It's all about me

Tagged by the Yella for the self-revelatory meme...

1. What were three of the stupidest things you have done in your life?

First let me say that, like Yella, most of the stupid things I've done have ended up to my benefit in the end, if I take the long view. Second, I am taking this at face value--"stupidest," as in "doh!" not necessarily most regretable, which I would hardly blog about. Though admittedly there is overlap in these categories. Let me also say, it's really tough to pick only three. And it's humbling to think about how long this list could be.

a) Attempting to cop drugs in the DC projects as a teenage white girl

b) Hitch-hiking (and here I am feeling just a wee bit of gratitude I didn't end up in garbage bags under a half dozen bridges)

c) Putting off writing my dissertation for so many years

2. At the current moment, who has the most influence in your life?

My best friend, Andrea (when she says, "I wouldn't do that if I were you," I really listen; when most other people say that, I think, "Yeah, but you're not, are you?")

3. If you were given a time machine that functioned, and you were allowed to only pick up to five people to dine with, who would you pick?

a) Anne Hutchinson
b) Stephen Burroughs
c) Deborah Sampson
d) Vincent Van Gogh
e) my dad

Which is to say, my dad and the outlaws. Probably I should add Dorothy Parker, or PT Barnum, or Oscar Wilde or someone who would brighten up the attitude a little, but I'm counting on Stephen Burroughs to keep things lively.

4. If you had three wishes that were not supernatural, what would they be?

a) Free, on-demand health care for everyone

b) A redistribution of wealth (aka economic justice)

c) Peace on earth (well, maybe all of those are supernatural, but oh well)

5. Someone is visiting your hometown/place where you live at the moment. Name two things you regret your city not having, and two things people should avoid.

Two things it's a shame we don't have:

a) air with a decent amount of oxygen
b) sidewalk culture

Two things people should avoid:

a) the 405 during rush hour(s)
b) the 101 during rush hour(s)

6. Name one event that has changed your life.

Okay, this may sound weird, but I'd say HUAC, despite the fact that it happened before I was born. Having a parent who was blacklisted teaches you a lot of things from a young age--like standing up for what you believe in is not necessarily rewarded, your government is not always on your side, and zealotry of all kinds should be regarded with suspicion to name just a few.

7. Tag 5 people.

Conor
Elise
Carrie
CB
Rook

A bridge too far

It should come as no great surprise to NMTE readers that I was a teenage punk. Let me date myself: in April 1981, I was 15 years old and I saw the Dead Kennedys at DC's 9:30 club and it changed my life. The club was less than a year old and Dischord was less than six months old. It was the perfect place and the perfect time to be an angry teenager. Way back then, once upon a time, if you were a teenage girl that got a crew cut and wore mini-kilts and combat boots with homemade band tee-shirts and ripped fishnets, people went so far as to spit on you. True story. So the wrath of my teen years was constantly augmented by the hostile reactions of the general population during those Reagan years.

So what's the point of all of this nostalgic rambling? Nike, that's what. Alex at After School Snack has alerted me to Nike's ad campaign for their 2005 skateboard tour:



On the left: Dischord's third pressing.

On the right: Nike's tour flier.




My advice to Dischord: Just sue 'em. (I did notice that Nike has posted an apology on their website, no doubt in fears of such a thing. Fucking co-opting bastards.)

If email services were boyfriends

I just got this error message from Yahoo mail:

I'm afraid I wasn't able to deliver your message to the following addresses. This is a permanent error; I've given up. Sorry it didn't work out.

421 SERVICE NOT AVAILABLE
I'm not going to try again; this message has been in the queue too long.

I'm thinking some tech guy at Yahoo is doing a wee bit of projecting. All it needs is the "It's not you; it's me" sentence and it would be perfect.

Badvertising

In the category "advertising that does the opposite of what it's supposed to" falls Yahoo's plug for their new photo email service:

Now every email is an event.
Easily drag and drop hundreds of photos per email.

You know, if every email was an event I might have to put a bullet in my brain. I don't think I could take it.

Surrender is not a Ranger word

Last month, Seymour Hersh mentioned a series of digital photos that had been forwarded to him:

After I did Abu Ghraib, I got a bunch of digital pictures emailed me, and -- was a lot of work on it, and I decided, well, we can talk about it later. You never know why you do things. You have some general rules, but in this case, a bunch of kids were going along in three vehicles. One of them got blown up. The other two units -- soldiers ran out, saw some people running, opened up fire. It was a bunch of boys playing soccer. And in the digital videos you see everybody standing around, they pull the bodies together. This is last summer. They pull the bodies together. You see the body parts, the legs and boots of the Americans pulling bodies together. Young kids, I don't know how old, 13, 15, I guess. And then you see soldiers dropping R.P.G.'s, which are rocket-launched grenades around them. And then they're called in as an insurgent kill.

Hersh determined not to follow up on the story because it was inconclusive and it could threaten his sources.

Cryptome has the pictures of the dead boys with and without the weapon, courtesy of Mark Kraft.

Baghdad Dweller and Feral Scholar also weigh in.

As an aside: today is something of a watershed moment for me. For the first time, I am not aghast or even surprised by this kind of news. For so long now, I have been astonished by my own ability to continue to be shocked and outraged. Today, it just feels wearying.

(Thanks to S for the link.)

To quote Andrea:

"It's like they just can't be evil enough."

U.S. to resume plutonium 238 production

Why I love the valley

Saturday night B and I went to Vern's Volver Volver for the best tamales in the valley. (Well, B had the potato tacos because she doesn't like tamales.) I admit I was disappointed because they were out of the sweet tamales (with pineapple and raisins) but the lack of sweet tamales was made up for by the Spanish game show on the wide screen TV. I have no idea what the premise of the show was--I do not speak Spanish--but I can tell you there were seals propped up at the game show podiums barking and clapping.

After Vern's we stopped for gas at Arco and a man missing half an arm wanted to wash our windshield. Somewhere below the elbow and above what would have been a wrist his arm tapered off, and duct taped to the taper end was a bottle of windex. (We said no thanks.)

And then we went to the multiplex and saw Romero's Land of the Dead, which fucking rocked. It was the antidote to last week's Batman, made even better seeing it at a multiplex in the Valley. Oh the irony.

Warning, potential spoilers:

Like I said, Land of the Dead was the Batman antiviral. The message of Batman: Things are good as long as the filthy rich are benevolent, "good" men. When things are bad, one man can potentially change the world--though he can't be with a woman while he does. The message of L of the D: Capitalism sucks, no matter who is in charge. Hell yeah the antihero gets the girl, and he only tries to save the world to an extent; then he gets the hell out of there. So yeah, it rocked. I loved it.

He may be for torture, but at least he's pro-tit

Via AMERICABlog comes the heartening news that the Spirit of Justice and the Majesty of Law are, once again, baring their breasts. I for one, look forward to a return to the good old days:

When former Attorney General Edwin Meese released a report on pornography in the 1980s, photographers dived to the floor to capture the image of him raising the report in the air, with the partially nude female statue behind him.

I want to see those reporters hitting the turf during Gonzo's press conferences.

"They're living in the tropics"

Cheney yesterday on Guantanamo:

They're very well treated down there. They're living in the tropics. They're well fed. They've got everything they could possibly want. There isn't any other nation in the world that would treat people who were determined to kill Americans the way we're treating these people.

But do they get doritos, that's what I want to know. Or is that just for the masterminds?

Ministry for Public Enlightenment

Still too busy to blog, but to say the whole CPB/public broadcasting news chills me to the bone. Am I excessively paranoid to see Patricia Harrison's election to CPB's CEO as the latest sign of creeping Fascism? (Harrison being the former co-chair of the Republican Party and the assistant secretary of state for educational and cultural affairs)

I fear to think what Sesame Street will be forced to do with their "one of these things is not like the other" sketches.

Great ideas from the writing group

So tonight the writing group met again after an extended hiatus. What beats poetry and tuna melts at a bad North Hollywood diner, I ask you? Unfortunately, as D, D, and K had to vie with the too-highly-pitched laughter of the teased blonde duo in the booth to my back, and I had to strain to hear the conversation at our own booth, my misanthropy began to grow. Remember that line from Repo Man: "Ordinary fucking people--I hate 'em"? It was like that. Finally, I had to cut off the verse talk with the summary statement that we jointly agreed should be the title of a TV series hosted by your's truly: I Hate My Species.

Can't you see it? I think it would be so great--and what better place than LA? One week at Disneyland, the next week at Malibu, the following week at Northridge Mall's Hot Topics store... the possibilities are endless. And here's the scary confession: I really want to do this. A lot.

Why are we still even talking about it?

Once again, we are confronted with the potential Flag Burning amendment. The House today passed HJ Res 10: "The Congress shall have power to prohibit the physical desecration of the flag of the United States." AP tells us that there is a greater chance than ever before of the amendment passing the Senate as well:

. . .the measure has always died in the Senate, falling short of the 67 votes needed. The last time the Senate took up the amendment was in 2000, when it failed 63-37.

But last year's elections gave Republicans a four-seat pickup in the Senate, and now proponents and critics alike say the amendment stands within a vote or two of reaching the two-thirds requirement in that chamber.

Of course, if the Senate passes it then it will go on to the states for ratification. Can you hear my deep and heavy sighing over here?

This has been a too, too busy week for me, which accounts for the paucity of posts, and so I haven't had time to do what I would normally do, which is read the Congressional Record. (Only the most geeky among us can admit, "Yes, I was up too late because I was reading the Congressional Record until 2am.") But I couldn't resist skimming it a little nonetheless.

Here are a couple of choice moments:
Florida's Alcee Hastings:

Throughout this debate, Mr. Speaker, I am sure that some of our colleagues are going to try to paint some of us Democrats as unpatriotic. They will tell the American people that because we support the protection of our civil liberties and the constitutional right for an American to burn her flag, we are therefore not loyal citizens. . . .

To those who intend to levy such artificial claims, I say shame on you. You see, Mr. Speaker, this Congress and the Bush administration loves draping itself in the flag when talking about troops and terrorism. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with that, if they so choose to do that.

Yet . . . more than 1,700 Americans have died in Iraq, and some substantial number in Afghanistan, and, yet, when they come home to Dover, Delaware, with flag-draped coffins, this administration who is so proud of the flag and all of you who would support its being made a part of a Constitution, refuses to let the public see the pictures of those persons with those flag-draped coffins, and I might add, punishes the media for trying to access them.

The hypocrisy is so thick, that you can choke on it.

New York's Gary Ackerman:

The Constitution this week is being nibbled to death by small men with press secretaries. If the flag burners offend us, do not beat a cowardly retreat by rushing to ban them. Meet their ideas with bigger ideas, for an even better America to protect the flag by protecting democracy, not by retreating from it.

The choice today is substance or symbolism. We cannot kill a flag. It is a symbol; and, yes, patriots have died, but they have died for liberty. They have died for democracy. They have died for the right of the protestors. They died for values.

The flag is a symbol of those values. Saying that people died for the flag is symbolic language. What they really died for are American principles. The Constitution gives us our rights. The Constitution guarantees our liberties. The Constitution embodies our freedoms. It is our substance. The flag is the symbol for which it stands.

True patriots choose substance over symbolism.

Great stuff.

So in honor of today's Constitutional Desecration, here is today's trivia question:
Q: When did the first recorded incident of flag desecration take place in America?

Insert Jeopardy music here....

....

Give up? A: 1634. John Endicott cut the cross out of the Red Ensign, which British colonies were required to fly, because he felt it was sacrilegious to conflate divine and kingly rule in the symbol of the cross on the flag--"popery," to put it in the Puritans' terms.

Can you tell I wrote a chapter on the history of the flag? Ask me another one...

Anyway, the point being, after three hundred seventy years, I see no reason to revise the Constitution now.

Headline of the day

Brain Areas Shut Off During Female Orgasm

Um...duh.

AP reports:

New research indicates parts of the brain that govern fear and anxiety are switched off when a woman is having an orgasm but remain active if she is faking.

In the first study to map brain function during orgasm, scientists from the Netherlands also found that as a woman climaxes, an area of the brain governing emotional control is largely deactivated.

"The fact that there is no deactivation in faked orgasms means a basic part of a real orgasm is letting go. Women can imitate orgasm quite well, as we know, but there is nothing really happening in the brain," said neuroscientist Gert Holstege, presenting his findings Monday to the annual meeting of the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology.

. . .

"During orgasm, there was strong, enormous deactivation in the brain. During fake orgasm, there was no deactivation of the brain at all. None," Holstege said.

Shutting down the brain during orgasm may ensure that obstacles such as fear and stress did not get in the way, Holstege proposed. "Deactivation of these very important parts of the brain might be the most important necessity for having an orgasm," he said.

And here we are thinking several things. First, we suspect Gert Holstege may have some personal issues he could fruitfully share with a therapist of some kind. His "as we know" and "None," seem a bit forceful to us and we wonder if his research is motivated by some sort of last-laugh impulse.

Gert aside, NMTE offers this as the latest in our biology/romance series--the "why we do the things we do" strain of personal blogging. And so my fellow blog grrrlz, if any of you have found yourselves redecorating the relationship house while it was burning down around you, be solaced with the knowledge that your biology was your destiny. It's not your fault--the sex gave you brain damage.

Quote of the day

"There's no level of cynicism deep enough to account for humanity. In order to be cynical enough not to be continually surprised, you would have to be hospitalizable."

Andrea in our phone conversation tonight

Curiouser and curiouser

Is it just me, or does it seem to anyone else that the US's role in world politics is getting more and more bizarre? Disgusting, yes, venal, of course, but also just plain weird.

In that vein, AP has a story on Saddam's relationship with his prison guards. First let me say his remarks about Bush bear an eerie resemblance to those from Clinton remarked on earlier in the month:

GQ magazine's July issue says Saddam greatly admired President Reagan and thought President Clinton was "OK," but had harsh words for both President Bushes, each of whom went to war against him.

"The Bush father, son, no good," one of the soldiers, Cpl. Jonathan "Paco" Reese, 22, of Millville, Pa., quotes Saddam as saying. But his fellow GI, Specialist Sean O'Shea, then 19, says Saddam later softened that view.

"Towards the end he was saying that he doesn't hold any hard feelings and he just wanted to talk to Bush, to make friends with him," O'Shea, of Minooka, Pa., told the magazine.

I'm envisioning the golf game, you know?

And then there's this extract:

Saddam learned the names of the GIs guarding him, was interested in the details of their lives, which they were not supposed to discuss, and sometimes offered fatherly advice. They conversed in English.

O'Shea said when he told him he was not married, Saddam "started telling me what to do." "He was like, `you gotta find a good woman. Not too smart, not too dumb. Not too old, not too young. One that can cook and clean.'"

Then he smiled, made what O'Shea interpreted as a "spanking" gesture, laughed and went back to washing his clothes in the sink.

The soldiers say Saddam was preoccupied with cleanliness, washing up after shaking hands and using diaper wipes to clean his meal trays, his utensils and the table before eating. "He had germophobia or whatever you call it" said Dawson, 25, of Berwick, Pa.

The article quotes the GIs on Saddam's eating preferences ? Raisin Bran Crunch was his breakfast favorite. "No Froot Loops," he told O'Shea. He ate fish and chicken but refused beef at dinner.

For a time his favorite food was Cheetos, and when those ran out, Saddam would "get grumpy," the story says. One day the guards substituted Doritos corn chips, and Saddam forgot about Cheetos. "He'd eat a family size bag of Doritos in 10 minutes," Dawson says.

And what I'm thinking right now is that capitalism and sexism seem to be forces strong enough to allow men to forge bonds regardless of their differences. Sure, you may be head of the evil empire, and I'm part of the forces fighting against the darkness, but we can all agree that snack food is yummy and a good woman knows how to cook, right?

Good god. It's Kafka meets David Foster Wallace, I tell you. This era... Heaven help us.

Places I've been

create your own visited country map

Via the world-traveling Conor comes the link to create maps of where you've been. My worldwide map is paltry next to his, but I'll bet he can't match my US map.




create your own personalized map of the USA

Why I'm glad I have air conditioning

When I lived in DC I didn't have air conditioning. Anyone who has ever been to DC in the summer months understands that this is highly problematic. It leads one to linger in the grocery store frozen food section, restraining the urge to lie down in the freezer cases; work long hours at one's air conditioned job; and yes, go to summer movies as often as possible.

Happily, I now have air conditioning and only rarely do I make the mistake of gambling on a summer blockbuster. Tonight was the occasion for one of those rare mistakes: Batman.

Yeah.

It was painful. Really awful. To the point of being almost embarrassing.

Becky's one-line review: At least there was no Robin.

You can find anything on the Internets

I'm loving this: Sushi Finder

I never liked his art much...

...but I may have to rethink that.

David Hockney is moving back to England so that he can smoke wherever he wants.

(Via art.blogging.la)

Why I get my news online

Oliphant chimes in on the DSM.

You know, when I was in DC, I watched a lot of cable news, which I don't usually do, and really, if you didn't know better, you would think the only two things happening in the world last week were a missing girl in Aruba and the Michael Jackson trial. Very sad.

I am back at work today, for the moment anyway. Still viral. Feeling, in fact, like the life force has been sucked from me by some sort of vampiric force.

And so, in the interest of energy saving economy, here are two things:

First, KCRW's alert about the evisceration of public broadcasting.

Second, as you all probably know by now, the House voted to restrict the Patriot Act. Not so much of a stand as some of us would hope, but I guess the longest journey begins with a single step.

Germs and hate mail

Home from work today with that virus/cold thing mentioned below. I slept all day. I mean, we're talking all day. Then we had a real shaker when I was still in gradual wake-up mode. Enough of a shaker to send Nic the cat fleeing in terror for the bathroom. For whatever reason the tub functions as his cat bomb shelter.

So I have little to report right now. Big headache. One of my New Zealand friends, however, sent me a copy of a letter to the editor from this morning's NZ paper (no online link) and it's worth sharing:

US heads for fall
The result of the Jackson trial is further proof that the United States is a nation in decay. If Jackson were a dog in North Canterbury he would be put down. His tastes are bizarre and his demeanor is weird enough to be described as obscene. Yet he walks free.

Only in America could this happen.

This country, in its death throes--brought on faster by electing a president who is barely literate and who has all the charm of a dead ferret--spirals downwards daily. In the United States corruption rules, justice is measured in plea bargaining and Hollywood is where the gods live. This nation that now sees its inevitable fate has turned to Christianity, hoping that God is the way to salvation. Consequently, it has managed to turn Christianity into a freak show controlled by greedy showmen robbing gullible widows of their mite.

North America's turn as the leader of the planet will end in the next 10 years or so, when it will find itself a distant third to China and Europe in world leadership. We should look forward to its demise for the sakes of all our children.
Don Hutchings

I love that "all the charm of a dead ferret" line. Though I suspect dead ferrets may be more charming than living ones. (My apologies to ferret lovers out there. My experience with them has been a little too rodent-ish to endear me to the species.)

Fighting a cold

Me, that is. I have wanted to believe this is allergies, but I am shifting out of denial today. I blame US Air.

Which is to say, not much will probably happen on the blogging front today unless I rally.

In the meantime, check out the LA Times story on the Downing Street Memo. I honestly believe this sort of coverage wouldn't be happening were it not for the pressure from Blogville. Let's hear it for Shakespeare's Sister!

Photo highlights from DC

L and A and Archives








Barry Flanagan's Thinker on a Rock

And another thing

Read Shakespeare's Sister for the latest memos coming out about Iraq. It's pretty sickening. Stuff like this:

• Memo from Peter Ricketts (Political Director, UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office) to Jack Straw (UK Foreign Secretary), March 22, 2002

For Iraq, "regime change" does not stack up. It sounds like a grudge between Bush and Saddam. Much better, as you have suggested, to make the objective ending the threat to the international community from Iraqi WMD...

And cup holders...don't forget the cup holders....I'm sorry. I lost myself for a moment. I thought we were selling a car not talking about invading a foreign country. It's so easy to get those two things confused.

I know I am ridiculously--what's the word--not naive, maybe idealistic--ridiculously idealistic sometimes, but is it too much to ask that we don't market war. (For more on marketing and Iraq, see last December's post that talks about a government advisory board report on marketing the "US brand" to Middle Eastern Muslims with gems like this:

How will the U.S. define the role of its "brand" in terms of the needs and wants of key target audiences?
. . .
What images, icons and symbolic elements will help communicate and enrich this "brand" meaning?

Have I mentioned lately that I hate Capitalism?

Patriot act stuff

The ACLU's ED Anthony Romero is a guest blogger this week at TPM Cafe. If you haven't called your senator about the Patriot Act yet, please do. My fellow Californians can reach Diane "capitulation queen" Feinstein here: (202) 224-3841. Because she has become a poster child for the right wing (endorsing Rice, providing a quote for the White House FAQ on the Patriot Act, etc.) her vote is particularly important. The ACLU has a good site devoted to action against the act. I know that the bill of rights is my hobby horse, but even those not obsessed with the trashing of the Constitution will want to take the time to call their Senators. Unless you're a fan of secret searches and incarceration without judicial review, and I'm certain none of you are.

It's all coming clear to me now

The Guardian reported a couple of weeks ago on a hormone that increases trust when sniffed. They say it may help explain romantic relationships and business deals:

Oxytocin plays a role in the bonding between mother and suckling infant; it helps you feel that you "know" someone you have met before, and it plays a powerful role in romantic love and desire.

Now, Swiss scientists report in Nature today, a few molecules in the nostrils will make you more inclined to trust a business partner.

Personally, I'd love to be able to blame my frightful relationship with my ex on a chemical compound but I think the story noted below about love and mental illness may be more relevant.

On the other hand, as The Guardian notes, one fears the impact of these discoveries on the political sphere:

"Some may worry about the prospect that political operators will generously spray the crowd with oxytocin at rallies of their candidates," he adds in Nature.

"The scenario may be rather too close to reality for comfort, but those with such fears should note that current marketing techniques--for political and other products--may well exert their effects through the natural release of molecules such as oxytocin in response to well-crafted stimuli."

Yeah. That's what I'm talking about. Do you think they distribute the stuff like bottles of dristan at cabinet meetings and press conferences? It would certainly explain a lot. The reason it feels so much like political gaslight most of the time is that no one is sharing their oxytocin vials with us left wing bloggers. (And what's with the name? It's like an opiate for the dyslexic.)

(Thanks to S for the link.)

24

Here is a brief recreation of the highlights of the last 24 hours of my life:

2:00pm EST: We leave for Washington National.

3:30pm EST: I arrive at my gate in plenty of time despite the confluence of road construction and a bad accident on 95. "So far so good," is what I am thinking.

4:15pm EST: The flight leaves for Pittsburgh.

5:30pm EST: I arrive at my gate in Pittsburgh.

5:35pm EST: They close Pittsburgh airport.

5:45, 6:00, 6:15, 6:30: We receive "weather updates." [Note that Pittsburgh is the best place to be delayed as they have free wireless and a complete mall attached to the airport. However, as we are never given more than a 15-minute margin, the leash is too short to do anything but actively wait. I spend most of this time amusing myself by listening to the cluster of young IT guys, who must be on their way to a conference, discuss hardware in the way that other male population groups steal glances at each other in the locker room.]

7:00pm EST: The plane boards

7:00pm to 9:30pm EST: I sit in a stationary plane. Time loses meaning. The only forward progress is the actual rotation of the earth itself. The following events happen in some order during this time period:

The US Air people tell us that because of the thunderstorm, the ground crew was unable to work, so we are waiting for them to unload the luggage from the previous flight and load our luggage. This will take approximately a half hour.

I meet Cedric, the charming five-year-old sitting next to me.

The US Air people tell us that they had to remove some broken seats on the flight and now they are waiting for the person with the log book to return so the repair can get logged.

Cedric and I agree that we hate the US Air people.

We are informed that there is something wrong with the communication system and the technician is on the way.

Cedric tells me his transformer robot is going to suck my blood. I put up no resistance.

The technician is perplexed about how to fix the communication system in a fully boarded plane.

Cedric staves off thunderous boredom by converting the pillowcase into a chapeau.



We lose power and everything becomes pitch black for a moment. The techno-geek behind me explains, "They're rebooting the plane."

The technician realizes he can fix things, but he needs to wait for "a special wrench."

I lose the will to live.

9:30pm EST: The plane begins taxi-ing. We break into applause.

9:45pm: They pass out free headsets to reward us.

10:00pm: They attempt to screen Hitch, but the sound doesn't work.

10:30pm or so: The flight attendant reaches our row with the food cart and explains that they have run out of all food except beef jerky and a Kit Kat bar. I resist the urge to tell her not to worry; I have already chewed my arm off in frustration.

1:45am PST: Finally, I make it home. Nic the cat is at once hysterically joyful to see me and furious that I have been gone. He wakes me at fifteen minute intervals throughout the night, once by biting my shoulder.

8-something am PST: I surrender to the suspicion I have been staving off all night--that a cosmic plot is afoot--when I am awakened by an earthquake.

So now it is 1:00pm. I am still in my pajamas. I had tentative plans for tonight, but I'm thinking I may cancel them. Pulling up the drawbridge is feeling like a really good option for the rest of the day.

UPDATE: As of Monday afternoon, Cedric's mom still has not received her luggage. True story.

Two things

1. Two and half hours is a really long time to sit in a stationary airplane on the tarmack.

2. I'm never flying US Air again.

Once again I say...

...wireless networks are the best airport innovation since the invention of the plane.

Left DC this afternoon. Now, I am in Pittsburgh and sadly, the airport is closed because of hideous thunderstorms. The last time I was in a closed airport was over a decade ago--Logan Airport on my way from Wisconsin to Amsterdam. It was blizzarding in Boston and everything in Logan was closed. Because we were in the international terminal, the airport became a smoking airport for the occasion as the Europeans simply smoked. The Red Cross even came to give us beverages. I am cautiously optimistic this current experience will be less dramatic. Nonetheless, I have Gilligan's Island fears...

Will someone out there take care of my cat if I never return to LA?

What if Eliza Doolittle were black?

Perhaps the most amusing news story here in DC during my stay has been that of the inaudible Metro announcements. When I lived here, we were all used to the periodic announcements that sounded like the grown-ups on Peanuts cartoons: "Wah...wah...wah...Doors open on the left." Not a huge problem. You just kept track of where you were on the line and were careful to get off where you were supposed to. Well, now that the announcement could, in theory, say, "There's a terrorist on your train. Run for your lives," the authorities have determined it's important to be able to actually understand what the Metro workers are saying. The solution? Elocution classes. Thus riders will be told, according to Reuters, that they are approaching "Pent-a-gon" station, not "Pen-a-gon." (Happily, there is no "Libary of Congress" stop as that would present particular challenges methinks.)

Making the story even more laughable is the litany of woes confronting Metro:

The transit authority took a beating in a recent Washington Post series that detailed financial troubles, broken escalators, ground water leaking into train tunnels and other problems. Smith said the elocution classes were set up months ago and were not a response to the newspaper's series.

Good to know as I fail to understand how articulation will help the situation. Knowing there is "wa-ter" in the tunnel, not "war-ter" doesn't make it any drier, yes?

In other Metro news, trains now all sport signs urging riders to pay attention when a fellow passenger leaves a package. If the person will not take the package with him or her even when prompted, one should call the police they advise. The posters attempt to infuse the situation with levity through captions such as, "Don't forget your teeth" (really) with a picture of dentures. All of which pales in comparison to MARC's poster campaign. (Thanks to Chris for the link.)

Just for Andrea

Today's link: The Institute of Draped Clothes

I hear what you're asking: But Why?

Draping clothes is a volatile art. It relies entirely on personal knowledge and creativity. We are not sure, today, how people in antiquity draped their costumes. Many ancient ways of draping saris are forgotten today. If no institution starts research today, the art may soon vanish completely. Draping is a most ancient and widespread form of clothing, used by billions of people all over the word. It is part of mankind's heritage. We must give it its right place and recognition. Draping is fun! Draping is an accessible and rewarding creative endeavour.

Who knew? A volatile art indeed.

One of the ten thousand things I am behind on

Stupid Blogger...Trying now for the second time to confess my procrastination sins. Blogger ate my last post.

So yeah, procrastination is a defect of character I seem to be stuck with, regardless of the number of times I've humbly asked that it be removed. And updating my blogroll seems to be right up there with mopping my kitchen floor for things that I do only when it reaches some sort of tipping point far past that of most folks. At some point not too long after I return home and am not poaching time on my sister's computer, I will do a little clean up. I know there are some of you who are probably wondering, "Is she ever going to link to me?" (Yes, CB, I'm talking to you.)

Also, un-noted here thus far is the fact that I've joined the crowd at the Big Brass Alliance. If somehow you've managed to remain uninformed and uninvolved, go check it out and visit After Downing Street which has links to Conyer's letter and all sorts of other ways you can exert your citizen pressure.

And I'm proud to be part of The Dark Wraith's Bloggirrrlz Gallery.

And yeah, I know the whole site could stand a non-orange revamp. I'm only a half step above a dumb end-user though, so barring some generous offer from a smarter friend, I don't see it happening any time soon.

Doublespeak

Needless to say, I've been following the Patriot Act renewal news with some degree of anxiety and disgust. Anyone who knows me or reads this blog regularly already knows where I stand. Today's eyerolling entry will be short (I have shopping to do)--if you want more ranting about civil liberties, just read back in the archives. In the meantime, you can check out the White House fact sheet on the act. I particularly love this paragraph:

Before The Patriot Act, Criminal Investigators Were Separated From Intelligence Officers By A Legal And Bureaucratic Wall. The Patriot Act helped tear down this wall, giving law enforcement and intelligence officers the ability to share information, work together, and bring terrorists to justice.

I just love when the government refers to the Constitution as "a legal and bureaucratic wall."

One might also note that, even in the brief page allotted to the high points, they found space to quote Feinstein:

As Senator Diane Feinstein said, "I have no reported abuses."

I'm thinking there's a special spot in hell for Diane. If you're in doubt see January's entry on her grotesque boosterism of Rice.

Let's hear it for the one-party system. All we need is for Hillary to secure the Dem's nomination to cement it.

The healing power of decadence

L, A, and I spent went to the National Gallery today to see the Lautrec exhibit. I will post more about the day upon my return (when I can upload the photos of Barry Flanagan's Thinker on a Rock), but for now let me just say that I have determined that periodic doses of avant garde decadence may be the key for me to survive our present era. It made me so happy to wander through those rooms of lithographs, paintings, and drawings that by the end I was grinning like an idiot. It was a really good reminder for me that no matter how much power the fundies get, they cannot crush everything. Up with Decadence! I say.

In other news, at least one researcher is entertaining the notion that Jesus died of a blood clot:

An Israeli researcher has challenged the popular belief that Jesus died of blood loss on the cross, saying he probably succumbed to a sometimes fatal disorder now associated with long-haul air travel.

I need to point out that Reuters is the source of that fabulous quote; the article later calls the condition "economy class condition" which I guess is pretty appropriate because I just can't see Jesus in first class myself. MSNBC's version of the story opens with a still from that Gibson epic, a questionable choice at best.

GM index

By now we've all heard about GM's vivisection. Just to place the job loss (25,000) in context...

$12,798,572: GM CEO Wagoner's 2003 compensation including stock options
$12,477,364: Wagoner's unexercised stock options from previous years
2506 AD: The year the accumulated wages of an average worker would total one year of Wagoner's compensation
3199 AD: The year the accumulated wages of a minimum wage worker would total one year of Wagoner's compensation
54%: The amount pay increased in 2004 for the CEOs of the largest 500 companies
11%: The average decrease in full-time worker pay from 1973 adjusted for inflation
45: The number of workers whose combined pay would equal that of a CEO in 1973
140: The number of workers whose combined pay would equal that of a CEO in 1991
300: The number of workers whose combined pay would equal that of a CEO in 2004

(Stats complements of the AFL-CIO's executive paywatch database and the UAW.)

Putting a new phrase into circulation

Upon watching Brad Pitt discussing the prospect of adopting an African orphan with Diane Sawyer ("It's a beautiful idea, really. Right now I'm just concentrating on down-sizing. We've just got so much crap.") with U2 playing in the background, we realized we need a new phrase: "White Hipsters' Burden."

Pulp fiction cliff's notes

The wonderful Jennifer Shiman of Angry Alien has been busy. She now has Pulp Fiction on her front page, and it looks like we have plenty to look forward to now that she's doing work for Starz (The Big Chill, Scarface, and Night of the Living Dead are among the forthcoming shorts).

For those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about: Shiman does 30-second encapsulations of famous films, reinacted by animated bunnies. I find them hilarious (I particularly like Jaws and The Shining), though I just played a couple for my brother who kind of stared at me like, "This is the sort of thing that amuses you?" So I guess you have to be a certain kind of person.

Is that the sound of dueling banjos I hear?

Thanks to Chris for pointing out the outrage du jour, Human Events Online's list of the ten most harmful books of the 19th and 20th centuries. A list which features, among others, Das Kapital, The Feminine Mystique, and Dewey's Democracy and Education. Chris has posted his own counter-list, which includes both the OT and NT.

Andrea notes that if you include Human Events' "honorable mentions" the list becomes really a great summer reading list that could easily be mistaken for a Great Books course syllabus.

Conversation snippet

Andrea: Apple is now moving to Intel processors, did you see that?
Me: Really?? Wow, the Mac people must all be wearing black armbands.
Andrea: They're getting into the bathtub with their laptops.

Synecdoche

One of the reasons I wanted to come to DC right now is that I have a 16 year-old niece who has been struggling (my extremely euphemistic way of describing how life is going for her right now).

Yesterday morning she left to go on the road with the traveling carnival.

I was happy to be informed that she brought her journal with her. I look forward to the future memoir: My Years as a Teenage Carny. Sometimes that's the best you can hope for from life--good fodder for future art. (I come by it honestly; that's all I'm trying to say.)

Mid-flight realization

Flying from Ft. Lauderdale to DC last night, I was seated next to a couple I can only refer to as "typical Washingtonians." They were clad in those studied casual clothes--currently stylish in a preppy way. The woman's handbag had to have run at least $500, and they were both sucking water out of those nipple bottles that disturb me a great deal. The woman was reading Money magazine (and Body and Shape) and the man was reading Men's Health. I was reading a book on oral history research practices and thinking about how Washington and Wall Street are the only two places on earth where they can even sell copies of Money magazine to women (okay, you can slam me for that comment, but it does seem true to me). In LA, after all, the distinction between money and shape/body is obscure at best.

So yes, they were reading their magazines. Woman began doing the word search on the children's puzzle page of the airline magazine. Man was correcting her work and helping her over her shoulder. "Doesn't that look like an 'o' to you?" I moved on to the NYT crossword puzzle and tried not to feel bitter about the distribution of wealth.

Woman began menu planning, showing Man recipes for low-fat salads (sigh) running in side-bars to the Cabo vacation ads, as they both moved from nipple water to bloody marys with gin.

A snippet of conversation:
Woman: We definitely need to tip the dog sitter since she came through at the last minute.
Man: Hmm.
Woman: And I think we should think about the whole dog thing again.
Man: Hmm?
Woman: I mean, we said we weren't going to let having a dog get in the way of living our lives.
Man: But you want children.
Woman: That's an entirely different matter.

This was the point that I realized people in LA are really no more shallow than people in DC. They are just differently shallow. And they own it better.

Love is the drug....cont.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the news that love affects the brain like drug addiction is getting international attention (thanks to S for the link). Australia's Fairfax Digital opens their story with a reference to Emily Dickinson, a choice that would get my attention, as an American lit PhD, under any circumstances, but one that seems even more striking in the face of this weekend's NYT fruitfly story hook:

When it strikes, romantic love can feel like a kind of madness. Infatuated people act irrationally. They lose concentration. They feel giddy, wretched and wonderful. It is one of life's most powerful experiences. Emily Dickinson described it as "a perfect--paralysing bliss--contented as despair".

For centuries, we've looked to philosophers and poets to parse the mysteries of the human heart. Now it is science's turn.

When Dr Helen Fisher, of Rutgers University in New Jersey, reads the Dickinson poem, she sees passion, certainly. But she also detects signs of high levels of dopamine in the poet's caudate nucleus.

And here, of course, they lose me. God help those scientists with their understanding of Dickinson's caudate nucleus. It must suck to go through the world seeing things through that particular lens.

The story's close?

Because, as Peanuts' Charlie Brown said: "Nothing takes the taste out of peanut butter quite like unrequited love."

Kudos to any journalist who manages to open with Dickinson and close with Charlie Brown I say.

I know I should quit smoking

I'm not trying to make allowances for a bad habit that is a social annoyance--I'm really not--but I do want to point out that there's something wrong with security policy that allows you pack an unloaded gun in your luggage but not a lighter. You know?

I am in Fort Lauderdale airport, on my way to DC. Despite a glacially slow connection, the presence of free wireless in the terminal is probably keeping me from potentially actionable choices on my part. I have been here too long. (It's hard to plan a sensible itinerary when you don't know the event schedule until you get there.) It is also a very lucky turn of events that the small child who was singing "I've been working on the railroad" over and over and over and over in a monotone voice while hanging upside down on the chair in front of me (chin toward the ceiling, small almond eyes fixed on me typing) has been removed by some beneficent adult.

I would say something brilliant about the news, but the connection is so slow that trying to access anything worth reading is more frustration than it's worth. I'm sure everything continues to be messed up in predictable ways. I'll read the paper on the flight after which time maybe I'll have something more profound and less whiny to say.

Two random observations from Florida

1. You know it's humid when post-it notes don't really work.

2. It's not really a compliment if you have to say to someone, "That's a compliment." As in, "You remind me so much of Nancy Kulp [who played Jane Hathaway on the Beverly Hillbillies]. That's a compliment" (I am only slightly molified by the fact that she was the first out lesbian on TV.)

Update: In retrospect, I think that the Jane Hathaway comment was sort of like the queer version of "Are you a friend of Bill W?"

96 tears and 96 eyes

I have it on good authority (Mike) that this was the lead paragraph in a front-page NYT story today:

When the genetically altered fruit fly was released into the observation chamber, it did what these breeders par excellence tend to do. It pursued a waiting virgin female. It gently tapped the girl with its leg, played her a song (using wings as instruments) and, only then, dared to lick her--all part of standard fruit fly seduction.

After that sensational, opening, the story goes on to say that the fruitfly in question (the licker not the lickee) was, however, not a boy fruitfly but a girl fruitfly who had been "artificially endowed with a single male-type gene" (the lickee being a non-genetically modified girl fruitfly). And so, the researchers are arguing, sexual orientation should be seen not as a political matter, but a genetic one, since at least in fruitflies, it is the purview of our genetic code.

Putting aside the intellectual angles here (since it is 1:30am in Florida and I have to be up in a few hours), I just want to say that I think it's pretty noteworthy that the Times is telling us about lesbian fruitfly licking on its front page.

Also, let me say it is very humid in Florida.

Okay I have to go to bed. Enough about the playahs of the fruitfly world.

You can't be neutral on a moving train

I was going to title this post "Why I am not a Clinton Democrat," but that seemed too deceptive since I'm not really a Democrat at all. I mean, I'll vote for whomever they run in 2008. I have commented here more than once that I would have voted for Socks if he ran against W--and frankly, I might prefer Socks to the Other Clinton, but hey, I'll hold my nose and do it.

In any case, here are some excerpts from Clinton's appearance on Larry King yesterday.

On W:

KING: How do you explain the friendship with President Bush?

CLINTON: Well, I just like him. First of all, I've always liked him. I've always admired him. I mean, he gave his life to public service. He comes from a family who did. His father was a distinguished senator from Connecticut.

And so I share an interest in public service. He likes sports. I like sports. He likes people. And I think he's a genuinely good man. I like him. I like his wife. I like his family. I've liked him since I first met him in 1983, two years before you went on the air here.

KING: In fact, you're going to his house.

CLINTON: I am. He invited me to come up to Kennebunkport where I have not been for 22 years.

KING: Beautiful.

CLINTON: And to play golf with him and ride in his boat. And I'm looking forward to it.

He likes sports--I like sports??? Why am I reminded of that fictitious Kerry moment "Who among us doesn't like NASCAR?"

On Felt/Deep Throat:

KING: What do you make of the Mark Felt story? Is he an American hero?

CLINTON: I think he did a good thing. And I think it's -- it was an unusual circumstance. I think Felt believed that there was the chance that this whole thing would be covered up. Ordinarily, I think a law enforcement official shouldn't be leaking to the press because you should let criminal action take its course.

When he did that, he obviously believed there was a chance that the thing would be covered up. And there was some evidence -- we now know that there was also a problem with trying to use the FBI, and the IRS, and other agencies of the federal government for political purposes back then. So there's some reason to believe he was right.

I don't think that -- he always felt ambivalent about it, apparently. And I think that's good. Because, on balance, you don't want law enforcement officials leaking to the press, even the truth, much less some vendetta or something that's not true. But under these circumstances, I think he did the right thing.

So "back then" when federal agencies were used for political purposes, it might be okay to leak crimes to the press, as long as you feel guilty for it. Let me say, it is difficult to type with my eyes rolling to the back of my head this way.

On Hillary's propensity to stick by her convictions:

CLINTON: . . . You just look at her whole life. There's a remarkable consistency in her life. She decides what she believes. She'll change her mind, if the evidence warrants it. I mean, she's not a dunderhead or any -- you know, she's not...

KING: She was a Goldwater Republican.

CLINTON: Yes, but -- she was a Goldwater Republican. And Hillary used to joke with me that Goldwater carried her hometown 3 to 1 and the others thought he was too liberal where she grew up. But you know, and we liked Barry Goldwater a lot. We went to see him when he was ill in Arizona before he passed away.

But she has always been somebody who was just convicted. I mean, she lives by a conviction. And...

KING: Stays the course?

CLINTON: She stays the course, you know?

We liked Goldwater??? We liked Barry Goldwater a lot??? Hello? Do we even have a Democratic Party anymore?

The Mister Rogers moment:

CLINTON: I mean, you know, this idea that somebody we disagree with on economic or social policy or something we have to turn into some kind of ogre or demon, I think, is a mistake. I mean, it's like telling the American people or half the American people that don't agree with you they're all fools. That's just not true.

Most of the people I've known in politics, by the way, in this country and in other countries, before I became president and when I was in the White House, most of them have been good people. They'd been smart, hard-working, well-motivated, and they pretty well did what they believed was right.

He later mentions "adoring" Billy Graham because, "Whether you agree or disagree with everything, he is a man who lives his faith," and respecting Karl Rove because "he's a good grassroots politician." I need to cut in here and state a fact which is so flamingly obvious there should be no need to waste the energy typing it, and yet: Being a person of conviction doesn't make you admirable unless your convictions are admirable. Duh, right?

On the war du jour:

KING: You supported the president when he went into Iraq. Do you still support him?

CLINTON: Yes, I felt, as I said then, I felt that we should have let the U.N. inspectors finish their job. But once he made the decision to go forward, I thought all Americans should have said, well, we're in this thing now. We've got to back our troops and we've got to hope that the enterprise succeeds because there's no question that Saddam was a bad guy. The Iraqis would be better off without him, if we can build a coherent country here.

What to say?

All day I have been thinking off and on about what it must be like to live somewhere that 30 to 40 people die every day.

In sum, the transcript speaks to an ethical shallowness--a man for whom "liking" people is more important than standing for principle. Because if we can all just get together over a good game of golf, everything's going to be okay. Is it wrong for me to say that I think Clinton really, really needs alanon or acoa? I thought that through his presidency. He is like the coda poster child.

Anyway, I am going back to Woodward and Bernstein on Larry King. At least they aren't talking about adoring Billy Graham.

Why I would make a lousy Buddhist

Even were I able to lay to rest my struggle with the whole "desire is the root of all suffering" thing, I would make a lousy Buddhist. This is what I'm thinking about as I prepare to leave tomorrow.

Here's how it goes for me: Okay, it's past the first of the month, so I have to pay rent. But of course, to do that, I have to balance my checkbook. And then there are those other bills that are late... and the trash to take out... and I have to call the catsitter...

And then the work things: Do I have the projector? Does it work okay with my laptop? Did the boxes make it to the hotel? And those last minute adjustments to the session profiles--they need doing...

Do I have enough cat food? Did I remember to pack my coffee and filters? Do I have time to vacuum my apartment? For that matter, I should probably do those twelve things I've been putting off for six months. Because even though they've been on my to-do list for six months, they really can't wait the eleven days I'll be gone.

Are you getting the picture? It's tough to be me--that's what I'm trying to say. Be grateful you don't have to carry my brain around in your cranium. You'd be an insomniac too.

And here's the really ironic thing: I'm actually a great spontaneous traveler. I've had enough traveling mishaps (and fiascos) that I don't stress much at all once I've locked my apartment door behind me. There's little that a credit card and a measure of patience can't extricate me from, I know this.

Anyway, so I'm going to Florida tomorrow for work, and then from there to DC and possibly NYC (if I'm feeling recharged enough and it's not pouring--yes, I know; I've been completely corrupted by LA). I'll be online sporadically and will post when possible, but will be spending most of my time interacting face-to-face in the fleshly world. If I go to the Toulouse-Lautrec exhibit or the National Museum of the American Indian, I promise to let you all know how they were.



(And if I go to New York, I'll post a picture the shoes I will inevitably buy on 8th Street.)

Chutzpah of the satanic variety

Rumsfeld on the Amnesty report:

No force in the world has done more to liberate people that they have never met than the men and women of the United States military. Indeed, that's why the recent allegation that the US military is running a gulag at Guantanamo Bay is so reprehensible.

. . .

Oh my goodness, there's so much transparency in Gitmo and so much oversight. There have been so many reforms instituted in the Department of Defense, and the oversight and the attention that's given to what's taking place at Gitmo is extensive. And the implication that it's a gulag is what's wrong -- not what's going on at Gitmo.

Well that's a relief. I feel better. Don't you feel better?

I may have to buy this

From Cafepress, of course

This modern world

...is very, very funny this week.

And the blog is rocking too

Geez. The Bush folks sure are pissed about Amnesty International's use of the word "gulag", huh? Perhaps Amnesty should just clarify things a bit by eschewing comparisons to the Soviet Union and making it clear that when they say "gulags", they simply meant "secret prisons in which innocent people have been tortured to death".

I am embarrassed to admit I've thought about this

More than once:

GENEVA, Ill. May 30, 2005 — A 46-year-old man allegedly set his own home on fire in order to get two visitors to leave, police said.

. . .

When authorities arrived at Craig's home, which is owned by his mother, it was engulfed in flames, police said. Craig and his two guests were not injured.

Craig allegedly had asked two visitors to leave, but when they refused, he threatened to light his house on fire, police said.

(From Corrente via Alternate Brain)

This explains a lot

You've got to appreciate a news story that begins "New love can look for all the world like mental illness, a blend of mania, dementia, and obsession . . . that could almost be mistaken for psychosis." Other good lines:

. . .researchers in New York and New Jersey argue that romantic love is a biological urge distinct from sexual arousal.

It is closer in its neural profile to drives like hunger, thirst or drug craving, the researchers assert, than to emotional states like excitement or affection.

And this

Dr. Helen Fisher, an anthropologist at Rutgers University and the co-author of the analysis. "And when rejected, some people contemplate stalking, homicide, suicide. This drive for romantic love can be stronger than the will to live."

Yeesh. I will refrain from interjecting the thousand personal anecdotes that seem frighteningly relevant here, except to say there is some limited relief in understanding that my ex-es were merely acting under biological imperative.

I know the personal is political, but...

So I saw The Interpreter this weekend. [Warning: spoiler to follow.] It didn't totally suck. But here's the thing that bugs me. Whenever H-wood tries to make a movie about politics--at least in this era--everything seems to come back to the nuclear family. I'm not naive; I understand that a big film demands a love interest. Paths of Glory just couldn't get made right now. I get that. But The Interpreter wasn't just marred by that (in fact, I credit them with making a film where none of the loaded guns go off, so to speak).

There was a way in which the movie said: Your country has been subject to revolutions and bloodshed, upheaval, betrayal of all that is precious--and we understand your passion because your family died. And the male lead really understands your passion because his wife died. Revolution...car accident. You see the difficulty here, yes? I don't want to be too much of a jerk. I mean, it wasn't a horror show like the remake of Manchurian Candidate; it was just disappointing. I get that the personal is political. I really do. But there are ways in which the political--and in particular, a sense of duty and justice--should be greater than the personal. This is why I dislike "victims' rights" statements in the courtroom, for instance. I believe the law should be something entirely different and apart from a personal plea of anger and grief. I think it's right that it be so.

For many of us, our role or actions in the political sphere are linked to our relationships with our families. I understand that, and in that way, I should probably cut the film more of a break. I think it was trying to say that about Kidman's character--that her politics and her family history were inextricably intertwined but that she recognized a deeper duty than family love. (Of course, if the Penn character had just been fucked up in some other way, it would have been much easier to buy that reading for me.) The fact that my grandfather came here to escape the pogroms, the fact that my dad was blacklisted, these things have much to do with who I am in many ways. But...if I had a relative killed in the towers on 9/11, that wouldn't make me any more in favor of the "war on terror."

And on the note of political duty and the role of family--crazy stuff with Deep Throat, huh? Vanity Fair [.pdf] has the full story. Within the same week, Deep Throat comes forward and Newsweek says it will toughen its policy on the use of anonymous sources. Funny world, huh?

Not dead yet

Okay, I am back. I apologize for the extended hiatus. As I mentioned, work became all consuming and then recovery from work took more time than I'd anticipated. So here I am, restored, renewed, and ready to return to virtual punditry.

It's Memorial Day. I have assiduously avoided cookouts and picnics today and have, instead, stayed in and gotten caught up on some things. I did buy a swimsuit this weekend, which means I should be congratulated on braving the crowds at the mall and that my denial about living in LA is finally breaking down. I've been here three years. I have a lovely pool in my complex, and yet, I have not owned a bathing suit. I am a gradual assimilator.

On a more somber note, it is Memorial Day and without meaning any disrespect to the men and women in the military and our veterans, this seems particularly problematic to me this year. It would be less vexed, in my mind, to memorialize our fallen soldiers if we weren't putting them in harm's way on a daily basis. Take NBC's Memorial Day page, for example. Flags and sympathy. Here is a sample card:



Here is what Bush had to say two years ago on Memorial Day:

Each Memorial Day, we pray for peace throughout the world, remembering what was gained and what was lost during times of war. From the bravery of the men at Valley Forge, to the daring of Normandy, the courage of Iwo Jima, and the steady resolve in Afghanistan and Iraq, our men and women in uniform have won for us every hour that we live in freedom. During this year's observance, we particularly recognize the courageous spirit of the men and women in our Nation's Armed Forces who are working with our coalition partners to restore civil order, provide critical humanitarian aid, and renew Afghanistan and Iraq. As we honor those who have served and have been lost, we better understand the meaning of patriotism and citizenship, and we pledge that their sacrifices will not be in vain.

It's just sad; that's what I'm saying.

Wage slave

Okay, so once again, I am preparing to descend into meeting hell. It is, in fact, the eleventh hour here on the west coast, so it's fitting that I just finished the prep for my three-day workgroup meeting that begins tomorrow. Which is to say--scant blogging ahead folks. Others, I know, will be offline because of vacations, beach trips, etc. Leisure is for sissies, that's what I say.

Truly, I am looking forward to the meeting, but it puts me off the grid for a while.

In the meantime, coming to us all the way from the emerald isle is the link to Penguin remixes. Don't we all have a thing for the hipster librarian type, after all?

Niche marketing at its finest

Have I mentioned that I love the Internet? I really do. Site of the day compliments of M, who forwarded it with the tag line, "For the discerning and morally sound cannibal in your life."

Who says irony is dead

Winning my time-waster of the week award (during a week when I have no time to waste) is the Contagious Media Showdown. Honestly, I don't know much about it. I only found it researching the panty hoax on After School Snack (because you know we at NMTE love to post about panties). But there's some fine surfing to be had following the links listed here. (You can find out more about Contagious Media on their homepage, which lists some of their other projects.)

Breaking out my tinfoil hat

I don't really like hats, and tinfoil doesn't suit me so well, but Yahoo!'s "Tech Tuesday" section is so creepy today I'm thinking it may be time to fashion that Gary Glitter meets X-Files piece of headgear. I remember when Tech sections focused on better video games and higher speed Internet connections. Today's? Biometrics, national ID cards, passports with super-duper security stuff. And I love this: the story on biometric security titled "Login Liberation." Or this: the company that offers school lunch checkout equipment that uses students' fingerprints to access their accounts. I know it's trite but I can't get that scene from Bladerunner out of my head where Decker is interrogating Leon with that eye scanner thingie. I think I need a vacation.

No child left intact

I know a lot of you are probably also on True Majority's mailing list, but for those of you who aren't...

Did you know that the No Child Left Behind Act has a section that forces schools to give student information to military recruiters and to give recruiters the same access to students that colleges and prospective employers have? Yeah. I didn't know. Working Assets is campaigning against the provision (and for HR 551, which would require written parental consent to pass along contact information for students).

Today

The Library of Congress is webcasting Václav Havel's speech on human rights today at 6:00 (I'm assuming eastern standard).

The problem with literature is language

Barnes and Noble's Sterling Publishing has finally solved the problem of how to extract the meaning in books without all of those pesky words getting in the way. Their new "classic starts" series (which, I'm sorry, sounds way too much like a frozen foods brand to me) presents classic children's books the way we want them: for dummies. After School Snack has the WSJ extract that explains the books "appeal to both those who struggle to read and to avid younger students whose reading skills aren't quite strong enough to let them master The Adventures of Tom Sawyer in its original. The books, which have been retold using simpler words, have been surprisingly hot sellers..." After poking around on Sterling's site, I also discovered the Young Readers Shakespeare Series which similarly vivisects the Bard "skillfully blending Shakespeare's own lines with simple, modern language."

The WSJ story quotes a visiting scholar at Harvard's School of Ed, who explains, "kids spend so much time trying to decipher the words that the meaning of the story eludes them."

WTF??? Can you hear the sound of my head exploding? I am trying to understand this distinction between words and meaning. Telling a story is not like juicing an orange. Let's just get rid of all of that pesky pulp and rind and get right to the meaning. To make matters worse, the Classic Starts titles are all children's books to begin with. We're not talking here about simplifying Gravity's Rainbow. No, this is a list with tough-to-tackle titles such as The Secret Garden and Little Women.

I'm not trying to be a total jerk here. I understand the draw of stories for their own sake. Shit, if I watch the first fifteen minutes of a Lifetime movie, I am incapable of leaving the television until the damn thing is done. I am a slave to narrative. But there are plenty of good stories that are already told in tiny sentences with one- and two-syllable words to publish. Why go marauding the classics?

Sterling's tag line: "The stories are abridged; the quality is complete. Classic Starts treats the world's beloved tales (and children) with the respect they deserve--all at an incomparable price." With respect like that, who needs abuse?

How many isolated incidents make a pattern?

I can't even bring myself to quote from Friday's New York Times story about the torture of prisoners in Bagram, Afghanistan. By now, many of you have probably already read it, but what can I say, I'm behind on life so I'm posting about it now.

The story focuses on the deaths of two prisoners who were beaten, hung by chains from the ceiling, and otherwise brutally abused. One seems to have been detained merely for being in the wrong place at the wrong time--he drove by a military base that had been the target of an attack that day.

It's deeply depressing. And of course, it underscores the madness of the administration's complaints against Newsweek. The past couple of weeks in the news has felt, in this way, to me like some sick amalgam of 1984 and Lord of the Flies where we get both the savagery of naked imperialism and the totalitarian news organ to explain our world to us. If I were a Christian, I would title this post "my god, why hast thou forsaken me"; as it is, I can only try to cherish the part of me that is continually appalled and sickened by America's actions in the name of freedom and liberty. May I never become inured to our grotesque hypocrisy.

Always, at every moment, there will be the thrill of victory, the sensation of trampling on an enemy who is helpless. If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face -- for ever. . . . The heretic, the enemy of society, will always be there, so that he can be defeated and humiliated over again. Everything that you have undergone since you have been in our hands -- all that will continue, and worse. The espionage, the betrayals, the arrests, the tortures, the executions, the disappearances will never cease. It will be a world of terror as much as a world of triumph. . . . Always we shall have the heretic here at our mercy, screaming with pain, broken up, contemptible -- and in the end utterly penitent, saved from himself, crawling to our feet of his own accord. That is the world that we are preparing, Winston. A world of victory after victory, triumph after triumph after triumph: an endless pressing, pressing, pressing upon the nerve of power. You are beginning, I can see, to realize what that world will be like. But in the end you will do more than understand it. You will accept it, welcome it, become part of it.'
1984

Oh how the mighty have fallen

Today we discovered we are now officially middle aged. We cannot deny it any longer. How can we be sure? Because The Flaming Lips are headlining at Xingolati: Groove Cruise of the Pacific.

Picture a "what if Carnival Cruises sponsored burning man" event that seemingly distills the worst of all possible worlds (floating man?).

For instance, this is from the FAQ:

The navy has a ritual for new sailors when they cross the equator. Are you doing any kind of ritual? I see there is a trident in the Xingolati logo. Is that the trident of Neptune?

There is depth to the name Xingolati. We didn't just create a word to be different. It's a puzzle. Ritual is an important element of any event. This cruise is about the path to getting there. . .crossing the line. . .taking it to the next level. Any kind of spiritual growth requires a rite of passage. There are many artists on board that will take us through this journey. The Mutaytor will help us make the transformation that occurs during the voyage. Neptune is the God of the Sea; we certainly want to respect the gods. There will be expressions that come from people inspired by the atmosphere, the music, and the interaction with others. It's like a seminar or a retreat. You will have to take some time to process the experience and decide how to apply it to your life. It's about accepting the broader realm of possibilities.

Um yeah. Okay. I'm thinking some serious drug use played a part in conceptualizing Xingolati (and the depth of the name eludes this blogger--it sounds to me like something a Mexican coffee lover would name his dog).

But just because you're ritualizing your spiritual transformation doesn't mean you should ignore the meat container. Because god knows, what's nirvana without maribou. The "What to Bring" section tells us:

Xingolati is a fashion fabulous event, so bring your best threads. Exaggerate your character and bring out those beautiful items you keep for special occasions. This is participatory theatre, look your best!

Evening gowns
Super heros welcome
Fake furs
Wigs
Gaudi jewelry (hmm...necklaces with colorful tilework?)
Questionable hair styles
Rings & jewels
Fake mustaches

I'm going to perform an intervention here and tell any prospective groove cruisers that, no, you should not bring your fake mustaches. There is a really useful distinction to be made between "fashion fabulous" and "you look like a horse's ass." If you're not clear on where that line falls, consult with a friend before packing. Please.

Pictures from this weekend

We went to Hollywood Forever for a screening again this weekend--this time to see The Bad and the Beautiful. I admit I'd not seen it before, and while Lana Turner is certainly beautiful, I was hoping she would be a bit more bad. Ah well. This time we had our photo op with Johnny's statue.

We'll always have Paris

Rick Santorum today on the Democrat's opposition to the "nuclear option"--their desire to retain the right to filibuster:

The rule has been in place for 214 years that this is the way we confirm judges. Broken by the other side two years ago, and the audacity of some members to stand up and say, "How dare you break this rule," it's the equivalent of Adolf Hitler in 1942: "I'm in Paris. How dare you invade me. How dare you bomb my city? It's mine."

Let me make sure I get this--opposition to tyranny is fascism? What I want to know is when do they take the last remaining voices of resistance into room 101 and let rats run across their faces? I love big brother.

Crooks and Liars has the video clip. And Ward Sutton is good on the subject this week as well.

Happy birthday to the blog

It's a year old today. I mean, for whatever that's worth.

So why don't I feel safer?

In the category of "things I really wish hadn't happened in the same week" fall these two stories.

First, the House passed (424 to 4) a bill (HR 1817) that appropriates more than 34 billion dollars for the Department of Homeland Security (because who needs Social Security when you have Homeland Security, right?). If anyone has the stomach to read the 105-page monstrosity and explain to me more specifically which of my freedoms are now even further limited, feel free. Despite my policy wonk tendencies, I just can't bring myself to do it right now.

The second thing that happened this week is that the FBI explained to the Senate that the single biggest domestic terrorist threat comes from animal liberation and environmental activists:

"There is nothing else going on in this country over the last several years that is racking up the high number of violent crimes and terrorist actions," Lewis said.

. . .

Lewis said the FBI concluded that after analyzing all types of cases and comparing the groups with "right-wing extremists, KKK, anti-abortion groups and the like." . . .

Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., the panel's chairman, said he hoped to examine more closely how the groups might be getting assistance in fundraising and communications from tax-exempt organizations' "mainstream activists" not directly blamed for the violence.

"Just like al-Qaida or any other terrorist organization, ELF and ALF cannot accomplish their goals without money, membership and the media," Inhofe said.

The FBI said 35 of its offices have 150 open investigations, with activists claiming credit for 1,200 crimes between 1990 and mid-2004.

Truly, I wish I were making this up--it's like a parody of right wing extremism--but sadly, I am not. Though I was thinking about it--this parodic nature of current events, and I thought about the history here--the Salem witch hunts . . . HUAC . . . and now "terrorism." Marx was right, the third time is farce.

This week on the 101

And people don't understand why I take surface streets

More on Wal-mart and hell

Let me say I would rather remain unattached the rest of my days on earth than meet a mate at Wal-mart singles night. A craze that started in Germany, Wal-mart singles night is spreading like a cancer throughout the world:

Romantically unattached customers who swing by between 6 and 8 P.M. are given a red bow for their cart (it indicates you're single and there to mingle); some locations even offer up a glass of champagne-or a rose to present to that eye-catching "item" you just gotta have. "Flirt points"-stations where you can taste romance-themed products like chocolates and wines-throughout the store make striking up a conversation with that cutie in the housewares section even easier.

(As I type this, my friend Becky is telling me "I want to go to that almost as much as I want to go to Hellhouse." We both agree the draw is similar in nature.)

"I wasn't talking about 'normal'; what I was talking about is 'natural'"

This from Horsley's latest incredible interview on the Alan Colmes show to explain his earlier confession that he spent his youth fucking mules. And this distinction--between what is "normal" and what is "natural"--I think pretty well captures so much of what is wrong with a certain strain of fundamentalist Christian ideology.

Here's a typical admission from Horsley: "I had sex with anything that moved. If we had a warm watermelon out in the field, I might give it a name." (Note to Horsley: watermelons are stationary.)

The logic goes like this: Because Eve ate the apple, Horsley was born in sin. Being born in sin, we all (well, men anyway) have a natural desire to have sex with anything that moves (as well as warm watermelons, apparently). And so, were it not for the beneficent intervention of our lord Jesus, we'd all be out humping mules.

Wow.

Yes, everyone is blogging about the interviews, and usually I don't just pile onto the fray, but having just listened to the interviews, I was compelled to provide the link. You can find them all on his wacko site.

The better part of valor

So yesterday a friend came by work to do some business and say hello. After she left, the receptionist says to me, "So she's not pregnant, huh?"

"Ah, no," I say, trying hard not to imagine the conversation that led to this conclusion.

"Well, she shouldn't wear that dress then," receptionist woman says.

Moyers on CPB the Ministry of Truth

Yelladog points us to this week's NYT story on CPB's attempts to moderate the "liberal bias" temper the left wing opinion force NPR to bend over and take W's agenda with a smile.

If you haven't read/heard Bill Moyers' speech to the National Conference for Media Reform, it's worth the click. As he indicates, Moyers has the dubious distinction of being monitored by CPB's Tomlinson (who paid $10G for said "monitoring"--jeez, I'd even watch O'Reilly for that).

Moyers, who is of course, retired now, is threatening to return to active duty:

I should put my detractors on notice: They might just compel me out of the rocking chair and back into the anchor chair.

Who are they? I mean the people obsessed with control, using the government to threaten and intimidate. I mean the people who are hollowing out middle-class security even as they enlist the sons and daughters of the working class in a war to make sure Ahmed Chalabi winds up controlling Iraq's oil. I mean the people who turn faith-based initiatives into a slush fund and who encourage the pious to look heavenward and pray so as not to see the long arm of privilege and power picking their pockets. I mean the people who squelch free speech in an effort to obliterate dissent and consolidate their orthodoxy into the official view of reality from which any deviation becomes unpatriotic heresy.

That's who I mean. And if that's editorializing, so be it. A free press is one where it’s OK to state the conclusion you're led to by the evidence.

A nod to what everyone else is talking about

I hereby acknowledge that I am the only sentient being in my country who does not care about the latest episode in the Star Wars opus. I just don't. It's like a belief in god--I've tried; I really have; I just can't muster the enthusiasm. Perhaps one day I will open some previously locked door in my psyche and find a taste for blockbuster movies alongside faith in a creator (as well as a desire to watch reality TV and a yearning for a new car though my old one works just fine). In the meantime, I share with anyone else who is a non-fan, the Village Voice review of Sith:

In debt to lurid sci-fi-novel cover art, Revenge of the Sith achieves the ultimate in what could be called Baroque Nerdism, a frame-filling aesthetic of graphic overdesign that began with The Phantom Menace and has now been jacked up to an absurd degree. Half the film takes place at dawn or dusk, so that the Marin County team can geek out on artificial roseate glow—a sugary luminence used so frequently one wonders if they developed a Maxfield Parrish plug-in to get the job done.

Hee hee. Baroque Nerdism. I love it. Anyway, the review is pretty funny and damn well written (even if they did misspell "luminance").

We're all going to hell

This depresses me so much I cannot even speak...

Looking on the bright side

Thinking this morning about yesterday's post and Galloway's use of the word "traduced" in his fervent speech before the Senate, it occurred to me that, say what I want about this administration, it hasn't been all bad. Just think of all of the words that one so rarely gets occasion to use that have been put back into frequent circulation. Venality, obfuscation, perfidy, and rapaciousness are just a few that come to mind. What's more, I've had increased motivation to brush up on history and literary classics. My heart is filled with gratitude.

My Mister Rogers' calendar today tells me that the word "caring" comes from the Gothic word kara, which means "to lament." Mr. Rogers says, "Caring is a matter of being there. . .lamenting right along with the one who laments." So, my regular readers, if no one's told you they care about you today, let me be the first.

What was that McClellan phrase?

Oh, that's right "a certain journalistic standard that should be met."

Apparently Newsweek is the only institution in the country expected to meet any kind of standards. God knows the Senate gets a pass. This from Galloway's defense of himself before HUAC HSGAC today:

Now I know that standards have slipped in the last few years in Washington, but for a lawyer you are remarkably cavalier with any idea of justice. I am here today but last week you already found me guilty. You traduced my name around the world without ever having asked me a single question, without ever having contacted me, without ever written to me or telephoned me, without any attempt to contact me whatsoever. And you call that justice.

Now I want to deal with the pages that relate to me in this dossier and I want to point out areas where there are--let's be charitable and say errors. Then I want to put this in the context where I believe it ought to be. On the very first page of your document about me you assert that I have had "many meetings" with Saddam Hussein. This is false.

I have had two meetings with Saddam Hussein, once in 1994 and once in August of 2002. By no stretch of the English language can that be described as "many meetings" with Saddam Hussein.

As a matter of fact, I have met Saddam Hussein exactly the same number of times as Donald Rumsfeld met him. The difference is Donald Rumsfeld met him to sell him guns and to give him maps the better to target those guns. I met him to try and bring about an end to sanctions, suffering and war. . .

I think I'm going to start using that phrase--"let's be charitable and say..." As in "let's be charitable and say our country is run by a bunch of bloodthirsty criminals with absolutely no sense of accountability, ethics, or conscience.

(And as an aside, I would give my eye teeth for a president that could use the word "traduced" in a sentence.)

Scylla and Charybdis

My coworker said to me just now, "There's a thin line between deep depression and the feeling that life just didn't happen."

To get the full impact, you have to imagine the line delivered with a Russian accent.