Sympathy

I haven't posted in a while. My brother passed two months ago today.  It was sudden and unexpected. One of those cancers that show little in the way of symptoms until it's too late.

I'm not exactly what one would call emotionally demonstrative, unless you count being perpetually glib an emotion. (Yeah, I know. Yada yada defense mechanism...I'm workin' on it, alright?).  So I was caught off guard as far as how much his loss affected everything I was doing. Especially writing.  I usually write a blog post down on paper, then go back and read it a day or so later. At that point, I usually think, "What crap", and try again. 

You're welcome.

My brother and I weren't close growing up. He was 15 years older, and out on his own before I was really aware of his presence. As a teenager, I spent a couple of summers with him and his family. I had a lot of hair, and an equal amount of angst. But he was patient with me, and I was lucid enough between bong hits for some of it to take. He would occasionally get the look on his face that hard to describe. It was his way of calling bullshit when I did or said something stupid. Whatever it was, it worked.

After I became an adult, my brother and I found that we had two diametrically opposing political viewpoints. This made for some interesting Thanksgivings, and a couple of decades' worth of spirited emails. 

For me, it began when Reagan was elected.  I knew it was bad. Really bad. I knew that the consequences would be far-reaching.  Being able to say, "I told you so" isn't as fun as I thought it would be.

I suspect now that, much of the time, my brother was playing devil's advocate in order to get me to think logically, and back up my opinions. If so, I owe him a debt of gratitude.

But what I've learned, is that logic and reason must be tempered with empathy and compassion. Otherwise, we tend to end up doing what is expedient, rather than what is right.

Part of my liberalism, and my atheism for that matter,  is the belief that most people are good, decent, hard-working folks just trying to do the best they can.  Sometimes this is little more than a carefully cultivated delusion. But it's a necessary one, I think. When I'm wrong, it is often spectacularly so. But the times I'm right more than make up for it. If I'm to err, I prefer it to be on the positive side. The problem is, that it requires a strength which I don't always posses. It's at these times, I tend to go into a sort of hibernation until it passes.

Otherwise, I run the risk of seeing, in my mind's eye, that look on my brother's face.

Finding Logic

I've probably spent my whole life trying to figure out the Tea Party.  Of course they weren't always called that, but these people have always been with us. I'm not talking about simply conservatism, though that's bad enough. That, I can understand to a degree. I don't agree with it, but I can at least see how they arrived at their (often incredibly wrong) conclusions.


No, I'm talking about folks who claim to venerate freedom, but would take it from their neighbor for the smallest of trespasses.  Who claim to want a better world for their children, but have no problem sacrificing them to endless, pointless wars. People who hate and fear the one real constant in this world -- change.


I'm also talking about those they elect to hold public office. It's hard to tell which is worse: Those who seek power by pandering to fear and hatred, or those that give it to them.  But I believe Paul Begala gives a good explanation in a recent article as to how we got to where we are today:

Specifically, they did four things:

• Cut taxes (with a heavy tilt toward the rich).
• Caged two wars on the national credit card (one of which was against a country that had nothing to do with 9/11 and posed no serious threat to America).
• Passed a prescription drug benefit with no pay-for (the first entitlement in American history without a revenue source), and deregulated Wall Street (which helped turn the American economy into a casino and touched off the Great Recession).

After reading a news story about changing demographics in America, someone asked me if I was afraid that the white race would disappear.  After quelling the urge to punch him in the nose, I told him that my concern was for the species as a whole, and that there was no such thing as a purebred human being, nor should there be (Change, remember?). They were less than happy with my response.


I can't understand people who's beliefs are so firmly held, that no amount of logic, reason, or quantifiable proof will sway them. They are, in fact, so adverse to this, that they would just as soon see this world end, rather than face any number of inconvenient truths.


To cite Mr. Begala again:

It has become a trope of the right to accuse Obama and the Democrats of trying to remake America in the image of Europe. That, of course, is silly as well as insulting to the people who gave us the Magna Carta and the Enlightenment, not to mention spaghetti. But in whose image would the radical Republicans remake us? Certainly not in the image of the Founding Fathers. The Republicans are already seeking to make Swiss cheese out of Mr. Madison's masterpiece, littering the Constitution with amendments on budgeting, the line-item veto, gay marriage, abortion, school prayer, restricting birthright citizenship, and more.

Seems to me the GOP seeks a banana republic: a toxic blend of right-wing populism, anti-intellectualism, debt defaults, and an end to the ladder of economic opportunity.

These people hate knowledge, complexity; they hate the infernal need to explore. They are the petty, bigoted, greedy people who lack compassion, empathy, imagination, even common courtesy.


But I've realized that out of all the (deservedly negative) adjectives I've used to describe them,they are one thing above all others.


They are dangerous.

On the Tracks

A few days ago, Texas executed a Mexican national for the rape and murder of a 16 year-old girl in 1995.  His guilt was never in question.  But as a Mexican national, he had a right to notify his embassy or consulate at the time of his arrest.  He was not informed of that right.  President Obama, the United Nations and others asked Texas Governor, Rick Perry, to stay the execution, but he refused.  In doing so, he violated a treaty we have not only with Mexico, but with every other civilized country on the planet.  And we just told them all that our word is worth nothing.  Governor Perry's motives had nothing to do with getting justice for a teenage girl, and everything to do with political expediency.  The Supreme Court agreed with him.  Killing someone was just their way of thumbing their collective noses at the feds, and at the President in particular.  According to Justice Antonin Scalia, even innocence isn't enough to stay an execution.  He once wrote,

"Mere factual innocence is no reason not to carry our a death sentence properly reached."

This is just one of many symptoms of a much larger, and potentially lethal, disease. I'll leave you with the words of Jon Nichols, who states it with more eloquence than I possess.

Face it, America.  You've been bought and sold.

Only an idiot would believe our political leaders, regardless of their party affiliation, to be altruistic patriots who only want what's best for us.  If you are in political power or if you are the CEO of a corporation, the last thing in the world that you want is to have a general populace that is capable of thinking for themselves or formulating their own opinions.  

You want people to keep their words about the nation sweet, for fear that they might otherwise seem to be the bitter seeds of treason.  You want people to think that "women's suffrage" means keeping them in the kitchen.  

Sheep, brainless sheep who hold no concept of where they have been or where they are going, who need only to have a cloth of red, white, and blue waved in their faces to lead them.  Oh and docile, too.  Don't forget docile.  Provided your bank account is sizable, your carnal needs are sated, and your TV is all reality, then it's all good, right?


We're standing on the railroad tracks.  We can see the train coming, but we're too comfortable to get off.  And yet we'll still probably be surprised when the train mows us down.

Nothing changes

Among all the images floating around the internet, I came across this.

Does the rhetoric sound familiar?  Trade Kennedy's face for Obama's, and it could have been written today.

They call themselves the Tea Party, but they've always been around.  The intolerant, ultra-religious, racist, mouth-breathing fools may always be with us.

We fail to impart the mistakes we've made to our children, so the cycle repeats.  Or, worse, we feed them the poison that was fed to us, and the ignorance continues.

Time and Distance

So, we have a little over a week's worth of distance from this tragedy. One goes through certain stages in a situation like this. Shock, disbelief and grief initially. Then anger and outrage, aggravated as I witnessed the transparent attempt by those on the right to deflect blame from themselves, and assign it to others. It only got worse as the days wore on.

There was Sarah Palin's video (which I could only watch in 30 second intervals, punctuated by a lot of drinking.), in which she portrayed herself as the true victim in all of this. It was such an embarrassing, self-serving display of insensitivity, that any presidential aspirations she may have had probably ended right there. Then again, Arizona recently elected a governor who can barely form complete sentences, and those she can form are often lies. I never underestimate stupidity. Palin's latest quote is, "I will not shut up!" There's a surprise.

Then there was Trent Humphries, co-founder of the Tucson Tea Party, who had the distinction of being the first person of the extreme right to actually blame the victims for the crime against them (I would have bet money on Fox). Immediately after which, he began to express fear for the safety of himself, the Tea Party, and his family (in that order, I assume). Before this, many, including myself, hadn't even heard of him. I believe his initial inflammatory statements were designed, at least in part, to rectify that situation. The most recent incident happened at a town hall meeting, at which Eric Fuller, one of the victims of the shooting, was arrested after taking a picture of Humpries, and muttering "Your dead." It's my belief that Mr. Fuller should have stayed home. The trauma of being shot, and watching those around him brutally murdered was only a few days old, and I think he was still in shock. I also believe that Mr. Humpries knew this, and deliberately provoked a man he knew to be in a fragile state of mind. When Humphries was asked if he wanted to press charges, he declined (smartest move yet).

"I am more worried about our community," he said. "This doesn't need to be about Trent Humphries. This doesn't need to be about politics."

Right. What is it with sociopaths always referring to themselves in the third person?

I could call Humphries a subhuman slug, but it would be doing a disservice to slugs everywhere.

There are others. Rush Limbaugh, Glen Beck, Sean Hannity, all whose comments I found to be offensive and tiresome.

It's my belief that everyone of conscience, no matter their ideology, asked themselves the same thing at some point after the shooting:

"Did I do anything to contribute to this?"

In the end, the answer isn't nearly as important as having the decency to ask the question in the first place. And in what may be the few positive things to come out of this, it became painfully easy to spot those who didn't look inward. Whose first thought was to protect themselves and their ideologies. They fear to look into their own hearts, because of what looks back at them from the darkness. It is, more than anything over the last two years, the greatest measure of their lack of integrity and character. And that's a good thing.

Because now we know who they truly are.

Saturation of stupidity

Yesterday, at a local Safeway, a disturbed young man shot a number of people, including Rep. Gabielle Giffords, federal judge John Roll, and a nine-year-old child. I didn't comment. Partly because I wanted more information, but mostly I was too angry and heartsick to form coherent thoughts.

From what I've read, and the YouTube videos I've seen, Jared Loughner was a disturbed individual, and quite probably mentally ill. Because of this, I'm told that I should not consider this a politically motivated act.

Bullshit.

Rep. Giffords' office is just around the corner from where I live. During the health care debate, there were Tea Party picketers on that corner, as was their right. But their shouts at passing cars, and the signs they carried were troubling and offensive. After the vote on health care, her offices were vadalized. During the mid-terms, her political opponent's Tea Party followers placed signs across the street that came strategically short of promoting direct physical violence.

For the last two years, we've been inundated by the right with lies, omissions, and ad hominem attacks. And I'm not even counting the clinically insane things said, which served only to gain or divert attention. Fox news' unending string of propaganda does a huge disservice to those who naively look to them for actual news. They know this. How could they not?

To Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, Sarah Palin and all the corporate ghouls that control them, hate is just another commodity to be packaged and sold to the masses.

You can't saturate a nation with this sort of stupidity, and not expect someone, mentally ill or not, to react to it.

Now it has come to this. We live in a nation where a valid argument against one's opponent is that he is too smart. A nation where a significant percentage of people consider quantifiable, demonstrable proof of something to be merely opinion. A nation that rewrites it's own history when it makes them uncomfortable. A nation that changes it's constitution when they find it to be inconvenient. A nation that values expediency over what is right.

And, perhaps someday, a nation of people no longer worthy of their liberty.

And so it begins...

A recent ruling by US District Judge Susan Bolton took the teeth out of SB1070. Personally, I feel that the injunction should have applied to the whole of the law, but I'll take what I can get.  Still, in the desert, south of here, we've got armed neo-Nazis patrolling with the tacit permission, and even encouragement, of law enforcement and elected officials.  Anyone see a problem here?  Anyone?

Meanwhile, in Summit NJ, an immigrant dishwasher from El Salvador was beaten to death in an unprovoked attack by three teenagers, one of whom took cell phone video of it to show his friends.  Kids who have probably spent time listening to hatred spewed by their parents, not to mention the likes of Beck, Hannity, Limbaugh, Bachmann, Arpaio...the list goes on ad nauseum.

All of this -- The anti-immigrant sentiment, the tea-baggers, obstructionism by the right, all of it.  It isn't about states rights, or big government, or the Tenth Amendment.  It's about every bitter, ignorant, redneck racist in this country crawling out from under their rocks  and into the light. 

Because we left the door open.

If China jumped off a bridge...

Entirely too many WTF moments on the Internet as of late.  Joe Lieberman wants to give the President executive power over the Internet.  An effective "kill switch" for the Internet in case of some cyber attack. 

Let me get this straight.  A person (or persons) attacking the Internet would, I assume want to somehow disable it.  So in order to protect ourselves, we need the ability to break the Internet.  Huh?  I don't know the President's position on this, nor do I care.

His reasoning is that China has this capability, so we should, too.  In the words of Jon Stewart, "Well, if China says it's OK...".

(Comedy Central won't let me embed...)

Daily show 6/21

Zero Tolerance

Tolerance, empathy, reason, compassion, diversity.  Growing up, I'd always believed these to be good things.  Apparently, I was wrong.  I've been trying to assimilate everything that has happened over the last couple of years.  In that, I've failed.  The hope, however fleeting, I felt when Obama was elected is a distant memory.  Tea parties, corporate malfeasance, firearms at Presidential speaking engagements, threats of violence from public officials, more corporate malfeasance, an unconstitutional immigration law, a vendetta against education by public officials...

This goes on ad nauseum. I've felt all along that all this nonsense had a ring of familiarity about it.  The anti-immigration sentiment, especially, reminds me of Nazi Germany, just after they took power.  People hate that comparison, but it is valid.  The Nazis were in power for over a decade before their "final solution".  They started off small, too.

I recently read an article at Metafilter, regarding the American Third Position, yet another white supremacist group that is trying to gain a foothold here in Arizona.  A comment made on that article stated it more eloquently than I ever could:

This is the pattern. There are always a small percent of people who blame somebody, and somebody will always be someone different. Skin color and religious symbols are easy targets, but ask the Irish how much good being white, christian and english speaking did them.

In good times, these idiots get little traction. In bad times, however, people get depressed and angry, and when someone comes up with something along the line of "You'd have a job if it weren't for those fucking Martians...." and suddenly, they start getting traction.

The worse the economy, the more traction it gets -- more people are depressed and angry, and they're more depressed and angrier as it gets worse. Now, add in hopelessness -- they become convinced that things won't change, so they don't really care if they survive. Now you have angry people who are willing to fight because they don't really care if they die.

Then we get the fucktards, now flying high, with the "If we just kill all the fucking martians, and the fucking government who supports the fucking martians" and suddenly, things get very ugly very quickly.

This is why the extremist's first target is the moderate. Moderates provide moderation and rationality, which directly cuts the fuel off from the extremist. The extremist goal is to remove the moderates -- force the opponent to one extreme, and get rid of those in the middle. Suddenly, the *only* message is "Kill the Martians, and we're just the government you need to kill the Martians."

Oh, I mean Jews. Or Slavs. Or city dwelling Cambodians. Or any number of minorities in the past. This is an old trick, killing the people who don't look like you in bad times goes all the way back to ancient Egypt, if not further.

Hitler and Pol Pot were just reading a script that has been read hundreds of times before -- and, it seems, we're now in rehearsals for the next big production of Kill The Minority.

I read a great suggestion recently regarding the immigration law.  Enforce it to within an inch of it's life.  Make everyone show proof of citizenship.  No exceptions.  You show it when you check out a library book, or pay a water bill.  Let's see how long it lasts, then.

I know of no method to secure the repeal of bad or obnoxious laws so effective as their stringent execution.
                                                              -Ulysses S. Grant

Haiti

I have been absent as of late.  No excuse except my own inherent laziness.  I hope this finds everyone who reads it well.  Sadly, 2010 has already witnessed its first disaster.

By now, everyone has heard about the earthquake in Haiti.  I'm sure everyone has also heard the responses from folks like Pat Robertson and Rush Limbaugh.
Their lack of compassion and common decency should be self evident to everyone.

I won't respond to it, mostly because Jon Stewart has already done so with his usual good humor and common sense.

Luckily, most Americans are decent and compassionate, as evidenced in the great outpouring of support and help from those who have little to begin with.  Those that don't feel this way all seem to be posting on Craigslist's R&R
section.  Let them.

This morning I watched an interview with former Presidents' Bush and Clinton on Face the Nation.  They have been appointed by President Obama to coordinate and expedite relief efforts.  Both men are a great example of putting aside political differences for the greater good, and America is fortunate that they, and those like them, are willing to serve when called.

And so, I urge everyone reading this to check the sidebar and give what you can to the Red Cross.  We live paycheck to paycheck, and have done so.  If we spend a couple of weeks eating more beenie weenies and top ramen than normal, we still have many, many blessings to count.

Actually, I should thank them...

Hope y'all had a great Thanksgiving. I thoroughly enjoyed mine.  I ate, then slept, then woke up, then ate...  See a pattern here?  To the male of the species, Thanksgiving dinner is like sex.  We have little choice but to sleep afterwards.  

 

Spent the weekend putting up the tree and the lights.  Both pitiful, but ours.  

 

Had a nice first day back to work, charming little old ladies, and hot college chicks (for both of whom my fondness knows no bounds)

 

Then I get home and check my email.  Awaiting me was a little blurb with the words "Let's take back America before it's too late!" (those words are never a good sign, no matter who says them).  Attached was a link to a Youtube video (I will spare you that), replete with images of eagles, waving american flags...and teabaggers (why do I do this to myself?).  All of this was accompanied by a butchered version of "New York, New York" (for this alone, they should get whacked).

It was such an incredible piece of dreck, both in execution and intent, that my response was somewhat...testy.  I remember saying something about their inherent lack of credibility...the rest is a bit of a blur.  I was that pissed.

Liberalism and Conservatism.  The Ying and Yang that once made America great (or at least tolerable).  Look how they've gone and fucked up the balance.

And for that, they get from me a Chuck Heston sized "Damn you all to Hell!".

Diversity

Y'know, I was never this politically active before I went to prison. During that time, I witnessed fear, hatred, racism, and no small amount of gratuitous violence on a daily basis.  When I was released, I tried to leave it all behind me in the realm of bad memories.  I succeeded at first.  

My first job was doing political surveys over the phone.  Mostly for out of state municipal candidates in local elections.  The questions were always somewhat one-sided, and I always ended up feeling cheap and sordid by the end of my shift (and not in a good way, either). I believe it's referred to as "push polling". 

As the presidential election drew closer, the nature of the surveys began to change.  They became more serious, and, thankfully, more balanced.  The answers I received, however, ranged from troubling to downright scary.  The fact that Barack Obama was a person of color was a deal-breaker, and that was that.  That got me curious.  Anyone who scared such hateful and ignorant people was worth looking into.  So, I started doing my homework.  I alway knew that the right wing's main ideology was that Washington is always the enemy, stealing their hard-earned money to redistribute it to the undeserving and shiftless poor (some of whom just happen to be immigrants or black).  The more I looked into the opposition's stance, the more outraged I became.  Rush Limbaugh, who recently advocated a return to segregated buses, was always a joke, and dismissed easily enough.  The same thing goes for Hannity and all the other nut-jobs at Fox News (scaring old, white people since 1996).

Then, there's Glenn Beck.  He had done everything short of calling for armed insurrection.

Washington Monthly’s Steve Benen writes: “Beck has spent months — literally screaming and crying — insisting that the president is a socialist/fascist/communist/racist who’s trying to destroy the country through totalitarian means. Major media outlets have plenty of irresponsible voices, but Beck has been unique in his insane rantings. It wasn’t hard to imagine some of his viewers/listeners getting so worked up, they might at least consider doing something dangerous.”

Beck has recently backpedaled away from this, saying, "But just one lunatic like Timothy McVeigh could ruin everything that everyone has worked so hard for."  Of course, he doesn't mention the thousands of innocent people that could be hurt or killed by such an act.  His only concern is the protection of his twisted ideology (and his job).  But, once you yell "Fire!" in a crowded theater, it's a little hard to take it back.

I'm really starting to get worried now.  Reading some of the signs carried during the recent "million-moron march" quite literally sickened me.  Recently a Muslim woman came in to my workplace.  She wanted my help picking out a bottle of wine for a Jewish friend for Rosh Hashanah.  (Unfortunately, I was of little help to her.  Being a atheist, most religion looks the same to me.)  Still, I thought it was really cool, and was thinking "Only in America".  My next customer, who in all other respects was a sweet, little old lady, leaned close to me and whispered, "I wish they were all dead."

It broke my heart.  Such hate and ignorance, spoken so casually, was the same I witnessed in prison.  The base, primal fear of anything that looks and acts different might have served some purpose early in our evolution.  The irony is, that same fear may also end us as a species.

Me?  I like diversity, reason, and compassion.  I like the fact that I can get on a bus and hear six different languages spoken. I've met a lot of good people from all over the world, and my first thought isn't, "Why can't they look and act more like me?"

Perhaps prison served its intended purpose.  It made me want to be a more active, responsible person; to leave behind something positive when I go.

So, to all you conservatives out there, so desperate for an enemy to hate.  Relax, you found him.

News Items...

Interesting week in the news.  The CIA torturing prisoners with power drills.  A Nutjob with an assault rifle shows up at an Obama opposition rally in Phoenix.  A woman yells "Heil Hitler" at a Jew during a town hall meeting (and her actions are promptly defended by a couple of skinheads).  Out of all this absurdity, one thing caught my eye.  Hawaii is removing 168 female inmates from a private prison in Kentucky over charges of abuse by guards.  You'd think someone in Hawaii would have seen that one coming.  The story is bad enough, but one little tidbit blew my mind. 

In Kentucky, the rape of an inmate by a prison guard is a misdemeanor.

My people have a President

I caught this on CSPAN yesterday. John Hodgman (PC guy) at the Radio & TV Correspondent's Assn. Dinner. I noticed the conspicuous absence of MAC guy. Off someplace being cool, I suspect. Linux girl really should have been there, though.