Shooting Star

Okay, one last star I'll post from SALON, since I've been doing alright by them, looks like...

Iraq and a hard place, still

Although I never agreed with Clinton's vote, always felt that the Bush League were leading the country by the nose on the rush to war with Iraq, I think she's in a real bind right now on admitting to that vote being a mistake, and don't really fault her for not copping to it, because the Right can run all over that, making it a campaign issue, another distraction from their own rotten record of obeisance to Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld/Rove's manipulations.

It could: 1) make her seem like a dupe for believing Bush's deception to begin with; 2) make her seem to be a flip-flopper (only Democrats are called this, it seems); 3) be used as an indictment of the troops; 4) be construed as an attack on her for supporting the incoherent, janus-headed policy to begin with ("how can you be against the war you supported?" -- the line they used against Kerry); 5) be seen as political cowardice, like finger-in-the-wind sentiment pollchasing.

I think she probably won't admit to it being a mistake for all of those reasons, and a few more. Like Obama's blackness, the "admit to a mistake" smoke-and-mirrors show is a diversion meant to indict the character of a candidate.

The ones who should be fessing up to mistakes are Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Rove, and you'll never hear them do that, either. So why blame Hillary for it?

She (and many other Congresspeople) made the same mistake with their votes. She's got plenty of company. I wish she had shown more political courage back then, but 20/20 hindsight and all of that. I understand why she's not admitting to it as a mistake.

-- Slackie Onassis

Learnin'

A star for a little blurb; I wanted to write more, but was kinda pissed at the article...

We Need Quick Learners

Obama has been called the Democrats' Ronald Reagan because he has the personality to sell the public on programs it might reject on their merits. (In Reagan's case, it was supply-side economics. In Obama's, it would be national healthcare.)

Except that, unlike Reagan, Obama's actually smart -- to imply that there's no substance behind the image is typical Reader backhanding. Despite McClelland's snide Reader-style digs salt-and-peppered throughout the piece, what still emerges from it is that Obama learned from his mistakes and -- he admitted to them and, most importantly, didn't repeat them.

All the more reason why we could use somebody like that in the White House, no?

-- Slackie Onassis

And another star on the article ripping on that NYT reporter who is a shoddy journalist...

Commissars Are Never Wrong

There are numerous explanations for that, but one that ought not be overlooked is simple arrogance. Some national journalists simply believe that they are immune from criticism because they are more knowlegeable and wiser than their critics.

I agree, although I'd probably say "most" instead of "some" -- part of what's gutted journalism in this country is the emergence of journalists as a political class unto themselves (and probably fuels their sniping of Internet information gathering -- whether blogs, or YouTube, etc. -- anything that gets information out there in ways that they're not a part of is "bad information").

The Press has become a uniquely-situated institution, straddling three arenas: Businesspeople, celebrities, policymakers (indirectly, in their ability to draw attention to things and get people to think about whatever it is they cover -- and what they don't cover gets ignored). I don't think we have journalists in America anymore; we have commissars. "Pravda-like" is right.

The celebrity angle is probably the most recent and startling corrupting influence. A celebrity journalist is eventually going to have to choose which they value more -- their journalistic integrity or their celebrity; the former path is thankless drudgery, the latter brings fame and fortune.

No wonder we have so few journalists, anymore.

-- Slackie Onassis

For what it's worth

Another star; an article that pissed me off, Bushies blaming "24" for prisoner abuse. Just absurd, and infuriating, so I jotted a comment down...

I Smell a Rat

Oh, come on. I mean, sure, a lot of America takes its cues from television and movies, but I think it's a dodge to try to blame "24" on bad treatment of prisoners. That feels like a cover story, like Dan Quayle blaming "Murphy Brown" for our cultural woes. More GOP secular culture-bashing, as pointless as it is meaningless.

More to the point, it tries to camouflage the very real responsibility the Bush League leadership has for creating the climate of lawlessness that led to the abuses to begin with! They knew just what they were doing the minute they get up the prisoner camps in Cuba, and when they adopted their rendition torture-go-round way of circumnavigating international laws.

It's not Jack Bauer's fault that prisoner abuse and torture has gone on. Rather, the fault lies with George Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Alberto Gonzalez, and many other members of the Bush League who think extremism in defense of imperial executive authority is no vice.

What next, blaming video games for Abu Ghraib?

-- Slackie Onassis

I must've done something right, since I ended up with a trollbite, courtesy of Locutus, stargazer extraordinaire...

Article never said that "24" was to blame. The article indicated that some of the training cadre in the military are concerned that some individuals may be mimicking the show.

What a silly, pointless quibble! Poor thing! If the officials are concerned that folks are mimicking the show, then they're indirectly blaming the show for the problem, no? He missed the point of my comment, which was that the leadership are the ones we need to blame, not television shows (or individuals imitating television shows).

Starry

Got another one. It's not that I support people like Ortega, but what I support is countries having popular elections, self-determination, being able to conduct their affairs without political interference from the US. I support countries taking care of their own people, and oppose dictatorships, juntas, fascist regimes. And I strenuously oppose the US policy of supporting political strongmen abroad. If we're paragons of democracy (and these days, it's a debatable assumption, no?) -- we should not be afraid of democracy, which means the right for people to self-determination, and NOT corrupt and brutal governments kowtowing to us...

Banana Republicans and Death Squad Democracies

In El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras, misery plus surging violent crime has turned hope into one word: emigration, preferably to El Norte.

Ironic that three North American-style "success stories" (e.g., popular leftist movements brutally crushed through American intervention/interference and rightist regimes put in place) have led to countries in miserable condition, where the only recourse for the populace is flight!

From Washington's perspective, any Central or Latin American country that tries to take care of its own populace (versus, say, foreign creditors) is immediately on our blacklist. Our stance toward them goes from wary, to icy, to cold, to hostile.

Whereas the regimes that rely on paramilitaries and death squads to terrorize their countries into submission (or civil war), give corporations a free hand in exporting resources and wealth and let them wield undue political influence (aka, "embrace free market economics"), smash trade unions, kill journalists and teachers, have horrible human rights records, and have glaring social inequality -- well, our government likes those countries, so long as they embrace capitalism.

Good luck to Chávez, to Ortega, to the various countries down there who are trying to improve the lives of their citizenry, instead of marching to the tune of Washington, which is invariably bad for the country that does it, good for the corrupt government we're supporting (in terms of our aid to them), and terrible for the people forced to endure it.

Washington likes juntas and coups in the region, and that's not hyperbole, that's history -- it's policy (wrapped up in obfuscating language about democracy, of course)! Shows where our hearts really are in the matter of freedom and democracy, if it's measured in actual practice, and not simply in rhetoric and buzzwords. Never has our rhetoric strayed further from actual practice than in Central and Latin America.

-- Slackie Onassis

About time

I'd had a few starless letters of late, thought I was entering a slump, and then...

War without end, Amen

In a way, it almost feels like the neocons and reactionaries are deliberately stirring the pot to ensure generations of war to come, because the threat of peace breaking out (admittedly, a long-term threat at this point, thanks to them) would threaten their tidy relations with defense contractors.

I remember when the Soviet Union collapsed, and for about two weeks, they talked nervously about a peace dividend, and how, in the 90s, in the wake of it, how the GOP was floundering, since their whole politics is based on enemy imagery, on a nefarious "Other" that threatens our way of life. They would periodically chirp about narco-terrorism, but it never carried the gravitas that the overhyped Communist Conspiracy(tm) menace did.

9/11 had to have been an answer to their prayers, sadly enough, giving them the perfect bogeyman (never mind that most of the terrorist came from Saudi Arabia, that's immaterial, right?) And if they claimed that the terrorists envied our success and hated our way of life (instead of, say, opposing our lopsided, lavish support of Israel and endless, cynical oil politics and support of secularish police states in the region), they could get Americans behind a crusade in the Middle East.

Well, now we've got the crusade, and maybe it's not going so well, but, eternal optimists that Americans ultimately are, a new front in the War on Terror could be just the ticket for the defense industry, the shot in the arm it needs to get people back on board. Beat those war drums, salt the newsfeeds with stories about Iranian villainy, and the war-to-be practically sells itself.

And best of all, from their perspective, is if it turns into a quagmire as well, because then they can stab Democrats in the back if we "lose" the region by withdrawing, and insist that we keep fighting in the region indefinitely, or else lose our standing in the world (what standing that remains, that is). The absence of a real progressive wing in the Democrats ensures that they'll take the gutless stance of keeping the war going.

Think of how the GOP dragooned the Democrats into becoming cold warriors by tarring them with the "Soft on Communism" brush, and the billions of dollars wasted for decades fighting the Cold War. The Democrats were busy proving themselves to be tough talkers and walkers, too, at the expense of our actual way of life in the this country. Now the reactionaries want a Hot War to run for as long, and the war industry will be laughing all the way to their offshore banks.

Everybody circle around, now, and recite Mark Twain's "The War Prayer."

-- Slackie Onassis

Star

Ding! Another star! Woo hoo! I figured they'd like it.

Break a Nail!

I think it's a good thing to go from monologue to dialogue. Theater actors, stand-up comics, and live bands have had to deal with that kind of instant feedback for centuries, and I think they've come out alright. Sure, there are lousy audiences and hecklers at times, but perhaps the writer just needs to have a thicker skin, and not let it get to them -- the good folks will get it, and the trolls will be out there, too. In showbiz, they say "break a leg" -- so, for you, I'd say "break a nail!" to reflect the different demands of a keyboard-driven gig.

For too long, the culture creators have come from a particular social class, embodying a standard set of values (you know, Ivy League-educated, upper-middle class background, etc.) -- meritocracy in action, or so we're to believe. And as a result, it shapes not only what they write about, but what they see, too, what they're even able to perceive (I'd loosely term that the David Brooks Effect, given his astounding cultural myopia). I think it reflects the lack of real diversity in the American intellectual class -- the Best and Brightest simply don't have all the right answers, but don't try telling them that! They matter, because, well, because they're content providers, that's why!

That disconnect between meritocrat and audience is probably why polls consistently show the American public to be ahead of their representatives on issues. So long as they're all hunkered down in DC, they're okay, but outside the Beltway, they're lacking, forced to deal with the rascal multitudes, and afraid of it -- no wonder Bush's handlers never have unstaged appearances for the man; he's afraid of that instant feedback.

Similarly, the culture creators operate from East and West Coasts, twin poles, and too often like to pretend that there's nothing in between. The voiceless majority are supposed to shut up and be passive recipients of received wisdom -- that's how it's been for too long. It's been done to death; the Net lets us all participate, and I think you shouldn't fear it or worry about it, just enjoy the ride. The medium is the message, right?

-- Slackie Onassis

I think

I think this one deserves a star; we'll see if it does...

The movement, and not the man

As much as I would enjoy seeing him in the dock, and eventually in prison, the above compromise would be worth it just to preserve the republic.

That's Gerald Ford-style talk, there. The republic has been poisoned by the Bush administration and the GOP at large, the damage has already been done, both in terms of the unconstitutional expansion of executive power, and in the more overt and above-board economic and political policies that are in place.

Until those things are reversed, no successor, however they appear on the scene, is going to be able (or, more frighteningly, willing) to undo the harm. People keep thinking that the Bushies are the source of the problem -- but GW himself has been guided by some very old hands at government, people who go all the way back to the Nixon administration. And they, themselves, are products of a political approach that hearkens back to the McCarthy years, way back in the early 1950s!

Is Bush an aberration, or the full and logical flowering of what the GOP has been steadily working on since the Barry Goldwater defeat of 1964?

Seems to me so long as people focus exclusively on Bush (or even just Dick Cheney), it lets them overlook the institutional structures that have created an anti-democratic culture in the GOP.

You take away the man (or the men, if you count Cheney in the mix), the problem remains: the approach -- the Unitary Executive Theory of power, the subordinate style of a GOP Congress, the acquiescent reactionary Judiciary -- these are all the consequences of a particular approach to governance the GOP favors, for specific political ends.

The Republicans who are speaking out against the Bush League are still beneficiaries of that same political approach, are still creatures of this movement, even as they engage in damage control to try to distance themselves from Bush.

If they abandoned their party in protest (either to become independents or Democrats), I would think they were more sincerely opposed to what's gone on; but they haven't -- they're still Republicans, and that's significant.

They are still part of the system that led to GW Bush. Bush was not an aberration -- he was the logical, inevitable expression of GOP politics from 1964 onward.

Cold warriors, indeed. Unfortunately, it appears that the cold war they were waging was against American democracy.

-- Slackie Onassis

And yet another one

I need to start writing them articles, I think!

Ambushed

The Bush Presidency has always been on a suicide mission; stealing an election or two, the pace of their reactionary legislation, the milking of (inter)national sympathy after 9/11 to ramrod their ideological agenda through -- it always spoke to me of desperation on their part, a keen recognition that time wasn't on their side, and if they could just get their tax cuts for the wealthy codified into law, then nobody would be able to take them away without incurring political damage.

Gulf War II, what's to say, exactly? A gambit that failed? Then again, the usual scapegoats emerge -- we tried to bring them freedom, but those stupid Iraqis screwed it up; our noble ideals were tarnished in the cauldron of Baghdad. And those damned turncoats at home, sapping the will of the nation to make a war of opportunity work. Maybe nothing's been learned -- the Democrats paid a heavy price for the Vietnam War they inherited; I hope the Republicans pay as steep a price.

But as we see the sun setting on the Bush League, we also see another carrier group deployed to the Persian Gulf, even as the US tells Iran to "back off" -- akin to having somebody getting in your face and saying the same thing. There's still time for another crisis, a belated Gulf of Tonkin-style event, time for a war in Iran.

Bush has already demonstrated that the will of the people means jack to him, and only Fox Newsworthy hagiographers-in-waiting will find any silver lining in the dark cloud of this administration.

So, why not a war with Iran -- why not get while the getting's good? War forgives all sins to those who perpetuate it, so long as you win. The Decider has literally nothing to lose. Get us bogged down in the whole region, ensuring that all future presidents have to deal with the problem he created (sort of the way the deficit and the tax cuts have mortgaged America's future -- nice one, guys!)

I'm more scared of this administration now than ever. For all the talk of lame ducks, I think this administration has a more bestial aspect. Cornered, the beast will surely lash out.

-- Slackie Onassis

Starstruck

Another star, this time me bitching about Chuck "the Fuck" Hagel, from some ill-considered comments people made about maybe him teaming up with a Democrat for a combined ticket...

Chuckwagon

Is this what it's come to, even in the wake of the 2006 battering of the GOP, that people try to figure out a dream Democratic ticket with a Republican? Hagel's stance on the Iraq War isn't noble or particularly wise -- it's common sense! And if the war was going well (whatever that means), he'd be on board with it like all the others. Are people so cowed that stating the obvious is what passes for political courage?

The American Conservative Union gives him a lifetime rating of 86 (putting him ahead of McCain and Bill Frist, who are themselves politically Pleistocene). Forget Third Way appeasement -- maybe Joe Lieberman would like to run with Hagel. Maybe Webb, or some other collaborator. Whatever.

We barely have two parties as it is! Let's not blur them together, please! Instead, let the Democrats run on a new New Deal, a real agenda that recognizes that national security is best achieved not by wars of opportunity abroad, but by opportunities for Americans at home, at school, at work. Through investing in a better America in a multitude of ways -- our success and security as a nation is better served through repairing our reputation abroad, and that means making America a better place, versus being the world's (corrupt) policeman.

-- Slackie Onassis

Another star! And another!

I've been in the zone lately with SALON; this in response to their "Carnivores vs. Herbivores" article/book review...

Meating of the Minds

I don't get hung up on it, except with all the chemicals and drugs and how unsanitary the processes are -- you just need to ride past a chicken or pig farm to smell just how bad it is.

The concentration of agriculture into a few corporate hands is probably one of the biggest problems in the overall process -- their worst practices become the industry standard, instead of alternative processes being put into practice (whether free-range, organic, etc.)

I wonder if the quality of the produce were better, whether it would reduce intake of it, paradoxically enough. Just like how real sugar and butter satisfies more than corn syrup and margarine, so (I imagine) would meat from healthy, drug-and-hormone-free animals probably be healthier and more satisfying for those who choose to eat it.

Unfortunately, as currently constructed, the junk-food (meaning food that is mass-marketed with profit emphasized over quality -- e.g., what's good for the food producer, versus what's good for the food consumer) is cheaper than the quality food -- there's a market advantage in the way things are tipped toward the bottom feeders.

Lest vegetarians think they are immune to the problem of agribusiness, the concentration of agricultural capital ensures even a vegetarian a diet rich in petrochemical fertilizers, corn syrup, pesticides, toxic sewer sludge masquerading as healthy fertilizer (e.g., "biosolids"), GM-modified crops foisted on consumers without their consent, etc.

The whole American food production system needs an overhaul to reflect consumer health needs, versus the desire of the industry for maximum profits. So, let the vegetarians and the meat eaters put down their forks and knives and find common cause in the pursuit of better quality for the food they choose to eat.

-- Slackie Onassis

With regard to the comment lambasting Bush's tepid stance on global warming...

Wind and Solar Farms?

What about taking agricultural subsidies that are paid out to farms to lie fallow and using it instead to develop wind and solar power on those farms, or else providing some additional incentive to farmers to develop wind and sun farms?

It's perhaps a way of helping out small farmers and the environment at the same time, and also would ideally decentralize the power generation industry, which could help make the country that much safer in the long-term (versus, say, proliferation of nuclear plants, which could be risky in the post-9/11 world).

Failing that, have those fallow farms grow trees -- just plant trees and let the land go wild where possible. Obviously this won't solve the entire problem, but it would have to help, when taken with other steps.

-- Slackie Onassis

I'm on a roll

SALON picked another of my letters as their "Editor's Choice!" I guess I should dig and find the other ones I wrote that got the little red star on them. Later, later...

McCain't do it!

McCain the War Hero(tm) embodies the cult of personality; or given the mainstream media's love of him, perhaps the cult of "pressonality" -- his undeserved reputation as a maverick invariably gets kicked under the rug when dealing with the man.

For the non-Republicans who like him, please examine his actual voting record, which is the best measure of the man, at least where Democrats, moderates, and independents are concerned, those people who mistakenly think McCain is on their side, or at least isn't as bad as the "real" conservatives.

The American Conservative Union gave McCain an 83 ranking on his lifetime votes -- Sam Brownback earned 95 (by comparison, Democrats Russ Feingold earned 12, Hillary Clinton 9, Barack Obama 8, Charles Schumer 6, and Barbara Boxer and Ted Kennedy 3). Many things McCain may be, but a maverick he's not.

McCain is a press product, an action figure, a cipher, a strawman, a figment, a mirage -- people project onto him what they want to see, and he and his handlers worked that angle so well, at least until after 9/11, when McCain had to step across the line in the sand drawn by Bush. It could be that circumstances have dimmed the media-cultivated aura that previously surrounded McCain. If 9/11 hadn't happened, if George II hadn't happened, McCain would have almost surely have been president. And that's scary.

Let's hope we're able to move past Potemkin Village politicking and into something more substantial. Or maybe Americans aren't yet tired of empty symbols, sly illusions, and cynical/creduluous houses of media mirrors.

Note to moderates, liberals, and fence-sitters: McCain isn't one of you, and never was. Vote for him at your peril.

-- Slackie Onassis

(later)

Success is the best revenge?

I suppose the only cultural and/or political defense against fascism would be a widely-shared prosperity. If fascists feed on despair and fear and uncertainty, then democrats (small "d") would have to bring people to the table through solid increases in pay, better work conditions, investing in the community, and other classic economic populist moves that bring hope and prosperity to many people currently left on the margins of the American political process.

The Right's decades-long attack on the idea (to say nothing of the practice) of Good Government has only lent to the culture of despair, the tyranny of diminished expectations.

Fascists thrive on crises, which is why they seem to appear during times of unease. Not all crises can be prevented, but things like social inequality and concentration of wealth and opportunity can be legislatively addressed and can help offer the needed stability to weather the political threat posed by would-be fascists, who are the ultimate political opportunists.

A broadly expanded middle class is the recipe for social stability, which is why fascism seems so much a middle-class movement -- when the middle class feels threatened, it seems to turn to fascism, which offers something other than the complete overturning of the social order (ala Communism). Bolster the middle class, and the invidious appeal of fascism evaporates.

Shared prosperity just might pull the fangs on the fascist snake oil salesmen who are, at heart, hucksters and charlatans selling pretty lies to delude and mislead.

-- Slackie Onassis

There's one or two others, but I can't find'em.