I'm Back

The Bush Administration is still making me angry, my husband and I had a little boy in November 2005, and I spend most of my days doing story analysis. Lately I seem to be having what I think must be a middle-age crisis.

I don't dance anymore but sometimes miss it a lot -- especially when I hear some good dance music -- but I do yoga. Thank God for yoga.

On the Four-Year Anniversary of September 11

The Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. By December 7, 1945, the U.S. had kicked the collective asses of the fascists in Japan and Germany. Does the Bush Administration expect us to believe that Osama bin Laden is a more formidable foe than the war machines of Hitler and Emperor Hirohito combined? There has yet to be any justice for the three thousand-plus Americans who were killed in the bombings.

Meanwhile, we have close to 2,000 American dead and and countless more innocent Iraqi dead in Iraq, where the Neo-con power-grab has devolved into mounting chaos. And worldwide terrorist attacks reached an all-time high last year.

It's no surprise that conservatives think it's okay to put an idiot in office, and other unqualified morons in charge of government functions like FEMA. After all, they don't believe it's the role of government to help people, so it's okay if our leaders are incompetent, right? Because it's not like the country might ever need actual leadership or anything...

How long is it going to take ordinary Americans to become utterly disgusted with these carbetbagging scumbags, and for the names of Bush and his cohorts to be thoroughly reviled? Because even though I don't believe Bush actually won either the 2000 or 2004 election, both were close enough for Karl Rove's machine to steal -- and today, the fourth anniversary of September 11 (which all those clueless bozos with their "Support Our Troops" bumperstickers assure everyone they will "never forget"), there are actually Yahoos on the National Mall and elsewhere, cheering for the blatantly corrupt and contemptible administration of the worst President ever.

Thoughts and prayers for the people of New Orleans and their lovely unique city for the natural and man-made catastrophes that they have had to endure. If there is a silver lining to the tragedy -- how much of it could have been averted, and how many lives saved, through competent leadership? -- it is that Hurricane Katrina might persuade the nation to reject the conservative lie that government cannot and should not help ordinary citizens, and exists only to restrict individual liberties and redistribute our tax dollars to the already-haves.

If we don't start demanding that our government spend tax dollars to improve and safeguard the lives of regular citizens, New Orleans will surely be just the first disaster of the coming century, for it reveals just how much conservatives value ordinary American lives.

Okay, Enough of That

Today I will not blog about things in the world that bug me, of which there are apparently many (t0 look at my previous posts). Today I will attempt to be cheerful.

I was just looking at Manolo's Shoe Bloe, which is one of my favorite blogs, and his comments about the Georgia bride who ran away to New Mexico. She had fourteen bridesmaids and 600 guests! Who even knows 600 people? I am very glad that we kept the guest list to about 75 when we got married last October -- and I agree that the enormity and expense of the wedding strike me as being diametrically opposed to the happiness of the union: if you have a happy relationship, you don't need to go impressing other people.

I have also been thinking about another entry on Manolo's site, in which he reprints part of an interview with his heroine, Miuccia Prada. In it, she speculates that the less clothing a woman wears, the more unhappy she is. It made me think of stripping. of course. Was I less happy then? In many ways I was, but then, I am happily married now. I enjoyed flaunting my body for attention as a younger woman but am also perfectly content that all that's behind me now.

Miuccia also mentions that the young women in her office always talk about love in terms of what they expect to get, rather than what they would like to give. I think she is correct: many people are caught up in issues of entitlement that would evaporate if they saw love as something that flows from them, not necessarily expecting return. The thing is, it will bring a return -- but one has to have faith, and be ready to give love without needing or expecting a return.

And those are my flowery musings for today. Perhaps I need to say something about faith too, as this creationism thing in Kansas is really irking me (there I go again).

In my view, fundamentalism = lack of faith. Because when someone has faith, they don't need to go around looking for scientific proof to compel others (or themselves?) to believe, nor do they fear the beliefs of others, nor do they need others to believe along with them so that their beliefs may be validated. A person of faith does not need to cling to literal, inflexible interpretations and force them down others' throats.

These people who lack of faith -- yet claim that only they are truly faithful -- cause many problems in the world today, as one can see just by looking around. In the Middle East and in this country too they are happy to kill and maim. In this country they are trying to force their way into government and stifle freedom of thought. Because, you know, when people think, and exercise their free will, they tend to come up with ideas which are different. Only to inflexible cowards does this represent a problem.

I suspect they will not succeed in the long run because, as H.L. Mencken famously said, "there's nothing like prayer in schools to guarantee a nation of athiests."

And Hypocrites

This Terry Schaivo case... ugh. When are people on the right going to start getting sick of their own side's pandering and hypocrisy?

Let that poor woman's body die for heaven's sake... As I see it, her soul is long gone (thank goodness for that). All that remains is this drama in which people stake out their positions as vicious ideologues or people willing to deal with reality. And the reality is that she's in a persistent vegetative state, and that her husband has the legal right to determine what happens next. Her parents are being exploited by so-called "pro-life" forces. How sad that they would subject their own daughter to all this as a result.

Pro-life is a joke. They could care less about actual human lives. Bunch of grandstanding, intrusive hypocrites.

Human behavior sure can be repulsive.

Nation of Pharisees

Not like we weren't already pretty far down that road already, but we seem to have taken a few more steps: the Senate is poised to pass legislation to toughen existing bankruptcy laws -- something credit card companies have been pushing for for years but which Democrats have been blocking, until the last election -- that will penalize the poor and middle-class but exempts the wealthy and corporations.

A Christian nation, indeed. As Abraham Lincoln put it, "I tremble for my species when I think that God is just."

Oddly enough, many Americans think we ought to be invading other people's countries and telling them how to live.

One consolation is that, while 50.5% of voters voted for Bush in November, 49.5% did not -- and when you consider how our elections are determined by the massive amounts of PR and propaganda that shape public opinion, that indicates that a lot of people aren't drinking the Kool-Aid. I imagine that more Germans voted for Hitler.

As some of the Right's most loyal supporters are those most likely to be screwed in the new "sharecropper society," it will be interesting to see what happens in November 2006. Perhaps the red states will vote for the right to start eating their children, even more than they already are.

Note to Congress: just because people aren't very smart and don't have tons of money, that doesn't mean it's right to trick them and exploit them and imperil their children.

Wealth Transfer

That's the phrase we liberals need to start using to describe the U.S. military presence in Iraq and Medicare "reform," among other things. Also the Administration's attempt at Social Security "reform," although I agree with Paul Krugman when he argues that the true goal of movement conservatives is to dismantle the system, because they ideologically oppose it.

We can't have people thinking that government can actually improve their lives or anything, because those in power are interested in holding on to it. People might start thinking that all kinds of change and progress are possible, including food and medical care for all and even world peace. Which would really fuck up the economy, and run counter to the transformation of our country into a third world consumer plantation.*

(This isn't my idea; I borrowed it from Bill Hicks. Even though he died more than a decade ago, these catchphrases are more relevant than ever.)

As my husband pointed out to me, where there's a plantation, there's always a big house. A movement conservative is one who intends to live in it.

I Dream of George

On the morning of Wednesday January 20th, I dreamt that George W. Bush was my boyfriend.

We had a romantic time hugging and kissing, and he was quite sweet and affectionate but no intellectual heavyweight. He was rather vain of his arms, which he exercises to keep slim but toned. Laura was not around and I got the sense they were not on good terms, as though their marriage was a sham for his office. We did not discuss politics, and I got the impression that nothing interested him less. Our relationship was more about cuddling than sex.

Well, this has to be one of my strangest dreams ever, as there are few things I detest more than Dubya. My husband thinks that perhaps I am trying to find the silver lining in what the next four years will bring, or in something else I don't like.