Trying to make ends meet, you’re a slave to the money then you die.
I’ll take you down the only road I’ve ever been down…
You know the one that takes you to the places where all the veins meet – Richard Ashcroft (The Verve)
Random thoughts. You know the ones that come to you after you’ve drank a bottle of wine or smoked the last joint in the box while listening the latest fancies of YouTube music. The thoughts that come to mind after reading a writer that can actually articulate a sentence and a thought unlike today’s “popular” culture bullshit that the over simplified, ego centric youth are forced to read by their teachers who only care about making that next student loan payment on time. Well, it’s really not their fault, more a victim of a culture that values excess rather than quality. I mean, how many different ways can you package a show where plastic girls argue, fight, and put out more often than the busiest of porn stars, to some over the hill rock star. Music is another thing the poor bastards (often literally) have to put on there iPods in order to be anywhere above the ‘never going to get laid’ teenage social class system. How’d we go from Clapton to Spears?
And now to the main point of my rumblings on a rain soak evening where it seems I’ve lost everything including that god damn baseball game to a bunch of one-armed cultural rejects. Restaurants! I live in a despot of a hometown that seams only to support the ‘chain’ establishment meme. Every local treasure seems to have fallen victim to the jolly coke addicted teenager dressed up as Chucky Cheese. Microbreweries which seem to have become an overnight obsession in this state, cease to exist here. I find myself on Cormac McCarthy’s The Road where the cannibalistic chains are swallowing up any sense of individuality and originality that we had. What is good and what’s comfortable are almost never the same thing.
Were obsessed as a culture with the inevitable ‘American Dream’ tag line. This pop culture dilemma has squeezed me in. I love it; it’s the greatest this generation (whatever the fuck their called) has given us. The fact that you can be a 35 year old hooker, living on the corner of 52nd and Broadway, paying her pimp while he snorts cocaine off her ass while the next night she goes out and belts out ‘Sex on Fire’ in front of Simon Cowell and gets paid five million dollars. This is a secret, often embrassing back of the closet joy of mine to see. Even though the American Dream isn’t really true anymore, or possibly ever was, it makes me at least feel good, that someone who never thought they’d have a chance to afford that vacation to the Caribbean now can. I just hope they stay the fuck out of St. Barths.
So I think this alcoholic induced tyrant has covered the basics of todays most fucked of a culture. Popular music probably shouldn’t have been produced if the musician can’t go out on a stage and actually sing their own songs. Books probably shouldn’t have been written if it has anything, god forbid to do with a vampire. Movies, well those seem to be doing just fine, probably because their easy and comfortable. Food probably shouldn’t be consumed if the fish gets flown in from the Philippines or the cow from Mexico. Local is always and I mean always better. The American Dream presence has never been stronger on TV but has been truly pissed away in reality as corporations have become the free loaders and the poor and middle class are stuck to pull the cash from their yet to sprout money tree. But who knows, maybe they will win the X Factor this season.
When thinking about the news this week about the death of America’s most wanted target, Osama Bin Laden, I wasn’t sure about how to exactly take it. At times over the last ten years, I’ve like many of you, lost focus and doubted that he was either alive or that we would ever find him. I have been doubting that he had anything much to do with Al-Qaida anymore other than being their so-called ‘spokesman’. I think the information that came out about where he was living where there was no phone or internet access confirms my previously held suspension. Since 9/11, we took away what he managed to do to the world which was to create a sense of insecurity in his daily life and for the most part, that seemed to be good enough for me. To me, this relationship I had with him had never been personnel, I knew of no one that was affected by any of these tragedies conducted under his guidance and my outrage which mostly came in the form of disappointment, was toward the most expensive, well equipped military that could not find their ‘man’ for ten years in the eastern part of Afghanistan and/or in Pakistan.
I am elated that we did finally catch him and that our greater than twenty-seven billion dollar a year CIA did their job. It was also nice to see for once, that vastly different sections of our government can properly collaborate, from the intelligence officers gaining information, to the president and staffers developing a plan, to the military executing that plan to perfection. If anything, this gives me faith that government can work.
On the other hand, Bin Laden died how he wanted, a martyr and a billboard for someone else to step up in his place and cause further extremism. I would have liked us to find him hiding in a hole like Sadaam Hussein (no relation) and undergo a trial and be executed within the legal system. Maybe I am picking needles in a haystack but doesn’t everyone have their tiny fantasies about how his end would come. I have no problem with the mission or the results of the mission, it was just a minor of a hope of mine, that when the time did come when America crossed paths with Osama, that it would be a Sadaam Hussein like encounter.
Christopher McDougall explores the mysteries of the human desire to run. How did running help early humans survive — and what urges from our ancient ancestors spur us on today? At TEDxPennQuarter, McDougall tells the story of the marathoner with a heart of gold, the unlikely ultra-runner, and the hidden tribe in Mexico that runs to live. [Excerpt from TED website]
A article that I contributed in Liberatas Magazine March issue discussing the meaning of life.
Very enlightening! Enjoy
Short Poem this week by W.B. Yeats, if anything its good for a cheap laugh.
| WINE comes in at the mouth And love comes in at the eye; That's all we shall know for truth Before we grow old and die. I lift the glass to my mouth, I look at you, and I sigh |
Finally at last, some American political material to write about with the 112th congress being sworn in today. John Boehner (R-OH) was sworn in as Speaker of the House while the senate is still claimed with a democratic majority. So, let’s get to work to solve America’s problems, right? Umm, well maybe we should take a second glance.
First up, the republicans in the house are preparing to vote on repealing health-care reform on January 12th. However symbolic they would like this vote to be portrayed in the media, they do so in an irresponsible way. Here’s how. They are voting to repeal a bill about health care, without writing a replacement bill that if their vote passes, would be adopted to deal with, at the very least: preexisting conditions, uninsured patients, etc. This is extremely irresponsible of congressional republicans, especially to those of us that can stay on their parents insurance until they’re 26 because of the recently passed law.
Second, dealing with the federal deficit. The congressional republicans said they would immediately cut 100 billion from the federal budget to ‘pre-stimulus’ levels (maybe just starting with a balancing a budget for this year would be nice?). But, they will, in no way touch the defense portion of the budget. Ok, fine, let’s just cut from the other large expenditures of the government. Medicare, Medicaid, and social security. Oops, did I push the wrong button; so we don’t want to piss off grandma since 2 out of those 3 programs directly affect her? In other words, social programs that affect a majority of voters in each of their districts, are off the table also. Well, now I really have to start digging for cuts. Earmarks? Ok, let’s get rid of earmarks, because their basically used to buy votes, send some of that money used, and put it into the domestic discretionary fund because it does provide vital funds for infrastructure and other projects, important in local communities. Domestic discretionary spending? Great, let’s take a look and cut waste but remember, these provide money for schools, infrastructure, environmental features and many programs and services that we enjoy. Federal pay freeze? Done, by the last congress. Legislative 5% budget allowance cut? 35 million out of a 3.5 trillion dollar budget. Ok, it’s a symbolic start by Representative Boehner but almost a joke when trying to cut 100 billion. Pay as you go? Good idea, but let’s actually follow the rule which we didn’t do with the tax cuts approved last month. You can’t support something only when it applies to the other party and favors you and then break the rule for your party when there is some legislation that you want to see passed. There’s no doubt we need to cut the “junk” spending out of government, but in the long run, in order to tackle the massive problems we have, we have to tackle the big money items including the defense budget, social security reform, Medicare reform and tax reform. Would you like to tackle those congressman or congresswomen?
The problem with campaign promises is that no politician wants to make the tough choices to tackle our real problems of tax reform, health care, social programs, and the deficit once there in office. They all want to live on the high side of popularity and not what’s best for the country. They’ve just been kicking the can down the road until the last minute, taxes for instance, which just got kicked down the road to be handled again in two years. When are we (as the voting public) going to hold the people that represent us accountable for making tough decisions that are best for the country because if we keep kicking this can down the road, eventually were going to fall of a cliff and the crash isn’t gunna be pretty.
The New York Times, arguably the biggest and most powerful, influential thought paper printed in the world, features two op-ed columnists that I have truly come to appreciate in Thomas Friedman and Maureen Dowd. This lecture was filmed in 2007 at the University of California Berkeley for the graduate school of journalism lecture series. Its a fun look back on the issues that were pressing us in 2007 in the eyes of these two smart, witty writers. Enjoy!
(This weeks poem is another by James Fenton. A comment by Peter Legur sums this poem up simply,
The usual cliches of love poetry are wiped away by the particulars of a shoddy hotel room, and focused on the lover, the reality, the authentic flesh and feeling.
No clichesterol. Healthy, tonic. Excellente.)
Enjoy!
Don’t talk to me of love. I’ve had an earful
And I get tearful when I’ve downed a drink or two.
I’m one of your talking wounded.
I’m a hostage. I’m maroonded.
But I’m in Paris with you.
Yes I’m angry at the way I’ve been bamboozled
And resentful at the mess I’ve been through.
I admit I’m on the rebound
And I don’t care where are we bound.
I’m in Paris with you.
Do you mind if we do not go to the Louvre
If we say sod off to sodding Notre Dame,
If we skip the Champs Elysées
And remain here in this sleazy
Old hotel room
Doing this and that
To what and whom
Learning who you are,
Learning what I am.
Don’t talk to me of love. Let’s talk of Paris,
The little bit of Paris in our view.
There’s that crack across the ceiling
And the hotel walls are peeling
And I’m in Paris with you.
Don’t talk to me of love. Let’s talk of Paris.
I’m in Paris with the slightest thing you do.
I’m in Paris with your eyes, your mouth,
I’m in Paris with… all points south.
Am I embarrassing you?
I’m in Paris with you.
The Edge Effect 