Some of Nothing

Why I Read Fiction
Tuesday, June 24, 2008

One of the things I like most about fiction is that, whenever I start to feel like I'm living in a uniquely farcical time or place, I invariably pick up a fiction book from a totally different time or place that captures similarly farcical themes or scenarios. Par exemple, my favorite PG Wodehouse book, Psmith in the City, elucidates a familiar rationale for why an ignorant, belligerent conservative might win an election (in this situation, said conservative is a bank manager):

Also it had been discovered, on the eve of the poll, that the bank manager's opponent, in his youth, had been educated at a school in Germany, and had subsequently spent two years at Heidelberg University. These damaging revelations were having a marked effect on the warm-hearted patriots of Kenningford, who were now referring to the candidate in thick but earnest tones as 'the German Spy'.

Sound familiar? OK. We know that destructively paranoid nationalism is nothing new, but seriously...Late 19th century Britain meets early 21st century America. I wonder if they required flag lapel pins too.

(Thanks to Project Gutenberg for providing the text of this quote.)

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Nothing New byslag at 5:00 PM 3 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

Obama Grants Wishes! Calls McCain "Afraid".
Monday, May 19, 2008

Apparently, Obama is stealing McCain's ability to grant wishes because he granted my wish to see him call McCain out on his big chicken tendencies. From TPM:

McCain said [calling Iran weak compared to the USSR] revealed Obama's "inexperience and reckless judgment." Here's the key part of Obama's reply...

"Here's the truth: the Soviet Union had thousands of nuclear weapons, and Iran doesn't have a single one. But when the world was on the brink of nuclear holocaust, Kennedy talked to Khrushchev and he got those missiles out of Cuba. Why shouldn't we have the same courage and the confidence to talk to our enemies? That's what strong countries do, that's what strong presidents do, that's what I'll do when I'm president of the United States of America."

Obama also said: "What are George Bush and John McCain afraid of"?

Watch it on video in all its glory (and to find out what McCain's really thinking when he talks, just replace his words with "Kokokaw" over and over again in your mind):


More of this please!

Best screenshot ever from TPM:And what do voters think about Obama's recent responses to Bush/McCain? From Gallup:

Obama Opens Up 16-Point Lead, Biggest Yet

More of this too, please!

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Nothing New byslag at 1:53 PM 2 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

Obama's Loving It (and so am I)
Friday, May 16, 2008

Watching the back and forth between Bush/McCain and Democrats over Obama's foreign policy strategy today has been a thing of beauty. Seriously. I'm this close to feeling that thrill that Chris Matthews gets up his leg. As Mark Murray explains:

When President Bush -- thousands of miles away in Israel -- decided to fire his thinly veiled shot at Obama yesterday, it was a giant gift to the Illinois senator and his campaign. Why? One, it essentially kept Clinton on the sidelines just two days after her big West Virginia victory. Two, Obama’s opponent was no longer Clinton or McCain, but the man with the 27% job-approval rating. And three, it rallied Democrats to Obama’s side. Even neutral Dems, like Joe Biden, Rahm Emanuel and Harry Reid, quickly leapt to Obama’s defense.

President Bush finally living up to his promise to be a uniter not a divider by kindly uniting the Democrats to Obama's side. Love is in the air today.

As far as the actual Bush/McCain foreign policy position goes, I'm with Obama (and Steve Benen):

“They’re trying to fool you. They’re trying to scare you. And they’re not telling you the truth [because] they can’t win a foreign policy debate on the merits,” Obama said. He went on to call the Bush/McCain approach “naive and irresponsible.”

This is what campaigns are all about. Forget pins and preachers — the president and his would-be Republican successor have a specific, misguided worldview about America’s role in the world, and how we can use our international influence to the world’s benefit. That is to say, a failed worldview, which Republicans are anxious to pursue for another four years, starting in 2009. To get there, Bush, McCain, and their cohorts are returning to the cheap and predictable talking points that have gotten them this far — those who reject their ideas are “weak,” “naive,” and putting the nation at risk.

I would add one word to describe Bush/McCain: they are "afraid". Or as JFK said:

Let us never negotiate out of fear, but let us never fear to negotiate.

"Afraid" is the word that I'd like to see Obama use the most on Bush/McCain. He's talked a lot about the politics of fear and how damaging it is to our national discourse, but what I wish he'd do more of is turn it around. Explain that they're only trying to scare us because they're the ones that are scared. Scared witless of all enemies--foreign and domestic--simply because they look different, have different lifestyles, speak differently, or have different belief systems. Scared of their own shadows if they ever got out from under their beds.

We, as Americans, simply need to start drawing upon our own faculties and inner strength to protect ourselves. We need to be inspired to rally our courage and not let the fear mongers drive us to our dark scary place. Obama knows we need to feel hope. But we also need to feel anger. We need to be angry at the scared little reprobates who have spent the last seven years playing games with Terror Alerts, Osama bin Laden tapes, and opportunistic bogeymen. The real "hysterical" weaklings in this country are those who are willing to enthusiastically trade liberty for security. The With Us or Against Us chickenhawks who are more than happy to send other people's kids off to war while they hide under their covers at home--maybe periodically skipping a golf game or two. Or, as the new Republican slogan puts it:

Kokokaw. Kokokaw. Kokokaw...Chickens don't clap!

(Yes, I'm going to be playing this slogan every time Republicans happily sound off their inner chicken squawk because it cracks me up.)

And allow me to agree with Steve Benen once again:

You know, after months of malaise, I’m actually starting to enjoy this campaign again.

Right on! Go Obama!

Obama: If George Bush and John McCain want to have a debate about protecting the United States of America, that is a debate that I'm happy to have any time, any place, and that is a debate that I will win because George Bush and John McCain have a lot to answer for.

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Nothing New byslag at 3:43 PM 2 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

Democrats: Unprincipled or Unrealistic? CNN Reports--You Decide
Monday, March 31, 2008

Glenn Greenwald has been relentlessly articulating some of the significant problems caused by the asymmetry of reporting on Iraq (one of which being the fact that we've spent five (5) years involved in a war that was supposedly going to take 6 months). As part of his point, he highlights a video of Charlie Rose interviewing two Iraqis about what the war has cost Iraqi citizens:

Even now, Americans are inundated with "The Surge is Working!" rhetoric and hear almost none of the views expressed in this interview, just as -- prior to the invasion -- they were exposed to every shade and color of pro-invasion advocates while the anti-war view was drastically minimized and even suppressed. Amazingly, nothing has actually changed from that 2002-2003 period when -- as even Howard Kurtz documented in one of the better (and only) pieces of establishment journalism examining pre-war media coverage -- actual war opponents were buried, rendered invisible, and war advocates were amplified and celebrated. That's still happening.

Atrios has frequently said that the range of acceptable establishment political opinion in the U.S. spans the suffocatingly narrow gamut from The New Republic to National Review (or: "From The New Republic to The Free Republic"). The substantial body of opinion to "the left" of the pro-war (or, at best, anti-war-execution) New Republic is excluded as fringe and unserious, while nothing substantial exists to the right of National Review. There is never any outer boundary on the Right.

In his post, Greenwald included the video clip of the interview, which is absolutely essential viewing for everyone--if, for no other reason than its rarity of viewpoint.

And almost as if designed expressly to illustrate Greenwald's point, CNN features this interview with Brooking's Institute's decidedly pro-war Michael O'Hanlon and CNN's very own Pentagon correspondent, Barbara Starr, who's there to "keep him honest":

First, we can tell how "honest" Starr keeps war-groupie O'Hanlon by the very serious-looking glasses she's wearing and her very grave demeanor. Aside from that, we can further tell how serious she is when she says this at the end of the interview:

Right now, General Petraeus, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of staff all say "No mandated timetables for withdrawal. We have to stay until the job is done." That is not what the Democrats want. What do these commanders do if a Democrat wins and a Democrat sticks to that campaign promise [getting us out of the war]? What the Pentagon may be hoping behind the scenes is, if a Democrat wins, they'll do what they all do when they do win; they'll wiggle out of their campaign promises a little bit and reality will take over and nothing will fundamentally change for the troops. At least for a while. [emphasis mine]

I almost don't know what to say here. Barbara Starr: CNN "correspondent"/voice of the Pentagon?

First, who determines when "the job is done"? Who sets the mission? Who nominates the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs? Last I heard, the President does those things. And if Barack Obama came in tomorrow and said "hey guys, we're refining our mission..." is he then denying "reality"? No. He's being the President. That's his job. And while his job is to listen to advice from his trustworthy advisers, he's still the Commander-in-Chief (or as Bush likes to call himself, "the Decider"). For the benefit of Barbara Starr--Pentagon mouthpiece correspondent--here's an easy-to-follow chain of command diagram: The People-->The President-->Secretary of Defense... That's what the rest of us call "reality".

According to Barbara Starr/Pentagon, Democrats get to choose between being completely unprincipled (as they always are, apparently) by breaking their withdrawal promises and being completely unrealistic by keeping their withdrawal promises. Which means that our only choice to avoid such wholly unAmerican folly would be to vote for McCain, I guess. Bomb, bomb, bomb...need I go on? Obviously, CNN's Pentagon correspondent's way of keeping O'Hanlon "honest" is by juxtaposing his pro-war view with the Pentagon/Starr's pro-war view. Apparently, the rest of us just need to learn to stop worrying and love the bomb.

Note: As Crooks and Liars and Atrios have noted before, this isn't the first time Barbara Starr has gone all Faux Newsy on our asses. C&L documents Starr's righteous indignation at the military's accusing the media of trying to "hype" the supposed threat from Iran. Apparently, Starr hasn't seen Katie Couric's starring role in John McCain: Behind the Music or bothered to watch her own news network--as C&L illustrates in their posted video. Beyond that, if what Barbara Starr says is true, and the military lied about the media's role in hyping Iran, how do we know that they're not lying about withdrawal timelines from Iraq? I wonder if Ms. Starr ever bothered to look into that.

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Nothing New byslag at 8:07 PM 0 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

Watch McCain Lie About FISA
Wednesday, March 12, 2008

John McCain: I’m very serious when I say, I think it’s disgraceful that the House of Representatives didn’t act and this is going to lapse. We’re fighting an implacable enemy here. I cannot imagine the House of Representatives not moving forward, and letting this bill just lapse.

And frankly, I was proud of the president by saying he would delay his trip to Africa to try to get this thing done. This is a compelling issue of national security. …

Of course, there's always the truth to fall back on:

The House attempted to pass a 21-day extension of the act Thursday, but it failed after President Bush said he would veto it.

Apparently, this issue is so compelling that Bush doesn't mind just letting it go. I guess lying to the media is ok as long as you cook them up some good dogs afterward

And has anyone seen the slides from Bush's Africa trip? It's almost as if he was actually there.

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Nothing New byslag at 10:20 AM 2 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

A Good Sign
Friday, February 29, 2008

Obama responds to a fear mongering Clinton ad:

I do want to take a moment to respond, because the press is, I’m sure, curious, to an ad that Senator Clinton is apparently running today. It asks a legitimate question. It says, who do you want answering the phone in the White House when it's 3:00 a.m. and something has happened in the world. It’s a legitimate question. And we’ve seen these ads before. They’re usually the kind that play upon people's fears and try to scare up votes....

And TPM's commenters do a great job of invoking Bill Clinton just to pile on the irony:

Ohiomeister posted this on another thread and it is just superb.

"Now one of Clinton’s laws of politics is this: If one candidate’s trying to scare you and the other one’s trying to get you to think, if one candidate’s appealing to your fears and the other one’s appealing to your hopes, you better vote for the person who wants you to think and hope."

-Bill Clinton, 2004

I generally prefer to invoke the Dude invoking Bush Sr: "This aggression will not stand, man." It's good for all occasions.

As Firedoglake and many others have noted, the way Obama has responded to attacks such as these is quite refreshing:

For those of us who've been worried about Barack's readiness to deal with the GOP sludge machine, it's a good sign.

...So is this bit of framing goodness from Team Obama, responding to Dubya's press conference today:

With their words today, George Bush and John McCain called for staying the course with an endless war in Iraq and a failed policy of not talking to leaders we don’t like, but Americans of all political persuasions are calling for change. The American people aren’t looking for tough talk about fighting for 100 years in Iraq, because they know we need to end this war, finish the job in Afghanistan, and take the fight to al Qaeda. The American people aren’t looking for more of a do-nothing Cuba policy that has failed to secure the release of dissidents, failed to bring democracy to the island, and failed to advance freedom for fifty years, because they know we need to pursue new opportunities to achieve liberty for the Cuban people.

Notice how the statement intentionally links "tough talk" with failure, and puts Obama on the side of the American people in wanting policies that get results instead? A couple of months ago, I mentioned that for almost three years now, I've been "writing about the basic distinction of bluster versus responsibility and the need to consciously rehabilitate and reclaim common sense as an approach for addressing policy issues, especially with regard to national security. . . . We need to start asserting the value of thinking about what works, not just what sounds like the most macho response." It's great that Obama and his brain trust appear to get this.

It's so nice to see a mainstream candidate fighting back the way Obama is. He's encouraging Democrats to be proud of thinking again and to fight for our values. And if we're lucky, he's doing it in a way that's getting some mainstream media attention. Maybe his fearless style will embolden the House to hold back on the Protect Telecommunications Act. We've stayed down long enough.

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Nothing New byslag at 10:20 AM 2 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

Leadership: the Anti-Bush
Tuesday, February 19, 2008

In choosing between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, I sometimes feel like I'm deciding which sides of the Bush Administration I dislike the least. Obama reminds me of Bush in the way he can talk without saying much and in the way he can disarm people by getting them to like him personally. Clinton reminds me of all the rest of Bush I don't like: political legacy, secrecy, ginormous amounts of lobbyist money, dirty campaigning. From the Clinton side of the ledger, I would say that the secrecy and dirty campaigning are the most troubling. And Clinton's latest misdeed of insinuating plagiarism on Obama's part is just another example of why she is off of our Christmas card list. From Jeff Fecke at Shakesville:

Now, plagiarism is a serious charge, and it's based on failing to attribute words properly. Obama did not, in his speech, say "As Deval Patrick said...", but then again, Deval Patrick himself told Obama to use the line, and not to worry about the credit.

That's not plagiarism. That's speechwriting.

Howard Wolfson of the Clinton campaign, continuing that campaign's efforts to make everyone surrounding Hillary Clinton look like a complete buffoon, asserts the plagiarism charge still sticks:

Wolfson said the plagiarism charge still holds because listeners go in with the assumption that Obama's speeches are original, unless credit is given. "So I think it's fine that Deval Patrick said that," Wolfson said. "But what I'm concerned about is that the public has an expectation that Sen. Obama's words are his own."

To which I can only respond: has Hillary Clinton fired her speechwriters? I highly doubt it. Every day, Clinton, Obama, McCain, and Huckabee get out of bed, go somewhere, and give speeches written, at least in part, by someone who is not them. The words, in short, are "not their own." And yet nobody accuses Hillary Clinton of plagiarizing her speechwriters' words when speaking; indeed, it would be stupid to do so.

Now, I'm all for pulling back the veil in politics. If you want to show the world that Obama doesn't do all of his own work, I'm there for you. But in order to retain your own credibility in the process, you need to do it directly and openly instead of through misleading accusations. And you need to be prepared to show your own little wizard as well. Personally, I'd like to see Obama respond to this Clinton tactic by opening his campaign up and let the light really shine in. At his campaign events, he should have all of his staff, all of his speechwriters, managers, advisers, etc, up on stage with him and have them all take a bow. Hell, he should bring his secret service up there, if he can.

Of course, the danger that comes from actually clearing away the brush is that maybe some of Obama's people aren't so great after all. Maybe they're dusty old political triangulators like Mark Penn, Howard Wolfson, and Terry McAuliffe. But then again, maybe not. Either way, a strong leader doesn't engage in Bush/Clinton-style secrecy and deception. Instead, a strong leader proves how great his/her decisions are by how great the people s/he hires are.

There's a book titled Good to Great that analyzes corporate success stories and discusses a concept called Level 5 Leadership (yes, typically vapid business-speak). The book tries to vanquish the myth of the celebrity CEO as being the catalyst for big change. Instead, the leaders of "good-to-great" (ugh!) companies are those who know that "if you have the wrong people, it doesn't matter whether you discover the right direction; you still won't have a great company. Great vision without great people is irrelevant." These leaders are often self-effacing, always put the good of the company before their own good, and regularly say "we" instead of "I" when discussing challenges and successes. It is this kind of leadership our country needs now.

In short, if Obama wants to prove himself and his leadership abilities, he shouldn't hesitate to call Clinton's bluff and show the world how he inspires the great people around him to do great things. Strip away the secrecy that marked the Bush years and don't fear or be shielded from criticism. Prove to us all that we're smarter than we think and that we can view the political process for what it is and still want to participate. Many of us are simply tired of having dust in our eyes and are ready for a truly confident leader who isn't actually afraid of the People. Obama can compel us to believe in him by proving he believes in us. That would be the kind of change we can believe in.

NOTE to the Clinton campaign: If Obama actually does any of these things, just chalk it up to one of two things:
1. The Obama campaign received permission to use these ideas without crediting Some of Nothing.
or
2. It doesn't take a village to figure this stuff out.

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Nothing New byslag at 8:51 AM 2 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

The Reaction or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Obama
Wednesday, February 13, 2008

When no less than four CNN personalities take on the Decider for misrepresenting Obama's position on Pakistan, I can't help but giggle like a schoolgirl. Via Crooks and Liars:

How many times have one or more of these people failed to stand up for truth in the face of Bush-league fantasy over the last 7 years? What about even before the Decider became the Decider, during the 2000 campaign? What about during the Clinton years? And now, with Believable Change on the horizon, we have four (4) of them on the case. Honestly, part of me wants to object to this display simply on the basis of principle. I want the quest for reality to be their primary objective no matter who it is benefiting. But the rest of me says, "f--- that! Go Obama!".

Bush is right: These truly ARE dangerous times.

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Nothing New byslag at 11:36 AM 1 dispenses karmic justice! (or just comments here)  

Memory Hole: McCain v. Interwebs
Thursday, February 7, 2008

Remember back in 2006-2007 when John McCain waged war on the interwebs? Here's an oldie but a goodie from a 2006 C|net article:

McCain's proposal, called the "Stop the Online Exploitation of Our Children Act" (click for PDF), requires that reports be submitted to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, which in turn will forward them to the relevant police agency. (The organization received $32.6 million in tax dollars in 2005, according to its financial disclosure documents.)

Internet service providers already must follow those reporting requirements. But McCain's proposal is liable to be controversial because it levies the same regulatory scheme--and even stiffer penalties--on even individual bloggers who offer discussion areas on their Web sites.[...]

The other section of McCain's legislation targets convicted sex offenders. It would create a federal registry of "any e-mail address, instant-message address, or other similar Internet identifier" they use, and punish sex offenders with up to 10 years in prison if they don't supply it.

Then, any social-networking site must take "effective measures" to remove any Web page that's "associated" with a sex offender.

Because "social-networking site" isn't defined, it could encompass far more than just MySpace.com, Friendster and similar sites. The list could include: Slashdot, which permits public profiles; Amazon.com, which permits author profiles and personal lists; and blogs like RedState.com that show public profiles. In addition, media companies like News.com publisher CNET Networks permit users to create profiles of favorite games, gadgets and music.

"This constitutionally dubious proposal is being made apparently mostly based on fear or political considerations rather than on the facts," said EFF's Bankston. Studies by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children show the online sexual solicitation of minors has dropped in the past five years, despite the growth of social-networking services, he said.

So, what happened to McCain's bill? According to GovTrack, it never made it to debate. But here we see the consequences of "maverick" McCain's need to pander to the right. And we see how easily he uses the politics of fear in the process. Do we want more of this from our next president?

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Nothing New byslag at 9:49 AM 0 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

Republicans: The Real "Girlie Men" and Women?
Thursday, December 13, 2007

Isn't it interesting how Republicans continually call other people chickens? I mean: beyond Schwartzenegger's idiotic "girlie men" statement, we have Limbaugh's "feminization" or "chickification" of whatever, not to mention Bill OhhhhhhReilly's continual use of the c-word (coward--which is, at least, an improvement). So, not only are we all a bunch of wusses, we're also a bunch of girls, which for most Republicans would seem to be the same thing. Well, according to the Situationist, science may say different:

The reason thoughts of death make people more conservative, Jost says, is that they awaken a deep desire to see the world as fair and just, to believe that people get what they deserve, and to accept the existing social order as valid, rather than in need of change. When these natural desires are primed by thoughts of death and a barrage of mortal fear, people gravitate toward conservatism because it’s more certain about the answers it provides—right vs. wrong, good vs. evil, us vs. them—and because conservative leaders are more likely to advocate a return to traditional values, allowing people to stick with what’s familiar and known. “Conservatism is a more black and white ideology than liberalism,” explains Jost. “It emphasizes tradition and authority, which are reassuring during periods of threat.”

To test the theory, Jost prompted people to think about either pain—by looking at things like an ambulance, a dentist’s chair, and a bee sting—or death, by looking at things like a funeral hearse, the grim reaper, and a dead-end sign. Across the political spectrum, people who had been primed to think about death were more conservative on issues like immigration, affirmative action, and same-sex marriage than those who had merely thought about pain, although the effect size was relatively small. The implication is clear: For liberals, conservatives, and independents alike, thinking about death actually makes people more conservative—at least temporarily.

Now, I honestly don't know how reliable the results of studies such as these are, and they are certainly more complexity-laden in the Situationist's post than they are here. But what seems incredibly obvious is that campaign strategists (the Roves of the world) use them...a lot. As the Situationist notes:

“At least some of the President’s support is the result of constant and relentless reminders of death, some of which is just what’s happening in the world, but much of which is carefully cultivated and calculated as an electoral strategy,” says Solomon. “In politics these days, there’s a dose of reason, and there’s a dose of irrationality driven by psychological terror that may very well be swinging elections.”

Solomon demonstrated that thinking about 9/11 made people go from preferring Kerry to preferring Bush. “Very subtle manipulations of psychological conditions profoundly affect political preferences,” Solomon concludes. “In difficult moments, people don’t want complex, nuanced, John Kerry-like waffling or sophisticated cogitation. They want somebody charismatic to step up and say, ‘I know where our problem is and God has given me the clout to kick those people’s asses.’”

Sure. This is hardly a groundbreaking conclusion. Remember the Fear and Loathing in NYC that was dubbed the 2004 Republican National Convention? How many times did Bush talk about fear and threats in his speech:

We knew Saddam Hussein's record of aggression and support for terror. We knew his long history of pursuing, even using, weapons of mass destruction. And we know that September the 11th requires our country to think differently: We must, and we will, confront threats to America before it is too late. (Applause.)

In Saddam Hussein, we saw a threat.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: (Inaudible.)

AUDIENCE: U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A!

So, the problem that liberals have is that we don't constantly feel threatened. We're not always under attack. Why is this? Well, the Situationist also cites some possible personality differences:

As kids, liberals had developed close relationships with peers and were rated by their teachers as self-reliant, energetic, impulsive, and resilient. People who were conservative at age 23 had been described by their teachers as easily victimized, easily offended, indecisive, fearful, rigid, inhibited, and vulnerable at age 3. The reason for the difference, the Blocks hypothesized, was that insecure kids most needed the reassurance of tradition and authority, and they found it in conservative politics.

It's hard to say how much of this we can buy. I mean, anecdotally, everything brought up in this study matches my own personal observations of Republicans (and I mean everything), but maybe that's why I'm more likely to believe it. But then, maybe my wondering if I can believe it, in spite of the fact that it matches my observations, is what makes me a liberal. Not only that, I think that I DO feel threatened...by Republicans. True that I'm not going to go all extracurricular with my fear and start blowing stuff up, but the impact I've seen them make on our world is pretty disgusting. So, maybe I'm not afraid but disgusted? To top it off, I also kind of feel threatened by terrorists, but I'm pretty sure I can take them. It's all so perplexing. Either way, the most pressing question I have in all this is:

Which is worse: the notion that Republicans may be such complete and utter wusses or the notion that their complete and utter wussery may be so easily manipulated?

Well, that, and why are they so afraid of girls? Just askin' (again).

Oh yeah, and to get it on the record: If Bill OhhhhhhhReilly doesn't respond to my blog entry, he's a coward! (but then again, maybe that's up to science to tell us)

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Nothing New byslag at 1:51 PM 0 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

Freedom on the March
Monday, November 5, 2007

There's something to be said for just taking the pill. This Sunday, taking the pill meant getting up early to attend the church of pugilism and watching Control Room for the first time. In the case of pugilism, I spent every punch trying to focus on feeling my feet on the floor. In the case of Control Room, I spent most of the time trying to avoid getting frustrated, upset, and angry. Both tactics were designed to achieve the same result: obtaining intellectual/emotional distance from a situation long enough to get a glimpse into its fundamental mechanics.

Obviously, in boxing, we hit things with our hands. Consequently, when we want to hit harder, our initial instinct is to focus more energy into our arms and fists. This is where the glove meets the bag. However, because we can get significantly more energy from our legs, focusing only on our upper body is not only inefficient, but it's a good way to get a whoopin' if we ever get into a fight with someone who has more upper body strength (and for most girls, that's most guys). So, we need to take a step back (literally) and work from the ground up. And in the process of working to punch from our feet, we also try to observe the spots in our bodies where we're using extra strength to compensate for extra weakness--preferably, before we get injured.

While this sounds like a straightforward process, it can be incredibly difficult to achieve for someone who is stridently focused on solving problems because it adds more complexity--more opportunities to observe imperfections that can't all be dealt with at once. This brings me to Control Room. The reason I've avoided this movie for so long is because I knew that what it was about--the run up to the Iraq invasion and all the emotional and intellectual carnage involved therein. And it was being told from a "media" perspective, which necessarily meant that there would be spin. With all of these areas of complexity to focus on, I knew that frustration and the requisite feeling of impotence would ensue. And one doesn't just sign up for that sort of thing without attempting to adequately prepare beforehand.

In this case, boxing in the morning actually provided some of the preparation. There's a reason we call it "church of pugilism", and that's because every time we attend, it reminds us how weak and pathetic we actually are (and we assume that's really what church is all about). And at the same time, it gives us an avenue to deal with our imperfections. If we focus on intellectually observing our bodies as we punch, we find specific areas to improve on. So, the next time we show up, maybe we'll be a little less weak and pathetic. And the painful realization that we can't solve all of our problems in one day is actually quite liberating because (for the day, at least) it reminds us that that's what life is all about--slowly but surely becoming better at the things into which we decide to put our effort.

It would be a lie to say that this preparation preserved me from all of the uncomfortable feelings that attended a sense of frustration and impotence. Control Room highlighted the most significant weaknesses of our society--our apathy, our malleability, and our instinctual need to assert strength in order to compensate for our feeling of weakness. And just as with boxing, it demonstrated how, by acting solely from initial instinct (fear), we have been inefficient and have, invariably, received a bit of a whoopin'. It was amazing to see how much insight into American politics, media, and psychology can be had by people who live all the way on the other side of the world. Along with this insight came an obvious admiration of our democratic foundation and the awareness that, in spite of our imperfections, we are always striving to become better.

As Al Gore says, when we--as a society--are deprived of our reason (when we punch out of instinct and fail to step back and observe where we're feeling weakness), democracy itself can receive injury. We have observed this repeatedly since September 11th with the suspension of habeas corpus, our flouting of the Geneva Conventions, and our tolerance for lawlessness on the part of our government--all in the name of protection for our freedom. It seems obvious that we desperately need to deal with our weaknesses to not only prevent further injury but also to eventually make us much stronger. And we do this--not by being afraid to acknowledge them or by compensating for them by exerting other strengths--but instead, by connecting our feet to the ground to remember where we stand and understanding how we, as Americans, operate. Because, despite all assertions to the contrary, not collectively thinking about the problem doesn't make it go away; it just makes us even more afraid of--and vulnerable to--further injury.

PS For the latest on this issue, take a look at Glenn Greewald's recent post--timing is eerie.

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Nothing New byslag at 7:49 PM 2 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

Halloween Seriousness
Tuesday, October 30, 2007

Great column from Krugman:

For one thing, there isn’t actually any such thing as Islamofascism — it’s not an ideology; it’s a figment of the neocon imagination. The term came into vogue only because it was a way for Iraq hawks to gloss over the awkward transition from pursuing Osama bin Laden, who attacked America, to Saddam Hussein, who didn’t. And Iran had nothing whatsoever to do with 9/11 — in fact, the Iranian regime was quite helpful to the United States when it went after Al Qaeda and its Taliban allies in Afghanistan.

Beyond that, the claim that Iran is on the path to global domination is beyond ludicrous. Yes, the Iranian regime is a nasty piece of work in many ways, and it would be a bad thing if that regime acquired nuclear weapons. But let’s have some perspective, please: we’re talking about a country with roughly the G.D.P. of Connecticut, and a government whose military budget is roughly the same as Sweden’s.

Meanwhile, the idea that bombing will bring the Iranian regime to its knees — and bombing is the only option, since we’ve run out of troops — is pure wishful thinking. Last year Israel tried to cripple Hezbollah with an air campaign, and ended up strengthening it instead. There’s every reason to believe that an attack on Iran would produce the same result, with the added effects of endangering U.S. forces in Iraq and driving oil prices well into triple digits.

The only thing we have to fear: my pathetic drawing "ability". Will work on this one more later.

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Nothing New byslag at 11:56 AM 0 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

White House Flock
Sunday, October 14, 2007

Today, Frank Rich wrote an Op-Ed in the NYTimes stating the obvious fact that the American public is failing to clean up our government's dirty work: "It’s up to us to wake up our somnambulant Congress to challenge administration policy every day."

Years ago, Seymour Hersh wondered about the stability of our system of government: “That 8 or 9 people can change so much...Where was the military, the Congress, the press? What has happened raises the question about the thinness of the fabric of democracy.”

In 1961, Dwight D. Eisenhower gave an historic speech in which he declared, "Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together."

And way back in the early 1800s, Thomas Jefferson warned us, "All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent."

Damn hippies all.

This one's for you, White House Flock.

PS If you've never hear School House Rock Rocks, I recommend checking it out. Pavement played No More Kings on that album.

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Nothing New byslag at 5:49 PM 2 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

Symfundiosis
Tuesday, September 11, 2007

We all know that without bin Laden, Bush would be sitting back at the ranch right now, with his feet up, maybe pulling wings off butterflies or snorting a few lines. The 2004 election was all about fear. Remember orange alert? And fear seems to be very much the province of fundamentalists. Fear of god, fear of gays, fear of other fearmongers. You know how it goes. The s.o. and I discuss this interdependency all the time, so we've decided it needs it's own word. Symbiosis for the reality-based community.

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Nothing New byslag at 10:43 AM 1 dispenses karmic justice! (or just comments here)