The good news of the week: Since Hamas won the Palestinian elections in a landslide, no one expects the United States to continue donating $70 million in direct annual aid to the Palestinian Authority. The money saved will be able to go instead to pay for much needed social projects within this country, such as our urgent national need to know which shelter bed which particular homeless person is sleeping in every night, including his or her name, social security number, date of birth, and the names and addresses of all of his or her relatives.
Then, with the money that’s leftover, we’ll be able to buy two or three Tomahawk missiles to shoot at Pakistan, a lame nuclear power that would never have the nerve to shoot us back, until the onset of World War III.
In fact all the hand wringing over the Hamas win has been plain silly. People just need to relax, count their silver linings, smell the roses, and drink their milk, or whatever.
OK, so they’ve been terrorists. So what? Well, then, this win must have come as quite a shock to them, right? It sure invalidates all their past methods, to find out that all they had to do was just persuade people to vote for them. Ha! Democracy won, terrorism lost! We showed you, Hamas! Your terrorist ways look pretty stupid now, don’t they? Losers!
Secondly, until now Hamas has been able to look all sparkly and shiny as the party out of power. When you’re out of power you can promise anything. But now they have to govern. The fact is suicide bombers are all drama queens who are too important to pick up the garbage or maintain the sewage. Reality is bound to set in, and any party that could manage to do the boring dirty work to stay in power would start to look like your granny in her underwear. Or they won’t be able to hack it, in which case they’re out in the next election. It’s all good, either way.
As President George Bush has noted, the election showed that the Palestinian people were dissatisfied with the status quo. Just like people everywhere, they want better educations, and no children left behind, and an expensive privatized medical system that favors the already favored. They want to land men and women on Mars, prevent women from having abortions, and have prayer in their classrooms. They want tax cuts for the rich, in order to encourage economic growth and development in the private sector, so the public sector can shrivel up, die, and go to hell. But they’re not Americans, so they don’t get what they want.
No, just kidding. They do too get what they want, they’re a democracy, and that’s what democracies are for! It’s just that, after that -- after they get what they want -- we get what we want. Because we’re bigger than they are, see? So we can take what they want away from them.
Already, Hamas is getting Americans mad at them, and prone to want to get rid of them, by calling for the introduction of sharia law among the Palestinian people. This is unacceptable to Americans because it involves a dress code. Americans will not stand for a dress code, anywhere, especially on Fridays.
Of course, the $70 million we’re saving per year by not giving the Palestinians aid is less than a hundredth what it will take to invade them and make them free from themselves and their own stupidity again, but we are a resourceful people, and we know how to use credit.
Of course, the Saudis might take exception to anything we do to Hamas, call in all our debts with them, thus triggering the onset of World War III. But looking at it on the bright side, it’s better to get that over with and move on, right?
So cheer up everyone: your glass is half-full!
Showing posts with label terrorists. Show all posts
Showing posts with label terrorists. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 1, 2006
Wednesday, January 18, 2006
Ahmadinejad's Two Seconds of Clarity
Here we are on the verge of another foreign policy “oops, our bad, but that’s all right” moment. The Iraq War: “Oops, no WMDs, our bad. But that’s all right, Saddam had to go anyway, right?” The CIA's attack on a village in Pakistan: “Oops, our bad. Al-Zawahri wasn’t there. But that’s all right; the people killed included several non-Pakistanis so they must have been terrorists, right? Besides we already established in Iraq we could attack and kill anyone in any country anywhere, including thousands of innocents, whenever we thought we might eliminate one enemy, so, what the hell?”
Really, what the hell? All sorts of folks are condemning Harry Belafonte for calling Bush the world’s greatest terrorist. But all Belafonte was doing was giving credit where credit is due. Bush surely authorized the CIA attack. If any attack of that nature were conducted by a foreign power in this country, it would be called a terrorist attack, at the least. But Bush has convinced the majority of Americans that he is not a terrorist. It’s precisely that which makes him so great!
The newest “oops” moment in the making concerns Iran. Thanks to a CNN translator’s error, most Americans today probably believe that last Saturday Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said that his nation has the right to build nuclear weapons, when actually what he said was that no civilized nation needs nuclear weapons.
Let’s put that in perspective. First of all, it means it must be really hard to find good translators of Farsi. That one wasn’t even close. On the other hand, since CNN was banned from Iran because of this screwup, what Farsi-English translators there are, good or not, will become more available. Snap one up now, prices will never be lower!
But what I think really needs to be appreciated is that the biggest nutcase in the Middle East, and in fact the biggest nutcase with major political influence anywhere east of Darfur and west of North Korea, said something saner than George Bush has ever said or is likely to ever say, and he won’t be believed.
And why won’t Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad be believed, you ask? Well, even though he has always been totally straight-up with his stupid “death to America” rhetoric and his extreme nutcase ideas that Israel should be moved to Auschwitz and/or downtown Berlin under permanent Polish or German management, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad won’t be believed because he is a president of a country, and George Bush knows that presidents of countries can’t be believed. Why heck, that just goes without saying! Presidents are all liars!
Meanwhile, just as in 2003 the UN wanted nothing to do with an invasion of Iraq without proof of WMDs, so now, the UN will never authorize sanctions without proof of a nuclear weapons program, so...
So we are all set up for: “Oops we bombed nuclear energy-making facilities, instead of bombing bomb-making plants. Our bad. But it’s all right, because we’ve decided for them they don’t need nuclear energy anyway, and besides, they’re Islamic extremists who attack people in other countries without justification. Besides, nobody else would do it but us, so we had to act for the good of Iranians and all Mankind. Sorry ‘bout the mess and the thousands of innocent lives lost, but we did what was right.”
Questions for Further Discussion:
1. Senator McCain says the only thing worse than attacking Iran would be an Iran armed with nuclear weapons. Which would be worse: a) the United States having nuclear weapons, or b) the United States being attacked?
2. Iran is hosting a “Holocaust Conference” to study the evidence that the Holocaust never happened. Are they asking for an Israeli missile strike, or what? If the answer is “what,” try being more specific, for a minute or so. Then, give up, have a cold one, or take a couple of aspirin, or whatever you’re used to doing to re-enter reality.
Really, what the hell? All sorts of folks are condemning Harry Belafonte for calling Bush the world’s greatest terrorist. But all Belafonte was doing was giving credit where credit is due. Bush surely authorized the CIA attack. If any attack of that nature were conducted by a foreign power in this country, it would be called a terrorist attack, at the least. But Bush has convinced the majority of Americans that he is not a terrorist. It’s precisely that which makes him so great!
The newest “oops” moment in the making concerns Iran. Thanks to a CNN translator’s error, most Americans today probably believe that last Saturday Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said that his nation has the right to build nuclear weapons, when actually what he said was that no civilized nation needs nuclear weapons.
Let’s put that in perspective. First of all, it means it must be really hard to find good translators of Farsi. That one wasn’t even close. On the other hand, since CNN was banned from Iran because of this screwup, what Farsi-English translators there are, good or not, will become more available. Snap one up now, prices will never be lower!
But what I think really needs to be appreciated is that the biggest nutcase in the Middle East, and in fact the biggest nutcase with major political influence anywhere east of Darfur and west of North Korea, said something saner than George Bush has ever said or is likely to ever say, and he won’t be believed.
And why won’t Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad be believed, you ask? Well, even though he has always been totally straight-up with his stupid “death to America” rhetoric and his extreme nutcase ideas that Israel should be moved to Auschwitz and/or downtown Berlin under permanent Polish or German management, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad won’t be believed because he is a president of a country, and George Bush knows that presidents of countries can’t be believed. Why heck, that just goes without saying! Presidents are all liars!
Meanwhile, just as in 2003 the UN wanted nothing to do with an invasion of Iraq without proof of WMDs, so now, the UN will never authorize sanctions without proof of a nuclear weapons program, so...
So we are all set up for: “Oops we bombed nuclear energy-making facilities, instead of bombing bomb-making plants. Our bad. But it’s all right, because we’ve decided for them they don’t need nuclear energy anyway, and besides, they’re Islamic extremists who attack people in other countries without justification. Besides, nobody else would do it but us, so we had to act for the good of Iranians and all Mankind. Sorry ‘bout the mess and the thousands of innocent lives lost, but we did what was right.”
Questions for Further Discussion:
1. Senator McCain says the only thing worse than attacking Iran would be an Iran armed with nuclear weapons. Which would be worse: a) the United States having nuclear weapons, or b) the United States being attacked?
2. Iran is hosting a “Holocaust Conference” to study the evidence that the Holocaust never happened. Are they asking for an Israeli missile strike, or what? If the answer is “what,” try being more specific, for a minute or so. Then, give up, have a cold one, or take a couple of aspirin, or whatever you’re used to doing to re-enter reality.
Wednesday, July 27, 2005
Heads Up, incoming
As an American I can’t help but be thrilled, as I am sure you are, by Lance Armstrong’s incredible win, for the seventh straight time, of some French contest or game or something, in their Frenchy country. But, I wonder, is that news I can use? Or not?
What the heck is news we can use, anyway? This is supposed to be a community newspaper. But what is community news, anyway? Is it just news that happens around here, in the local community? Is it news that makes our community feel good, like the Lance thing? Or is it news that tells us something that we can really use, such as an announcement of “heads up, incoming?”
I say it’s the “heads up, incoming” thing. Let’s take an example. About two weeks ago some terrorists set off three bombs in London, a city in another one of those unpatriotic countries where they don’t recite our Pledge of Allegiance. In fact it’s just above France on the map. Anyway, a week later, on account of those bombings, you had New York police randomly searching the bags of subway users.
Now, I don’t know much about geography. I don’t know the price of tea in China, now that their currency is no longer pegged to the dollar. I don’t know how much wool they mine in Australia, or whether or not they use modern synthetics instead. I’m a good American, so I prefer to mind my own business. But I can look at page 5 of my Funk & Wagnall’s Hammond World Atlas, as I’m doing right now, and I can tell you that Seattle is only an inch from New York, while New York is a whole inch and a half, about, from London!
What that tells us is this: the effects of three London bombings were able to travel, uh, three-fifths of the way here in just one week. So: Heads up! Incoming! You’re only two London bombs away from random searches of your own! Run and hide!
Let’s take a related example. Since the bombings the London police have taken to wearing all black, going around like ninjas, carrying guns, and shooting foreign looking guys who run away from guys that look like ninjas with guns. I would like to say it can’t happen here, but, HOLY-MOLY, our cops ALREADY carry guns, so ANYTHING could push them over the edge! Heads up! Incoming!
If you don’t believe me you should watch your local TV news, like Channel Nine and a Half News at Nine and a Half or whatever. Some guy named Greg or Steve will be talking to some woman named Nancy, say, and he’ll say, “So, Nancy, say, is there something the viewers here in Seattle can do to avoid being shot by men who look like ninjas with guns?” And Nancy, who plays the smart one, will say, “Yes there is, Greg or Steve. Experts around the world all agree that if you are confronted by men who look like ninjas and if they appear to have guns, you should NOT look foreign to them, and whatever you do, do NOT run away.” “That’s good to know, Nancy!” “It sure is, Greg or Steve!”
In fact the House of Representatives, a legislative body that often meets 3000 or so miles from here, has just decided it wants to renew the PATRIOT Act for another ten years. That could help pay for those cool all-black ensembles for our local police, not to mention more guns. I’m betting this is important to my homeless or formerly-homeless, mostly foreign looking, poor to middling-poor, already kicked-down & beaten-around community.
And for those of you who don’t look foreign, I want you to look around you at the foreign-looking people and say, out loud, so loud they can hear you, “There but for the Grace of God go I,” because I’m an incorrigible trouble-maker.
What the heck is news we can use, anyway? This is supposed to be a community newspaper. But what is community news, anyway? Is it just news that happens around here, in the local community? Is it news that makes our community feel good, like the Lance thing? Or is it news that tells us something that we can really use, such as an announcement of “heads up, incoming?”
I say it’s the “heads up, incoming” thing. Let’s take an example. About two weeks ago some terrorists set off three bombs in London, a city in another one of those unpatriotic countries where they don’t recite our Pledge of Allegiance. In fact it’s just above France on the map. Anyway, a week later, on account of those bombings, you had New York police randomly searching the bags of subway users.
Now, I don’t know much about geography. I don’t know the price of tea in China, now that their currency is no longer pegged to the dollar. I don’t know how much wool they mine in Australia, or whether or not they use modern synthetics instead. I’m a good American, so I prefer to mind my own business. But I can look at page 5 of my Funk & Wagnall’s Hammond World Atlas, as I’m doing right now, and I can tell you that Seattle is only an inch from New York, while New York is a whole inch and a half, about, from London!
What that tells us is this: the effects of three London bombings were able to travel, uh, three-fifths of the way here in just one week. So: Heads up! Incoming! You’re only two London bombs away from random searches of your own! Run and hide!
Let’s take a related example. Since the bombings the London police have taken to wearing all black, going around like ninjas, carrying guns, and shooting foreign looking guys who run away from guys that look like ninjas with guns. I would like to say it can’t happen here, but, HOLY-MOLY, our cops ALREADY carry guns, so ANYTHING could push them over the edge! Heads up! Incoming!
If you don’t believe me you should watch your local TV news, like Channel Nine and a Half News at Nine and a Half or whatever. Some guy named Greg or Steve will be talking to some woman named Nancy, say, and he’ll say, “So, Nancy, say, is there something the viewers here in Seattle can do to avoid being shot by men who look like ninjas with guns?” And Nancy, who plays the smart one, will say, “Yes there is, Greg or Steve. Experts around the world all agree that if you are confronted by men who look like ninjas and if they appear to have guns, you should NOT look foreign to them, and whatever you do, do NOT run away.” “That’s good to know, Nancy!” “It sure is, Greg or Steve!”
In fact the House of Representatives, a legislative body that often meets 3000 or so miles from here, has just decided it wants to renew the PATRIOT Act for another ten years. That could help pay for those cool all-black ensembles for our local police, not to mention more guns. I’m betting this is important to my homeless or formerly-homeless, mostly foreign looking, poor to middling-poor, already kicked-down & beaten-around community.
And for those of you who don’t look foreign, I want you to look around you at the foreign-looking people and say, out loud, so loud they can hear you, “There but for the Grace of God go I,” because I’m an incorrigible trouble-maker.
Wednesday, June 22, 2005
My Mother the Alien
Let’s talk about Representative F. James Sensenbrenner, Jr. (R-WI)!
George Bush may be president and all, but Sensenbrenner is Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee. Combine that with a majestic style, a love of family, and a willing spirit, and you’ve got real power.
Everything Sensenbrenner does, everything he wants, is for the good of us all. Jim wants to protect us from terrorists, so he sneaks the Real ID Act into law. The next thing you know, instead of the government having to prove you aren’t a native before deporting you, it’s your job to prove you are one.
My mother, whose original birth certificate was lost in a fire, couldn’t prove she was born in South Dakota. If only we had the Real ID Act back when I was a kid, I might have been able to get her a one-way ticket to Belize.
Before Sensenbrenner, your identity was defined by you and your family and how you chose to live. Now the federal government will define you. You will be a file linked to the electronic data on a card issued by the DMV. Only good upstanding citizens who deeply care about your welfare, such as DMV workers, will have access to all your personal information, and there is no possibility that the government will use its information on you except to send you to Guantanamo when you deserve it.
For the good of the Nation and the courts, Sensenbrenner wants to hold up new judgeships for an overworked federal judiciary until the supposedly left-leaning Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals can be split into three more manageable pieces. At the same time he wants to find a way to punish judges, short of impeachment, who stray from his interpretation of the law and the constitution, by means of an “office of inspector general” that Congress and the House Judiciary Committee would establish. He says "The appropriate questions are how do we punish and who does the punishing." My questions also!
Speaking of punishing, and how, check out Sensenbrenner’s new baby, HR 1528, AKA “The Safe Access to Drug Treatment and Child Protection Act of 2005.”
Here are two of the reasons this bill wins my nomination for The Legislation Most Likely in All of Human History to Have Been Written While High on Hallucinogens: 1) It provides two years mandatory prison time for failing to report a drug crime to the police even if the information is second-hand. 2) You get an extra year if the people you don’t snitch on include your own children.
Say you come home early from dinner with the husband or wife and you catch your three teenage kids passing a single joint around the living room. So you think it’s enough to just tell them they’re all grounded for a week, no keys to the car for a month, and no video games until next Whitsuntide? You honestly call that parenting? Sensenbrenner says if you don’t pick up the phone within 24 hours, dial 911, and report your kids to the police, you belong in federal prison. For three years! You drug-crime-tolerating scum!
Here’s another scenario. You’re walking down the street and you happen to see a pair of Nikes draped over a phone line. You can go to prison for two years if you then fail to tell the police you saw signs of drug dealing in that neighborhood. What’s that you say, you didn’t know that was a sign? Yeah, right. Tell it to the judge, buddy.
Just yesterday I was on a bus and overheard some teenagers talking about scoring drugs. I didn’t tell the driver to call it in! I’m so irresponsible, I’m threatening the safety of America and the American way of life. Thank goodness Jim Sensenbrenner cares enough about America to have me and everybody else on that bus put away.
We were all just abusing the Free Ride Zone anyway.
George Bush may be president and all, but Sensenbrenner is Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee. Combine that with a majestic style, a love of family, and a willing spirit, and you’ve got real power.
Everything Sensenbrenner does, everything he wants, is for the good of us all. Jim wants to protect us from terrorists, so he sneaks the Real ID Act into law. The next thing you know, instead of the government having to prove you aren’t a native before deporting you, it’s your job to prove you are one.
My mother, whose original birth certificate was lost in a fire, couldn’t prove she was born in South Dakota. If only we had the Real ID Act back when I was a kid, I might have been able to get her a one-way ticket to Belize.
Before Sensenbrenner, your identity was defined by you and your family and how you chose to live. Now the federal government will define you. You will be a file linked to the electronic data on a card issued by the DMV. Only good upstanding citizens who deeply care about your welfare, such as DMV workers, will have access to all your personal information, and there is no possibility that the government will use its information on you except to send you to Guantanamo when you deserve it.
For the good of the Nation and the courts, Sensenbrenner wants to hold up new judgeships for an overworked federal judiciary until the supposedly left-leaning Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals can be split into three more manageable pieces. At the same time he wants to find a way to punish judges, short of impeachment, who stray from his interpretation of the law and the constitution, by means of an “office of inspector general” that Congress and the House Judiciary Committee would establish. He says "The appropriate questions are how do we punish and who does the punishing." My questions also!
Speaking of punishing, and how, check out Sensenbrenner’s new baby, HR 1528, AKA “The Safe Access to Drug Treatment and Child Protection Act of 2005.”
Here are two of the reasons this bill wins my nomination for The Legislation Most Likely in All of Human History to Have Been Written While High on Hallucinogens: 1) It provides two years mandatory prison time for failing to report a drug crime to the police even if the information is second-hand. 2) You get an extra year if the people you don’t snitch on include your own children.
Say you come home early from dinner with the husband or wife and you catch your three teenage kids passing a single joint around the living room. So you think it’s enough to just tell them they’re all grounded for a week, no keys to the car for a month, and no video games until next Whitsuntide? You honestly call that parenting? Sensenbrenner says if you don’t pick up the phone within 24 hours, dial 911, and report your kids to the police, you belong in federal prison. For three years! You drug-crime-tolerating scum!
Here’s another scenario. You’re walking down the street and you happen to see a pair of Nikes draped over a phone line. You can go to prison for two years if you then fail to tell the police you saw signs of drug dealing in that neighborhood. What’s that you say, you didn’t know that was a sign? Yeah, right. Tell it to the judge, buddy.
Just yesterday I was on a bus and overheard some teenagers talking about scoring drugs. I didn’t tell the driver to call it in! I’m so irresponsible, I’m threatening the safety of America and the American way of life. Thank goodness Jim Sensenbrenner cares enough about America to have me and everybody else on that bus put away.
We were all just abusing the Free Ride Zone anyway.
Thursday, November 11, 2004
Bitter Sleeping Pill
Well, here we are. It's the Dawn of a New Day, America Has Spoken, the fat lady has sung, and birds everywhere have flown south for four years.
The good news: expect a resurgence of Fifties-ish-style paranoia to feed a renaissance of the paranoia-genre of horror-scifi movies. With modern cgi technology and the experience of this year's election under our collective-consciousness belt, we can look forward to some terrific movies. Titles like the Attack of the Evangelical Masters, or Night of the Living Neocons, or Invasion of the Constitution Snatchers spring to mind, but I'm sure talented writers could sublimate them way up better than I could. Sublimation was never my forte. Vomit is my forte.
So tell me, do I sound bitter? Good, because I'd hate to sound like I was living a lie or in denial or anything like that. No, unlike 51% of whatever percent of America bothered to vote, I live in the world of Reality, not the world of Bush-Think. So if I'm bitter I'm going to know it, and I'm not going to care if I show it.
I don't mind the country's election choice nearly so much as the transparent mind meltingly bombastic canard of Cheney et al to the effect that George W. Bush now has a significant mandate. He does not. That the numbers of voters that put Bush over the top was a record does not erase the fact that the numbers that voted for Kerry was a record also. For an incumbent running for a second term, 3% is a slim margin. That was no landslide and I would put far more faith in the Bush Administration if it didn't consist of such cowards in the face of the truth that they couldn't even admit it and proceed from there.
If the administration can't rule without propagating fantasy after fantasy, then all of America will get into the act.
Do I sound bitter? Let's see, in news from Texas we've already returned to the days of after-school specials. The decision by voters all across America to affirm the lie that denying marriage to gays is justified has already begun to be followed by orders to require textbooks rewritten to reflect the majority opinion. As if elections determined matters of fact.
The precedent could lead to interesting new forms of oppression. For instance we can expect Texas to hold a state-wide initiative soon to decide Yes On Creationism, bypassing that whole free scientific discussion crap. Then when it passes, they'll announce that the majority has called it true so it's true. Schoolbooks will be rewritten, fools will gloat over the fall of the wise, and it won't be overturned because Bush will have, by then, installed additional fools in the Supreme Court.
In October 2001 I expressed the fear that the terrorists may win, because they might have succeeded in bombing us back to the Fifties. Well, it's happened. "What, Me Bitter?"
Hey, what's the worst that could happen? Sure, a man who's already prosecuted the first totally unprovoked war in American history based on fabrications has his finger on the red button. Sure, an arrogant blasphemer who thinks he's God's all-time favorite president has the power to destroy our environment for the sake of his corporate buddies, and he has the character and temperament to tell us it's for our own good and the Greater Glory of God. Sure, a "servant of the people" that thinks Habeas Corpus, the right to a swift and speedy trial, and the right to be free of unwarranted searches are all obsolete concepts has now got almost complete control of government. But you have to get over it, right?
So in the interest of getting over it, I propose a further slide into irrationality and denial and fantasy. Lets all say black is white and white is black and have us a four-year carnival of lunacy.
The terrorists are on the run. Osama is scared of the terrible visage of George W. Bush, Man of God and Macho Ace National Guard Pilot. If the terrorists do by chance succeed in striking America again, it will have been Bill Clinton's fault. Gays will never endanger our marriages again. Speaking out against a government of liars is an attack on America.
Sweet dreams, one and all.
Thursday, July 22, 2004
Sticker Shock
The price of freedom is eternal vigilance. Are you feeling all paid out yet?
I am. First, we had the scare of being told that if George Bush or Donald Rumsfeld, say, decided to label us an enemy combatant, we could be imprisoned without trial indefinitely, even for life, just by shipping us to Guantanamo Bay. A lot of screaming and a Supreme Court ruling finally succeeded in regaining our right to be free from indefinite imprisonment without trial.
Why should we have to fight for such a basic freedom from our own government, a government whose duty is to protect our freedoms?
Then a couple weeks ago our precious Homeland Security, WHICH WAS ESTABLISHED TO DEFEND THIS COUNTRY, decided to see whether the 2004 presidential election could be postponed in the event of a terrorist attack.
Well let's see, the Constitution doesn't allow a delay, so we'd have to change that, and state constitutions don't allow delays, so we'd have to change about 50 state constitutions, and lets see, we would have 4 months to do that and get straight who does the delaying under what circumstances and so NO NO NO NO NO, IT'S NOT POSSIBLE, AND HOMELAND SECURITY IS RUN BY DUMBASSES!
So they said something like, well yes we know all that but we're just "looking into" the possibility.
To Homeland Security: Please "look into" the possibility of doing something legal for a change, like how are you going to do your duty and ensure that elections go on IN SPITE of any terrorist attacks.
Why should we have to yell and scream at Homeland Security to get them to defend our national elections? Who needs terrorists when we have defenders like these?
Then, periodically, we hear about some citizens being arrested or detained for "trespassing" at a Bush speech for either carrying anti-Bush signs, or as happened most recently, wearing anti-Bush T-shirts.
How long will it be, do you think, before our government, WHOSE JOB IS TO PROTECT OUR FREEDOM, will grant that freedom of speech is one of those freedoms they have to protect, not trample? How much yelling and screaming from the rest of us will it take? Will this require a Supreme Court ruling too?
The latest assault on freedom in this country comes from the President's own Orwellian-named New Freedom Commission on Mental Health. They are calling for mandatory mental health screening for "consumers of all ages" in this country, beginning with grade-school students who can be easily accessed through the public school system, then going on to include pre-school children and eventually adults.
Psychiatrists doing these mass screenings would use government-approved flow charts to decide who is mentally ill. The kids who test positive could then be required to take psychiatric meds, to control their illnesses and make them happy consumers.
I don't think the Constitution once refers to citizens as consumers, much less as "mental health consumers." The term is a favorite of pharmaceutical companies, which is a very big hint from me to you telling you who is behind this crap.
Just make sure that when your kids go in for compulsory psyche screening they haven't been "consumers" of any sugar-frosted cereal lately, as points will be deducted for fidgeting. Anti-authoritarian behavior will certainly be a decision point on the flow chart, so better tell them not to wear anti-Bush T-shirts.
Elder Bush motto: Don't worry, be happy. Junior Bush motto: Don't worry, take your happy pills. Or else.
To paraphrase Dick Cheney, I think Bush should go screen himself.
Thursday, July 8, 2004
I Loved That Monkey
Let's talk about everything!
Usually, if I would have trouble deciding what to write about, I would blame it on being depressed. Maybe my pet monkey was just assassinated, or maybe I just found out that a certain legally prescribed medication shouldn't be, too late to stop it from turning me into a hairless goat. Or maybe my country was just taken over by yahoos and I started wishing I could move somewhere that had a constitution that the government in power respected.
Downturns like those can ruin your perspective so that you can't see straight enough to write about anything in particular, so you write about everything and hope for the best.
But upturns can have the same effect, I now know. Last week I got such good news that I am now giddy as a schoolgirl. I won't say why, because I'm such a tease, but I will instead distract you all with this: seeing Colin Powell sing as the construction worker in the Village People gave me new life and hope for America. How can you not love a man who can swing a hammer from his belt like that? Am I right, girls?
So here I am, feeling so good I'm ready to say: this IS the best of all possible worlds! Let's count our blessings!
Hooray! Saddam Hussein is being tried by the people we installed in his place, the very same ones we picked out because they hated Saddam the most! How great is that? They're even following our democratic example and making him submit to interrogation without letting him once see a lawyer! Not only that, but they're charging him with invading another country (Kuwait) without provocation! Our newly created allies have learned American democracy perfectly, and are beginning to master American hypocrisy too! I'm sure Saddam will have a wonderful trial, much better than any he could get from an international court. Maybe the Iraqis will even behead Saddam, encouraging more insurgents to behead more of us! Off with everyone's head!
Hooray! It's now OK for the President of the Senate to tell a Senator to go F-himself whenever it makes him "feel better"! Abuse of power and position be damned! It just feels good to tell the leader of the party out of power off for having the audacity to criticize one's precious self and one's superior political opinions. It's especially great to be able to tell some Democrat to go F-himself the same day Republican legislation passes to fine the bejeezus out of anyone else using the same word on TV or radio. Did someone say "hypocrisy"? I should have to call it H, or pay a gigantic fine! But even when we can't say it in print our leaders will still H. It will make them feel better!
Most of all, hooray for the newfound uses of detaining innocent people while calling them terrorists without formally charging them!
Last week the Supreme Court said you can't merely hold people as "enemy combatants" indefinitely. Eventually you have to allow them to legally challenge their detention, or you have to release them. This is called "human rights", something that we have said we were for, at least for the past 228 years or so, when we weren't doing the H-thing.
But the court will let the President detain potentially innocent people for reasonable periods of time, whatever that might be. I was worried about this loophole until I heard that the New York Times was reporting that the US, with Britain, had secretly traded Saudi prisoners held at Gitmo for Brits that had been tortured and held by the Saudis. How heartening.
The released Saudis were surely innocent; our government would never, NEVER, trade real terrorists even for innocent Westerners. That would be letting the terrorists win.
So there is something to be said for locking up innocent people, after all! Think of them as if they were pennies. Have a prisoner, give a prisoner! Need a prisoner, take a prisoner! It just saves trouble, and that's what America is all about!
Oh no. I AM a hairless goat.
Thursday, April 15, 2004
Next Time It'll Be A Magic 8-Ball
As you may have already noticed, we here at Real Change can't let an April Fools Day go by without writing some April Fools Day appropriate nonsense. Our sad frail egos are slightly stoked every year when we hear rumors of some of you being taken in even though our Managing Spoilsport always prints warnings to protect the truth.
But the real news outdid us all this year. Our little fib about the guy arrested for pushing a refrigerator down a street pales in comparison to, say, the story from Fort Meyers, Florida, about the plane searched because a psychic intuited that a bomb was on board.
As a spokesperson for the Transportation Security Administration in these times, we can't ignore anything." That's right, we can't ignore anything that might warn us of terrorism. Psychics, entrails, evil stars, voices in our heads, they all can be put to service defending our great nation from stupid terrorists. We need warnings! Everybody call and warn the government about bombs anywhere you think they might be. Somebody call the White House and tell them Rumsfeld has a bomb up his ass.
Then we heard about British novelist Ian McEwan's difficulties getting in to this country. McEwan wanted to fly in from Vancouver, BC, and made the mistake of telling our border guys that he would be giving paid speeches in our country. They actually told him that amounted to coming to the U.S. to earn money to "practice his lifestyle." I have no idea what they thought his lifestyle was, apart from novelist.
Speaking of April Fools, McEwan fooled a lot of people a few years ago with a phony psychiatric case report in an appendix to one of his novels. It was so convincing some psychiatrists quoted it and some critics dismissed the novel as merely an elaboration on a real case. Way to go, Ian!
So, anyway, it used to be that British novelists on speaking tours were given visa waivers at our borders, but Homeland Security officials now say, we have got to be vigilant so that we "don't have another 9-11." You never know when a British novelist might crash himself into a skyscraper on his way to giving a talk at Benaroya Hall.
Our favorite part of this story is the part where, in one of three interrogations he endured, McEwan was asked whether he wrote fiction novels or non-fiction novels. Everybody has read this as evidence that our immigration officials have the combined IQ of a seedless grape, but I like to give them the benefit of the doubt. Maybe the questioner was thinking, if he answers "non-fiction" that'll prove he's a fake for sure, it will.
Finally McEwan was let into this country. The reason given to allow him in was (this is really true) "this is attracting a lot of unfavorable publicity."
So here's the deal. If you are a suspected British novelist slash potential -terrorist slash lifestyle-offender trying to get into the US, and our border guys want to keep you out, just call all the newspapers on the west coast and make a big stink about it. Our guys will whine about what a threat you are, but they'll let you in because otherwise they'd look bad, even though they are sure you will whack us all with your books!mI've saved the biggest April Fool of the year for last. Every major newspaper in the country was fooled by the story from Fallujah about the four "civilian contractors" who were killed and whose bodies were mutilated and dragged through the streets. Pretty brutal stuff to be doing to innocent "civilian contractors".
But just three days later a squad of "commandos" from a private security company were reported repulsing a raid on US Headquarters in Najaf. The "commandos" were working for the same company as the four in Fallujah.
So what were they, "commandos" or "civilian contractors"? Answer: both! They were mercenaries! They were fully armed mercenaries in military style uniforms playing soldier of fortune in what is, let's face it, a war zone.
Look out: the April Fools bar has been set very high for next year.
But the real news outdid us all this year. Our little fib about the guy arrested for pushing a refrigerator down a street pales in comparison to, say, the story from Fort Meyers, Florida, about the plane searched because a psychic intuited that a bomb was on board.
As a spokesperson for the Transportation Security Administration in these times, we can't ignore anything." That's right, we can't ignore anything that might warn us of terrorism. Psychics, entrails, evil stars, voices in our heads, they all can be put to service defending our great nation from stupid terrorists. We need warnings! Everybody call and warn the government about bombs anywhere you think they might be. Somebody call the White House and tell them Rumsfeld has a bomb up his ass.
Then we heard about British novelist Ian McEwan's difficulties getting in to this country. McEwan wanted to fly in from Vancouver, BC, and made the mistake of telling our border guys that he would be giving paid speeches in our country. They actually told him that amounted to coming to the U.S. to earn money to "practice his lifestyle." I have no idea what they thought his lifestyle was, apart from novelist.
Speaking of April Fools, McEwan fooled a lot of people a few years ago with a phony psychiatric case report in an appendix to one of his novels. It was so convincing some psychiatrists quoted it and some critics dismissed the novel as merely an elaboration on a real case. Way to go, Ian!
So, anyway, it used to be that British novelists on speaking tours were given visa waivers at our borders, but Homeland Security officials now say, we have got to be vigilant so that we "don't have another 9-11." You never know when a British novelist might crash himself into a skyscraper on his way to giving a talk at Benaroya Hall.
Our favorite part of this story is the part where, in one of three interrogations he endured, McEwan was asked whether he wrote fiction novels or non-fiction novels. Everybody has read this as evidence that our immigration officials have the combined IQ of a seedless grape, but I like to give them the benefit of the doubt. Maybe the questioner was thinking, if he answers "non-fiction" that'll prove he's a fake for sure, it will.
Finally McEwan was let into this country. The reason given to allow him in was (this is really true) "this is attracting a lot of unfavorable publicity."
So here's the deal. If you are a suspected British novelist slash potential -terrorist slash lifestyle-offender trying to get into the US, and our border guys want to keep you out, just call all the newspapers on the west coast and make a big stink about it. Our guys will whine about what a threat you are, but they'll let you in because otherwise they'd look bad, even though they are sure you will whack us all with your books!mI've saved the biggest April Fool of the year for last. Every major newspaper in the country was fooled by the story from Fallujah about the four "civilian contractors" who were killed and whose bodies were mutilated and dragged through the streets. Pretty brutal stuff to be doing to innocent "civilian contractors".
But just three days later a squad of "commandos" from a private security company were reported repulsing a raid on US Headquarters in Najaf. The "commandos" were working for the same company as the four in Fallujah.
So what were they, "commandos" or "civilian contractors"? Answer: both! They were mercenaries! They were fully armed mercenaries in military style uniforms playing soldier of fortune in what is, let's face it, a war zone.
Look out: the April Fools bar has been set very high for next year.
Thursday, September 19, 2002
Second Happ'nin
Last year we here at Real Change celebrated our seventh year of putting out this rag. We did this for two reasons. One, any excuse for a party. Two, "seven" has Biblical significance. You've got seven days of creation, seven years of feast, seven years of famine, seven seals of the Book of Judgment, stuff like that. We wanted to plug in to that kind of action, 'cause the Bible is happ'nin.
Of course the feast/famine scenario did concern me at the time. I wondered what the next seven years could bring, given that the first seven went reasonably well. I thought, uh-oh, the second seven just likely may be reasonably rotten.
So far my fear has been realized. Seven years of Real Change was followed within the month by 9/11/01 and the ensuing economic downturn and social paranoia.
You'd think that as more people face poverty there would be more appreciation for those who have already been poor, but it doesn't work like that. You'd think that when someone earning, say, fifty thousand a year, has had to take a five thousand dollar annual pay cut, the hardship might help her/him identify with the guy who gets next to nothing on GAU, but NO. Instead, he/she blames the guy on GAU for the missing five thousand.
Many times this past year, lying awake at night, spinning the wheels in my brain, I have wondered what would have happened if all the victims on 9/11 had been homeless. Suppose, instead of flying planes into those towers, the same terrorists had managed to simultaneously bomb and obliterate twenty or thirty fully occupied homeless shelters all across the US. I hate to say it, but I don't think we would be in a recession now. Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think we would be talking now about eliminating Saddam Hussein. I don't even think we would have attacked the Taliban or pursued Osama to the edge of the world. I think the general American public would have shrugged the whole thing off the way they shrug off famine in Somalia.
The good news: war with Iraq will probably only last a few weeks. The bad news: nothing good will be accomplished by it. Oh, some weapons of mass destruction might get destroyed, but only by means of mass destruction. An evil dictator will lose power, but the resulting turmoil will grow new evil dictators. The American economy will not benefit from the brief war; it will only serve to raise expectations in time for the November elections. In fact, if the war doesn't happen by November, it will probably be postponed altogether until 2004.
Don't get me wrong. Real Change itself is doing OK in its second seven years. But our environment has taken a noticeable turn for the worse. I wouldn't call it famine yet, but I wouldn't exactly call it feast either. Knock on wood.
So you all should understand why I haven't been too terribly eager to admit that this column just passed its own seven-year mark in August. "Anniversary? What anniversary? Look! Isn't that Osama bin Laden over there in the rugby shirt and jeans? (Columnist runs and hides.)"
Yes. I have been doing this for seven years, and the thought of that puts me in the mind to run away to Bora Bora. What could the next seven years be like? Will I again succumb to duck-licking? Will my muse, Cindy Holly, stick with me? Will I ever write in iambic tetrameter again?
Looking back at the last seven years is hard for me, because there are so few successes. OK, so we didn't end homelessness. I don't know how, but we screwed that one up. We also didn't end poverty. I kick myself every day for that.
On the other hand, we have had our victories. Or we can pretend that we have. For instance, this is the second column in a row in which we have used the word "happ'nin". But we are most proud of convincing the Seattle Times that "Dilly Dally Alley" was an icky name for their comics page (see "induced retching", this column, May 16, '02.)
In seven years, the Times comics page. In fourteen years, who knows? Maybe something pretty good.
Of course the feast/famine scenario did concern me at the time. I wondered what the next seven years could bring, given that the first seven went reasonably well. I thought, uh-oh, the second seven just likely may be reasonably rotten.
So far my fear has been realized. Seven years of Real Change was followed within the month by 9/11/01 and the ensuing economic downturn and social paranoia.
You'd think that as more people face poverty there would be more appreciation for those who have already been poor, but it doesn't work like that. You'd think that when someone earning, say, fifty thousand a year, has had to take a five thousand dollar annual pay cut, the hardship might help her/him identify with the guy who gets next to nothing on GAU, but NO. Instead, he/she blames the guy on GAU for the missing five thousand.
Many times this past year, lying awake at night, spinning the wheels in my brain, I have wondered what would have happened if all the victims on 9/11 had been homeless. Suppose, instead of flying planes into those towers, the same terrorists had managed to simultaneously bomb and obliterate twenty or thirty fully occupied homeless shelters all across the US. I hate to say it, but I don't think we would be in a recession now. Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think we would be talking now about eliminating Saddam Hussein. I don't even think we would have attacked the Taliban or pursued Osama to the edge of the world. I think the general American public would have shrugged the whole thing off the way they shrug off famine in Somalia.
The good news: war with Iraq will probably only last a few weeks. The bad news: nothing good will be accomplished by it. Oh, some weapons of mass destruction might get destroyed, but only by means of mass destruction. An evil dictator will lose power, but the resulting turmoil will grow new evil dictators. The American economy will not benefit from the brief war; it will only serve to raise expectations in time for the November elections. In fact, if the war doesn't happen by November, it will probably be postponed altogether until 2004.
Don't get me wrong. Real Change itself is doing OK in its second seven years. But our environment has taken a noticeable turn for the worse. I wouldn't call it famine yet, but I wouldn't exactly call it feast either. Knock on wood.
So you all should understand why I haven't been too terribly eager to admit that this column just passed its own seven-year mark in August. "Anniversary? What anniversary? Look! Isn't that Osama bin Laden over there in the rugby shirt and jeans? (Columnist runs and hides.)"
Yes. I have been doing this for seven years, and the thought of that puts me in the mind to run away to Bora Bora. What could the next seven years be like? Will I again succumb to duck-licking? Will my muse, Cindy Holly, stick with me? Will I ever write in iambic tetrameter again?
Looking back at the last seven years is hard for me, because there are so few successes. OK, so we didn't end homelessness. I don't know how, but we screwed that one up. We also didn't end poverty. I kick myself every day for that.
On the other hand, we have had our victories. Or we can pretend that we have. For instance, this is the second column in a row in which we have used the word "happ'nin". But we are most proud of convincing the Seattle Times that "Dilly Dally Alley" was an icky name for their comics page (see "induced retching", this column, May 16, '02.)
In seven years, the Times comics page. In fourteen years, who knows? Maybe something pretty good.
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