Tuesday, July 31, 2007
Bushie Tantrums
Hey Folks -
This is from a while back, but it still rings true. Darth Cheney will be bullshitting Larry King tonight; so I think this works.
- Uke Man
July 1, 2007
Tears on My Pillow
By MAUREEN DOWD
“I miss Albania!” W. wails. “They know how to treat a president there. Women were kissing me and men rubbed my hair. The crowd kept yelling, ‘Bushie!,’ and they almost grabbed the watch right off my wrist trying to get at me.”
The concerned group huddling outside the president’s closed-bedroom door in Kennebunkport can barely hear him. His voice is muffled because he has his face buried in his feather pillow, which the Secret Service has carefully transported from Washington to Maine for the weekend, knowing that it would be needed. They guard it so conscientiously that they have even given it a code name. Since the president’s Secret Service name is Tumbler, his agents christened his beloved pillow Slumber.
“Son, I know how you feel,” Poppy calls in to him, trying to sound positive. “Riding high in 2002, shot down in 2007. That’s life, as Sinatra says. You were a puppet and a pawn to King Dick and it screwed up your presidency and our party and the Middle East and the Atlantic alliance and the family legacy and Jeb’s future, not to mention the fate of the planet.
But you can’t just roll yourself up in a big ball and die, George. Your friend Vlad the Impaler is here, and I think you should come out and talk to him. You invited him and he came all the way from Russia, and you don’t want to be rude.
“I’ve already taken him to Mabel’s Lobster Claw and out on the boat. He scared all the fish away. I don’t know what else to do with him, George.He brained the Filipino manservant, the little brown one, with a horseshoe.”
Putin steps forward. “Let me try,” he tells Poppy.
“George, hey, it’s me, Ostrich Legs, Pooty Poot. Remember when you gave me those nicknames? Come out, and I show you my real soul. Dark, dark, dark. I put the Putin back in Rasputin.
Listen, Albania stinks. Maine much nicer. I saw Moose and Squirrel in the woods. Let’s throw horseshoes at them! I love this American sport.”
Tumbler burrows into Slumber. “Why doesn’t anybody like me anymore,Daddy?” he keens. “Man, I miss Tony. My Iraq
poodle left me with a porcupine. And I can’t believe my own Republicans crossed me on the immigration bill. Now my Mexican buddies from Midland are saying, ‘Adiós, Jorge.’ Vice doesn’t even want to be in the same branch of government as me. Where is Dick, by the way?”
His mother steps briskly up to the door. “Now listen, Georgie,” Barbara says. “We didn’t invite Dick. He’s not our kind. He has utterly ruined your presidency. There’s a Washington Post series I want you to read. I’ve put it in the kitchen by your bowl of Cookie Crisps. It explains all about how Dick played you for a fool on everything from Iraq to capital gains.
He set up the West Wing paper flow in a way that undermined your goals and advanced his. He let you act like you were the Decider, dear, when you were really just the Dupe.”
W. howls, “Dick promised me I would never be a wimp and now I’m a wimp!”
Putin intervenes. “No, George, don’t blame Dick,” he says. “Dick good man. Shoots friend in face. But Dick too soft. Friend lived. He needs put more people in your Gitmo gulag, shut down newspapers, kill more critics. I’ll send you some of my special polonium-210 pellets. They just like Altoids, curiously strong.”
Clarence Thomas rushes up to the door, black robes flapping. “I got here as fast as I could,” he assures Poppy, before yelling in to W.: “I’m sorry about the Guantánamo decision. I don’t know what my brethren were thinking, applying the Constitution to Cuba. What’s law got to do with it? I should have fought harder. I was a little distracted by our decision to stop race from being a factor in making schools racially diverse. I needed to make sure that black children all over America would have none of the advantages I had.”
Henry Kissinger oils his way across the floor. “Mr. President,” he rumblesthrough the door, “it’s not so bad bungling a war. I got to date Jill St.John.”
Condi joins the group, and wrinkles her nose at Putin. He puts his arm around her and gives her head a noogie. “When I said U.S. aggression is like Third Reich,” he tells her, with his most charming K.G.B. smile, “I meant it in a good way.”
Condi ignores him and coos to W.: “There’s bad news and good news, sir. Or maybe it’s Vice versa. Cheney’s going to pardon Scooter. And the Albanians have agreed to put your presidential library in Tirana.”
Monday, July 30, 2007
Intellect v Emotion
Hey Folks -
Below, columnist Robym Blumner discusses the Democrats' "problem" getting people to support them. Based upon the work of a university psychology professor, she says:
"Democrats have been appealing to the dispassionate, rational, fact-sensitive voter, a being, apparently, who doesn't exist."
I guess you gotta get emotional if you want support. Americans, she says, keep supporting the Republicans even though " In most polls, Americans are demonstrably more supportive of the Democratic agenda."
What does this say about Americans ?
It says that a large minority of us (those supporters of the Republican agenda) are stupid enough or slimy enough or selfish enough to actually favor and enjoy poor-bashing, gay-bashing, union-bashing, science-bashing, constitution-trashing, ad nauseum.
But worse, it says that a majority of us are smart enough to see that the Democrats' agenda - as puny as it may be - is superior to the Republicans'; but we are too weak emotionally to support what we intellectually know is superior.
That's pretty damned pathetic, but - in my experience - it is true. It's the only thing I've been able to find that explains why people tend to behave irrationally in so many instances where it is completely obvious - on an intellectual level - that they should act differently.
Many aspects of society are completely or partially irrational; for example, many notions within "Intelligent Design," multiple religions' claiming to be the ONE true religion, racism, sexism, homophobia, faith in political parties; the need to be thin, tan, young, and beautiful; the glory of sports, celebrities, etc., etc., etc.
Much of society is irrational on its face, such as the claim "we are a nation of laws, not men" while quite clearly the "justice" system regularly treats celebrities, wealthy people, and the President's gophers better than the rest of us (especially the poor and minorities among us).
But beyond that, these irrationalities are multiplied immensely by their interaction among themselves. For example, Christianity as practiced by most people is full of irrational contradictions, but these are multiplied when many self-identified Christians claim also to be capitalists, good Americans, tax-resisters, capital punishment proponents, or war supporters - to name a few.
Whatever irrational conflicts exist within his or her personal Christianity, a Christian cannot RATIONALLY justify support for "buyer beware," capital punishment, or the Iraq war. A Christian who demands Christian prayer in public school cannot RATIONALLY claim to be supporting America's Constitution. A Christian cannot RATIONALLY justify withholding Caesar's taxes from Caesar.
Yet, they do; they do all of this and more; and they do it on an emotional basis - in the face of perfectly obvious and overwhelming objective evidence to the contrary; and all the while they move blithely along, cushioned from the factual, objective, scientific reality by an inpenetrable hedge of interlocking emotional fabrications.
Pretty damned pathetic.
- Uke Man
Robyn Blumner: Democrats should shed the gloves
Monday, July 23, 2007
By Robyn Blumner
Democrats finally have a prophet who can lead them to the promised land of winning national elections.
In one exceptionally clear 400-page volume, Drew Westen, a professor of psychology at Emory University, lays out everything that Democrats have been doing wrong. He explains it in neuroscientific terms according to what regions of the brain control political decision-making, but it comes down to this: Democrats have been appealing to the dispassionate, rational, fact-sensitive voter, a being, apparently, who doesn't exist.
According to Westen's The Political Brain: The Role of Emotions in Deciding the Fate of the Nation, winning elections is all about influencing feelings and emotions. Westen says bringing more passion into politics requires storytelling narratives and other emotional cues that powerfully engage those circuits of the brain that recruit and reinforce beliefs.
Democrats keep losing presidential campaigns, not because the issues they stand for are unappealing, but because they tend to structure their campaigns to engage the brain's reasoning centers. The results speak for themselves. In most polls, Americans are demonstrably more supportive of the Democratic agenda, yet Republicans keep winning.
The most blatant example of an emotionally dead campaign was that moment during the 1988 presidential debates when moderator Bernard Shaw asked Michael Dukakis whether he would favor the death penalty for someone who raped and murdered his wife.
"No, I don't, Bernard," Dukakis said. "I don't see any evidence that it's a deterrent, and I think there are better and more-effective ways to deal with violent crime."
As Westen writes, Dukakis answered in the language of "rational utility," describing his concerns for the death penalty's deterrent value. But the average listener heard a different question: "Are you a man?" The answer was no.
Democrats insist on taking the high road and focusing on policy, fact and expertise, while Republicans willingly use unconscious emotional cues such as race baiting (Willie Horton, states' rights, etc.) to win by any means.
Westen says Democrats should not dip into such unethical waters, but they should not shy away from negative campaigning. He says that positive and negative associations engage different parts of the brain, and no campaign should cede half this neurological territory.
During a presidential debate between George W. Bush and Al Gore, moderator Jim Lehrer asked Bush whether there were character differences between himself and Gore. Bush raised the specter of fund-raising improprieties by Gore at a Buddhist temple and suggesting that the Lincoln bedroom was offered as a prize to big donors while Gore was vice president. (Westen says Lincoln bedroom also allowed Bush to draw unconscious associations with sexual improprieties in the White House.)
Gore's response: "I think we ought to attack our country's problems, not attack each other. I want to spend my time making this country even better than it is, not trying to make you out to be a bad person."
Westen says that Gore demonstrated a weakness that resonated particularly with Southern men, who more aggressively respond to any slight of honor. (Physiological tests prove it.) Gore didn't carry a single state of the former Confederacy, not even his own.
Here is Westen's proposed rejoinder: "Governor, you have attacked my honor and integrity in front of my family, the people of my home state of Tennessee, and millions of my fellow Americans. So I think it's time to teach you a few old-fashioned lessons about character.
"When I enlisted to fight in the Vietnam War, you were talkin' real tough about Vietnam. But when you got the call, you called your daddy and begged him to pull some strings so you wouldn't have to go to war. So instead of defending your country with honor, you put some poor Texas mill worker's kid on the front line in your place to get shot at.
"Where I come from, we call that a coward."
I'm guessing that Southern men might have perked up.
Voting is emotional, not cognitive, Westen says.
Yes, this is distressing to hear. But it is a fact that Democrats need to fully appreciate and start acting on, if they want a fighting chance for the presidency.
Robyn Blumner writes for Tribune Media Services.
blumner@sptimes.com
Below, columnist Robym Blumner discusses the Democrats' "problem" getting people to support them. Based upon the work of a university psychology professor, she says:
"Democrats have been appealing to the dispassionate, rational, fact-sensitive voter, a being, apparently, who doesn't exist."
I guess you gotta get emotional if you want support. Americans, she says, keep supporting the Republicans even though " In most polls, Americans are demonstrably more supportive of the Democratic agenda."
What does this say about Americans ?
It says that a large minority of us (those supporters of the Republican agenda) are stupid enough or slimy enough or selfish enough to actually favor and enjoy poor-bashing, gay-bashing, union-bashing, science-bashing, constitution-trashing, ad nauseum.
But worse, it says that a majority of us are smart enough to see that the Democrats' agenda - as puny as it may be - is superior to the Republicans'; but we are too weak emotionally to support what we intellectually know is superior.
That's pretty damned pathetic, but - in my experience - it is true. It's the only thing I've been able to find that explains why people tend to behave irrationally in so many instances where it is completely obvious - on an intellectual level - that they should act differently.
Many aspects of society are completely or partially irrational; for example, many notions within "Intelligent Design," multiple religions' claiming to be the ONE true religion, racism, sexism, homophobia, faith in political parties; the need to be thin, tan, young, and beautiful; the glory of sports, celebrities, etc., etc., etc.
Much of society is irrational on its face, such as the claim "we are a nation of laws, not men" while quite clearly the "justice" system regularly treats celebrities, wealthy people, and the President's gophers better than the rest of us (especially the poor and minorities among us).
But beyond that, these irrationalities are multiplied immensely by their interaction among themselves. For example, Christianity as practiced by most people is full of irrational contradictions, but these are multiplied when many self-identified Christians claim also to be capitalists, good Americans, tax-resisters, capital punishment proponents, or war supporters - to name a few.
Whatever irrational conflicts exist within his or her personal Christianity, a Christian cannot RATIONALLY justify support for "buyer beware," capital punishment, or the Iraq war. A Christian who demands Christian prayer in public school cannot RATIONALLY claim to be supporting America's Constitution. A Christian cannot RATIONALLY justify withholding Caesar's taxes from Caesar.
Yet, they do; they do all of this and more; and they do it on an emotional basis - in the face of perfectly obvious and overwhelming objective evidence to the contrary; and all the while they move blithely along, cushioned from the factual, objective, scientific reality by an inpenetrable hedge of interlocking emotional fabrications.
Pretty damned pathetic.
- Uke Man
Robyn Blumner: Democrats should shed the gloves
Monday, July 23, 2007
By Robyn Blumner
Democrats finally have a prophet who can lead them to the promised land of winning national elections.
In one exceptionally clear 400-page volume, Drew Westen, a professor of psychology at Emory University, lays out everything that Democrats have been doing wrong. He explains it in neuroscientific terms according to what regions of the brain control political decision-making, but it comes down to this: Democrats have been appealing to the dispassionate, rational, fact-sensitive voter, a being, apparently, who doesn't exist.
According to Westen's The Political Brain: The Role of Emotions in Deciding the Fate of the Nation, winning elections is all about influencing feelings and emotions. Westen says bringing more passion into politics requires storytelling narratives and other emotional cues that powerfully engage those circuits of the brain that recruit and reinforce beliefs.
Democrats keep losing presidential campaigns, not because the issues they stand for are unappealing, but because they tend to structure their campaigns to engage the brain's reasoning centers. The results speak for themselves. In most polls, Americans are demonstrably more supportive of the Democratic agenda, yet Republicans keep winning.
The most blatant example of an emotionally dead campaign was that moment during the 1988 presidential debates when moderator Bernard Shaw asked Michael Dukakis whether he would favor the death penalty for someone who raped and murdered his wife.
"No, I don't, Bernard," Dukakis said. "I don't see any evidence that it's a deterrent, and I think there are better and more-effective ways to deal with violent crime."
As Westen writes, Dukakis answered in the language of "rational utility," describing his concerns for the death penalty's deterrent value. But the average listener heard a different question: "Are you a man?" The answer was no.
Democrats insist on taking the high road and focusing on policy, fact and expertise, while Republicans willingly use unconscious emotional cues such as race baiting (Willie Horton, states' rights, etc.) to win by any means.
Westen says Democrats should not dip into such unethical waters, but they should not shy away from negative campaigning. He says that positive and negative associations engage different parts of the brain, and no campaign should cede half this neurological territory.
During a presidential debate between George W. Bush and Al Gore, moderator Jim Lehrer asked Bush whether there were character differences between himself and Gore. Bush raised the specter of fund-raising improprieties by Gore at a Buddhist temple and suggesting that the Lincoln bedroom was offered as a prize to big donors while Gore was vice president. (Westen says Lincoln bedroom also allowed Bush to draw unconscious associations with sexual improprieties in the White House.)
Gore's response: "I think we ought to attack our country's problems, not attack each other. I want to spend my time making this country even better than it is, not trying to make you out to be a bad person."
Westen says that Gore demonstrated a weakness that resonated particularly with Southern men, who more aggressively respond to any slight of honor. (Physiological tests prove it.) Gore didn't carry a single state of the former Confederacy, not even his own.
Here is Westen's proposed rejoinder: "Governor, you have attacked my honor and integrity in front of my family, the people of my home state of Tennessee, and millions of my fellow Americans. So I think it's time to teach you a few old-fashioned lessons about character.
"When I enlisted to fight in the Vietnam War, you were talkin' real tough about Vietnam. But when you got the call, you called your daddy and begged him to pull some strings so you wouldn't have to go to war. So instead of defending your country with honor, you put some poor Texas mill worker's kid on the front line in your place to get shot at.
"Where I come from, we call that a coward."
I'm guessing that Southern men might have perked up.
Voting is emotional, not cognitive, Westen says.
Yes, this is distressing to hear. But it is a fact that Democrats need to fully appreciate and start acting on, if they want a fighting chance for the presidency.
Robyn Blumner writes for Tribune Media Services.
blumner@sptimes.com
Sunday, July 29, 2007
The "Good Ol' Days"
Before the "socialists" and "communists" on the Supreme Court and in Congress had their way
The answer is RACISM and CLASSISM
Hey Folks -
It sometimes amazes me what the Dispatch (my local newspaper) will publish under the heading "Letters to the Editor." Below is one you can almost smell as well as read. According to its editors (speaking on a local radio program), the paper is a "moderately conservative" paper and on its editorial page presents equal numbers of commentary by lefty pundits and righty pundits, going "right down the middle."
Unfortunately, they went on to identify Thomas Friedman as the lefty balancing out George Will, the righty. Sort of makes the "middle" somewhere to the right of the middle, don't you think?
Read the letter below (I think it's [maybe] to the right); then I'll have a bit more to say. I've inserted a few comments in blue.
Court working to right some wrongs
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
I respond to the July 3 Dispatch Forum column by Eugene Robinson, "High court's school ruling means many more steps backward." Robinson has it wrong.
It has taken the court 53 years to right the wrongs committed by leftist members of the U.S. Supreme Court (He's talking about 1954 and the Brown v. Board of Education case. Obviously, he thinks "separate but equal" is just fine). If anything, President Bush's legacy of turning the court around and heading it back toward adhering to the U.S. Constitution, getting away from legislating from the bench and quitting its social engineering will be an accomplishment long overdue. Can this be interpreted as anything other than hoping for a "long overdue" return to segregation and "Jim Crow"?
Robinson played the race card all through his column (whatever that means, Robinson was still NOT a racist). He can't face failure.
He continued to talk about diversity. Only socialists and communists use the term. (And, for the most part, racists are the ones who call advocates of "diversity" "socialists and communists.") It is a dismal failure.
Our forced busing to accomplish integrated schools, and integrated schools after 53 years are also a failure (The reasons are racism and classism). If diversity is so wonderful, ask yourself, why did "white flight"occur? (Because of racism and classism) Why have school boards in major cities, including Columbus, gone under black control? (Because of racism and classism) Why have standards fallen? (Because of racism and classism) Why have the percentage of high-school graduates fallen? (Because of racism and classism) Grade averages? (Because of racism and classism)
On what standard are they based?
Why are students in the 12th grade unable to pass a ninth-grade evaluation test? (Because of racism and classism) Why is an all-black high school allowed to exist? (Because of racism and classism) When will an all-white high school be instituted? They already exist.
In conclusion, when the court continues to act and respond like a Supreme Court should, would it be too much to expect our Congress to again be legislators and statesmen, instead of political hacks, continually campaigning, raising money for campaigns and voting themselves raises? Yeah, let's return to pre-1954 when everything was nearly perfect - in the schools, on the busses, at the pools, in the diners, and even at the water fountains.
DALE E. LAUFFER
Columbus
Now aside from the sadly ignorant, possibly demented racism of this letter, doesn't it put the Dispatch in a difficult position? What is the "opposite" view that will keep the letters page ballanced right down the middle?
Would it be a letter demanding whites be sent back to Europe? Does someone need to demand that 12% of the states be set aside for Black Americans only? Or does the Dispatch see something more humane - like Rodney King's "Why can't we all just get along" - as radical enough to ballance Lauffer's sick and hateful rant?
Sort of puts the "middle" somewhere to the right of the middle, don't you think?
- Uke Man
It sometimes amazes me what the Dispatch (my local newspaper) will publish under the heading "Letters to the Editor." Below is one you can almost smell as well as read. According to its editors (speaking on a local radio program), the paper is a "moderately conservative" paper and on its editorial page presents equal numbers of commentary by lefty pundits and righty pundits, going "right down the middle."
Unfortunately, they went on to identify Thomas Friedman as the lefty balancing out George Will, the righty. Sort of makes the "middle" somewhere to the right of the middle, don't you think?
Read the letter below (I think it's [maybe] to the right); then I'll have a bit more to say. I've inserted a few comments in blue.
Court working to right some wrongs
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
I respond to the July 3 Dispatch Forum column by Eugene Robinson, "High court's school ruling means many more steps backward." Robinson has it wrong.
It has taken the court 53 years to right the wrongs committed by leftist members of the U.S. Supreme Court (He's talking about 1954 and the Brown v. Board of Education case. Obviously, he thinks "separate but equal" is just fine). If anything, President Bush's legacy of turning the court around and heading it back toward adhering to the U.S. Constitution, getting away from legislating from the bench and quitting its social engineering will be an accomplishment long overdue. Can this be interpreted as anything other than hoping for a "long overdue" return to segregation and "Jim Crow"?
Robinson played the race card all through his column (whatever that means, Robinson was still NOT a racist). He can't face failure.
He continued to talk about diversity. Only socialists and communists use the term. (And, for the most part, racists are the ones who call advocates of "diversity" "socialists and communists.") It is a dismal failure.
Our forced busing to accomplish integrated schools, and integrated schools after 53 years are also a failure (The reasons are racism and classism). If diversity is so wonderful, ask yourself, why did "white flight"occur? (Because of racism and classism) Why have school boards in major cities, including Columbus, gone under black control? (Because of racism and classism) Why have standards fallen? (Because of racism and classism) Why have the percentage of high-school graduates fallen? (Because of racism and classism) Grade averages? (Because of racism and classism)
On what standard are they based?
Why are students in the 12th grade unable to pass a ninth-grade evaluation test? (Because of racism and classism) Why is an all-black high school allowed to exist? (Because of racism and classism) When will an all-white high school be instituted? They already exist.
In conclusion, when the court continues to act and respond like a Supreme Court should, would it be too much to expect our Congress to again be legislators and statesmen, instead of political hacks, continually campaigning, raising money for campaigns and voting themselves raises? Yeah, let's return to pre-1954 when everything was nearly perfect - in the schools, on the busses, at the pools, in the diners, and even at the water fountains.
DALE E. LAUFFER
Columbus
Now aside from the sadly ignorant, possibly demented racism of this letter, doesn't it put the Dispatch in a difficult position? What is the "opposite" view that will keep the letters page ballanced right down the middle?
Would it be a letter demanding whites be sent back to Europe? Does someone need to demand that 12% of the states be set aside for Black Americans only? Or does the Dispatch see something more humane - like Rodney King's "Why can't we all just get along" - as radical enough to ballance Lauffer's sick and hateful rant?
Sort of puts the "middle" somewhere to the right of the middle, don't you think?
- Uke Man
Saturday, July 28, 2007
Is Prayer Efficacious ???
Hey Folks –
Have you heard: Dick Cheney got his mechanical heart operated on today. I heard that he survived the procedure – proving beyond a doubt that prayer is fruitless.
Has anyone heard? Before he went under the knife did he pass the power of the Presidency on to the Bush kid?
If so, has he taken it back yet? Or is it being held in an undisclosed location?
Just wondering.
- Uke Man
Have you heard: Dick Cheney got his mechanical heart operated on today. I heard that he survived the procedure – proving beyond a doubt that prayer is fruitless.
Has anyone heard? Before he went under the knife did he pass the power of the Presidency on to the Bush kid?
If so, has he taken it back yet? Or is it being held in an undisclosed location?
Just wondering.
- Uke Man
Friday, July 27, 2007
Thursday, July 26, 2007
An interesting film - review and clips from NPR
Hey Folks -
Here's what looks to me like an interesting movie: "This Is England."
Get the lowdown at: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=12225611
Here's a bit of what you can read or hear (and be sure to find the "Watch 'England' Clips" section down the page a ways):
Maggie Thatcher's England, 1983, just after the Falklands war: In a town where there are no jobs, men who want to support their families head off to become cannon fodder, leaving their children behind. Shaun is a smart 12-year-old, who lost his father in the war, and who therefore, in the merciless logic of the schoolyard, gets picked on constantly. So his eyes are blurred with tears as he blunders into what looks like trouble: a gang of skinheads lounging beneath an overpass.
- Uke Man
Here's what looks to me like an interesting movie: "This Is England."
Get the lowdown at: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=12225611
Here's a bit of what you can read or hear (and be sure to find the "Watch 'England' Clips" section down the page a ways):
Maggie Thatcher's England, 1983, just after the Falklands war: In a town where there are no jobs, men who want to support their families head off to become cannon fodder, leaving their children behind. Shaun is a smart 12-year-old, who lost his father in the war, and who therefore, in the merciless logic of the schoolyard, gets picked on constantly. So his eyes are blurred with tears as he blunders into what looks like trouble: a gang of skinheads lounging beneath an overpass.
- Uke Man
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
It's no accident that every "grass" contains an "ass"!!
Grass as green as money, thick as thieves, a glorious horizontal tapestry to quiet self-doubt and the scum who call you "shallow"!! Cheaper than Prozac, more effective than therapy
Now here's a god I could believe in !!
Hey Folks -
Michael Coleman is a Black Democrat and the mayor of Columbus, Ohio. Long ago early in his tenure a local, weekly newspaper ran a story on him that destroyed all the hopes I had foolishly projected onto his victory.
I should have gotten a clue from the fact that the local, conservative newspaper's editorial board didn't find him too objectionable; but it was the story on the mayor's lawn that sent me into depression.
As it turns out, the mayor (of the URBAN metropolis) obsesses about his lawn!! So much so, that he won't even let his son mow it because he might not do it right!! Our urban mayor is a closeted suburbanite!!
Since then I've bragged to outlanders that Mr. Coleman is the first white Black Mayor of Columbus.
To get a feel for what god might think, read on.
- Uke Man
YARD WORK - AS VIEWED FROM HEAVEN
(overheard in a conversation between God and St. Francis)
(a ukethanks to Sondra)
God: Francis, you know all about gardens and nature; what in theworld is going on down there in the U.S.? What happened to the dandelions, violets, thistles and the stuff I started eons ago? I had a perfect no-maintenance garden plan. Those plants grow in any type of soil, withstand drought, and multiply with abandon. The nectar from the long-lasting blossoms attracts butterflies, honeybees, and flocks of songbirds. I expected to see a vast garden of color by now. All I see are patches of green.
St. Francis: It's the tribes that settled there, Lord. They are called the Suburbanites. They started calling your flowers"weeds" and went to great lengths to kill them and replace them with grass.
God: Grass? But it is so boring, it's not colorful. It doesn't attract butterflies, bees or birds, only grubs and sod worms. It's temperamental with temperatures. Do these Suburbanites really want grass growing there?
St. Francis: Apparently not, Lord. As soon as it has grown a little, they cut it....sometimes two times a week.
God: They cut it? Do they bale it like hay?
St. Francis: Not exactly, Lord. Most of them rake it up and putit in bags.
God: They bag it? Why? Is it a cash crop? Do they sell it?
St. Francis: No sir, just the opposite. They pay to throw itaway.
God: Now let me get this straight...they fertilize it to make it grow and when it does grow, they cut it off and pay to throw it away?
St. Francis: Yes, sir.God: These Suburbanites must be relieved in the summer when we cut back on the rain and turn up the heat. That surely slows the growth and saves them a lot of work.
St. Francis: You aren't going to believe this Lord, but when the grass stops growing so fast, they drag out hoses and pay more money to water it so they can continue to mow it and pay to get rid of it.
God: What nonsense! At least they kept some of the trees.That was a sheer stroke of genius, if I do say so myself.The trees grow leaves in the spring to provide beauty and shade in the summer. In the autumn they fall to the ground and form a natural blanket to keep the moisture in the soil and protect the trees and bushes. Plus, as they rot, the leaves become compost to enhance the soil. It's a natural circle of life.
St. Francis: You'd better sit down, Lord. As soon as the leaves fall, the Suburbanites rake them into great piles and pay to have them hauled away.
God: No way! What do they do to protect the shrubs and tree roots in the winter to keep the soil moist and loose?
St Francis: After throwing the leaves away, they go out and buysomething called mulch. They haul it home and spread it around in place of the leaves.
God: And where do they get this mulch?
St. Francis: They cut down the trees and grind them up to makemulch.
God: Enough! I don't want to think about this anymore.Saint Catherine, you're in charge of the arts. What movie have you scheduled for us tonight?
St. Catherine: "Dumb and Dumber," Lord. It's a really stupid movie about....
God: Never mind--I think I just heard the whole story from SaintFrancis!
Michael Coleman is a Black Democrat and the mayor of Columbus, Ohio. Long ago early in his tenure a local, weekly newspaper ran a story on him that destroyed all the hopes I had foolishly projected onto his victory.
I should have gotten a clue from the fact that the local, conservative newspaper's editorial board didn't find him too objectionable; but it was the story on the mayor's lawn that sent me into depression.
As it turns out, the mayor (of the URBAN metropolis) obsesses about his lawn!! So much so, that he won't even let his son mow it because he might not do it right!! Our urban mayor is a closeted suburbanite!!
Since then I've bragged to outlanders that Mr. Coleman is the first white Black Mayor of Columbus.
To get a feel for what god might think, read on.
- Uke Man
YARD WORK - AS VIEWED FROM HEAVEN
(overheard in a conversation between God and St. Francis)
(a ukethanks to Sondra)
God: Francis, you know all about gardens and nature; what in theworld is going on down there in the U.S.? What happened to the dandelions, violets, thistles and the stuff I started eons ago? I had a perfect no-maintenance garden plan. Those plants grow in any type of soil, withstand drought, and multiply with abandon. The nectar from the long-lasting blossoms attracts butterflies, honeybees, and flocks of songbirds. I expected to see a vast garden of color by now. All I see are patches of green.
St. Francis: It's the tribes that settled there, Lord. They are called the Suburbanites. They started calling your flowers"weeds" and went to great lengths to kill them and replace them with grass.
God: Grass? But it is so boring, it's not colorful. It doesn't attract butterflies, bees or birds, only grubs and sod worms. It's temperamental with temperatures. Do these Suburbanites really want grass growing there?
St. Francis: Apparently not, Lord. As soon as it has grown a little, they cut it....sometimes two times a week.
God: They cut it? Do they bale it like hay?
St. Francis: Not exactly, Lord. Most of them rake it up and putit in bags.
God: They bag it? Why? Is it a cash crop? Do they sell it?
St. Francis: No sir, just the opposite. They pay to throw itaway.
God: Now let me get this straight...they fertilize it to make it grow and when it does grow, they cut it off and pay to throw it away?
St. Francis: Yes, sir.God: These Suburbanites must be relieved in the summer when we cut back on the rain and turn up the heat. That surely slows the growth and saves them a lot of work.
St. Francis: You aren't going to believe this Lord, but when the grass stops growing so fast, they drag out hoses and pay more money to water it so they can continue to mow it and pay to get rid of it.
God: What nonsense! At least they kept some of the trees.That was a sheer stroke of genius, if I do say so myself.The trees grow leaves in the spring to provide beauty and shade in the summer. In the autumn they fall to the ground and form a natural blanket to keep the moisture in the soil and protect the trees and bushes. Plus, as they rot, the leaves become compost to enhance the soil. It's a natural circle of life.
St. Francis: You'd better sit down, Lord. As soon as the leaves fall, the Suburbanites rake them into great piles and pay to have them hauled away.
God: No way! What do they do to protect the shrubs and tree roots in the winter to keep the soil moist and loose?
St Francis: After throwing the leaves away, they go out and buysomething called mulch. They haul it home and spread it around in place of the leaves.
God: And where do they get this mulch?
St. Francis: They cut down the trees and grind them up to makemulch.
God: Enough! I don't want to think about this anymore.Saint Catherine, you're in charge of the arts. What movie have you scheduled for us tonight?
St. Catherine: "Dumb and Dumber," Lord. It's a really stupid movie about....
God: Never mind--I think I just heard the whole story from SaintFrancis!
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
David Brooks is nuts again
Hey Folks -
Here's what Eugene Robinson thinks about the cheery little chipmunk in the White House.
- Uke Man
Bush's view of war effort is disturbing
Monday, July 23, 2007
By Eugene Robinson
One hopes the leader of the free world hasn't really, truly lost touch with objective reality. But one does have to wonder.
Last week, President Bush invited nine conservative pundits to the White House for what amounted to a pep talk, with the president providing all the pep. Somehow I was left off the list -- must have been an oversight. But some columnists who attended have been writing about the meeting or describing it to colleagues, and their accounts are downright scary.
National Review's Kate O'Beirne, who joined the presidential chat in the Roosevelt Room, told me that the most striking thing was the president's incongruously sunny demeanor. Bush's approval ratings are well below freezing, the nation is sooooo finished with his foolish and tragic war, many of his remaining allies in Congress have given notice that come September they plan to leave the Decider alone in his private Alamo -- and the president remains optimistic and upbeat.
Bush was "not at all weary or anguished" and in fact "very energized," wrote Michael Barone of U.S. News & World Report. He was "as confident and upbeat as ever," observed Rich Lowry of National Review. "Far from being beleaguered, Bush was assertive and good-humored," according to David Brooks of The New York Times.
Excuse me? I guess now he must be in an even better mood, since the feckless Iraqi government announced its decision to take the whole month of August off while U.S. troops continue fighting and dying in Baghdad's 130-degree summer heat.
It's almost as if Bush were trying to apply the principles of cognitive therapy, the system developed by psychiatrist Aaron T. Beck in the 1960s. Beck found that getting patients to banish negative thoughts and develop patterns of positive thinking was helpful in pulling them out of depression. However, Beck was trying to get the patients to see themselves and the world realistically, whereas Bush has left realism far behind.
"He says the most useful argument to make in support of his policy is to show what failure would mean," Barone wrote of the president and Iraq. "It would mean an ascendant radicalism, among both Shiite and Sunni Muslims, and it would embolden sponsors of terrorism such as Iran. Al-Qaida would be emboldened and would be able to recruit forces."
Excuse me again? This is what Bush believes would happen? Hasn't he noticed that these catastrophes have already befallen us? And that they are the direct consequence of his decision to invade and occupy Iraq?
Someone had tried to point this out at a news conference earlier this month. Bush replied with such a bizarre version of history that I hope he was being cynical and doesn't really believe what he said: "Actually, I was hoping to solve the Iraqi issue diplomatically. That's why I went to the United Nations and worked with the United Nations Security Council, which unanimously passed a resolution that said disclose, disarm or face serious consequences. That was the message, the clear message to Saddam Hussein. He chose the course. . . . It was his decision to make."
Let's see, we have learned that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction. That means Bush is claiming that Saddam Hussein "chose" the invasion -- and, ultimately, his own death -- by not showing us what he didn't have.
"Bush gives the impression that he is more steadfast on the war than many in his own administration and that, if need be, he'll be the last hawk standing," wrote Lowry. The president says the results of his recent troop escalation will be evaluated by Gen. David Petraeus, wrote Barone, and not by "the polls."
Translation: Everybody's out of step but me.
One of the more unnerving reports out of the president's seminar with the pundits came from Brooks, who quoted Bush as saying: "It's more of a theological perspective. I do believe there is an Almighty, and I believe a gift of that Almighty to all is freedom. And I will tell you that is a principle that no one can convince me that doesn't exist."
It's bad enough that Osama bin Laden is still out there plotting bloody new acts of terrorism, convinced that God wants him to slay the infidels. Now we know that the president of the United States believes God has chosen him to bring freedom to the world, that he refuses to acknowledge setbacks in his crusade and that he flat-out doesn't care what "the polls" -- meaning the American people -- might think. I'm having trouble seeing the bright side. I think I need cognitive therapy.
Eugene Robinson writes for the Washington Post Writers Group.
eugenerobinson@washpost.com
Here's what Eugene Robinson thinks about the cheery little chipmunk in the White House.
- Uke Man
Bush's view of war effort is disturbing
Monday, July 23, 2007
By Eugene Robinson
One hopes the leader of the free world hasn't really, truly lost touch with objective reality. But one does have to wonder.
Last week, President Bush invited nine conservative pundits to the White House for what amounted to a pep talk, with the president providing all the pep. Somehow I was left off the list -- must have been an oversight. But some columnists who attended have been writing about the meeting or describing it to colleagues, and their accounts are downright scary.
National Review's Kate O'Beirne, who joined the presidential chat in the Roosevelt Room, told me that the most striking thing was the president's incongruously sunny demeanor. Bush's approval ratings are well below freezing, the nation is sooooo finished with his foolish and tragic war, many of his remaining allies in Congress have given notice that come September they plan to leave the Decider alone in his private Alamo -- and the president remains optimistic and upbeat.
Bush was "not at all weary or anguished" and in fact "very energized," wrote Michael Barone of U.S. News & World Report. He was "as confident and upbeat as ever," observed Rich Lowry of National Review. "Far from being beleaguered, Bush was assertive and good-humored," according to David Brooks of The New York Times.
Excuse me? I guess now he must be in an even better mood, since the feckless Iraqi government announced its decision to take the whole month of August off while U.S. troops continue fighting and dying in Baghdad's 130-degree summer heat.
It's almost as if Bush were trying to apply the principles of cognitive therapy, the system developed by psychiatrist Aaron T. Beck in the 1960s. Beck found that getting patients to banish negative thoughts and develop patterns of positive thinking was helpful in pulling them out of depression. However, Beck was trying to get the patients to see themselves and the world realistically, whereas Bush has left realism far behind.
"He says the most useful argument to make in support of his policy is to show what failure would mean," Barone wrote of the president and Iraq. "It would mean an ascendant radicalism, among both Shiite and Sunni Muslims, and it would embolden sponsors of terrorism such as Iran. Al-Qaida would be emboldened and would be able to recruit forces."
Excuse me again? This is what Bush believes would happen? Hasn't he noticed that these catastrophes have already befallen us? And that they are the direct consequence of his decision to invade and occupy Iraq?
Someone had tried to point this out at a news conference earlier this month. Bush replied with such a bizarre version of history that I hope he was being cynical and doesn't really believe what he said: "Actually, I was hoping to solve the Iraqi issue diplomatically. That's why I went to the United Nations and worked with the United Nations Security Council, which unanimously passed a resolution that said disclose, disarm or face serious consequences. That was the message, the clear message to Saddam Hussein. He chose the course. . . . It was his decision to make."
Let's see, we have learned that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction. That means Bush is claiming that Saddam Hussein "chose" the invasion -- and, ultimately, his own death -- by not showing us what he didn't have.
"Bush gives the impression that he is more steadfast on the war than many in his own administration and that, if need be, he'll be the last hawk standing," wrote Lowry. The president says the results of his recent troop escalation will be evaluated by Gen. David Petraeus, wrote Barone, and not by "the polls."
Translation: Everybody's out of step but me.
One of the more unnerving reports out of the president's seminar with the pundits came from Brooks, who quoted Bush as saying: "It's more of a theological perspective. I do believe there is an Almighty, and I believe a gift of that Almighty to all is freedom. And I will tell you that is a principle that no one can convince me that doesn't exist."
It's bad enough that Osama bin Laden is still out there plotting bloody new acts of terrorism, convinced that God wants him to slay the infidels. Now we know that the president of the United States believes God has chosen him to bring freedom to the world, that he refuses to acknowledge setbacks in his crusade and that he flat-out doesn't care what "the polls" -- meaning the American people -- might think. I'm having trouble seeing the bright side. I think I need cognitive therapy.
Eugene Robinson writes for the Washington Post Writers Group.
eugenerobinson@washpost.com
Monday, July 23, 2007
David Brooks is nuts !!!
Hey Folks -
David Brooks recently wrote a column about how senators' views of Iraq "ranged from despondency to despair," but Bush was "assertive and good humored," "unshakably committed," a man who "feels no need to compromise," and who "seems empowered." Brooks proposes that Bush's "self-confidence is the most remarkable feature of his presidency." He talks about Bush's "unconquerable faith in the rightness of his Big Idea"; he quotes Bush describing his agenda, "It's more of a theological perspective." And it's apparent that Brooks finds all of this reassuring.
Brooks is an idiot!! See below what Paul Krugman thinks.
- Uke Man
July 20, 2007
All the President’s Enablers
By PAUL KRUGMAN
(a ukethanks to Phyll)
In a coordinated public relations offensive, the White House is using reliably friendly pundits — amazingly, they still exist — to put out the word that President Bush is as upbeat and confident as ever. It might even be true.
What I don’t understand is why we’re supposed to consider Mr. Bush’s continuing confidence a good thing.
Remember, Mr. Bush was confident six years ago when he promised to bring in Osama, dead or alive. He was confident four years ago, when he told the insurgents to bring it on. He was confident two years ago, when he told Brownie that he was doing a heckuva job.
Now Iraq is a bloody quagmire, Afghanistan is deteriorating and the Bush administration’s own National Intelligence Estimate admits, in effect, that thanks to Mr. Bush’s poor leadership America is losing the struggle with Al Qaeda. Yet Mr. Bush remains confident.
Sorry, but that’s not reassuring; it’s terrifying. It doesn’t demonstrate Mr. Bush’s strength of character; it shows that he has lost touch with reality.
Actually, it’s not clear that he ever was in touch with reality. I wrote about the Bush administration’s “infallibility complex,” its inability to admit mistakes or face up to real problems it didn’t want to deal with, in June 2002. Around the same time Ron Suskind, the investigative journalist, had a conversation with a senior Bush adviser who mocked the “reality-based community,” asserting that “when we act, we create our own reality.”
People who worried that the administration was living in a fantasy world used to be dismissed as victims of “Bush derangement syndrome,” liberals driven mad by Mr. Bush’s success. Now, however, it’s a syndrome that has spread even to former loyal Bushies.
Yet while Mr. Bush no longer has many true believers, he still has plenty of enablers — people who understand the folly of his actions, but refuse to do anything to stop him.
This week’s prime example is Senator Richard Lugar of Indiana, who made headlines a few weeks ago with a speech declaring that “our course in Iraq has lost contact with our vital national security interests.” Mr. Lugar is a smart, sensible man. He once acted courageously to head off another foreign policy disaster, persuading a reluctant Ronald Reagan to stop supporting Ferdinand Marcos, the corrupt leader of the Philippines, after a stolen election.
Yet that political courage was nowhere in evidence when Senate Democrats tried to get a vote on a measure that would have forced a course change in Iraq, and Republicans responded by threatening a filibuster. Mr. Lugar, along with several other Republicans who have expressed doubts about the war, voted against cutting off debate, thereby helping ensure that the folly he described so accurately in his Iraq speech will go on.
Thanks to that vote, nothing will happen until Gen. David Petraeus, the top commander in Iraq, delivers his report in September. But don’t expect too much even then. I hope he proves me wrong, but the general’s history suggests that he’s another smart, sensible enabler.
I don’t know why the op-ed article that General Petraeus published in The Washington Post on Sept. 26, 2004, hasn’t gotten more attention. After all, it puts to rest any notion that the general stands above politics: I don’t think it’s standard practice for serving military officers to publish opinion pieces that are strikingly helpful to an incumbent, six weeks before a national election.
In the article, General Petraeus told us that “Iraqi leaders are stepping forward, leading their country and their security forces courageously.” And those security forces were doing just fine: their leaders “are displaying courage and resilience” and “momentum has gathered in recent months.”
In other words, General Petraeus, without saying anything falsifiable, conveyed the totally misleading impression, highly convenient for his political masters, that victory was just around the corner. And the best guess has to be that he’ll do the same thing three years later.
You know, at this point I think we need to stop blaming Mr. Bush for the mess we’re in. He is what he always was, and everyone except a hard core of equally delusional loyalists knows it.
Yet Mr. Bush keeps doing damage because many people who understand how his folly is endangering the nation’s security still refuse, out of political caution and careerism, to do anything about it.
Sunday, July 22, 2007
"There are a lot of people who lie and get away with it."
Hey Folks -
Watch this video; then say "I support George W. Bush" three times, and your head will explode.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OgfzqulvhlQ
- Uke Man
p.s. Georgie claims to talk with god (the one in the Bible). Isn't "Thou shalt not lie" one of that god's 10 commandments?
Watch this video; then say "I support George W. Bush" three times, and your head will explode.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OgfzqulvhlQ
- Uke Man
p.s. Georgie claims to talk with god (the one in the Bible). Isn't "Thou shalt not lie" one of that god's 10 commandments?
Saturday, July 21, 2007
The Chickens are coming home to roost !!
Hey Folks -
H.L. Mencken said that no one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public. Well, if Froma Harrop is correct below, the American public may be waking up, but it's not clear whether any of the Bush criminals will go broke as a result of it.
More likely, when the sleeping slugs finally stir, it will be discovered that they are the ones who are broke.
- Uke Man
Anxiety in the Empire
by Froma Harrop
Now and then, a conservative columnist wonders why Americans have grown so sour about the country's future. After all, unemployment is low and stocks are rising. Sure, there's anger over the Iraq war and immigration, but things can't be that bad with the economy humming happily in the background. The implication: There's little troubling you that a trip to Circuit City couldn't fix.
Alas, retail therapy will not cure what's depressing most people — which is the growing sense that America is rapidly losing its national greatness. Up ahead, the public sees enormous challenges and huge threats, and a national leadership that doesn't care a fig about the communal big picture. They're witnessing this end-of-empire spectacle, where the powerful grabs as much loot as they can before the bottom falls out — all the while diverting the public's attention with flag-waving and noisy expressions of religiosity.
People are feeling conned as well as poorly led, which is not a pleasant sensation. Small wonder that 70 percent tell pollsters that the country is on the wrong track.
Americans do like to make money and spend it, but they also subscribe to some high ideals. In crises, they volunteer in droves. They risk their lives for strangers. While Americans prize individualism, they clearly value being part of a unique national story.
Thus, they feel vaguely insulted when their political establishment hangs low prices and tax cuts so high on the national altar. The American experience can't be all about consuming. Am I alone in regarding Cinderella's Castle in Disney World an undignified setting to swear in new citizens?
Americans see millions of working-class people slipping into poverty, as the super-rich amass astounding fortunes. Globalization deserves much of the blame for these trends, but then why widen the wealth gap — and federal budget deficits — with huge tax cuts for the wealthiest sliver?
The national debt is rising at shocking rates. Federal debt was less than 40 percent of gross domestic product in 2000. Under current tax and spending policies, it will reach 231 percent of GDP by 2050, according to a Center on Budget and Policy Priorities analysis of government numbers.
Personal borrowing is also worrisome and to some extent reflects desperate efforts to keep up appearances as real earnings slip. The median amount of credit-card debt carried by Americans is now $6,600. We are falling behind on servicing our consumer loans at the highest rate since 2001, according to a new report from the American Bankers Association.
America grew strong on Yankee ingenuity and scientific progress. Yet three Republican candidates for president question the theory of evolution, a building block of modern biology. The Bush administration's hostility to embryonic stem cell research is disappointing, but its efforts to talk down its potential are a disgrace. Add to that its public doubting of the science on global warming, then half-hearted measures to address the threat. Something has changed since America put men on the moon.
The Bush administration will occupy its own place of ignominy for several things — first, for trying to wage an unnecessary war on the cheap. At the same time, it left the national cash register open and unattended for well-connected corporate interests, be they oil companies, drug makers or defense contractors.
And so Americans may be pardoned for not celebrating the economic indicators. A country that doesn't pay its bills, that squanders its blood and prestige on military mistakes, that regards its working people as just another input in the global labor market doesn't sound like a country with a promising future. Americans sense they are losing what made them great, and that's why they're in a rotten mood.
H.L. Mencken said that no one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public. Well, if Froma Harrop is correct below, the American public may be waking up, but it's not clear whether any of the Bush criminals will go broke as a result of it.
More likely, when the sleeping slugs finally stir, it will be discovered that they are the ones who are broke.
- Uke Man
Anxiety in the Empire
by Froma Harrop
Now and then, a conservative columnist wonders why Americans have grown so sour about the country's future. After all, unemployment is low and stocks are rising. Sure, there's anger over the Iraq war and immigration, but things can't be that bad with the economy humming happily in the background. The implication: There's little troubling you that a trip to Circuit City couldn't fix.
Alas, retail therapy will not cure what's depressing most people — which is the growing sense that America is rapidly losing its national greatness. Up ahead, the public sees enormous challenges and huge threats, and a national leadership that doesn't care a fig about the communal big picture. They're witnessing this end-of-empire spectacle, where the powerful grabs as much loot as they can before the bottom falls out — all the while diverting the public's attention with flag-waving and noisy expressions of religiosity.
People are feeling conned as well as poorly led, which is not a pleasant sensation. Small wonder that 70 percent tell pollsters that the country is on the wrong track.
Americans do like to make money and spend it, but they also subscribe to some high ideals. In crises, they volunteer in droves. They risk their lives for strangers. While Americans prize individualism, they clearly value being part of a unique national story.
Thus, they feel vaguely insulted when their political establishment hangs low prices and tax cuts so high on the national altar. The American experience can't be all about consuming. Am I alone in regarding Cinderella's Castle in Disney World an undignified setting to swear in new citizens?
Americans see millions of working-class people slipping into poverty, as the super-rich amass astounding fortunes. Globalization deserves much of the blame for these trends, but then why widen the wealth gap — and federal budget deficits — with huge tax cuts for the wealthiest sliver?
The national debt is rising at shocking rates. Federal debt was less than 40 percent of gross domestic product in 2000. Under current tax and spending policies, it will reach 231 percent of GDP by 2050, according to a Center on Budget and Policy Priorities analysis of government numbers.
Personal borrowing is also worrisome and to some extent reflects desperate efforts to keep up appearances as real earnings slip. The median amount of credit-card debt carried by Americans is now $6,600. We are falling behind on servicing our consumer loans at the highest rate since 2001, according to a new report from the American Bankers Association.
America grew strong on Yankee ingenuity and scientific progress. Yet three Republican candidates for president question the theory of evolution, a building block of modern biology. The Bush administration's hostility to embryonic stem cell research is disappointing, but its efforts to talk down its potential are a disgrace. Add to that its public doubting of the science on global warming, then half-hearted measures to address the threat. Something has changed since America put men on the moon.
The Bush administration will occupy its own place of ignominy for several things — first, for trying to wage an unnecessary war on the cheap. At the same time, it left the national cash register open and unattended for well-connected corporate interests, be they oil companies, drug makers or defense contractors.
And so Americans may be pardoned for not celebrating the economic indicators. A country that doesn't pay its bills, that squanders its blood and prestige on military mistakes, that regards its working people as just another input in the global labor market doesn't sound like a country with a promising future. Americans sense they are losing what made them great, and that's why they're in a rotten mood.
Friday, July 20, 2007
Ice Cream and Coffee can be Dangerous !!
Hey Folks –
This morning I read about a man who had recently bought a laptop computer and had started using his lunch hour to sit in his car outside a coffee house checking his email via the webwaves emanating from the coffee establishment. After about a week of this he was accosted by policemen asking him who he was “spying” on. He was arrested and fined (as I remember) $400.00.
Later today I had a few minutes to kill before heading to my friend Pete’s for some recording; so, I stopped at the Dairy Queen for a Sunday (yum, yum: chocolate sauce, marshmallow, and crushed peanuts!!! What, when I was a kid, we called a “Jack & Jill”).
Anyway, I had been listening to the local public radio show interviewing a Brit living here and discussing the effort to contact extra-terrestrials. When the nice young Dairy Queen girl asked, “Is that for here or to go?” I thought, "I’ll take it to the car and listen to more of the space-talk." So, I said, "To go."
Well, there I was, sitting in the parking lot of the Dairy Queen eating my “Jack & Jill,” when it suddenly dawns on me that I could be arrested!! I had screwed the state out of its 15 cents of sales tax, and the gendarmes could appear at any moment!!!
I scooted down in the seat, nonchalantly started the car, and got the hell out of there!!
Thank god Columbus’s finest were too overworked harassing Mexicans (it was the West Side) to notice my skullduggery. Next time I’ll either stay inside the Queen or drive to the Steak ’n’ Shake parking lot next door to enjoy my treat.
- Uke Man
This morning I read about a man who had recently bought a laptop computer and had started using his lunch hour to sit in his car outside a coffee house checking his email via the webwaves emanating from the coffee establishment. After about a week of this he was accosted by policemen asking him who he was “spying” on. He was arrested and fined (as I remember) $400.00.
Later today I had a few minutes to kill before heading to my friend Pete’s for some recording; so, I stopped at the Dairy Queen for a Sunday (yum, yum: chocolate sauce, marshmallow, and crushed peanuts!!! What, when I was a kid, we called a “Jack & Jill”).
Anyway, I had been listening to the local public radio show interviewing a Brit living here and discussing the effort to contact extra-terrestrials. When the nice young Dairy Queen girl asked, “Is that for here or to go?” I thought, "I’ll take it to the car and listen to more of the space-talk." So, I said, "To go."
Well, there I was, sitting in the parking lot of the Dairy Queen eating my “Jack & Jill,” when it suddenly dawns on me that I could be arrested!! I had screwed the state out of its 15 cents of sales tax, and the gendarmes could appear at any moment!!!
I scooted down in the seat, nonchalantly started the car, and got the hell out of there!!
Thank god Columbus’s finest were too overworked harassing Mexicans (it was the West Side) to notice my skullduggery. Next time I’ll either stay inside the Queen or drive to the Steak ’n’ Shake parking lot next door to enjoy my treat.
- Uke Man
Thursday, July 19, 2007
How Smart Are We ??
Hey Folks -
Remember that old saying "Those who fail to learn from the mistakes of their predecessors are destined to repeat them"?
Well, check out this cartoon, and see how smart we've been over the years. Then ask yourself: "How smart are we now????"
http://www.markfiore.com/animation/amnesty.html
- Uke Man
Remember that old saying "Those who fail to learn from the mistakes of their predecessors are destined to repeat them"?
Well, check out this cartoon, and see how smart we've been over the years. Then ask yourself: "How smart are we now????"
http://www.markfiore.com/animation/amnesty.html
- Uke Man
A short (hopefully interesting) discussion
Hey Folks -
Below is part of a discussion taking place via an email group. I thought it might be of interest. If it continues and seems worth sharing, I'll share more in the future.
- Uke Man
Hi,
I've just started a book "Consumed" by Benjamin Barber. His thesis casts an ominous shadow on the problems you discussed.
He suggests that whereas Capitalism once produced products that people needed, for some time now it has been inventing "needs." Apparently, capital enterprises must constantly expand, but with the great disparity in wealth (the U.S., Canada, and Western Europe make up 11.5% of world population but do 60% of the consumer spending; sub-Saharan Africa has 11% of the world's population and does 1.2% of the spending), all the REAL needs of the well-off are easily addressed WITHOUT their purchasing/consuming enough to keep the expansion going. The REAL needs of the poor cannot be met because they don't have the income to pay for even the basics (nor does the system care to address problems that have no direct "return" on the "investment").
As a result, capital has to create among the well-off more and more need for unnecessary things, while ignoring the real needs of the other 80%. Clearly, that is a road to ruin, but I don't think those who benefit via that thoroughfare are listening or care.
Yours - Tom
Peter responded:
The history of human civilization starts when human imagination and excess time allowed things like art, culture, social specialization, heirarchies. Did cave men "need" cave art, jewelry, funerals? Once you have a warm fur coat, does it "need" to be stylish. If the food keeps you alive, does it "need" to be tasty?
Read up on Maslow's Heirarchy of needs.
I look at this from bottom up, not top down. Greedy corporations suceed or fail by how well they trigger the inherant desires of the consumers; once they have filled the basic desires, there is still an infinite craving in the human mind, heart and soul for more; not only material things but pleasure, novelty, status, self-actualization, love. Don't blame capitalists for "forcing" this - if anything, blame the individuals for allowing their human desires to be manipulated into shallow grasping for status, coolness, driving the "right" car, wearing the "right" clothes, supporting the "right" cause, etc.
Many "poor" now have a standard of living that would be envied by kings, emperors, etc of even the recent past. There are massive cases of social injustice, persecution, and handicaps of all kinds in the world; but I believe a lot of poverty is due to social and cultural beliefs and personal behavior.
Peter
Hi all [me, again],
Peter asks,” Did cave men "need" cave art, jewelry, funerals?” The answer is, “Yes.” They needed these things to assuage their natural fears; cave art to influence the hunt; jewelry for magic (potency and fertility); funerals (even Neanderthals had them) to address the reality of death (a concept beyond the conscious awareness of the animals they hunted). And these are real needs, stimulated by the natural environment.
Peter also asks, “If the food keeps you alive, does it "need" to be tasty?” Obviously, to stay alive food need not be tasty; starving people eat their shoes and make “cakes” from mud; but because of our biology certain things do taste better than others (and this varies from person to person in real ways). So, while food to stay alive may be a greater need than French cuisine, both are actual, real needs – and I think Maslow would agree with that.
The point I was trying to make was that there IS a difference between addressing real needs and inventing “needs” so that products can be sold to meet them. For example, using Maslow’s “Security,” it is the difference between a leader taking a country to war to protect it from an actual threat (thus addressing “Security”) and inventing a threat (causing insecurity) so that some hidden agenda can be advanced under the guise of meeting the people’s need for Security.
There is a difference.
Peter suggests, “once they have filled the basic desires [corporations], there is still an infinite craving in the human mind, heart and soul for more; not only material things but pleasure, novelty, status, self-actualization, love.
I think this is, at the least, an overstatement. The Amish, for one group, obviously don’t fit this description; and - while we may be a minority – many of us “English” don’t fit it either. It seems to me that this “infinite craving” for more is a cultural invention. Everyone needs food to survive; everyone confronts the reality of death; everyone does not have an “infinite craving” for more, more, more.
Those who do, it seems to me, are acting – as Peter suggests - under the influence of “social and cultural beliefs” which have invented such a need (the Amish apparently have been influenced by a different social/cultural foundation). And this challenges the suggestion, ”Don't blame capitalists for "forcing" this.”
It seems obvious to me that poor people living in this culture (no matter how well their standard of living stacks up with that of William the Conqueror or Napoleon) cannot be said to be leading the course of powerful corporations. Does anyone seriously believe that corporations provide $200.00 sneakers because poor black boys demand them (more, more) – or is it because corporations spend millions of dollars advertising the “need” for Air Jordan ’s.
It also seems obvious to me that suggesting: “Don't blame capitalists for "forcing" this - if anything, blame the individuals for allowing their human desires to be manipulated into shallow grasping for status, coolness, driving the "right" car, wearing the "right" clothes, supporting the "right" cause, etc.” is clearly wrong.
It’s the old “Buyer Beware” argument (“I sold you a lemon, a car I knew had been under water? That’s your problem. You shouldn’t be so stupid). It’s the conman’s excuse (“Hey ! You believed me. That’s your problem). It’s the rapist’s alibi (“She was asking for it. She shouldn’t have worn that sweater).
The corporations essentially own the media and the government. Laws and practices exist to serve the needs of the large and powerful (and those are the large and powerful capitalistic corporations). Blaming the little folks for being manipulated by the media/political barrage that constitutes growing up poor, working class, or middle class in America , makes no sense.
In any case, if the thesis of “Consumed” turns out to be correct, things will eventually have to change sometime in the future, or capitalism will collapse. And as B.F. Skinner used to say, “That’s an experimental question.”
Yours – Tom Harker
Below is part of a discussion taking place via an email group. I thought it might be of interest. If it continues and seems worth sharing, I'll share more in the future.
- Uke Man
Hi,
I've just started a book "Consumed" by Benjamin Barber. His thesis casts an ominous shadow on the problems you discussed.
He suggests that whereas Capitalism once produced products that people needed, for some time now it has been inventing "needs." Apparently, capital enterprises must constantly expand, but with the great disparity in wealth (the U.S., Canada, and Western Europe make up 11.5% of world population but do 60% of the consumer spending; sub-Saharan Africa has 11% of the world's population and does 1.2% of the spending), all the REAL needs of the well-off are easily addressed WITHOUT their purchasing/consuming enough to keep the expansion going. The REAL needs of the poor cannot be met because they don't have the income to pay for even the basics (nor does the system care to address problems that have no direct "return" on the "investment").
As a result, capital has to create among the well-off more and more need for unnecessary things, while ignoring the real needs of the other 80%. Clearly, that is a road to ruin, but I don't think those who benefit via that thoroughfare are listening or care.
Yours - Tom
Peter responded:
The history of human civilization starts when human imagination and excess time allowed things like art, culture, social specialization, heirarchies. Did cave men "need" cave art, jewelry, funerals? Once you have a warm fur coat, does it "need" to be stylish. If the food keeps you alive, does it "need" to be tasty?
Read up on Maslow's Heirarchy of needs.
I look at this from bottom up, not top down. Greedy corporations suceed or fail by how well they trigger the inherant desires of the consumers; once they have filled the basic desires, there is still an infinite craving in the human mind, heart and soul for more; not only material things but pleasure, novelty, status, self-actualization, love. Don't blame capitalists for "forcing" this - if anything, blame the individuals for allowing their human desires to be manipulated into shallow grasping for status, coolness, driving the "right" car, wearing the "right" clothes, supporting the "right" cause, etc.
Many "poor" now have a standard of living that would be envied by kings, emperors, etc of even the recent past. There are massive cases of social injustice, persecution, and handicaps of all kinds in the world; but I believe a lot of poverty is due to social and cultural beliefs and personal behavior.
Peter
Hi all [me, again],
Peter asks,” Did cave men "need" cave art, jewelry, funerals?” The answer is, “Yes.” They needed these things to assuage their natural fears; cave art to influence the hunt; jewelry for magic (potency and fertility); funerals (even Neanderthals had them) to address the reality of death (a concept beyond the conscious awareness of the animals they hunted). And these are real needs, stimulated by the natural environment.
Peter also asks, “If the food keeps you alive, does it "need" to be tasty?” Obviously, to stay alive food need not be tasty; starving people eat their shoes and make “cakes” from mud; but because of our biology certain things do taste better than others (and this varies from person to person in real ways). So, while food to stay alive may be a greater need than French cuisine, both are actual, real needs – and I think Maslow would agree with that.
The point I was trying to make was that there IS a difference between addressing real needs and inventing “needs” so that products can be sold to meet them. For example, using Maslow’s “Security,” it is the difference between a leader taking a country to war to protect it from an actual threat (thus addressing “Security”) and inventing a threat (causing insecurity) so that some hidden agenda can be advanced under the guise of meeting the people’s need for Security.
There is a difference.
Peter suggests, “once they have filled the basic desires [corporations], there is still an infinite craving in the human mind, heart and soul for more; not only material things but pleasure, novelty, status, self-actualization, love.
I think this is, at the least, an overstatement. The Amish, for one group, obviously don’t fit this description; and - while we may be a minority – many of us “English” don’t fit it either. It seems to me that this “infinite craving” for more is a cultural invention. Everyone needs food to survive; everyone confronts the reality of death; everyone does not have an “infinite craving” for more, more, more.
Those who do, it seems to me, are acting – as Peter suggests - under the influence of “social and cultural beliefs” which have invented such a need (the Amish apparently have been influenced by a different social/cultural foundation). And this challenges the suggestion, ”Don't blame capitalists for "forcing" this.”
It seems obvious to me that poor people living in this culture (no matter how well their standard of living stacks up with that of William the Conqueror or Napoleon) cannot be said to be leading the course of powerful corporations. Does anyone seriously believe that corporations provide $200.00 sneakers because poor black boys demand them (more, more) – or is it because corporations spend millions of dollars advertising the “need” for Air Jordan ’s.
It also seems obvious to me that suggesting: “Don't blame capitalists for "forcing" this - if anything, blame the individuals for allowing their human desires to be manipulated into shallow grasping for status, coolness, driving the "right" car, wearing the "right" clothes, supporting the "right" cause, etc.” is clearly wrong.
It’s the old “Buyer Beware” argument (“I sold you a lemon, a car I knew had been under water? That’s your problem. You shouldn’t be so stupid). It’s the conman’s excuse (“Hey ! You believed me. That’s your problem). It’s the rapist’s alibi (“She was asking for it. She shouldn’t have worn that sweater).
The corporations essentially own the media and the government. Laws and practices exist to serve the needs of the large and powerful (and those are the large and powerful capitalistic corporations). Blaming the little folks for being manipulated by the media/political barrage that constitutes growing up poor, working class, or middle class in America , makes no sense.
In any case, if the thesis of “Consumed” turns out to be correct, things will eventually have to change sometime in the future, or capitalism will collapse. And as B.F. Skinner used to say, “That’s an experimental question.”
Yours – Tom Harker
Friday, July 13, 2007
Hi, atus!!
Hey Folks -
Sorry, but I'll be away from the computer for a few days.
Love you. Check back on Wednesday.
- Uke Man
Sorry, but I'll be away from the computer for a few days.
Love you. Check back on Wednesday.
- Uke Man
So rested he by the Tumtum tree and stood a while in uffish thought
Georgie, our beamish boy !!! Galumphing through life.
Twas brillig, and the slithy toves did gyre and gimble in the wabe
Hey Folks -
Are we REALLY so stupid that we put up with a moron running this country?
If so, how smart are we?????
- Uke Man
July 11, 2007
History as an Alibi
By MAUREEN DOWD
WASHINGTON
(a ukethanks to Phyll)
On Friday, Condi Rice played hooky and spent the afternoon at the Tiger Woods golf tournament at Congressional Country Club in suburban Maryland.
She had lunch at the clubhouse with Tiger, who had dedicated the contest to American servicemen. She followed Phil Mickelson and Brad Faxon for a bit, after having them over to the White House on the Fourth to watch the fireworks. She gave interviews about her newfound affection for golf, laughing about her errant drives and “wicked hook.”
Like W. going out boating and fishing in Kennebunkport as Britain and its new prime minister, Gordon Brown, reeled from terrorist attacks, Condi acted as if she didn’t have a care in the world. And why on earth should she?
The homeland security chief, Michael Chertoff, has a gut feeling that a Qaeda cell might be coming or already be here. “Summertime seems to be appealing to them,” he said, sounding more like a meteorologist than the man charged with keeping us safe.
With 30 mortars hitting the Green Zone yesterday and Army recruiting wilting, some Bush advisers are at long last coming around to the Baker-Hamilton report recommendation that they should engage in intense diplomacy with the countries around Iraq.
Someone might tell Condi — who said in one of her golf interviews that her zest for sports is so all-encompassing that “I love anything with a score at the end” — that she’d better get to work or America’s score in Iraq will be zero.
The Iraq war she helped sell has turned into Grendel, devouring everything in sight and making it uninhabitable. It has ravaged Iraq, Bush’s presidency, the federal budget, the Republican majority, American invincibility and integrity, and now, John McCain’s chance to be president.
And there’s no Beowulf in sight. Just a bunch of spectacularly wrong hawks stubbornly continuing to be spectacularly wrong at what an alarmed Republican Senator John Warner calls “a time in our history unlike any I have ever witnessed before.”
Watching the warring tribes in Iraq grow more violent has caused the beginning of a reconciliation among the warring tribes in Washington, as they realize they have to get the car keys away from the careening president who has crashed into the globe.
With Republicans in revolt over the surge and losing patience, and Bushies worried, as one put it to The Washington Post, that “July has become the new September,” the president decided to do a p.r. surge to sound as if he’s acquainted with reality.
But in a speech in Cleveland yesterday, the president was still repeating his deranged generalities. Making a tiny concession, he said we would be able to pull back troops “in a while,” whatever that means, but asked Congress to wait for Gen. David Petraeus to debrief on the surge in September — rather than focus on the report due this week that says the ineffectual Iraq government has failed to meet benchmarks set by America.
It was ironic that his strongest supporter to the bitter end was the Republican who was once his bitter rival. There was speculation that Mr. McCain would come back from his visit to Iraq and revise his bullish support of the war to save his imploding campaign. But the opposite happened.
As his top advisers were purged, Mr. McCain went to the floor of the Senate to reassert his warped view that “there appears to be overall movement in the right direction.”
Like W., Senator McCain values the advice of Henry Kissinger and said, “We can find wisdom in several suggestions put forward recently by Henry Kissinger.”
Why they continue to seek counsel from the man who kept the Vietnam War going for years just to protect Richard Nixon’s electoral chances is beyond mystifying. But Mr. Kissinger holds their attention with all his warnings of “American impotence” emboldening radical Islam and Iran. Can’t W. and Mr. McCain see that American muscularity, stupidly thrown around, has already emboldened radical Islam and Iran?
The president mentioned in his speech yesterday that he was reading history, and he has been summoning historians and theologians to the White House for discussions on the fate of Iraq and the nature of good and evil.
W. thinks history will be his alibi. When presidents have screwed up and want to console themselves, they think history will give them a second chance. It’s the historical equivalent of a presidential pardon.
But there are other things — morality, strategy and security — that are more pressing than history. History is just the fanciest way possible of wanting to deny or distract attention from what’s happening now.
Are we REALLY so stupid that we put up with a moron running this country?
If so, how smart are we?????
- Uke Man
July 11, 2007
History as an Alibi
By MAUREEN DOWD
WASHINGTON
(a ukethanks to Phyll)
On Friday, Condi Rice played hooky and spent the afternoon at the Tiger Woods golf tournament at Congressional Country Club in suburban Maryland.
She had lunch at the clubhouse with Tiger, who had dedicated the contest to American servicemen. She followed Phil Mickelson and Brad Faxon for a bit, after having them over to the White House on the Fourth to watch the fireworks. She gave interviews about her newfound affection for golf, laughing about her errant drives and “wicked hook.”
Like W. going out boating and fishing in Kennebunkport as Britain and its new prime minister, Gordon Brown, reeled from terrorist attacks, Condi acted as if she didn’t have a care in the world. And why on earth should she?
The homeland security chief, Michael Chertoff, has a gut feeling that a Qaeda cell might be coming or already be here. “Summertime seems to be appealing to them,” he said, sounding more like a meteorologist than the man charged with keeping us safe.
With 30 mortars hitting the Green Zone yesterday and Army recruiting wilting, some Bush advisers are at long last coming around to the Baker-Hamilton report recommendation that they should engage in intense diplomacy with the countries around Iraq.
Someone might tell Condi — who said in one of her golf interviews that her zest for sports is so all-encompassing that “I love anything with a score at the end” — that she’d better get to work or America’s score in Iraq will be zero.
The Iraq war she helped sell has turned into Grendel, devouring everything in sight and making it uninhabitable. It has ravaged Iraq, Bush’s presidency, the federal budget, the Republican majority, American invincibility and integrity, and now, John McCain’s chance to be president.
And there’s no Beowulf in sight. Just a bunch of spectacularly wrong hawks stubbornly continuing to be spectacularly wrong at what an alarmed Republican Senator John Warner calls “a time in our history unlike any I have ever witnessed before.”
Watching the warring tribes in Iraq grow more violent has caused the beginning of a reconciliation among the warring tribes in Washington, as they realize they have to get the car keys away from the careening president who has crashed into the globe.
With Republicans in revolt over the surge and losing patience, and Bushies worried, as one put it to The Washington Post, that “July has become the new September,” the president decided to do a p.r. surge to sound as if he’s acquainted with reality.
But in a speech in Cleveland yesterday, the president was still repeating his deranged generalities. Making a tiny concession, he said we would be able to pull back troops “in a while,” whatever that means, but asked Congress to wait for Gen. David Petraeus to debrief on the surge in September — rather than focus on the report due this week that says the ineffectual Iraq government has failed to meet benchmarks set by America.
It was ironic that his strongest supporter to the bitter end was the Republican who was once his bitter rival. There was speculation that Mr. McCain would come back from his visit to Iraq and revise his bullish support of the war to save his imploding campaign. But the opposite happened.
As his top advisers were purged, Mr. McCain went to the floor of the Senate to reassert his warped view that “there appears to be overall movement in the right direction.”
Like W., Senator McCain values the advice of Henry Kissinger and said, “We can find wisdom in several suggestions put forward recently by Henry Kissinger.”
Why they continue to seek counsel from the man who kept the Vietnam War going for years just to protect Richard Nixon’s electoral chances is beyond mystifying. But Mr. Kissinger holds their attention with all his warnings of “American impotence” emboldening radical Islam and Iran. Can’t W. and Mr. McCain see that American muscularity, stupidly thrown around, has already emboldened radical Islam and Iran?
The president mentioned in his speech yesterday that he was reading history, and he has been summoning historians and theologians to the White House for discussions on the fate of Iraq and the nature of good and evil.
W. thinks history will be his alibi. When presidents have screwed up and want to console themselves, they think history will give them a second chance. It’s the historical equivalent of a presidential pardon.
But there are other things — morality, strategy and security — that are more pressing than history. History is just the fanciest way possible of wanting to deny or distract attention from what’s happening now.
Thursday, July 12, 2007
Racism lives. Forever????
Hey Folks -
Bob Herbert is one of the few national columnist who says it like it is regarding race in this "Christian" country. As he says, "some of the biggest issues confronting blacks — the spread of AIDS, chronic joblessness and racial discrimination, for example— are not considered mainstream issues" by those who control our attention.
We need another Malcolm X to get consumers' and grubby capitalists' attention off their personal possessions and wealth and back onto their fellow man. They won't do it for God or country; but they might try to avoid "whatever means necessary" being applied to the side of their heads.
- Uke Man
June 30, 2007
When Is Enough Enough?
By BOB HERBERT
(a ukethanks to Phyll)
Chances are you didn’t hear it, but on Thursday night Senator HillaryClinton said, “If H.I.V./AIDS were the leading cause of death of white women between the ages of 25 and 34, there would be an outraged outcry in this country.”
Her comment came on the same day that a malevolent majority on the U.S.Supreme Court threw a brick through the window of voluntary school integration efforts.
There comes a time when people are supposed to get angry. The rights and interests of black people in the U.S. have been under assault for the longest time, and in the absence of an effective counter force, that assault has only grown more brutal.
Have you looked at the public schools lately? Have you looked at the prisons? Have you looked at the legions of unemployed blacks roaming the neighborhoods of big cities across the country? These jobless African-Americans, so many of them men, are so marginal in the view of the wider society, so insignificant, so invisible, they aren’t even counted in the government’s official jobless statistics.And now this new majority on the Supreme Court seems committed to a legal trajectory that would hurl blacks back to the bad old days of the Jim Crow era.
Where’s the outcry? Where’s the line in the sand that the prejudiced portion of the population is not allowed to cross? Mrs. Clinton’s comment was made at a forum of Democratic presidential candidates at Howard University that was put together by Tavis Smiley, the radio and television personality, and broadcast nationally by PBS. The idea was to focus on issues of particular concern to African-Americans.
It’s discouraging that some of the biggest issues confronting blacks — the spread of AIDS, chronic joblessness and racial discrimination, for example— are not considered mainstream issues.
Senator John Edwards offered a disturbingly bleak but accurate picture of the lives of many young blacks: “When you have young African-American men who are completely convinced that they’re either going to die or go to prison and see absolutely no hope in their lives; when they live in an environment where the people around them don’t earn a decent wage; when they go to schools that are second-class schools compared to the wealthy suburban areas — they don’t see anything getting better.”
The difficult lives and often tragic fates of such young men are not much on the minds of so-called mainstream Americans, or the political and corporate elites who run the country. More noise needs to be made. There’ssomething very wrong with a passive acceptance of the degraded state in which so many African-Americans continue to live. Mr. Smiley is also organizing a forum of Republican candidates to be held in September. I wholeheartedly applaud his efforts. But if black people were more angry, and if they could channel that anger into political activism — first and foremost by voting as though their lives and the lives of their children depended on it — there would not be a need to have separate political forums to address their concerns.
If black people could find a way to come together in sky-high turnouts on Election Day, if they showed up at polling booths in numbers close to the maximum possible turnout, if they could set the example for all otherAmericans about the importance of exercising the franchise, the politicians would not dare to ignore their concerns.For black people, especially, the current composition of the Supreme Court should be the ultimate lesson in the importance of voting in a presidential election. No branch of the government has been more crucial than the judiciary in securing the rights and improving the lives of blacks over the past five or six decades.
George W. Bush, in a little more than six years, has tilted the court so radically that it is now, like the administration itself, relentlessly hostile to the interests of black people. That never would have happened if blacks had managed significantly more muscular turnouts in the 2000 and 2004 elections. (The war in Iraq would not have happened, either.)
There are, of course, many people, black and white, who are working on a vast array of important issues. But much, much more needs to be done. And blacks, in particular, need to intervene more directly in the public policy matters that concern them.In the 1960s, there were radicals running around screaming about blackpower. But the real power in this country has always been the power of the vote. Black Americans have not come close to maximizing that power. It’s not too late.
Bob Herbert is one of the few national columnist who says it like it is regarding race in this "Christian" country. As he says, "some of the biggest issues confronting blacks — the spread of AIDS, chronic joblessness and racial discrimination, for example— are not considered mainstream issues" by those who control our attention.
We need another Malcolm X to get consumers' and grubby capitalists' attention off their personal possessions and wealth and back onto their fellow man. They won't do it for God or country; but they might try to avoid "whatever means necessary" being applied to the side of their heads.
- Uke Man
June 30, 2007
When Is Enough Enough?
By BOB HERBERT
(a ukethanks to Phyll)
Chances are you didn’t hear it, but on Thursday night Senator HillaryClinton said, “If H.I.V./AIDS were the leading cause of death of white women between the ages of 25 and 34, there would be an outraged outcry in this country.”
Her comment came on the same day that a malevolent majority on the U.S.Supreme Court threw a brick through the window of voluntary school integration efforts.
There comes a time when people are supposed to get angry. The rights and interests of black people in the U.S. have been under assault for the longest time, and in the absence of an effective counter force, that assault has only grown more brutal.
Have you looked at the public schools lately? Have you looked at the prisons? Have you looked at the legions of unemployed blacks roaming the neighborhoods of big cities across the country? These jobless African-Americans, so many of them men, are so marginal in the view of the wider society, so insignificant, so invisible, they aren’t even counted in the government’s official jobless statistics.And now this new majority on the Supreme Court seems committed to a legal trajectory that would hurl blacks back to the bad old days of the Jim Crow era.
Where’s the outcry? Where’s the line in the sand that the prejudiced portion of the population is not allowed to cross? Mrs. Clinton’s comment was made at a forum of Democratic presidential candidates at Howard University that was put together by Tavis Smiley, the radio and television personality, and broadcast nationally by PBS. The idea was to focus on issues of particular concern to African-Americans.
It’s discouraging that some of the biggest issues confronting blacks — the spread of AIDS, chronic joblessness and racial discrimination, for example— are not considered mainstream issues.
Senator John Edwards offered a disturbingly bleak but accurate picture of the lives of many young blacks: “When you have young African-American men who are completely convinced that they’re either going to die or go to prison and see absolutely no hope in their lives; when they live in an environment where the people around them don’t earn a decent wage; when they go to schools that are second-class schools compared to the wealthy suburban areas — they don’t see anything getting better.”
The difficult lives and often tragic fates of such young men are not much on the minds of so-called mainstream Americans, or the political and corporate elites who run the country. More noise needs to be made. There’ssomething very wrong with a passive acceptance of the degraded state in which so many African-Americans continue to live. Mr. Smiley is also organizing a forum of Republican candidates to be held in September. I wholeheartedly applaud his efforts. But if black people were more angry, and if they could channel that anger into political activism — first and foremost by voting as though their lives and the lives of their children depended on it — there would not be a need to have separate political forums to address their concerns.
If black people could find a way to come together in sky-high turnouts on Election Day, if they showed up at polling booths in numbers close to the maximum possible turnout, if they could set the example for all otherAmericans about the importance of exercising the franchise, the politicians would not dare to ignore their concerns.For black people, especially, the current composition of the Supreme Court should be the ultimate lesson in the importance of voting in a presidential election. No branch of the government has been more crucial than the judiciary in securing the rights and improving the lives of blacks over the past five or six decades.
George W. Bush, in a little more than six years, has tilted the court so radically that it is now, like the administration itself, relentlessly hostile to the interests of black people. That never would have happened if blacks had managed significantly more muscular turnouts in the 2000 and 2004 elections. (The war in Iraq would not have happened, either.)
There are, of course, many people, black and white, who are working on a vast array of important issues. But much, much more needs to be done. And blacks, in particular, need to intervene more directly in the public policy matters that concern them.In the 1960s, there were radicals running around screaming about blackpower. But the real power in this country has always been the power of the vote. Black Americans have not come close to maximizing that power. It’s not too late.
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
Pope "Eggs" Benedict is at it again !!
AP news report on this issue available at: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/pope_other_christians;_ylt=AgURoqTZ0qkYJzn1QlF0_VvkeO0A
Hey Folks –
Well, the Pope is at it again trying to break his arm patting himself on the back, trying to make his funny hats fit tighter by swelling his head. “I am the greatest!! You're all dumb!! I’ve got the inside track to the infinite!!” What a dork.
I was raised Catholic and attended parochial schools through 8th grade; so I’ve heard this stuff before. It didn’t make sense then (when I was just a kid), and it doesn’t make sense now either.
Yep, there’s just ONE TRUE CHURCH, the Pope’s church, and everyone else is fucked – all other so-called Christians, as well as Jews, Muslims, Hindus, pagans, atheists, etc. are fucked.
Who says so?? Well, the Pope says so, and a major reason he’s down on Protestants is that they don’t want to curtsey and kiss his ring. Unlike Jews, Muslims, Hindus, pagans, atheists, and that ilk; protestants could wiggle into eternal bliss if they would just wise up and listen to the Man from the Vatican.
Since this isn’t happening in large numbers, Benedict probably figured it was time to turn up the heat (so to speak) threatening hell for anyone who won’t shape up and get in line.
He also gave the usual lame “reasons” – the same ones the nuns gave us 1st graders: the Catholic church supposedly has “apostolic succession” — the ability to trace its bi
Hey Folks –
Well, the Pope is at it again trying to break his arm patting himself on the back, trying to make his funny hats fit tighter by swelling his head. “I am the greatest!! You're all dumb!! I’ve got the inside track to the infinite!!” What a dork.
I was raised Catholic and attended parochial schools through 8th grade; so I’ve heard this stuff before. It didn’t make sense then (when I was just a kid), and it doesn’t make sense now either.
Yep, there’s just ONE TRUE CHURCH, the Pope’s church, and everyone else is fucked – all other so-called Christians, as well as Jews, Muslims, Hindus, pagans, atheists, etc. are fucked.
Who says so?? Well, the Pope says so, and a major reason he’s down on Protestants is that they don’t want to curtsey and kiss his ring. Unlike Jews, Muslims, Hindus, pagans, atheists, and that ilk; protestants could wiggle into eternal bliss if they would just wise up and listen to the Man from the Vatican.
Since this isn’t happening in large numbers, Benedict probably figured it was time to turn up the heat (so to speak) threatening hell for anyone who won’t shape up and get in line.
He also gave the usual lame “reasons” – the same ones the nuns gave us 1st graders: the Catholic church supposedly has “apostolic succession” — the ability to trace its bi