debates Zeno's paradoxes infinity contained within discrete points. He debated whether angels had better knowledge at dawn or at dusk, which refers in part to three types of time, diurnal or non-mystical time, eternity where God is, and aeviternal time, where angels are, that for anyone still reading is like the difference between batch, real-time processing, and whatever those turn based adventure games use, but it's more complicated than that. Aquinas did discuss whether more than one angel could occupy the same space, and you are blessed in that I am probably the world's leading expert on Aristotle's definition of place especially in the rebuttal of criticism by neo-platonic writers.

So anyway I started looking to find out well how many people actually attend Church services in Amurka. Whenever there is a march here we get two figures quoted, one from the police and one from the protestors, and i don't think we can dismiss police officers as illiterate and innumerate. Ask an accountant what's 15% of my profit and he responds what do you want it to be. Parishes where I have lived knew how much money came in weekly, they also had a general figure of how many baptised were in the area and technically ours. Some weeks they'd try pick out the visitors who threw the large bung in, but no one tried to count how many parishioners attended. One local superior told me we don't have any parishioners (in response to my suggestion we handed some power over to the laics). Some churches lower the reported numbers of attenders like mutatis mutandis the European CommonAgriculturalPolicy if you have too many you have to send money to support dem what has too few.

So I looked around and it seems on the whole it's not really about magick numbers. There was a time I would have been universally condemned for suggesting that the original estimate for 3.5 million to 6 million deaths of Jews in the death camps of WWII was possibly too high. Why anyone would suggest that if it were for example (only) 3 million Jews killed that somehow that is half as bad a tragedy, well i dunno i am surrounded by morons (or is that mora) I realise I am the only sane person left on this planet, your madness does not affect visitors from K-PAX but if that is true I am the one who requires medication as i am occasionally reminded by people lost in their decency and goodness. Fuck the good when I slay God I'll do them for free.

Interesting thing about money, coz you'd think counting of money would be more consistent (unless you are an accountant or work with money i guess) 17% of americans claim that they tithe their income to their church. Whereas the Churches claim at best 3% of americans do so. In Ireland that is one thing they did record and proclaim at the end of masses. So anyway it looks like closer to 20% of yanks attend services and about 0.1% of americans might pass for christian at a generous estimate, which is on par with any nation in a similar state of development. What was my point. I am just talking.

I got fed up of searching when I came across HE Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger head of the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. He isn't Tomaso de Torquemada. He was one of the most liberal progressive theologians of the second vatican council. Out with whom it would be fun to go people whose ideas i despise can be fun amiable loving. I read the actual words of his letter advising summary excommunication for Kerry and his supporters. There was a time unbelievable. They must be lying. It is not possible for him to have written this. Canon Lawyer are strange inhuman monsters but even they have to talk sense. There is no authority under Canon Law for summary excommunication without trial, you still need to undergo inquisition, and although that can be done in absentia, they still have to meet with you just to let you know, you get the letter your presence is required. Then i realised he probably had written it. And that's when i realised I didn't have anything left to say.

I studied stats while at school it was the year they allowed pocket calculators into exams and you could get some to show working for basic stats. You pushed the numbers and it provided standard deviation, mean, the working out. I don't object to the use of calculators. There is no need to learn the skills of mental or handwritten calculations. But somehow I never picked up what a standard deviation actually means. My knowledge now is still fairly basic. Part of how we work out what large numbers of people do based on measuring smaller groups, given as unbiased a sample as possible, large enough (and for Chi Squares this must be at least 10 in each square, i think that has something to do with the .05 ratio for significance but i can't recall). The spread can be found comparing the standard deviation with the mean average. A bit like whether troops stand in square or line when they face cannon, it's really quite simple to work out if you can see the picture.

What's my point. There is no point. The joke is not that Scholastics debate things we no longer do. The joke is more that people live in an age of faith and authority far more compelling than that of Aquinas Averroes and the Scholastics. If this computer breaks down the one who repairs it doesn't have a clue about how it works. He'll take out the broken bit and replace it. It seemed to me perhaps there was some connection with 21% of americans naming morality as important and the same figure of regular church attenders in revised figures using more scientific methodology.

I find myself living among cannibals who worship fire demons. Everyone has fucked off and gone back to K-PAX. Why doesn't anyone ever tell me. Always the last to know. Every (and don't fucking start with that fucking sophistry you can never say every never always it's my fucking language and you miss the point and for what the fuck are you still reading) american thinks there is an issue between Creationism and the theory of Evolution. From an outsider, from Europe it seems clear neither group has any interest in scientific method. The very debate is a sign of your badge as a magicko-religious people. Did anyone like my suggestion for tripudiare, i preferred it to saltare could anyone imagine praesultare now that would have been funny.

If Sadie ever gets that far it's time americans learnt what dramatic irony means or perhaps meant to the ancient world. I don't know why Alanis Morissette irritates me, coz she is far more impwessive as God than Charlton Heston, maybe that's why. I have never thought myself that clever, and these things are relative, but i am more and more aware how ignorant and stupid my brothers and sisters are, but then again you seem far happier, and I have other faults that bring me embarrassment.

The Comedy of Politik: Part One

2004-11-09T07:18:00.000-06:00

Where did humour originate? By humour, I mean comedic humour, not the ancient Greek theories of humour in physiology, psychology and medicine. Nope. Instead, this is a reference to laughter, joviality, and yes....mirth. Did some caveman clumbsily stumble into a puddle of mud, only to turn around and find his fellow cromagnonites giggling mightily? As far as polical humour is concerned, one wonders exaclty what is so amusing about George W. and Condoleezza acting out a scene from Titanic.

Comedy at its most common contemporary use of the term, is a a drama of light and amusing character and typically with a happy ending. At Mirthful Ones, the defintion we prefer is the lesser-mentioned one, the genre of dramatic literature dealing with the comic or with the serious in a light or satirical manner.

Of late, immediately preceding the election and continuing until the forseeable future, my own mood has been even more comically oriented than usual. Of course, it's often satirizing that which others would find slightly risque or even bordering on the offensive end of the spectrum. Obviously, this is In the fine tradition of George Carlin sort of offense....highly satirical and pushing the boundaries of free speech. This probably why three of my feature writers hail from England, as their humour fits right in with the motif of mirth. The remaining writer is Nick Lewis, and I need not explain his oddities....

As far as I can muster up the intelligence to ascertain, the first well-formed study of comedic theory started in the hands of Socrates and continued through Aristotle. “Comedy” designates certain traits of man's relationship with his fellows. More or less as fate is to the tragic hero, so society is to the comic hero. The idea of the comedic hero, then, refers to some aspect of man's conflict with his group (political, familial, professional, and so on) and its conventions, mores, ideals. But the same man is also part of that society; hence, in struggling with it he is apt to trip himself. Comedy, thus, is merely an ironic struggle with society.

So many ways to explore this and relate it all back to politics, law, and their overlapping philosophical themes. At present moment, this is relevant to political satire and parody...both of which are used for different reasons, both legal and comedic. This will be a continuing series that will be forthcoming over the forseeable future. As your not-so-humble servant, I shall perform an investigative running of the gauntlet to cover Aristophanes, Shakespeare, Kafka, Faust, Nietsche, Freud, Camus, Edith Wharton (which should be mighty interesting, for reasons that Eric Fink of Red Harvest has already picked up on). OH I'm excited...and then it shall all culminate with an analysis of the contemporary political satire & parody, along with an ideally proper analysis of the associated laws in the United States. Perhaps some pop culture in the mix, as appropriate.

For now though, I conclude this little ramble at a very wee hour and shall comedically stumble off in search of slumber.
Crossposted at The Boileryard

Idiots

2004-11-08T09:24:00.000-06:00

To the anarchist thugs (or, possibly, the ultra-right provocateur infiltrators) who resorted to rioting over the weekend . . . STOP! GROW UP! GO AWAY!

. . . . . . . . . . . . .
Be at peace

eureka

2004-11-07T15:03:00.000-06:00

I know I am meant to phrase it, hullo that looks odd, but I have noticed attempts by several posters to suggest that we have outgrown a primal level of thinking and have moved forward from the magicko-religious age to an age of enlightenment and reasoned thinking. This ignores a trend in modern behaviourist studies and is belied by many of the comments left by reasonably intelligent people and by the american electorate.
There are two quite interesting posts from et alia trying to use scientific method to rebut the certainty that the election was lost due to democrats identifying with gay mariage, abortion rights, and stem cell research. Indeed that is how I had read it. But why? Because enough people had said so and they had backed it up with an exit poll reading the highest figure 21% gave as their primary concern issues of morality. So et alia examines the argument more rigorously, isolating the variable, if it were true then certain things would follow. He pretty much demolishes the certainty that morality played any identifiable part in voting compared with 2000. Not surprisingly apart from the track back few understood the argument. Few accepted a difference between anecdotal evidence and quantitative analysis. No one suggested a form of qualitative analysis to objectify what they felt in their heart to be true. L'ame a ses raisons que la raison ne connait point. But there are tests for that too. I later read an article by David Aaraonovitch in the Manchester Guardian i think one of the british broadsheets and he too analyses the data we have none of which suggests that the election was highjacked by the issue of victorian morality. Yet people still believe it to be so. He was countering the view that Bush and his supporters are stupid. His analysis was that they were employed and doing very well. I dislike Blair. And he may well have alienated Scotland. But as long as middle england is happy and these aren't stupid people they are just very well off, he will be re-elected with a large majority in parliament.

Mick Arran here suggests also that americans have advanced beyond the need for superstition magick after all the age of reason has come we are all enlightened rational beings. There has been an awful lot of research to suggest that the part of our brains that can do crosswords is completely useless in terms of survival outside of buildings. The part that senses danger or reacts to a car pulling out suddenly is a part of our brain that liberals are ashamed to still possess. There is some fascinating research on what constitutes consciousness, how the brain works. But resisting the desire to ramble many experiments tend to suggest both that we are far more bigoted than we would like to believe but we have elaborate self-censoring that goes on usually before we act. Also most counter-intuitive scientific knowledge isn't really believed by people. Examples are we might say I know that x isn't true but I don't believe most people think that way. In most ways human beings do not believe the truth that science provides us, we believe in superstitions we live in the magicko-religious world.

An interesting read is The Curious incident of the dog in the night-time by Mark Haddon. It's taken from a Sherlock Holmes story which provides incidentally most of the expert evidence for Al-Qaeda, the argument of absence. The whole book provides examples of commonly held beliefs which the aspergers/autistic protagonist takes to extremes but qualitatively we live in the same autistic world, a magicko-religious world. Few understood the statistical argument shown by et alia. Even those who understand scientific method chose to believe the evidence of anecdotes. What struck me was that what we take to be worthy evidence is closer to primal civilisations. It is not so much a concern that the religious right may have power but that liberals who claim to follow a rational humanist enlightened approach are far more superstitious and irrational in their mindset than their antithetical enemy. Since we clearly live in an autistic world, and human contact is between bishops on opposing squares and of opposing colours, then the only form of contact is conducted in the encounter with the void, the abyss. That is my eureka, friendship, love, family, festivities may all be beautiful divertissements but it is only through authentic encounter with despair, the desert experience, epic sorrow, that true connection flowers. America, Europe, western civilisation was only meant as a beautiful overture for Yeat's prophecy, the world be utterly transformed and a tragic beauty born. Shalom Shalom.

Compare this to a standard view of america which is more accurate and what does that mean.other types of maps

Of Zombies, Bloggers, and The Will To Power As Disappearance [Part 2: Zombie Pedagogy]

2004-11-06T01:17:00.000-06:00

Man is a social animal, and it's only natural that when his need for communal experience, his need for actualization, his need to feel a part of his larger world — when these natural needs are dashed and rendered impossible due to the Golem's demand that communities cannot be permitted to exist — communities based upon a notion and habit of plenty, of shared resources, of giving — then that sense of lost community must and will find a way to resurface. And as fear is used as a wedge to drive a society apart to make it easier for the Golems (via their enforcers and "bewilderers") to control us, then the desire to form community becomes perverted as our evolutionary psychological demand for group identity kicks in and creates an artificial community that unites its members in increasingly angry in-group mentalities that defines itself by determining what does not belong in it. This alienation is what leads to fascism.

Part 2 Now Ready...

Taking care of us

2004-11-05T08:33:00.000-06:00

Fear. Fury. Abandonment. Grief. Depression. Confusion and disorientation. Isolation. Substance abuse. Depersonalization and objectification. Fight or flight agitation. Hopelessness. Suicidal ideation. Irrational thinking. Mood swings. Inconsolability. Escapism.

All of these are possible painful, sometimes deadly, reactions to trauma. For many of us, the last four years has been classically, continuously traumatic, culminating in major loss on Tuesday. Looks like it's gonna continue. In order to be effective, we need to be healthy and strong.

In a former career, I was fortunate to work as a clinical social worker, program developer, and manager of mental health programs. At other times in my life, I've been on the other side of the desk or in secure hospital units, unable to cope with the ubiquitous cognitive dissonance that is at the nucleus of existence in the United States of America. I am intimately familiar with all of the phenomena listed above.

I am doing remarkably well these past few days, mostly because absolutely nothing The Doubleduh-Cheney Gang does either surprises or shocks me and I accepted that John-John would probably not prevail, and if they did little if anything would change. I accepted on 9/12 that The Gang would exploit 9/11 for all it was worth and more. I prepared immediately to protect myself from not only the surrealist, chaotic tactics of the Wrong and The People of the Lie, but also from the insidious optimism, duplicity, and shape-shifting of liberalism and neoliberalism. I've been around for awhile. I've worked hard for my wisdom. I was fortunate enough to have a great father who taught me the truth. I expected disappointment. I'm dealing with it. I can see what is ahead. It's going to be worse than you think. I know the fun has just begun. We need to take care of each other.

So how 'bout you, brother, sister? How 'bout yer lover? How 'bout yer family? How 'bout yer comrades? The more you actively, intelligently support them, and the more you let them into the center of yourself, the more capable we will all be of weathering this challenge.

Neoconservatism and neoliberalism make me sick. They grow strong on yang. Yang is not "bad" . . . evil exists. It fills us with doubt and confusion.

Here is my humble counsel: live simply and methodically; check yourself and your comrades often for the symptoms listed above; demand (yes, demand) that your comrades lovingly confront you if your health is deteriorating. Recognize ontological bullshit for what it is and protect yourself and your comrades from it.

There will be casualties among us, but they can be minimized.

Grow up. Get real. Sit up straight. Make true love. Make responsible decisions. Expect the worst. Take your meds. Don't let friends drive drunk. Bail 'em out once and only once if they do and get caught. Shut your TV off and listen to lots of jazz and blues and hard-core hip-hop. Work. Flirt. Sleep. Love. Eat. Walk. Don't fuck around. Don't use yer goddam cell phone while driving and/or within 100 feet of another human being. Mind yer manners, asshole. Walk the talk. Study integrity. Pack out what you pack in. Keep yer voice down. Learn two other languages . . . at least enough to ask directions and avoid arrest. Live by the Sermon on the Mount, the Five Pillars, the Golden Rule, the Twelve Steps and the Twelve Traditions, the Desiderata, or the Prayer of St Francis. Walk softly, talk softly, consider an effective stick. Be circumspect. Love everyone, trust no one. Talk to other species of animals and listen to what they have to say. Don't use common sense, be it. Above all, be humble . . . we may be full of shit. Painful as it may be, those dumbasses may be right, and at any rate they got all the heavy ordnance and they are winning at the moment. Accept that we might be crushed. Today may be the last day of the rest of your life.

Davis Grubb, in Ancient Lights, describes flying as "avoiding hitting the ground." The now off-the-air blogger The Mad Prophet said, "Fuck you if you think you're better than anybody else." Amen. And . . .

. . . . . . . . . . .
Be at peace

A Renaissance of the Commons

2004-11-04T19:17:00.000-06:00

How the New Sciences and Internet Are Framing A New Global Identity and Order

By John Clippinger and David Bollier

Cultures, like people, can run out of ideas. They can exhaust themselves in the face of events and ideas they can no longer predict, explain or control. When they do, they revert to the repetitive assertion of the simplest and most soothing of their founding ideas. These attempts to ward off the unknown through the ritualized assertion of familiar core beliefs are what anthropologists call a “ghost dance.”

The name is taken from a Sioux Indian ritual dance designed to resurrect ancestors. Sioux warriors believed the dance made them impervious to the bullets of the
U.S. Calvary in the 1870s. What may seem to be a bizarre ritual is in fact a well-documented practice of all cultures, traditional and modern. Many events in contemporary American life can be understood as a ghost dance of denial: ritualistic behavior that people hope will ward off unpleasant social and economic realities, ecological perils and new global interdependencies that are profoundly threatening to established cultural norms. The ghost dance desperately repeats unexamined, unquestioned “truths” despite contrary evidence.

In our time, the ghost dance can be seen in a celebration of laissezfaire capitalism, radical individualism, and the alienability of all human activity and nature for market consumption. In their time, these myths were invaluable. They helped emancipate the “common man” from ancient obligations to feudal overlords by giving individuals the power not only to elect their own representatives, but to freely sell their labor in open markets. Civil freedoms would henceforth be linked with market freedoms.

Read More...

Don't Be Ridiculous

2004-11-04T18:21:00.000-06:00

I didn't vote for George Bush. I think his Presidency is a disaster for America.

But get real...

The words I am reading from people who should know better who consider themselves defeated in this election are just walking by the truth of it - and I already know nothing I'm going to say here is going to effect anybody, but what the hell... that's what blogs are for.

I have as of right now seen everything: I'm reading about how Kerry actually won Ohio, how votes were stolen in Florida, how the whole election was rigged, how the Democrats need their own Dirty Tricks Czar like Karl Rove, how Americans are stupid in general, that Democrats need to "get religion" in order to do their own fooling of the public, how they need to be more like Lenin (who was a failure), and that they are starting support groups to get through the next 4 years, because America will never recover from this, daDA dadumm daDEE daDOO.

Nobody wants to face what really happened Tuesday, and the resulting angst is just way too hilarious.

News flash: Kerry didn't convince enough people to vote for him. Hello?

You want to know why?

Forget the exit polls. Get rid of the issues meters. People don't tell these guys what they really feel because they are never asked to.

We look up one day and they're flying planes into buildings and 3000 people die. And people don't want that to happen again. Do they think everything Bush has done will prevent it from happening again? Don't be ridiculous - no one can guarantee that. But he's out there, for better or worse / say what you will. And what did John Kerry tell people he would do to fight terrorism?

No... seriously... can anyone tell me?

OK - "we're going to kill al qaida." Yeah. There ya go. That's a good idea.

All this other stuff... Republican shenanigans, Christianity used as a war chant, scaring people, dirty tricks, rigged machines, blah blah blah blah blah.

Kerry didn't connect with the voters. He didn't inspire them. He didn't make them feel he could do a better job. It isn't any more complex than that.

Why people feel there have to be great conspiracies and nefarious sub-texts and devious lessons learned is beyond me.

If you had had a great idea, you would have to beat people away from it with a stick.

You didn't.

Deal with it.

In no mood for conciliation or reconciliation

2004-11-04T09:00:00.000-06:00

The only thing more pathetic than Kerry's precipitous exit from the fight yesterday (which reminded me of Paul Bremer high-tailing it out of Dodge) was his "concession" speech. His call for bipartisanship in the federal legislature made me sick. The fact is that the people in this country are not united. Even if only a small portion of those who voted for Bush are nasty knuckle-draggers, the thought of unity, conciliation, reconciliation, and "healing" with the right gives me a migraine. The time for desparate alliances with liberals, neoliberals, and moderates is over - flushed down the toilet by Kerry and the Dumbopublican establishment.

When are progressive populists going to get it? Gore and Kerry both ran like stumblebums and bailed out quick. Al Gore grew a beard. Kerry will probably enter the Tour de France.

To Howard Dean I say, "cut the crap." I say the same thing to Waxman, Lee, Conyers, Solis, Kucinich, et. al. . . . trying to change the Democratic Party is a total waste of time. The result will be nothing more than co-optation by Hilary Clinton in her campaign against Schwarzenegger (The Prevaricator vs. The Gropenator).

A progressive populist movement must identify and organize itself, separate from existing parties (including Green and Reform), by clearly and unflichingly articulating basic principles:

rejection of military action except in defense against clear and imminent aggression and danger

rebuilding the American social contract by eliminating corporate influence in the political process, outlawing the death penalty, socializing health care for all, re-regulating against corporate abuse of workers and the ecosystem, and redistributing wealth

recommitting our armed forces and assets to homeland security, closing our bases in other countries, truly supporting our military families economically and socially

demilitarizing the national intelligence community, rejecting all covert operations except intelligence gathering; ending the militarization of American society and outlawing private military forces

creating open government, rejecting secrecy, which responds to the people's will

eliminating foreign aid to countries with aggressive and/or repressive governments

repealing most, if not all, of the provisions of the USA PATRIOT Act, and establishing a system of protective, rather than repressive, security laws

dismantling corporate monopolies in media

rejecting religious involvement of any kind in government, while recommitting to the right of each individual to freedom of belief, thought, worship, speech, and choice

Again, now is not the time for alliances. It is the time to resist and oppose any and all compliance and complicity with Republicans on the part of Democrats. We don't need the Democratic Party. And the Democratic Party will continue to suppress a progressive populist threat from within.

Now is the time work even harder to stop killing Iraqis and Palestinians and Afghans and bring our military families together at home. Now is the time to cut loose the war profiteers. Now is the time to demand a paradigm shift in energy and environmental policies.

There is not one Democrat in the Senate, nor are there more than a handful in the House, who would truly support such a movement. We have to do it ourselves.

(Also posted at Progressive Blog Alliance HQ and American Samizdat)

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Be at peace

On the non-existence of Al Qaeda

2004-11-04T06:13:00.000-06:00

Yeah OK another documentary from Auntie Beeb (in three parts on the rise of the neo-cons fundamentalist islam and the myth of al quaeda), one interesting point did emerge from it, that the dirty bomb plan that of a CBRN device was a fantasy created by Zubaida i believe his name was, he started off with japanese sci-fi films of the 1970s and then just got carried away.

The Chemical Biological Radioactive Nuclear Device relies on a bomb that requires two contradictory forms of response. For a Radioactive attack the area becomes contaminated and the need is to move them out of the area and then to begin decontamination, for biological attacks the people are contaminated and it is important for them not to move around as they infect those close to them, chemical attacks depend on weather conditions. Apparently original reports about the plan to destroy the Brooklyn Bridge came from King Kong Godzilla movies. Many of the so called non-combatants were sold to the US by the Northern Alliance and as they were paid for quantity you got a lot of Al-Qaeda from them. The hills of Tora Bora with its Thunderbirds are Go mountain hideaway never existed. And most of the Islamic Foreign fighters were quickly killed. Then the need for a new Cold War eternal enemy shadow warrior arose and Al Qaeda works for now. You really can't rely on evidence produced by torture these days. I wonder why.

If people buy this version they will have to invent something else and they will so i don't wish to persuade anyone.

The use of radioactive materiel as part of a dirty bomb was tested by US scientists and it was determined that even if people stayed in the same place for a year, there would not be sufficient radioactive poisoning from radioactive materiel once it was dispersed. Unless you use a nuclear device, insufficient contamination is produced. The programme then went through the plots exposed in the United States and the UK. A tourist video taken by muslim yutes visiting disney land was the main evidence against a group on the grounds that if you were going to case Disney land you would pretend to make a tourist video. Similarly a tourist map marked out by an ANZAC backpacker but left in his hostel became the main evidence against muslims on the grounds that they must be planning to destroy those sites. Another group were arrested when a colleague sent them an email saying he was getting married and settling down in Saudi so they wouldn't be seeing each other for some time, on the grounds that that wedding was the code word for 9-11 and only an idiot would say terrorist attack.

The premis of the programme is that islamic fundamentalism is real, hatred of americans is tangibly real especially in the arab world. But that there is no co-ordinated command and control organisation called Al Quaeda. There is far more evidence for a unified progressive blog alliance acting with one heart and mind in a plan to dominate the US and obtain political control of the Web, and we know what bollocks that would be. Since 9-11 there have been no further attacks on the US and still nothing in the UK it might be due to James Bond and his CIA friends but it might be because Osama has switched to the straight to video movie business where all the real money is.

The French seem to have enjoyed the results of the US election the most. Germany had already promised troops to assist the US if a more multi-national approach was adopted in the bridge building to follow (i.e. if Kerry was elected). Now the French realise they can moan and wring their hands in sorrow for another four years and they don't have to clear up the mess Bush started.

I hope he doesn't believe his advisors who tell him the US can and must now deal with Iran and the rest of the axis of evil who flout UN resolutions and aren't Israel, the US don't have the troops for another land war, though it is the only country with sufficient weapons of mass destruction to win a war from the air. And you have done it before against Japan in 1945 apparently the indiscriminate bombing of civilian populations are justified if you declare war first and no one has the futile sense of morality to fight back against a bully. But of course that will never happen americans are decent freedom loving people with a sense of decency and morality and democracy is your main export. I think this is the time to develop new ties with the emerging african democracies whose moral values you clearly share.

Bringing Light to a World in Darkness

2004-11-03T17:08:00.000-06:00

There is no political movement whose goals are more admirable, necessary, or virtuous than that of the Progressives. We fight the forces of war, ignorance, and greed with all of our hearts; many of us even understand that the survival of civilization, and perhaps humanity itself, may rest upon our shoulders during the next 100 years. And for better or worse, it will be up to us: we who, against all odds, are willing to fight for a better world. Unlike the generations before us, we will not allow ourselves to be content in handing our children a world shaped by ignorance and collective irresponsibility. Most every progressive understands this, on one level or another -- though most fail to remind each other of it often enough.

The life of a progressive is mostly one of suffering. The reason being that our minds are cursed with an unrelenting conflict between outer realities and our own inner ideals. Everyday, we endure wars between our limitless imaginations ,and our knowledge and acceptance of a tragedy which surrounds all of us; some call it "the real world". It is a ghastly affliction. But it happens to be who we are.

Most of us have tried, at one time or another, to run from our powerful spirits and minds. We've tried alcohol, drugs, sex, and a few have even resorted to suicide. Tragically, it's no suprise that such a dark world compells the brightest of its spirits to surrender and willingly extinguish their flames.

A lot has been said about bloggers, and the blogosphere; some call it a fad, others call it a revolution -- I think both positions start from the wrong place. A blogger is nothing more than a person who writes their thoughts for others to read. Period. To speak of bloggers or blogs as a whole is as foolish as speaking of books and authors as a whole. One can go no farther than saying, "a book is a place for words, which are written by an author, and read by a reader." Beyond that, one can only speculate that the right collection of words might have a profound effect on history.

In general, the blogosphere is a dark place; its catacombs are full of the mindless, insane, perverted, and cold hearted. Its walls are clad with pornography, death, and vanity. In otherwords, the blogosphere is as deluded, schizophrenic, and trashy as the real world.

Our alliance now finds itself in a cold and dark passage. However, we've brought our candles: let us keep them aflame; let us continue to give each other light and warmth, where there was once only frigid darkness. Let our collective light serve as a beacon of hope -- not just for each other -- but for those who are still wandering the dark catacombs cold and alone.

Next Steps

2004-11-03T13:30:00.000-06:00

"In war as in life, it is often necessary when some cherished scheme has failed, to take up the best alternative open, and if so, it is folly not to work for it with all your might." -Winston Churchill

Today, we progressives face a bleak reality. Our entire movement has traditionally depended upon people being intelligent and good hearted. However, look where our idealism has gotten us: a Kerry defeat, more Republicans in the house and senate, and what will probably become the most conservative supreme court in our history. I've dropped the dream of "waking people up". I've decided to cross over to the dark side.

Unless we Progressives can learn the "dark arts of Rove", we don't stand a chance. Its time that we learn to pluck the electorate's strings of hatred, vanity, and stupidity. But don't fret, we just have to change our message, not our ideals. God forbid one of us gets elected, we could exercise our power the way we always knew we would have: for peace, social justice, and freedom.

Inside Scoop: Kerry Win; Daschle likely to lose seat

2004-11-02T16:34:00.000-06:00

Doug Ireland , a PBAer who also happens to be an established Journalist, writes at 4:27 PM (est) :

From a senior source in the AFL-CIO's political operation:Kerry is down by 1 point in Virginia and Nevada, and down by 5 against Bush in North Carolina.....and the betting on 16th St. at the fed's HQ is that Daschle is toast... (trying to get absolutely confirmable numbers directly from my usual spies at the TV networks is like pulling teeth this election cycle--security is VERY tight...)

Update from Direland (5:00 est):
A source in the DNC shows exit poll numbers that contradict those that were reported at Kos, Drudge, and here.

Pennsylvania - Kerry 59 - Bush 40
Minnesota - Kerry 58.5 - Bush 40.2
New Jersey - Kerry 56.4 - Bush 43.2
New Hampshire - Kerry 57.9 - Bush 41.4
Maine - Kerry 55 - Bush 44.4
Michigan - Kerry 51.5 - Bush 47.7
Florida - Kerry 51.7 - Bush 48.1
New Mexico - Kerry 50.2 - Bush 48.8
Ohio - Kerry 52.2 - Bush 47.8
Wisconsin - Kerry 52.6 -
Bush 47.3

Iowa - Kerry 50 - Bush 50

Colorado - Kerry 48.7 - Bush 50.8
Arkansas - Kerry 44.5 - Bush 55

(Note: I'll be posting further updates at the Progressive Blog Alliance's Homepage)

Ten reasons to vote (in case you're still not sure)

2004-11-01T11:00:00.000-06:00

Just in case there are any undecideds reading this, here are the AFL-CIO Working Families Network's top ten reasons to vote for John Kerry tomorrow:

1. Jobs

We’ve lost 1.6 million private-sector jobs under President George W. Bush, whose solution has been to give tax cuts to the wealthy. One of Sen. John Kerry’s (D-Mass.) first priorities as president will be to restore the jobs—including manufacturing jobs—that have disappeared during the Bush administration. Kerry will work for a new tax credit to encourage manufacturers to create family-supporting jobs here in America. He will invest in new energy industries and in critical job-creating infrastructure projects: building roads and bridges, improving water and sewer systems, repairing and rebuilding crumbling schools and upgrading the nation’s transportation systems.

2. Overtime Pay

President Bush pushed through new rules predicted to take overtime pay rights away from some 6 million workers. On Sept. 14, Democratic vice presidential candidate Sen. John Edwards (N.C.) pledged: “On the day that John Kerry is sworn in as your next president, we will reverse this overtime rule that this administration put into place.”

3. Trade

In his Economic Report of the President, 2004, President Bush advocated exporting American jobs. He backs tax breaks for U.S. job exporters and is trying to expand the job-killing North American Free Trade Agreement to 34 more countries. Sen. Kerry will order an immediate 120-day review of all existing trade agreements to ensure they are fair and balanced for America’s workers. He will insist that enforceable worker and environmental standards are included in any new trade agreements. He will save jobs by ending tax incentives for corporations to move jobs overseas and will work to stop such countries as China and Japan from manipulating currency and undermining the value of U.S. products abroad.

4. Health Care

Five million more people are uninsured since President Bush took office. Retirees stand to lose existing drug coverage and the government is barred from negotiating lower drug costs under Bush’s flawed Medicare drug benefit. Sen. Kerry will reduce family health care premiums by up to $1,000, lower costs for businesses and expand insurance coverage to 95 percent of Americans. He’ll do this by shifting a share of catastrophic case costs to the government, covering uninsured children under the existing State Children’s Health Insurance Program and Medicaid and allowing all of us access to the same insurance plan now enjoyed by members of Congress. Kerry also will overhaul Bush’s Medicare drug benefit so it protects seniors and allows the government to negotiate lower drug costs.

5. Retirement Security

President Bush wants to siphon off Social Security funds into risky, private Wall Street accounts—a plan that would cost so much it would require raising the retirement age, cutting benefits or both. Sen. Kerry will strengthen Social Security—he will not privatize it or raise the retirement age. He supports stronger protections for workers’ 401(k) plans and other employer-provided retirement benefits.

6. Iraq

“America is fighting—and must win—two wars,” Sen. Kerry says. “The war in Iraq. And the war on terror.” He can give us a fresh start with greater international support for Iraqi freedom and for our troops. His plans for Iraq include urgently expanding efforts to train Iraqi security forces, moving forward with reconstruction efforts to bring real benefits to the Iraqi people and taking essential steps to guarantee the promised elections are held next year. Unlike the current president, he will level with the American people about this war.

7. Homeland Security

To fight the war on terror, Sen. Kerry will transform our military to better address terrorist threats, strengthen our intelligence services by implementing the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States’ (also known as the 9-11 Commission) recommendations and work to secure nuclear materials worldwide. At the same time, he will provide funds to hire and equip up to 100,000 firefighters, restore funding for the federal COPS program that supports state and local law enforcement agencies and improve port, rail and transit system security. President Bush has not only failed to secure our port, rail and transit systems, he also has cut grant funding for first responders.

8. Education

President Bush has shortchanged our children’s education, failing to fully fund the No Child Left Behind Act and to repair crumbling schools. Sen. Kerry will provide full funding for the No Child Left Behind Act so students and teachers can meet high standards. He will invest in repairing and modernizing substandard school buildings. He also will help make college affordable with a new College Opportunity Tax Credit.

9. Workers’ Freedom to Form Unions

President Bush has destroyed collective bargaining rights of more than 230,000 federal workers in the Department of Homeland Security, Transportation Security Administration and other federal agencies. In doing so, he has treated union members as threats to national security. Sen. Kerry strongly supports workers’ freedom to form unions. He and running mate Sen. Edwards are co-sponsors of the Employee Free Choice Act (S. 1925), which would crack down on employer intimidation and harassment of workers trying to form unions and/or reach a first contract. Kerry has directly supported workers struggling to form unions, including Boston janitors, Massachusetts grocery workers and employees of Quebecor World and Comcast.

10. Leadership

“There are born leaders—and he is one of them.” That’s what Gene Thorson, who served on a swift boat in South Vietnam with Sen. Kerry, says about the presidential candidate today. John Kerry is a leader whose commitments match America’s values. His leadership will enable him to make America strong at home and respected in the world. John Kerry has pledged to build a growing economy based on good jobs, a health care plan that reduces costs, an energy plan that frees us from Middle East oil, an able and well-equipped military, strong international alliances to keep America safe and secure. President Bush has led America—but in the wrong direction.

(cross posted from Red Harvest)

I Decide...

2004-10-31T17:29:00.000-06:00

I have finally reached a decision on my vote this Tuesday. Thanks to all of our readers at the Yard for putting up with this consternation (but, really... make posts, willya! Your emails are welcomed, but the floor is open to you all!), and to the Team Members who weighed in with their viewpoints and ideas over this long and arduous personal process.

I more seriously considered "None Of The Above" this year than I can ever remember. The arguments presented here by that view were well-reasoned and articulate. I can also say that they were influential in building the frame of mind needed to come to my conclusion.

I have already eliminated voting for the President's re-election. But in point of fact - the real truth is that here in Illinois my Presidential vote is mostly meaningless, and Alan Keyes has proven such a joke that Barak Obama was coronated months ago. Illinois has so far been declared for Kerry to such a degree I can safely tell you I have not heard ONE ad for either Presidential candidate. I hasten to add I am not an avid TV-watcher, and my radio listening is limited to the two classical stations in the area - neither of which play recorded ads of any kind - so I freely admit I may have missed it. However my wife (Mrs. Yard) concurs with my assessment, and she is a TV-user.

So it turns out I'll probably vote Bednarik just for the sake of not supporting either of the majors... but this is not the clear revelation I have had. No! I am going somewhere completely else with my voting Tuesday.

Since it is government itself, especially the modern American version of it, that I distrust most; and that limits to its activities are exactly what I want to see put into place; I am going to go out of my way to VOTE FOR GRIDLOCK.

If someone here suggested this exact thing, kudos to you - and apologies I can't recall who you were - you are a genius. If I came up with this all by myself... well that would be a surprise!

The decision is to play it by ear once in the booth... if a candidate will help stagnate the government - that's my candidate, if going against the referendum will deny funding to anything at all - that's my issue.

Block Compromise! Hand-cuff The Government! Vote For Gridlock!

Maybe They're Really Confederates

2004-10-31T15:08:00.000-06:00

A combination of two things: a West Wing episode from a few years ago where the White House's Supreme Court nominee turns out to be opposed to a fundamental (and Constitutional) right to privacy; an excerpt from America (The Book): A Citizen's Guide to Democracy Inaction about how the Founders f*cked up on their first go at a Constitution.

Now, lifting literal references from a dramatic television show and/or a surprisingly sober (yet humorous) "parody" book would be tantamount to, say, listening to Rush Limbaugh without doing your own reference checking or painting Hannity & Colmes as a fair and balanced debate show. So no, I'm not doing that.

However, I do get inspiration usually in the form of synthesis, where two rather disparate ideas are nonetheless juxtaposed, insisting that I find some commonality or at least relationship between the two. This is what I'm talking about here.
What I'm talking about is two seemingly separate thrusts by the current Republican regime. The first, an attack on privacy. Oh, not their own, because they have privatized measures of protecting their own privacy. Think Patriot Act.

The second, they wish to unilaterally disarm everything about the Federal government, except for those programs that will keep them strong. They gut education, claiming localities handle it better—tho, if that were true, small towns would learn nothing about the outside world except to avoid it, and urban schools would teach that rural areas are full of uneducated cousin fuckers. And no one would learn that the USA is part of a bigger world that has its own ideas of what's valuable and what's not. They gut social programs because, although they claim to want a smaller government, they only believe in entitlements that show up at their own doorsteps, dressed up as well-earned rewards.

Consolidation. That was my goal in entertaining these two facts side by side. Cosolidation. Of Power. That's what the Republicans are doing, except not for all Republicans, just the regime inner circle. A conservative government is not enough.

Oligarchy is the goal.

I invite you to read the text of the Articles of Confederation. It's a good read. And by the time you get to Article VI, you'll see why it failed: they wanted to have their cake and eat it too: State Sovereignty was explicit. Federal Power over them was implied. It's never good to pigeonhole your own power while giving jurisdiction in abstract, exploitable terms, to someone else. That's why, when the Constitution rolled around, the claim wasn't that the feds owned catch-all power, but rather that the feds stated their own power, only giving latitude to those explicitly subordinate.

The presumptive oligarchy in this country isn't about to assume only powers not explicitly stated by the Constitution. That's why they're out to change it, or gut it. Or silence the life's breath of it: the American People.

Look around at all the ennui. Look around at all the division. Look around at all the paradoxical support for larger government while stating they're for smaller government. Look around at all the tax "relief" being doled out like bubblegum from a parade float while spending obscene amounts on war. Look at all the nation building going on while idealizing self-determination.

Look at it.

Buying a government: just a cost of doing business

2004-10-29T14:24:00.000-05:00

If you still have some doubts about the direction of government in this country, I urge you to read David Sirota's "Corporate Colonization". It's short and scary.

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Be at peace

NOTICE

2004-10-29T13:20:00.000-05:00

Somehow, someone has managed to hack blogger and publish a corrupted version of ddjangoWIrE. It is not a cached copy - it is pirated. I have notified blogger about the problem and they are working on it.

ddjangoWIrE no longer exists. I am aware that anyone can use the name if I delete the blog, and that's OK (sleazy, but OK). However, the posts and archives that appear on the pirated version are MINE, and they are published without my permission, since I deleted the blog, and are not attributed to me.

Please! If you have a link to ddjangoWIrE on your blog, DELETE IT!

Thanks.

. . . . . . . . . . .

Be at peace

In the event of civil war

2004-10-29T04:54:00.000-05:00

I had thought there was too much hysterical talk of another civil war a new constitution but it began four years ago. Does anyone know what it is about. The Spartans had two kings at the same time, it allows for checks and balances and might be a resolution to this problem.

Though it would probably be more like living in world wide Cosby Show or Walton Mountain writ large, your two parties and candidates seem so similar from this distance. But then they do in most established democracies. So onto the speculation,

having refused UN or ICRC or AI election observers, and with the failure of the lawyers, what do you call it when they succeed by the way. Those states coloured blue split off from those states coloured red. Then the Libertarian Militias seize their moment to declare their own real true america and split off forcing african americans who didn't vote to make the fourth. There is nothing more aggressive or irrational than a bridge set. The Governor of California was born for this day. They have an economy almost as strong as Britain, so they will secede from whatever remains.

Having refused ballot observers the UN sec gen is not going to send in peace keepers because the blue berets keep the peace they don't make it. You wouldn't really want organisation of african unity boys patrolling they are more likely to loot than the locals. You don't trust Nato, bloody germans french treacherous spaniards. You see where this is all leading.

The only troops you would accept would be from tony blair, i am sure a deal could be struck. With all the divisions about signing a constitution to become one of 25 countries of a united europe with values, tradition, history stretching back to the dawn of time or the option to become officially the forty-seventh state of the new Union with Her Britannic Majesty (Cherie Blair) Empress of the New World. Blair Blair Blair, how could we have doubted you. The Duke of Buckingham salutes you, Wellington raises an eyebrow. Of course this is all quite short term. The immediate effect would hasten China's international dominance as the only remaining superpower. Is it a price that we want to pay. Now their film industry has come of age I wonder if anyone would notice.