Still haven't made it out to the pub with that shadow of mine, but today I got an e-mail from someone who could almost be my shadow, that's how opposed his thinking is to mine.
The message was addressed to "all my friends . . . liberal or conservative." Then, the author went on to assert basically that a whole string of the problems America is currently experiencing—especially the financial turmoil—results from the last two years of Democratic control in Congress.
Needless to say, I had to reply. I don't know what it is about me, but I just find it hard to relax when someone slings half-truths and exaggerations at me without a shred of evidence to back them up.
The message begins, "George Bush has been in office for 7-1/2 years. For the first six, the economy was fine."
Seems as though the author forgot how the economy tanked after 9/11. Perhaps those first six years of the Bush regime weren't so rosy, after all. Let's not forget that W came into office with a debt that Clinton had reduced by more than 8% (against the GDP) from where it was when Poppa Bush left office. When W finally says bye-bye to the White House, the national debt will be back up by almost 11% from where it was when he took power. Don't believe me? Take a look at the table of "National Debt by Presidential Terms" on Wikipedia.
In fact, while you're at it, why don't you ponder for a minute or two the way the debt has risen and fallen over presidential administrations in the last half-century? The last time the debt fell while a Republican was in office was during the first term of the Nixon administration. But, contrary to what most people who classify themselves as "conservatives" seem to believe, the debt ratio has fallen in each term of every single Democrat's administration on the chart. Strange, isn't it, that the "tax and spend" Democrats have a much better track record than Republicans at reducing the national debt?
My friend's message goes on, "A little over one year ago, consumer confidence stood at a 2-1/2 year high."
Is this REALLY something the author wants to brag about, especially given the assertion in the first sentence? One year ago was 2007. Two-and-a-half years before that was 2004. That's when the nation elected W for a second term. So, what he's saying is that the man was re-elected in the middle of an economic slump. And that's true, of course. But it was an economic slump that occurred while both the White House and Congress were completely in Republican hands.
The message asserts, "Regular gasoline sold for $2.19 a gallon."
If this was true in the early fall of 2007, it was probably only true in a few parts of the country and, then, not for very long. While gas prices have troughed five times in the last four years, with the bottom of the price range most of those times somewhere around $2.00/gallon, the country as a whole last saw gasoline consistently at $2.19 (or less) in the spring of 2004. See for yourself!
It adds, "The unemployment rate was 4.5%."
That statistic is based on the recorded unemployment rate as revealed to us by administrative offices of the federal government that are under the control of guess who? George W. Bush. And I doubt he's got any interest whatsoever in making the unemployment figures look better than they might actually be. Duh! On top of that, let's talk about the jobs that ARE available to persons in the market for a new one. If they can land anything, how many of those jobs pay the same or better wages than these people were making at their former employment?
The message states, probably all too accurately, "The Dow Jones hit a record high of 14,000+. Americans were buying new cars, taking cruises, vacations overseas, living large! . . ."
Too large, maybe? For my part, I made a conscious decision last year to live off nothng more than my paycheck, so I sure wasn't "living large." Were you? If so, for how much of it were you paying cash? I can't tell you how happy I am now that I made the choice to eliminate my debt when I did. But whether or not I had done so, the ticking up and down of the stock market doesn't have much effect on my day-to-day life. Unless you work on Wall Street, how does the market actually affect anyone personally every time it fluctuates? If it does that to you, you need to get a life.
Next the message gets into a matching series of complaints like, "Gasoline is now over $4 a gallon and climbing!"
But not today. I bought gas this morning at 1/10 of a cent under $3.00.
It says, "Americans have seen their home equity drop by 12 TRILLION DOLLARS, prices are still dropping, and 1% of American homes are in foreclosure."
And we're blaming the Democratic Congress for that!? Did they sign the papers for loans they couldn't pay? Did they dream up the anti-regulatory schemes that allowed lenders to take advantage of clients they knew perfectly well would be very unlikely to pay out the term of the exotic loan instruments they were selling?
And just what do you suppose might be the political affiliation of the former CEOs of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, AIG, Bare Stearns, Wachovia, Washington Mutual, etc., etc.—all of whom have taken home huge paychecks over the years they ran their organizations into the ground? At whose expense? Sorta seems to me that the Paulson bailout the administration crammed down Congress' throat is making the American people buy off these losers for the third time!
The author of the message whines, "As I write, the DOW is probing another low."
Actually, it was up 500 points the last I heard today (around 2:00 p.m. CDT). But, like I said, how many real people base anything they do in their daily lives on fluctuations in the stock market? For crying out loud! It can go up and down several times in any given hour of the day!
Then, the author expands on what the declining stock market means, "2.5 TRILLION DOLLARS has evaporated from Americans' stocks, bonds and mutual fund investment portfolios!"
And, we're all in that same boat together, aren't we—whether Democrat or Republican? Unless, of course, you happen to be so wealthy that you've put most of your money offshore in a bank that won't be touched by the current mess you probably helped create here at home.
Let's say the absolute worst happens to the American economy and we enter another Great Depression. Shall I remind you how America got through the last one? By people pulling together. Of course it wasn't pretty and it wouldn't be now, but at the moment we're still a long way from 1929. So, stop panicking!!
Then the author gets to the crux of his "argument," "Remember, the President has no control over any of these issues. Only Congress has that. And, what has Congress done in the last two years? Absolutely nothing."
The Democratic Congress of the last two years has been blocked every step of the way by the Republican minority that sees no reason to cross the aisle and work for bipartisan relief as long as their president doesn't want them to (and sometimes even when he does). Just because Democrats wrested minimal control of the House from Republicans who had taken the opportunity of the previous six years to gerrymander Congressional districts so that it was almost impossible for them to regain control (remember Tom DeLay's special visits to Texas in 2003), that doesn't mean they're to blame for the mess that was set in motion by Reagan and brought to fruition by the current Republican administration and the twelve years of a Republican-controlled Congress, six of which this administration has had at their behest. If we're looking to pick on Congress, does anyone need to be reminded that it was the Republican-controlled 105th Congress who thought one of their most important jobs was to investigate the sex life of Bill Clinton for months and months?
In any case, if "Congress has done absolutely nothing in the last two years" (which I don't think is true), that's mostly because the Democrats do not have a clear majority in either house and, therefore, they're unable to override any attempts to block legislation by the still strong Republican minority. Finally, we should also remember that whatever action Congress takes, the President can veto. And what does it take to overturn a veto? A super-majority, which the Democrats have NOT had. Moreover, W has had no trouble using his veto or the threat of it to keep Congress dancing to his tune these past two years. On top of that, he's taken advantage of "signing statments" more than any other president, and in doing so he basically countermands the responsibility of his administration to act according to the terms of any Congressional legislation he doesn't like.
Then comes the clincher, "Now, the Democratic candidate for president claims he is really going to give us change—along with a Democratic Congress!"
Let's not forget that the Republican candidate has also been singing the "change" song! He keeps telling us that he's a "maverick" and a Washington "outsider" (even though he's been in Congress for 25 years). I really don't think it's proposing to change things in Washington that's the problem. It's all the ways that the Washington establishment thwarts any real efforts to substantially alter the status quo, with which they're perfectly content and from which they're making lots of money—K Street, campaign finance reform, the Electoral College, tax reform, Social Security reform/management, education reform, health-care reform . . . do I need to go on?
The message ends, "Just how much more CHANGE do you think you can stand?"
Personally, I think America can stand a lot of change. And, boy, do we need some right now! When Barack Obama tells me that's what he plans to work for, I believe him. Whether or not he can be successful in his dream depends a lot on you and me. But, not for one minute do I buy it when either Sarah Palin or John McCain tries to say the same thing. The only dreams these people have are nightmares and you can see that on McCain's face every time he tries to smile.
I doubt that the person who sent me this message was its original author. That means you may get one like it from your "liberal or conservative" friend, too. If so, feel free to use any part of my response that you think apt.
. . .
Monday, October 13, 2008
Sunday, October 12, 2008
Truth Nor Consequences II
Last night, I spent some time on the Internet. After several weeks away from the fray, I waded onto YouTube and investigated some of the latest shenanigans by the GOP candidates. Shall we say I was a bit dumbfounded to discover that their lies have inflamed some of their so-called followers to the point where audience members have taken to calling out explicit threats against the opposition candidates. Okay, we all know that a fair amount of the Republican base is racist. And, thank God, we live in a country that permits freedom of speech . . . even hate speech! But the brazenness of some of these catcalls is enough to chill the blood of even the staunchest defender of the Bill of Rights. So outrageous has certain of this audience response become that McCain himself has tried to quell it.
Not so, of course, his running mate. For someone who took such umbrage at the Democratic candidate's reference to "pigs with lipstick," you'd think Sarah Palin might be offended that MSNBC captions her appearances with the phrase "Pitbully Pulpit." But not our “hockey mom.” Nosirree! For her part, she seems to revel in rabble-rousing! And, if the rabble were a little less easy to rouse or anything that came from her mouth a teensy bit more true, one might even say she's good at it. I guess the campaign had to find something she could do since she certainly can't answer questions. At the same time, I relish the irony that John McCain spoke forthrightly earlier in his run for the presidency about the public's distaste for negative campaigning. In contrast, I'm not sure Obama has ever felt the need to do likewise. While his team doesn't hesitate to cite negative facts about the opposition, they haven't really "gone negative" in the same way as McCain-Palin, have they?
Am I surprised that the Republicans have turned to negative campaigning as their numbers slide? Of course not. Karl Rove may not officially be advising McCain, but that doesn't mean he's ever out of the picture when it comes to contemporary Republican politics. I don't know about you, but I wonder how much money he's making these days as political commentator for that bastion of muckraking journalism Fox News. And did anyone besides me see the clip where even good old Karl had to admit that McCain's speech on the night of Obama's nomination might have been ill-advised? Too bad it isn't otherwise, but the Party who gave this country Abraham Lincoln has declined today to the point where any sort of campaign ethics seems to elude them. And, in recent years, they have Karl Rove to thank for that.
But now, I'm going to tell you about the most surprising of the lies I learned last night. On YouTube, there are clips from a program called The Young Turks. As I lurched around in the quagmire of political coverage clipped at YouTube, I came across these guys' commentary on the McCains' lie concerning their adopted daughter, which story broke in the Christian Science Monitor of August 20, 2008. As the commentary on the story reveals, this particular untruth is extraordinarily egregious and, for that matter, completely superfluous.
Apparently, prior to John McCain's run for the presidency, the story he and his wife Cindy regularly told concerning their adoption of a Bangladeshi orphan girl was completely true. In 1991 while Cindy was in Bangladesh on a medical mission, she visited a Dhaka orphanage that had been founded by Mother Teresa. Perhaps the nuns there knew that one of Mrs. McCain's charitable interests worked with birth defects in children, but whether or not, they urged her to help two girls who needed surgeries that they couldn't obtain locally. McCain agreed to take the children to the U.S. and see to it that they received the care they needed.
During the plane trip home Mrs. McCain was moved by the plight of the 10-week old baby, who had a fairly severe cleft palate, among other problems. In fact, as she tells it, this girl so touched her heart that Mrs. McCain decided she and her husband would adopt the little one. When John met Cindy on the ground in Arizona, seeing she had babies in tow, he inquired what she planned to do with the little girls. Cindy responded that she thought the girl who is now called Bridget could come home with them. Eventually, the McCains formally adopted Bridget while friends of theirs became parents to the other little girl, Mickey, who had a congenital heart problem. Like many good adoptive parents, the McCains made little noise about the noble act of rescuing these children. In fact, the less fuss everyone made over Bridget's specialness, the more easily she could truly grow into being their daughter and feel like she really belonged with her newfound family.
But the McCains' good deed would not go unpunished. During the lead up to the 2000 presidential election when John McCain opposed George W. Bush for the Republican nomination, Karl Rove and Charlie Condon hatched the brilliant idea of a phone campaign in South Carolina where Bush was trailing after McCain's win in New Hampshire. This phony survey called registered voters and posed the question: "Would you be more or less likely to vote for John McCain if you knew he had fathered an illegitimate black child?" Not a lie . . . exactly! (And, of course, Bill Clinton "never had sex with that woman" either.) Surely, this is just the sort of question any pollster might ask. . . . Or, maybe not! Can anyone say "underhanded," or how about just plain "dirty politics?" But the ploy worked. There's a good deal of evidence that the whisper campaign set in motion by these fraudulent calls almost singlehandedly put the kibosh on McCain's chances for the presidency at the time. Thus, we wound up with the eight interminable years of Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld-Rove and the guy who pastes his hair down with his own spit. [Aw, c'mon, his name starts with a "W". . . . Wolfowitz. I finally remembered it.]
Lest anyone suggest that John McCain cannot learn from past "mistakes," this is where the story begins to get really loopy. Shortly after losing the 2000 primary race, McCain told interviewer Morgan Strong that he believes "there is a special place in hell for people like those" who used his daughter Bridget in such a reckless and shameful way. I agree. But, if that's the case, why would you hire one of them to help you obtain your heart's ambition? Yet that's what John McCain did. In August 2006, he chose Charlie Condon to head up the revitalization of his political action committee, Straight Talk America. Since that effort ceased when McCain clinched his party's nomination, one assumes Condon has played other roles on staff. By association at least, Dan Glaister has Condon lurking somewhere behind the scenes in various decisions since mid-September of this year, when McCain's campaign called a halt to all informal moments between the candidate and the press and, then, foisted his lipstick-wearing running mate on him.
No matter from what circles of hell McCain now chooses the people closest to him, I've got to wonder who decided to spin the story of his daughter's adoption with a certain completely uncalled-for twist. On 3 February 2008, both The Sunday Mail [Sorry! I've been unable to track that reference and probably ought to delete it therefore, but we can trust the Huffington Post, can't we?] and The Sunday Telegraph ran stories about Cindy McCain that explicitly state it was Mother Teresa herself who convinced McCain to bring the children to the U.S. The first of these publications even puts the suspect sentence in Mrs. McCain's own words: "As only Mother Teresa can, she prevailed upon me to take this baby and another baby to the United States for medical care." That same day, someone changed the McCain campaign website's bio of Mrs. McCain to include the similar statement: "On one of those missions, Mother Teresa convinced Cindy to take two babies in need of medical attention to the United States."
Of course, it turns out that Mother Teresa was not even on the continent of Asia at the time, let alone at work in the Bangladeshi orphanage. Seems like someone should have taken a half-hour or so to do a little fact-checking. Yet, when you lie so blithely and get away with it so often, why let a little fact like Mother Teresa's actual whereabouts get in the way. For the most part, I refer you again to The Young Turks' fairly thorough analysis of this lie and the absolute lack of any necessity for it. Yet, in service to the second part of my title for this piece—"consequences"—I must pick up one of their points concerning it. What sort of media feeding frenzy would such a lie have provoked if it had come from Michelle Obama's mouth? Somehow, I doubt the Christian Science Monitor would have been the only major publication to carry the story. (The truth about the McCains has not been overlooked by the blogosphere, of course, since the story broke a couple months ago. But sometime you just have to wonder where the mainstream media keeps their heads.)
. . .
Not so, of course, his running mate. For someone who took such umbrage at the Democratic candidate's reference to "pigs with lipstick," you'd think Sarah Palin might be offended that MSNBC captions her appearances with the phrase "Pitbully Pulpit." But not our “hockey mom.” Nosirree! For her part, she seems to revel in rabble-rousing! And, if the rabble were a little less easy to rouse or anything that came from her mouth a teensy bit more true, one might even say she's good at it. I guess the campaign had to find something she could do since she certainly can't answer questions. At the same time, I relish the irony that John McCain spoke forthrightly earlier in his run for the presidency about the public's distaste for negative campaigning. In contrast, I'm not sure Obama has ever felt the need to do likewise. While his team doesn't hesitate to cite negative facts about the opposition, they haven't really "gone negative" in the same way as McCain-Palin, have they?
Am I surprised that the Republicans have turned to negative campaigning as their numbers slide? Of course not. Karl Rove may not officially be advising McCain, but that doesn't mean he's ever out of the picture when it comes to contemporary Republican politics. I don't know about you, but I wonder how much money he's making these days as political commentator for that bastion of muckraking journalism Fox News. And did anyone besides me see the clip where even good old Karl had to admit that McCain's speech on the night of Obama's nomination might have been ill-advised? Too bad it isn't otherwise, but the Party who gave this country Abraham Lincoln has declined today to the point where any sort of campaign ethics seems to elude them. And, in recent years, they have Karl Rove to thank for that.
But now, I'm going to tell you about the most surprising of the lies I learned last night. On YouTube, there are clips from a program called The Young Turks. As I lurched around in the quagmire of political coverage clipped at YouTube, I came across these guys' commentary on the McCains' lie concerning their adopted daughter, which story broke in the Christian Science Monitor of August 20, 2008. As the commentary on the story reveals, this particular untruth is extraordinarily egregious and, for that matter, completely superfluous.
Apparently, prior to John McCain's run for the presidency, the story he and his wife Cindy regularly told concerning their adoption of a Bangladeshi orphan girl was completely true. In 1991 while Cindy was in Bangladesh on a medical mission, she visited a Dhaka orphanage that had been founded by Mother Teresa. Perhaps the nuns there knew that one of Mrs. McCain's charitable interests worked with birth defects in children, but whether or not, they urged her to help two girls who needed surgeries that they couldn't obtain locally. McCain agreed to take the children to the U.S. and see to it that they received the care they needed.
During the plane trip home Mrs. McCain was moved by the plight of the 10-week old baby, who had a fairly severe cleft palate, among other problems. In fact, as she tells it, this girl so touched her heart that Mrs. McCain decided she and her husband would adopt the little one. When John met Cindy on the ground in Arizona, seeing she had babies in tow, he inquired what she planned to do with the little girls. Cindy responded that she thought the girl who is now called Bridget could come home with them. Eventually, the McCains formally adopted Bridget while friends of theirs became parents to the other little girl, Mickey, who had a congenital heart problem. Like many good adoptive parents, the McCains made little noise about the noble act of rescuing these children. In fact, the less fuss everyone made over Bridget's specialness, the more easily she could truly grow into being their daughter and feel like she really belonged with her newfound family.
But the McCains' good deed would not go unpunished. During the lead up to the 2000 presidential election when John McCain opposed George W. Bush for the Republican nomination, Karl Rove and Charlie Condon hatched the brilliant idea of a phone campaign in South Carolina where Bush was trailing after McCain's win in New Hampshire. This phony survey called registered voters and posed the question: "Would you be more or less likely to vote for John McCain if you knew he had fathered an illegitimate black child?" Not a lie . . . exactly! (And, of course, Bill Clinton "never had sex with that woman" either.) Surely, this is just the sort of question any pollster might ask. . . . Or, maybe not! Can anyone say "underhanded," or how about just plain "dirty politics?" But the ploy worked. There's a good deal of evidence that the whisper campaign set in motion by these fraudulent calls almost singlehandedly put the kibosh on McCain's chances for the presidency at the time. Thus, we wound up with the eight interminable years of Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld-Rove and the guy who pastes his hair down with his own spit. [Aw, c'mon, his name starts with a "W". . . . Wolfowitz. I finally remembered it.]
Lest anyone suggest that John McCain cannot learn from past "mistakes," this is where the story begins to get really loopy. Shortly after losing the 2000 primary race, McCain told interviewer Morgan Strong that he believes "there is a special place in hell for people like those" who used his daughter Bridget in such a reckless and shameful way. I agree. But, if that's the case, why would you hire one of them to help you obtain your heart's ambition? Yet that's what John McCain did. In August 2006, he chose Charlie Condon to head up the revitalization of his political action committee, Straight Talk America. Since that effort ceased when McCain clinched his party's nomination, one assumes Condon has played other roles on staff. By association at least, Dan Glaister has Condon lurking somewhere behind the scenes in various decisions since mid-September of this year, when McCain's campaign called a halt to all informal moments between the candidate and the press and, then, foisted his lipstick-wearing running mate on him.
No matter from what circles of hell McCain now chooses the people closest to him, I've got to wonder who decided to spin the story of his daughter's adoption with a certain completely uncalled-for twist. On 3 February 2008, both The Sunday Mail [Sorry! I've been unable to track that reference and probably ought to delete it therefore, but we can trust the Huffington Post, can't we?] and The Sunday Telegraph ran stories about Cindy McCain that explicitly state it was Mother Teresa herself who convinced McCain to bring the children to the U.S. The first of these publications even puts the suspect sentence in Mrs. McCain's own words: "As only Mother Teresa can, she prevailed upon me to take this baby and another baby to the United States for medical care." That same day, someone changed the McCain campaign website's bio of Mrs. McCain to include the similar statement: "On one of those missions, Mother Teresa convinced Cindy to take two babies in need of medical attention to the United States."
Of course, it turns out that Mother Teresa was not even on the continent of Asia at the time, let alone at work in the Bangladeshi orphanage. Seems like someone should have taken a half-hour or so to do a little fact-checking. Yet, when you lie so blithely and get away with it so often, why let a little fact like Mother Teresa's actual whereabouts get in the way. For the most part, I refer you again to The Young Turks' fairly thorough analysis of this lie and the absolute lack of any necessity for it. Yet, in service to the second part of my title for this piece—"consequences"—I must pick up one of their points concerning it. What sort of media feeding frenzy would such a lie have provoked if it had come from Michelle Obama's mouth? Somehow, I doubt the Christian Science Monitor would have been the only major publication to carry the story. (The truth about the McCains has not been overlooked by the blogosphere, of course, since the story broke a couple months ago. But sometime you just have to wonder where the mainstream media keeps their heads.)
. . .
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Truth Nor Consequences
There was a time, believe it or not, when consequences followed lies. Today I’m afraid we live in a country where liars imagine that the only consequence they’ll ever experience as a result of their untruth is ever greater success. Now, should there happen to be some fallout—they call that “trickledown”—from the inconsequential fables they spin around themselves . . . . Well! I guess it’s up to the little guy to sort that all out—or to take the blame, when that’s expedient.
And who exactly are the “little guys”? In the past, I used to think of you and me as the little guys—those of us who earn less than six figures and can barely scrape together two nickels to “save” each week. Now, I’m not so sure the little guys who’ll reap the gravest consequences of our continuously growing “productivity” and resulting eons of mega-consumption won’t be those of us who, literally, are little—namely, the children and grandchildren of the “boom” generation.
When did this national culture of lies without consequences get going? In one way, I suppose it’s as old as language itself. No word exists that isn’t “spin.” There’s a vortex of significance that swirls around any word and somewhere in the dark hole at the middle is the ding an sich. The thing that gives rise to the concept is, of course, not the concept itself. Thus, insubstantiality serves as the basis of all human thought, because that which causes the thought dissolves in the act of being thought about. Thereafter, it resides only in the hidden spot of thing-ness that has been totally obscured by the whorls of conceptualization which loop around it but are always being sucked back into it at the same time as the centripetal force tries to fling them away.
The fact that no word can actually stand in for the thing it represents is a reality we all cope with every minute of every day. But that doesn’t mean we have to like it. And, it absolutely doesn’t mean we should take advantage of one another by never meaning anything we say. On the contrary, precisely because truth is so difficult to attain, we ought to spend most of our time silent in contemplation of the “Om” or the “Atman” or the “I am” that is the first of all words and the center of all that is. Do so, and some truth may occasionally creep into the few words you say.
By contrast, look at me now. Pouring words onto the page in the metastasis that speaking truth to untruth must unfortunately become. So, let’s loop back to my question of when America lost its way in the progress toward truth and justice, the concepts upon which this nation was founded. U.S. involvement in Vietnam was the springboard, Richard Nixon was the diver. With Watergate, Nixon plunged not just himself, but all of us, into the bottomless waters of lies without end. Yes, I imagine presidents before Nixon had not always told us the gods-honest truth, but none before Nixon disregarded it so utterly. And what was the consequence?
He lost his job and slinked back to San Clemente tail between his legs! One could hope the man never had another good night’s rest. But, he certainly didn’t suffer much in the way of public consequences. Ford pardoned him a month after he resigned. Not because Nixon wasn’t guilty but, Ford says, because “the tranquility to which this nation has been restored . . . could be irreparably lost by the prospects of . . . prolonged and divisive debate over the propriety of exposing [the former President] to further punishment and degradation.” I guess it’s a good thing the founding fathers didn’t have these same qualms about prolonged and divisive debate with King George, huh?
Had the nation taken the Nixon occasion to debate and determine exactly what “separation of powers” and presidential “executive privilege” the Constitution intends, perhaps we would not be where we are today. Instead, Nixon’s bald-faced lies without consequences gave way to the charmingly masked lies of the former actor Ronald Reagan in his trickle-down economics, tax cuts for the wealthy and, most notoriously, the Iran-Contra Affair. Rather than tasking him with negative consequences for any of these travesties, the country honored Reagan with a state funeral upon his death in 2004. And, now, for the last eight years we’ve been treated to the shameless, self-indulgent pseudo-buffoonery of the younger Bush and his administration. Virtually every word from their mouths is another fear-mongering lie, and never any consequences. They’re happy to bring to justice the little guys like those they accused of offenses at Abu Ghraib, but who's going to be held responsible for the grave abuses at Guatanamo.
And what will be their legacy? Never-ending "War on Terror." National debt of inconceivable proportion. Millions without health care. Hundreds of thousands without jobs. More and more mortgage foreclosures. Grievously wounded veterans who have no long-term health care. Nothing done to slow climate change. Nothing done to improve public education. Nothing done to achieve energy independence. Failure in the financial sector. . . . But “victory” in Iraq! (Don’t think about Afghanistan. Don’t! I said.) And CEO’s with salaries that diverge from their workers’ pay by multiple hundreds of times! That’s the sort of world I hoped my child would inherit. . . . Or, no, I guess it isn't. For just a moment there, I must have dreamed I was a CEO.
. . .
And who exactly are the “little guys”? In the past, I used to think of you and me as the little guys—those of us who earn less than six figures and can barely scrape together two nickels to “save” each week. Now, I’m not so sure the little guys who’ll reap the gravest consequences of our continuously growing “productivity” and resulting eons of mega-consumption won’t be those of us who, literally, are little—namely, the children and grandchildren of the “boom” generation.
When did this national culture of lies without consequences get going? In one way, I suppose it’s as old as language itself. No word exists that isn’t “spin.” There’s a vortex of significance that swirls around any word and somewhere in the dark hole at the middle is the ding an sich. The thing that gives rise to the concept is, of course, not the concept itself. Thus, insubstantiality serves as the basis of all human thought, because that which causes the thought dissolves in the act of being thought about. Thereafter, it resides only in the hidden spot of thing-ness that has been totally obscured by the whorls of conceptualization which loop around it but are always being sucked back into it at the same time as the centripetal force tries to fling them away.
The fact that no word can actually stand in for the thing it represents is a reality we all cope with every minute of every day. But that doesn’t mean we have to like it. And, it absolutely doesn’t mean we should take advantage of one another by never meaning anything we say. On the contrary, precisely because truth is so difficult to attain, we ought to spend most of our time silent in contemplation of the “Om” or the “Atman” or the “I am” that is the first of all words and the center of all that is. Do so, and some truth may occasionally creep into the few words you say.
By contrast, look at me now. Pouring words onto the page in the metastasis that speaking truth to untruth must unfortunately become. So, let’s loop back to my question of when America lost its way in the progress toward truth and justice, the concepts upon which this nation was founded. U.S. involvement in Vietnam was the springboard, Richard Nixon was the diver. With Watergate, Nixon plunged not just himself, but all of us, into the bottomless waters of lies without end. Yes, I imagine presidents before Nixon had not always told us the gods-honest truth, but none before Nixon disregarded it so utterly. And what was the consequence?
He lost his job and slinked back to San Clemente tail between his legs! One could hope the man never had another good night’s rest. But, he certainly didn’t suffer much in the way of public consequences. Ford pardoned him a month after he resigned. Not because Nixon wasn’t guilty but, Ford says, because “the tranquility to which this nation has been restored . . . could be irreparably lost by the prospects of . . . prolonged and divisive debate over the propriety of exposing [the former President] to further punishment and degradation.” I guess it’s a good thing the founding fathers didn’t have these same qualms about prolonged and divisive debate with King George, huh?
Had the nation taken the Nixon occasion to debate and determine exactly what “separation of powers” and presidential “executive privilege” the Constitution intends, perhaps we would not be where we are today. Instead, Nixon’s bald-faced lies without consequences gave way to the charmingly masked lies of the former actor Ronald Reagan in his trickle-down economics, tax cuts for the wealthy and, most notoriously, the Iran-Contra Affair. Rather than tasking him with negative consequences for any of these travesties, the country honored Reagan with a state funeral upon his death in 2004. And, now, for the last eight years we’ve been treated to the shameless, self-indulgent pseudo-buffoonery of the younger Bush and his administration. Virtually every word from their mouths is another fear-mongering lie, and never any consequences. They’re happy to bring to justice the little guys like those they accused of offenses at Abu Ghraib, but who's going to be held responsible for the grave abuses at Guatanamo.
And what will be their legacy? Never-ending "War on Terror." National debt of inconceivable proportion. Millions without health care. Hundreds of thousands without jobs. More and more mortgage foreclosures. Grievously wounded veterans who have no long-term health care. Nothing done to slow climate change. Nothing done to improve public education. Nothing done to achieve energy independence. Failure in the financial sector. . . . But “victory” in Iraq! (Don’t think about Afghanistan. Don’t! I said.) And CEO’s with salaries that diverge from their workers’ pay by multiple hundreds of times! That’s the sort of world I hoped my child would inherit. . . . Or, no, I guess it isn't. For just a moment there, I must have dreamed I was a CEO.
. . .
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
These days, privilege is rank and so is brimstone!
But, it won’t be tomorrow that I invite my neighbor over. ’Cause, if you recall, my shadow and I are visiting the pub. And that’s just the way us bleeding-heart sinners are put together, as I’m sure Sarah Palin will tell you. We’re all really long on high-flown ideals and way too short on the kinds of action she's used to, the kind that doesn’t even cause her to blink.
So, I was talking to the guy that cleans our offices yesterday, and he made me realize that almost everything wrong with all the institutions in the U.S. can be summed up in two words . . . executive privilege. And I'm not talking only about the federal offices in Washington, D.C., either.
Are the corporations of America—those grand ole businesses that have flourished for generations on the sweat and labor of honest men and women—truly not responsible for the fixes they've gotten themselves into? I mean, who do they have to blame but themselves for never having paid any attention to one jot or tittle above the bottom line? It's exceedingly demeaning to those of us who have a few connected synapses left when they tell us that they "couldn't have foreseen" whatever today's disaster may be and they expect us to buy that BS!
Anyone who can add and subtract could have predicted the eventual failure of the so-called "housing bubble." The first time it became clear to me exactly what a "sub-prime mortgage" was, the hair on the back of my neck stood up. "Who would buy such an abortion?" I thought to myself. A lot of people, apparently. Part of the problem is that we let ourselves be easily swayed by language that comes to us with it's own quotation marks already tied to each end of the phrase. That's all the more true if the language is coming out of the mouth of someone supposed to be an authority in the field—like a mortgage banker, for instance, or an economist, or a hedge fund manager.
What do any of us peons actually know about the high-flown world of finance, after all? We've simply got no choice but to trust the experts. Problem is, most of them are plain and simple opportunists; i.e., someone in the right place at the right time. For the rest of us, it's caveat emptor right and left.
So now OUR government has bailed out Bare Stearns, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and, today, AIG! I can't even keep up with the sum total of our money they've so far committed to these giant corporations. But I'm going to have a real hard time forgetting that they fired the CEO's of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac after the two of them jointly earned almost $30 million last year, and we didn't ask them for a penny of it back . . . although it seems we aren't going to give them their golden parachutes. Boo hoo!
Do you begin to get a glimpse of what I mean by executive privilege?
. . .
So, I was talking to the guy that cleans our offices yesterday, and he made me realize that almost everything wrong with all the institutions in the U.S. can be summed up in two words . . . executive privilege. And I'm not talking only about the federal offices in Washington, D.C., either.
Are the corporations of America—those grand ole businesses that have flourished for generations on the sweat and labor of honest men and women—truly not responsible for the fixes they've gotten themselves into? I mean, who do they have to blame but themselves for never having paid any attention to one jot or tittle above the bottom line? It's exceedingly demeaning to those of us who have a few connected synapses left when they tell us that they "couldn't have foreseen" whatever today's disaster may be and they expect us to buy that BS!
Anyone who can add and subtract could have predicted the eventual failure of the so-called "housing bubble." The first time it became clear to me exactly what a "sub-prime mortgage" was, the hair on the back of my neck stood up. "Who would buy such an abortion?" I thought to myself. A lot of people, apparently. Part of the problem is that we let ourselves be easily swayed by language that comes to us with it's own quotation marks already tied to each end of the phrase. That's all the more true if the language is coming out of the mouth of someone supposed to be an authority in the field—like a mortgage banker, for instance, or an economist, or a hedge fund manager.
What do any of us peons actually know about the high-flown world of finance, after all? We've simply got no choice but to trust the experts. Problem is, most of them are plain and simple opportunists; i.e., someone in the right place at the right time. For the rest of us, it's caveat emptor right and left.
So now OUR government has bailed out Bare Stearns, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and, today, AIG! I can't even keep up with the sum total of our money they've so far committed to these giant corporations. But I'm going to have a real hard time forgetting that they fired the CEO's of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac after the two of them jointly earned almost $30 million last year, and we didn't ask them for a penny of it back . . . although it seems we aren't going to give them their golden parachutes. Boo hoo!
Do you begin to get a glimpse of what I mean by executive privilege?
. . .
Monday, September 15, 2008
My Heart Bleeds and I’m Proud of It!
Since when did it become a sin to have a bleeding heart? Should I be ashamed that I’m made of flesh and blood? Every holy woman or man is the more blessed the more the sinner can see that it is bright and viscous blood which surges in the saint’s heart. Yet here in this land of milk and honey, I’ve become afraid even to touch the earth, let alone admit I’m made of it. Do I imagine that the punishing father will come home to rip the honeyed bread from my mouth and splash the milk across the floor? I think I must. I know I deserve no more. Yet, there’s the bread, the milk, the honey . . . every morning, every night. God! I’m scared that someone will notice I’m the sinner, not the saint!
So I keep my head down. Don’t look in the eye of the stranger on the street. Cross over to the other side when I see trouble ahead. Turn the corner before the beggar catches me up. Scurry back into my hole when I hear footsteps behind me at night. It’s chaos out there, the tooth and the claw, rat’s race and grindstone and fear, fear, fear!
Should I happen one day to awaken without fear, all I need do is read the news, turn on TV, listen to the radio or access the Web. Before half an hour passes, I’ll remember a hundred reasons to be afraid. Where’s today’s hurricane? Earthquake? Genocide? Who’s just killed whom . . . and how many? Has the ice cap melted yet, are the polar bears all dead? Is the rainforest gone completely? The frogs and birds entirely disappeared? Have we left anyone out there who isn’t our enemy? Maybe I should get a gun. Never mind that I don’t really know how to use one. I’m sure it’d make me feel braver to brandish my weapon when threatened. But I feel threatened all the time! Yet I never see the face of the adversary.
Maybe that’s because he rides my back. And, there’s no turning fast enough to catch a glimpse. He’s always behind me because he belongs to me, my shadow. I make him; he makes me do things I wish I hadn’t, but we can’t be separated. For I fear to be without my fear. Instead, I dress him up and take him out for a nice dinner. Maybe truite a l’almondine will make us better friends. Tomorrow, we’ll keep it simple and go to the corner pub. There’re some guys I want to introduce him to. I know they’re all haunted by the same demon I am.
Perhaps, just perhaps, we will lift a glass and remember we’re all in this together! Democrat-Republican, Conservative-Liberal, Hutu-Tutsi, Israeli-Palestinian, Shi’a-Sunni, Catholic-Protestant, Hindu-Muslim, East-West, Mars-Venus, Us-Them. Why do epic adversaries always come in pairs? Can’t the human mind encompass more than one thing at a time? Not one of us gets out of this place alive! So, maybe we ought to make the best of it while we’re here. Here’s the bread . . . and there the honey. God doesn’t run away from us. We run from God and we never look back. After all, let’s not forget what happened to Lot’s wife! As if I need a reason not to glance behind me when I know it’s the wrath of God there. Is that why I can’t see my shadow?
When my sister bleeds—even if she’s the nameless Lot’s wife—I bleed too. And she bleeds every month. Isn’t that blood enough? Maybe if I let it slip from my mind that I’m my sister’s keeper, send her off to the red tent with the other women and get back to my man’s work, I can pretend that her blood isn’t mine, isn’t spilled for me and my children.
So, whose blood is this on my hands? Is it the blood of the elephant and rhinoceros, whose tough and pointy parts I must possess to keep my manhood hard? Is it the blood of tiger and ape, of frog and bird, bluefin and coral? How about Eritrea, Darfur, Tibet, Srebenica, Rwanda, Gallipoli, Wounded Knee, Auschwitz . . . ? Where will it end? In Iraq? North Korea? China? A flooded Antarctica? How many must I kill before my bloodlust is slaked? And to what end?
Whether dollar, yuan, rupee, ruble, peso or dinar—every single one is another tree whose life I took! Yet in the morning, in the evening . . . there’s the milk, bread and honey! Couldn’t I share it, just this once? I think my neighbor’s child may be starving. Let that thought flit through your mind, and the shadow shows up immediately to whisper in your ear, “It’s yours! Daddy gave it to you today, but you don’t know for sure that he will again tomorrow. So eat what you can and hide the rest. If your neighbor knows you have it, she’ll kill to have it from you. That’s what you’d do, wouldn’t you, if your baby were starving?” And you know you would, maybe for a lot less reason than that.
You stole the land you live on from the indigene. You pillaged the forest for the house you live in. You rape the earth for the meat in your mouth and the corn in the cupboard. You take and you take and you take, and what’s left in the end? A broken pillar of ash and salt on a bed of silk and gold. Oh, my! What riches you’ve amassed! Too bad you’re not here to enjoy them.
For me, I’m happy my heart still bleeds. I’m not entirely mineral yet. I have a shred of hope left, so I’ll vote for Obama because among politicians he alone urges my hope to live. I don’t know about you, but when I stop hoping, I die. And I’d like to believe that the day may come when I set aside my fear for a moment and invite my neighbor’s hungry family to sit down with me for a meal of bread, honey and milk.
. . .
So I keep my head down. Don’t look in the eye of the stranger on the street. Cross over to the other side when I see trouble ahead. Turn the corner before the beggar catches me up. Scurry back into my hole when I hear footsteps behind me at night. It’s chaos out there, the tooth and the claw, rat’s race and grindstone and fear, fear, fear!
Should I happen one day to awaken without fear, all I need do is read the news, turn on TV, listen to the radio or access the Web. Before half an hour passes, I’ll remember a hundred reasons to be afraid. Where’s today’s hurricane? Earthquake? Genocide? Who’s just killed whom . . . and how many? Has the ice cap melted yet, are the polar bears all dead? Is the rainforest gone completely? The frogs and birds entirely disappeared? Have we left anyone out there who isn’t our enemy? Maybe I should get a gun. Never mind that I don’t really know how to use one. I’m sure it’d make me feel braver to brandish my weapon when threatened. But I feel threatened all the time! Yet I never see the face of the adversary.
Maybe that’s because he rides my back. And, there’s no turning fast enough to catch a glimpse. He’s always behind me because he belongs to me, my shadow. I make him; he makes me do things I wish I hadn’t, but we can’t be separated. For I fear to be without my fear. Instead, I dress him up and take him out for a nice dinner. Maybe truite a l’almondine will make us better friends. Tomorrow, we’ll keep it simple and go to the corner pub. There’re some guys I want to introduce him to. I know they’re all haunted by the same demon I am.
Perhaps, just perhaps, we will lift a glass and remember we’re all in this together! Democrat-Republican, Conservative-Liberal, Hutu-Tutsi, Israeli-Palestinian, Shi’a-Sunni, Catholic-Protestant, Hindu-Muslim, East-West, Mars-Venus, Us-Them. Why do epic adversaries always come in pairs? Can’t the human mind encompass more than one thing at a time? Not one of us gets out of this place alive! So, maybe we ought to make the best of it while we’re here. Here’s the bread . . . and there the honey. God doesn’t run away from us. We run from God and we never look back. After all, let’s not forget what happened to Lot’s wife! As if I need a reason not to glance behind me when I know it’s the wrath of God there. Is that why I can’t see my shadow?
When my sister bleeds—even if she’s the nameless Lot’s wife—I bleed too. And she bleeds every month. Isn’t that blood enough? Maybe if I let it slip from my mind that I’m my sister’s keeper, send her off to the red tent with the other women and get back to my man’s work, I can pretend that her blood isn’t mine, isn’t spilled for me and my children.
So, whose blood is this on my hands? Is it the blood of the elephant and rhinoceros, whose tough and pointy parts I must possess to keep my manhood hard? Is it the blood of tiger and ape, of frog and bird, bluefin and coral? How about Eritrea, Darfur, Tibet, Srebenica, Rwanda, Gallipoli, Wounded Knee, Auschwitz . . . ? Where will it end? In Iraq? North Korea? China? A flooded Antarctica? How many must I kill before my bloodlust is slaked? And to what end?
Whether dollar, yuan, rupee, ruble, peso or dinar—every single one is another tree whose life I took! Yet in the morning, in the evening . . . there’s the milk, bread and honey! Couldn’t I share it, just this once? I think my neighbor’s child may be starving. Let that thought flit through your mind, and the shadow shows up immediately to whisper in your ear, “It’s yours! Daddy gave it to you today, but you don’t know for sure that he will again tomorrow. So eat what you can and hide the rest. If your neighbor knows you have it, she’ll kill to have it from you. That’s what you’d do, wouldn’t you, if your baby were starving?” And you know you would, maybe for a lot less reason than that.
You stole the land you live on from the indigene. You pillaged the forest for the house you live in. You rape the earth for the meat in your mouth and the corn in the cupboard. You take and you take and you take, and what’s left in the end? A broken pillar of ash and salt on a bed of silk and gold. Oh, my! What riches you’ve amassed! Too bad you’re not here to enjoy them.
For me, I’m happy my heart still bleeds. I’m not entirely mineral yet. I have a shred of hope left, so I’ll vote for Obama because among politicians he alone urges my hope to live. I don’t know about you, but when I stop hoping, I die. And I’d like to believe that the day may come when I set aside my fear for a moment and invite my neighbor’s hungry family to sit down with me for a meal of bread, honey and milk.
. . .
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