Can't Get You Out of My Head: An Emotional History of the Modern World - Adam Curtis - 2021

★★★★★-Holy shit. A masterpiece six-part BBC documentary series from Adam Curtis about how our contemporary existence, which emphasizes individualism over collectivism, is completely shit, totally unfulfilling, and was designed as a way for the powerful elite to keep citizens in control. “All human beings live in a made-up dream world of stories, which give them the illusion that they are in control,” he says. “But really, there’s something else inside them that they will never contact.” Goes through all of the intricacies of how it got this way. I think this is supposed to be a kind of call to wake-the-fuck-up, but doesn't exactly offer a way out of the mess, not that it really needs to. The documentary is more impartial observation.

It really goes deep, discussing things like the fall of the British Empire, American imperialism, China's political crisis in the wake of the Great Leap Forward, and the resurgence of Russian nationalism. It goes through all this and more whilst telling individual stories that came out of those systems. 

All this has led the perpetual creation of conspiracy theories and grasping at dangerous national myths. This while also coming to a sobering realization in the failure of technology to emancipate society envisioned by techno-utopians. The result was a surge in populism in the West, culminating in Brexit and Trump, as people looked to radically alternative visions for the future, allowing for those in power to push beyond ethical boundaries that should have served as breaking points. Like I said, holy shit. 

Curtis first blipped on my radar in college when I stumbled upon his BBC documentary series Pandora's Box: A Fable From the Age of Science which aired in 1993. It deals with the consequences of political and technocratic rationalism. Also in six parts, each episode deals with a theme. They are: Communism in the Soviet Union, systems analysis and game theory during the Cold War, economy of the United Kingdom during the 1970s, the insecticide DDT, Kwame Nkrumah's leadership in Ghana in the 1950s, and the history of nuclear power. It blew my mind. 

At some point in the last year I heard an interview with Chuck Klosterman where he talked about Pandora's Box and Adam Curtis, focusing on this new documentary and how heavy it was. That shit is my brand, so I'd watch until my brain hurt, turn it off, and start up again the next day from where I left off. It took me forever to watch it. But holy shit, did I love it. As a guy who fancies himself a media theorist, I'm not sure if it is for everyone, but it is definitely my jam. 

One of the things I enjoyed most was the lesson of the oft-forgotten historical figure whose influence triggered ripples that continue into the present. Individuals like Michael X, Afeni Shakur and her son Tupac (who took on the persona of a character to create change only to live as a cartoon), Arthur Sackler, Jiang Qing (Mao Zedong's wife), Murray Gell-Mann, and others are explored to provide some context behind the turmoil that engulfs the world at present. 

It also details the struggles faced by those marginalized by society. Some examples. The story of a woman seeking a sex change in the 1970s that is forced to undergo demeaning psychological evaluation. The reality of the Ethiopian famine which led to Live Aid which is remembered as a kick ass concert but was really a scandal that throws us into the complexities of humanitarian intervention that resulted in the exploitation of the narrative for personal gain. 

Yeah, this mesmerizing series rocked me. The main point that I walked away with is that humans inhabit a simplified dream world that defies rationality. In an era of individualism, rather than attempting to alter this dream world, governments fight for its preservation. The allure of appealing to reason and effecting change on a grand scale is rendered obsolete as we are content with the dream, like in Brave New World. This controlling our collective rage (done on a global scale) is a means to consolidate power and eliminate political adversaries. The disheartening truth is that all endeavors to radically transform the world lead to profound pessimism with the responsibility lying on the individual, rather than society as a whole. As individuals turn inward, the management of this attractive yet pessimistically curated dream world becomes a hybrid amalgamation of psychology, economics, and finance. The dream world thrives as through its meticulous cultivation by the ruling class.

This is something I think about constantly as I recycle, eat a vegan diet, and just basically try and live simply. It's all just a drop in the bucket, my actions. It shouldn't be on us to change the world. Sure, we probably all do our part, some of us anyhow. But it should really be on the ruling classes to get the real problems figured out. But why do that when they can just distract us with bullshit while preserving the status quo. Yeah, if I were teaching a class, this would absolutely be on my syllabus. I've got like 12 pages of notes, but nothing I really say about it is going to do it justice. 

You can watch it for free on YouTube here. It will blow your mind. Plus, the soundtrack is incredible.

On Trump's CNN Townhall

In regards to CNN putting this trash on television. Way I see it, basing this on my worthless grad school work on Neil Postman and Marshall McLuhan and so forth, the electric teevee machine isn’t designed for real debate, just entertainment. So despite claiming they are a news source, their trying to entertain (unlike say PBS or whatever). It’s purpose is to get you there and keep you watching. He’s on their network to do the dog and pony show and bring in unlikely viewers, maybe (wishful thinking here) win some over by pandering to them. “See we aren’t liberal after all! Trump is here! We gave him a platform and let him say whatever he wants (pretty much).” So they keep pandering, inching farther right. Bring on someone like Jeffrey Lord and Tomi Lauren to say whatever Trump says is normal and that he was the greatest president ever. Hoping to get more viewers and more advertising and all that.

The aim is to seem middle of the road to get both sides watching. To do this, media companies in this lane give crazy a platform and constantly cover it. This always has the effect of normalizing it. “If the election wasn’t stolen, why would they let him repeatedly say this?” “If he was a rapist, why would they let him joke about it?” So forth. Plus, I think we’re still in this climate change and guns everywhere mess because both sides get treated as valid. Right-wing media is treated pretty fairly though they outright lie and deny the other side as being valid at all. So what we get is the echo chamber saying congress shutting down the government is great (or whatever), and then the mainstream saying, “well, they have a point.”

Trump’s gift, from a media theory perspective, is his ability to own people’s attention because he understands how mediums like television own our attention. So he stokes conflict, turning everything into can’t-look-away entertainment.

CNN knows this. They are not innocent. Yeah, viewers make the choice to watch, but they’re manipulated into doing so. Trump won in 2016 because of this shit. 

Biden announces re-election campaign as GOP attempts to undermine policies and shut down government

I’ll be goddamned. What a month. President Biden officially announced his reelection campaign. House Republicans decided to try to make him look as bad as possible and maybe shut the government down. Fox News settled with Dominion and ousted their craziest mouthpiece, sure to be replaced by someone worse. Trump's life is a complete embarrassing mess. Meatball Ron and Disney got it on, and the Mouse, who doesn't fuck around, won. And the Supreme Court came off looking even more corrupt, which barely seem possible. With so much to be outraged about, I'm breaking this up into several posts. 

The president's re-election campaign began earlier this week with a video announcement. More “fighting for the soul of America,” which is still on the ballot, hence scenes from the Capitol riot. From the video: 

“Every generation of Americans has faced a moment when they’ve had to defend democracy, stand up for our personal freedoms, and stand up for our right to vote and our civil rights. This is ours. Let’s finish the job.”

Biden's great strength is his love for politics and everything about it, the rituals, the customs, the meeting people. He's authentic. But he's old and people are freaking out. The Republican frontrunner is also in his 80s so let's chill out. The real concern here is that no one seems to want Kamala Harris to become president. However, Biden's comfortable with her, so give her a break. 

Immediately, House Republicans “led” by Speaker Kevin McCarthy decided to alter their debt limit plan. Back when this was a routine measure to raise the country's debt limit to cover existing debts. Now it's usually twisted around when Republicans control the House into a de facto budget debate. Their proposal would cut federal spending by almost 14% over a decade and undermine major elements of President Biden's domestic agenda—i.e. eliminating clean energy tax credits and his student loan cancellation. It would also impose stricter work requirements for federal nutrition and health programs.

McCarthy, a joke who is being led by the craziest of the crazies from his party who have a razor then majority anyway, made concessions to appease blocs of lawmakers, including all of the above. On two of the holdouts, from the New York Times: 

Rep. Derrick Van Orden (Wisc.), who had lobbied to preserve energy tax credits, similarly said he would be “voting yes” after changes to the bill. Still another key holdout, Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.), the leader of the far-right House Freedom Caucus, separately told reporters he would back the legislation, heralding Republicans for “moving a bill that actually, literally cuts spending, and provides savings for the American people.”

This is all bullshit and theater, of course. The bill was pushed forward by far-right lawmakers, who claimed that it provided savings for the American people and cut spending. This is all in the vain of cutting spending. Shocker, they don’t care about cutting spending. 

Obviously, with Democrats controlling the Senate and the White House, this shit is dead on arrival. Democrats, for their part, argued that the proposal is intended to force Biden to negotiate away his administration's accomplishments in advance of running for re-election. As such, they are portraying the plan as a threat to the country's credit and well-being, warning that the bill would be harmful to the American people and the economy by holding the country ransom, all of which is true.

From Representative Jim McGovern of Massachusetts, the top Democrat on the Rules Committee: “My analysis of this new plan is that it is even more draconian, even more devastating, even worse, even more mean. Your problem with this bill was that it didn’t screw people fast enough.”

This guy knows a shake down when he sees one. 

With the nation's borrowing limit projected to be reached as early as this summer without congressional action, President Biden has called on Republicans to raise the limit with no conditions attached. 

In short, what was meant to be a routine and uncontroversial measure has been turned into a contentious debate over the budget and the country's future, with Republicans using it as a way to try to undo President Biden's policies and further their own agenda. Just another day living in a divided government. 

Prosperity & Violence: The Political Economy of Development - Robert H. Bates

Prosperity & Violence: The Political Economy of Development. Written by one Robert H. Bates. He's an economist and political scientist by trade. Distinguished professor at Harvard University. Published in 1981, the book has since been revised and reprinted several times and is regularly read in college political science classes. 

This is a pretty difficult little book. I read it in college. I know because it had notes in my handwriting written in the margins. However, I can’t recall this at all. Probably for a political science class, I assume, maybe a developing democracy or a consolidating a dictator ship course I took. This had to be one of the less memorable things we read for whichever was the case.

That said, the gist is that economic development is not solely determined by factors such as natural resources or culture, but rather by the interplay between economic and political institutions. Sort of at odds with Jared Diamond, I guess you could say. Bates, for his part, argues that societies with inclusive and flexible institutions, such as competitive markets and responsive governments, are more likely to experience sustained economic growth and prosperity. On the other hand, societies with extractive and rigid institutions, such as monopolistic markets and authoritarian governments, are more likely to experience economic stagnation and violence. 

His big claim is that politics has always been about the use of violence, and has developed from there, but is still the state's main function. As he writes, “Those who engage in politics, rather than production, specialize in the use of violence. Most commonly, they use power to redistribute, not create, wealth. As acts of redistribution, often inflict losses, the use of force often destroys. For power to be used to produce wealth, coercion must therefore be used in new ways. Those who specialize in the use of force must refrain from violence and delegate their authority to those who will employ it productively. They must delegate it to those who specialize in combining land, labor, and capital in the process of production,” (p. 26). 

Bates supports this argument and others with case studies from various countries in Africa and Latin America, showing how their political and economic institutions have influenced their development trajectories. These were the most interesting parts of the book.

Also hints at a lot of economic hitman type work throughout, especially that done by the US government and Soviet Russia. Doesn't get specific but you know it is there. Stuff about taking out loans for infrastructure that developing counties couldn't pay back, eventually resulting in regime change, economic collapse, failed states, and so forth. My younger self was unaware of this phenomenon but was picking up on it. Notes read, “Why they keep borrowing? What happens to countries that can't pay back,” and so forth. 

Lot of the stuff about foreign meddling helping to usher in collapse gets glossed over. Example: “Creditors required the governments of developing nations to adopt policies that would lower the demand for imports, and thus ease the burden of paying for previous purchases from abroad. Cuts in government deficits, higher rates of interest, and lower levels of public spending—these and other measures lowered the level of domestic demand and thus the demand for imports, reducing the burden of foreign payments on the one hand, while on the other sparking policy-induced recessions,” (p. 90). “Seems like a real recipe for disaster,” I wrote circa 2002. Indeed, my younger guy. It's also insanely oversimplified. 

Anyway, the book has been widely influential in the fields of political economy and development studies, apparently. It has been praised for its rigorous analysis and insightful arguments, hence it's near required reading for poli-sci students. I liked it and found it interesting though it is written in academic speak and is at times guilty of oversimplifying complex issues. It also ignores the role of external factors such as globalization and international institutions when discussing the failed states.

He ends the book with the famous Thomas Hobbes quote, that says, “the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.” Of it, Bates says, “[Hobbes] words disturb because they respond to much that is felt and seen in the present day, when, for too many in the developing world, insecurity remains the norm and development a dream that cruelly eludes their grasp,” (p. 115). To me, it seems that Bates is unwilling to blame developed countries like the US for sacrificing the prosperity of others for their own. That's just me doe. 

Political Musings - The War on Woke

Here is my monthly political musing following Conservative Political Action Conference and the National Conservatism Conference, both taking place in March. The gist of both was more or less liberals control everything and are destroying the country through “wokeness.”

Wokeness, of course, is the right's new boogeyman. The end of a line that goes abolition, reconstruction, suffrage, the New Deal, communism, civil rights, socialism, gay rights, wokeism. It's sort of used for a unified “left” that hates America which people use to justify their decision to vote for Donald Trump. The times ahead, for them, are a mix of fear and hope, with opponents who are both malevolent and ignorant, countless yet surpassed by "ordinary" Americans. The Republican party's repeated warnings of doomsday in the event of a Democratic victory can only be uttered so many times before their voters stop listening. 

This is all culture-war nonsense. The Tucker Carlson schtick, aka “owning the libs,” requires disregarding the genuine hardships of the world - such as the isolation of a transgender student, the anxiety of the uninsured, or the struggles of a Black man, so forth. It's a manipulative tactic that treats all of life as a ratings game that relies on constant outrage, signaling white identity, and making sweeping generalizations. Conservatives, led by Trump as their culture-war president with limited policy, are fixated on the culture war. However, any conservative worth a shit is contemplating how to move beyond this approach and achieve tangible progress.

Anyway, CPAC and NCC were a lot of projection with CPAC being pro-Trump and NCC being pro-far right with the 2024 hopefuls doing the heavy lifting. The later fancy themselves “Reagan Republicans,” which is more or less the same old shit. Coke Zero to Diet Coke, Carl's Jr. to Hardees, cocaine to crack, so forth. Same means and ends but with different packaging/delivery methods. Trump is pure rage, Reaganites are also full of rage, but smile a little more. 

Some examples of the latter group include Rachel Bovard, Ted Cruz, Josh Hawley, and Marco Rubio. 

Bovard got a lot of attention coming out of the conference. Sort of the breakout star. She's a somewhat intelligent/accomplished/young conservative who has worked for various Republican politicians and conservative organizations. She believes that previous generations of conservatives were too naive in thinking that liberals and conservatives had similar goals for America. In her view, the left is actively working to destroy everything the conservative movement stands for. The left does this by controlling every aspect of American society and culture and that they are using their power to dismantle traditional American values and institutions. She is not alone, of course, in such beliefs: 

Cruz: “The left’s attack is on America. The left hates America. It is the left that is trying to use culture as a tool to destroy America.”

Hawley: “Their grand ambition is to deconstruct the United States of America.”

Rubio: “We are confronted now by a systematic effort to dismantle our society, our traditions, our economy, and our way of life.” 

And so forth.

All of this is built on bullshit, of course. From Bovard: “Woke elites—increasingly the mainstream left of this country—do not want what we want. What they want is to destroy us... Not only will they use every power at their disposal to achieve their goal,” they’ve been doing it for years “by dominating every cultural, intellectual, and political institution.” Progressives pretend to be the oppressed ones, “but in reality, it’s just an old boys’ club, another frat house for entitled rich kids contrived to perpetuate their unearned privilege. It’s Skull and Bones for gender-studies majors!” So much for toning it down a bit. 

The left, according to them, is conspiring to undermine America. Not a lot of details on how this is being done but it seems to involve a combination of academia, Hollywood, the news media, and George Soros.

This is how they justify playing dirty and their attempts at doing at exactly what they are accusing the left of, namely destroying their way of life. Leonard Leo, a prominent figure in the Federalist Society, for example, has set his sights on expanding his influence beyond the judiciary and into various sectors of American culture. The guy was a key player in the effort to dismantle Roe v. Wade. Through that bullshit, Leo was involved in the appointments of Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court. His aim is to establish a "Federalist Society for everything" to take on such institutions as Wall Street, Silicon Valley, journalism, Hollywood, and academia. Leo believes that the same tactics that worked for the Federalist Society in the legal arena can be applied to other areas, including combating "wokeism" in corporate and educational settings, so-called biased media, and corrupting entertainment.

This is, of course, insane and unlikely to work since wrong to think organized/unified wokeists are taking over all the institutions of American life. Not that they care. It's just their way of justifying what they are doing at the state level. 

The argument, they say, is that since the libs control everything, they have to aggressively use state legislatures to pass laws embracing their values, essentially what’s now happening across red America, including my home state of Indiana. An “unapologetically embrace the use of state power,” is what they are calling it. National conservatism taken to its ultimate end, which involves utilizing state authority to dismantle large corporations while simultaneously resisting coastal cultural norms. The conflict between cultural values and economic classes merged, so they hope, and a new right-wing movement arises in which a group of intellectuals lead working-class individuals in opposing the cultural and corporate elites. Blah blah blah. Putting a lot of faith in pushing money upward, but it's worked so far so why not. 

So what are they trying to do with state power, you ask. Well, if you are Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, for example, a favorite for the Republican presidential nomination by the by, who says that his state “is where woke goes to die,” you use it to obliterate First Amendment Rights. 

A bill growing down there in America's wang is an explicit attempt to undo the 1964 Supreme Court decision, The New York Times Company v. Sullivan. This is a bulwark of First Amendment law that requires public figures to prove a news organization engaged in “actual malice” to win a defamation case. The so-called price of being a public figure decision. This case freed news organizations to pursue vigorous reporting about public officials without fear of paying damages.

The new bill would change the definition of actual malice to include any allegation that is “inherently improbable” or that is based on what it calls an “unverified” statement by an anonymous sourceMostucked up is that it says that all anonymous statements are “presumptively false” for the purposes of a defamation case.

If the bill is enacted, it would create enormous damage which other states will copy, likely with its language verbatim, on the way to the high court, where it will ultimately head. Once there, the conservative Justices will likely give it the okay as they would directly benefit from such a landmark case. Citizens who value free speech should really start raising a shit before the state silences them, just saying. The bill obviously represents a dangerous threat to free expression, not just for the news media, but for all Americans, regardless of their political beliefs. But, you know, for Republicans don't really seem to apply. 

Then, of course, there is the whole transgender rights thing that the Republican Party is actively making their major platform for their base of unhinged bigots. At CPAC, for example, one Michael Knowles advocated for the complete elimination of transgenderism from public life, a sentiment that captures the essence of the right's collective efforts. Although there are numerous bills with varying objectives and justifications, Indiana signed one yesterday, their overall impact is reflective of fuck you if you're transgender. DeSantis (did I mention his national aspirations?), again, is leveraging the issue to bolster his anti-woke political image. Own those libs!

What does all this mean, exactly? I think it means the Republican Party is on some weak bullshit, and they know it. It remains unclear whether right-wing populism is here to stay, but it is clear that it requires an adversary, and opposition to “woke” ideals is a convenient target, although ultimately a one they can't really define. Look at the Federalist Society, for example. Their objective until recently was simple: replace one group of judges with the most ideologically extreme. Having unfortunately succeeded, now they are largely opposed to this concept of being “woke,” which is more or less taking on the entire culture without knowing what it is or means. However, as they are learning, attempting to reverse social progress across all facets of American society is not a simple or attainable goal, especially when lacking an understanding of the root causes of that progress. 

To clarify, to be “woke” originally referred to having an awareness of social issues, particularly pertaining to racism and inequality. It has since evolved to encompass actively seeking education on issues with the goal of taking action to effect positive change. Nowadays, the term is commonly used to describe individuals who are socially conscious, who give a shit about other people, who aren't the raging asshole no one wants to engage with. These are the people that the anti-expression laws are coming for. For now, to the real fucks pushing this stuff, I say, go fuck yourself, you pieces of shit. 

The Presidents: 250 Years of American Political Leadership – Iain Dale

For Presidents' Day, figured I'd get to writing about the book on the gentlemen who have held the office I read earlier this month. I read about each of them, even the completely forgotten and/or terrible ones. Super interesting. All of them. Also, most of them were real pricks. 

Format of the book is each president gets an essay. Writers are academics, historians, journalists, and politicians. They were all carefully chosen based on expert knowledge of their subjects. The book goes through each of the presidents' achievements, influence, their lasting legacy, and how they were perceived in their own lifetimes. 

I am trying to put my political biases aside when looking at those I think are underrated, overrated, and those I think are truly great.

First off, the ranking systems I am looking at are the Siena Presidential Expert Poll and the C-Span Survey of Presidential Leadership. There are lots of others out there, but none of those get the respect or publicity of these two. 

Siena's been putting it's survey out since 1982. In total, they've published seven. Each has come out during the second year of the first term of each president since Ronald Reagan – 1982, 1990, 1994, 2002, 2010, 2018, and 2022. The rankings are based on surveys collected from historians, political scientists, and presidential scholars. The surveys judge the Presidents on attributes, abilities, and accomplishments. The Siena poll is more along with my rankings. 

The most recent C-Span survey, published in 2021, questioned 142 presidential historians and biographers. The questions consist of rankings based on effectiveness for ten categories. They are Public Persuasion, Crisis Leadership, Economic Management, Moral Authority, International Relations, Administrative Skills, Relations with Congress, Vision/Setting An Agenda, Pursued Equal Justice for All, and Performance Within the Context of His Times. 

In the 2022 Siena survey, the top five, which are unchanged from the 2018 version, were FDR, Lincoln, Washington, Teddy Roosevelt, and Jefferson. According to the C-SPAN survey, the five highest rated presidents are Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Theodore Roosevelt, and Dwight D. Eisenhower. Rounding out the top ten are Eisenhower, Truman, LBJ, Kennedy, and Madison. This is the first time LBJ has entered the top ten, very much deserved by the by. 

Of the Presidents in my lifetime, from most recent. Biden ranks 19. Trump 43. Obama 11, up from 17. I think that will be much higher in the future. W comes in at 35. He has been all over the place but always in the bottom half. Started at 23 just a year after 9/11. Went down to 39 in 2010 whilst we were still in the financial crisis him, and the Republicans caused and with Katrina still fresh in everyone's minds, before moving up to 33 in 2018. Clinton, who has always been in the teens, comes in at 14. H.W. at 20. And Reagan dropped from 13 to 18. Still way too overrated.

The worst five, also unchanged from the 2018 survey, are Andrew Johnson, Buchanan, Trump, Harding, and Pierce. Those seem about right.

For C-Span, the top ten are Lincoln, Washington, FDR, Teddy, Eisenhower, Truman, Jeffereson, JFK, Reagan, and Obama. The bottom five are William Henry Harrison, Donald Trump, Franklin Pierce, Andrew Johnson and James Buchanan.

My top four are pretty firm. That list is FDR, Lincoln, Washington, and Truman. Fifth would probably be Obama or LBJ, though Teddy, Wilson, and both the Adamses were pretty strong as well. If I really had to choose though, I'd go with Obama as he didn't have something he really screwed up with like the others. But LBJ is easily the most underrated President. If we are just looking at the good, I'm putting him at fourth.

Each of my presidents in the top four faced significant existential challenges related to the nation’s survival. One and two are Lincoln and FDR. No question. The three defining crises for American were the Civil War, the Great Depression, and World War II. These two knocked that shit out of the park. Lincoln kept the country from breaking apart. He also ended slavery. Dude is practically a saint. 

FDR did more for economic justice than any other president. The only one that comes close is LBJ, one of the reasons why he ranks so highly on my list. Came in at the worst of the Great Depression, telling Americans "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself." Then he made lasting policy that dug us out of the shit. And Republicans still try to dismantle his legacy. 

This is why I think the C-Span poll is shit. Any poll that doesn't have Lincoln or FDR at the top is a masturbatory. Also, having Reagan in the top ten is a complete joke. 

Conservative "greatness"

Which brings me to the overrated. First up, Reagan. The Gipper. Revered by Republicans as all except Ike and H.W. in their lifetimes have been complete shit shows. He gets undeserved credit for ending the Cold War and jumpstarting the economy. His major achievement was trickle-down which is bullshit that didn't work, and Republicans are still grifting us on. Meanwhile, dude repeatedly caved to terrorist and fucking supplied them, i.e. our enemies, with weapons, and supported the violent overthrow of the democratically elected Nicaraguan government by supporting “freedom fighters,” i.e. Contras. His administration was the most corrupt in U.S. history up until Trump with well over 100 administration officials, including several cabinet members, being investigated, indicted, or convicted of crimes. Many of them were pardoned by Reagan or Bush before they could even stand trial, which was a hell of president. He tripled the national debt in his eight years, making him third worst. The two ahead of him, FDR and Wilson, had world wars that drove their totals up. Reagan had peace. He also completely ignored the AIDS epidemic, continued to give Saddam fucking Hussein weapons despite his many atrocities like using chemical weapons to kill 5,000 plus Kurdish civilians, and vetoed the Comprehensive Apartheid Act against South African in 1986 that would have levied economic sanctions. This is just some of his bullshit. Fuck that guy.

Second, JFK. Rates high for his public speaking skills and vision. Masturbatory bullshit. He did defuse the Cuban Missile Crisis and promise to put a man on the moon. But the Cold War raged on and the most the moon stuff happened under LBJ and Nixon. These are the big two. 

Now underrated. Gonna start with Obama. He not only provided the country with an incredibly important health care initiative—something that presidents have been trying to do for almost 100 years—he also got us out of a crisis that was deeper than the Great Depression when the stock market crashed in 1929. What we were experiencing right before he took office was worse than what FDR had to deal with, and he pulled us the fuck out. How the fuck is he so tremendously underrated? I guess that is what he gets for pointing out that Republican economic policies are shit and being black. Thanks Obama! 

Second, LBJ, mostly for his pursuit of equal justice for all Americans. Took office after JFK was assassinated and greatly surpassed his predecessor. He enacted the landmark Civil Rights Act. He urged the country "to build a Great Society, a place where the meaning of man's life matches the marvels of man's labor," which became his agenda. This resulted in Medicare for the elderly, increased aid for education, and anti-poverty programs. Dude was a legend. 

This guy has been around

But then he also gave us Vietnam. He was also pretty disgusting. Made cabinet members take meetings with him while he was on the shitter, and he was fond of taking dudes who tested him to the bathroom while he pissed and turning to zip up to show off his apparently massive unit. 

But let's look at the good. Born legit poor, he started out teaching at an extremely poor, segregated Mexican-American high school, which he took pride in and made him sympathetic to racial issues. 

In 1965, after signing the Higher Education Act of 1965, Johnson said:

“I shall never forget the faces of the boys and the girls in that little Welhausen Mexican School, and I remember even yet the pain of realizing and knowing then that college was closed to practically every one of those children because they were too poor. And I think it was then that I made up my mind that this nation could never rest while the door to knowledge remained closed to any American.”

After teaching for a little while, in 1931 he was appointed to legislative secretary for one Richard M. Kleberg after winning a special election to represent Texas in the United States House of Representatives. A staunch supporter of the New Deal, he was bounced around to various positions culminating in an appointment to head the Texas National Youth Administration in 1935. This enabled him to use the government to create education and job opportunities for young people. 

This eventually led to him getting elected to the House in 1937, where he served until 1949, even taking on active military service during WWII. From there he went to the Senate from 1949 to 1961. While there he became Majority Whip, then Chair of the Senate Democratic Caucus, Minority Leader, Majority Leader, Vice President, and finally President. Incredible. 

One anecdote I loved that was not in the book that I heard about him was immediately after he left office he began smoking to everyone around him's shock. He suffered a near fatal heart attack at age 47. He was a heavy drinker, smoked 60 cigarettes a day, and never worked out. He quit for the next 15 years. Once he lit up that first time, his wife and daughter were like, what the fuck. He said something along the lines of, “I've given my life to my family and public service. The rest of my life is mine to do with as I want.” Now chain-smoking again, he said "I'm an old man, so what's the difference? I've been to the Mayo Clinic twice and the doctors tell me there is nothing they can do for me. My body is just aging in its own way. That's it. And I always loved cigarettes, missed them every day since I quit. Anyway, I don't want to linger the way Eisenhower did. When I go, I want to go fast." Right on. You can read about that time of his life in this Atlantic article from 1973. 

Next we have the Adamses. The elder, the nation's second president, known for his integrity; he deftly dealt with growing hostilities with France. We never went to war because he negotiated a peace deal. He was also opposed to slavery, as was his son, who had the misfortune of the first great recession. He His served during a time with a contentious Congress with great division. However, he fought for civil liberties and the unification of the country. But ended up losing to that fucker Jackson. 

Lastly, I'm going to mention Wilson. Dude had a strong vision for the country and moved many pieces of important legislation through Congress. He also convinced Congress in 1917 that America could no longer remain neutral in World War I. However, like Teddy Roosevelt, dude was incredibly racist and made the lives of black people much worse, basically turning a blind eye to lynching and watching Birth of a Nation in the White House. 

State of the Union - Joe Biden - 2023

Rooting against Biden tonight, was rooting against America. I know, I know. Politics are pretty much just a team sport. You’re all in for your team.

But if you’re rooting for the guys against compromise or taxing billionaires, but for eliminating Social Security, then you’re team sucks. Are you so for lower taxes for some rich asshole who wouldn’t give you the time of day that you’re willing to live in The Handmaid’s Tale? Is that what passes for smaller government these days?

Obviously, times are insane. In 2009, when that congressman yelled “you lie“ at Obama, he was officially reprimanded. Now, Marjorie Taylor Greene can just scream whatever she wants whenever she wants and no one bats an eye.

The Sarah Huckabee Sanders angry rebuttal was choice. Talking about “failed policies” while advocating for trickledown. Only fiscally conservative when a Dem is in office. Then it’s cut taxes and wait for the economy to explode. Also, “the woke left” is the new “socialist”. Basically, “don’t aspire toward education, you dumb fuck.”

Gist of the speech: Don’t fuck with entitlements that we pay into that will make our lives better, work toward comprise, cap prices on life-saving drugs, end BS fees, and give people more money for doing shit jobs. Biden basically asked Republicans to stop being assholes and they double downed on asshole.

American Horror Story: Cult

Finished this season last month. Just in time for the midterms. Evan Peters… you okay, brah? Some Tyler Durden project mayhem stuff going on with his character, except way more unhinged.

The line between political and religious cult is pretty thin here. The “sacred copulation” that happens is exactly what you’d imagine an insane cult orgy would be. It’s indescribable. The “climax” is really something. Goes there.

Sarah Paulson’s performance is dope. Paulson, me thinks, led the team this season, which is one of the best. There were several in a row that were unwatchable leading into this one. Back to being a fan now.

Borat Subsequent Moviefilm is the greatest movie of all time

What is more dangerous? This virus or the democrat?... My daddy is the smartest person in the whole flat world. Official title is Borat Subsequent Moviefilm: Delivery of Prodigious Bribe to American Regime for Make Benefit Once Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan. If you don't think Sacha Baron Cohen is a genius, then we probably can't be friends as you are probably going to defend Rudy Giuliani who was totally masturbating. 

Rotten Tomato Consensus: Borat Subsequent Moviefilm proves Sacha Baron Cohen's comedic creation remains a sharp tool for exposing the most misguided -- or utterly repugnant -- corners of American culture.

Gist is that Sacha Baron Cohen as Borat, the fictional Kazakh journalist and television personality, offers daughter Tutar (played by Maria Bakalova) to Vice President Mike "Penis" as a bride. When that doesn't work, he settles for Giuliani, who tries to get his dick hard on hidden camera which he claims was ye olde tucking in his shirt routine. Not even a funny euphemism, bra. There are also shenanigans at a debutante ball and lots of other CPAC type events, and various COVID-19 pandemic hijinx as well. 

After all that, though, the movie is surprisingly touching. First there is the relationship that builds between Borat and his daughter. It's super sweet. There is the babysitter that Borat hires to watch his daughter that does some amateur therapy with the two of them, which comes off as genuine.  Then there were Holocaust survivors he meets when he is doing his anti-semitic schtick. These women greet him with such kindness it is incredible. Meanwhile, Borat carries around a bag with a dollar sign on it and is dressed like this:

And finally, during the COVID pandemic, Borat stops at a liquor store. Whilst there, he asks a man where everyone is. The guy tells him about the pandemic. Borat then asks if he can stay with the guy. Cut to him with this guy and his roommate. These guys, Jerry Holleman and Jim Russell, are two Trump-supporting conspiracy theorists. They seem to actually care about Borat's well being and are extremely kind to him. I mean, no way I would have said yes to that request. And these two guys were like, fuck it. Of course them helping Borat write a “Wuhan Flu Song,” with lyrics like “Obama, what we gonna do? Inject him with the Wuhan flu” and “Journalists, what we gonna do? Chop ’em up like the Saudis do,” doesn't help their case. By the by, Borat, in disguise as a southern Trump fanatic, lots of layers here, obviously, performed this catchy tune at an alt-right rally opposing the lockdown. He got the crowd to sing along to the racist lyrics before the croud figured out they were being mocked and turned on him, nearly killing him. These dudes, though, were pretty proud of their new friend in a sort of, "wow, look at him go," way. At one point, while hanging out with these dudes, Borat says that he "hope quartine never end." OMG. 

Obvious MVP is Sacha Baron Cohen. I mean, true genius. But Bakalova is super solid as well. Then there is a girl at the deb ball that gets an honorable mention. So Borat asks this girl's dad how much he thought he could get if he tried to sell his daughter. The dad, a real piece of work here, says "$500." His daughter, super pissed, gives him a look that has to be seen to appreciate, and says, "that is FUCK-ING gross." Good for her. Gave me a lot of hope.

Mueller Report did not exonerate Trump... Barr did what he was hired to do and Dems need to step the fuck up

Angry political rant after Trump steals the narrative following Barr's bullshit summary of Mueller's report which he is never going to make public... Dems are a fucking joke. "Trying to impeach Trump would be bad," they say. "It didn't work so well when Reps tried it with Clinton." Horseshit. In 2000, after the bullshit impeachment, the GOP held all three branches of the government for the next six years.

Also, a sitting president can't be indicted? Why is that exactly? Oh, because Nixon's legal team wrote a memo saying so almost 50 years ago to save him from doing jail time. That is neither law nor precedent.

If Trump is allowed to server out his term, we will never return to normalcy. Republicans cannot be given a free pass to cheat in elections any more and then change laws and send more money upward with insane tax bills while global issues like climate change, hostile nation-states, recession, and right-wing nationalism threaten to bring all this shit down. Going dark is not the fucking answer. Dems need to stand the fuck up for justice right the fuck now.

In Petrol Speramus: The Impending “Crude Awakening”

The excrement of the devil, black blood, the blood stream of the new economy, the blood of the dinosaurs, the blood of the earth, black gold, Texas tea—oil—the subject of Basil Gelpke and Ray McCormack’s documentary A Crude Awakening: The Oil Crash is one of the most terrifying films I have ever seen; however, after doing some research and talking to some environmentalist acquaintances, it seems that this is more or less environmental propaganda. First, the filmmakers show us that “We use it [petroleum] for everything.” Then they tell us that “Collapse is only a few years away.” Before finally telling us that the world is going to end unless shit changes and we basically start using solar energy, as nuclear, hydrogen, and bio-diesel are no good.

Points the film makes, rather overtly, I might add, are as follows: Oil is our God. No matter who people say their deity is, they actually worship petroleum. Up until the 1950’s, the U.S. was the leading producer of crude oil, in many ways it built our economy, we were the Saudi Arabia of the world, and like with most things America dominates, it was thought that this was what it was going to be like forever. After that came Venezuala for our consumption while Russia depended on the city Baku. These places have been totally annihilated as a result of their loss of petrol-dollars. Oil is a magnate for war. More and more oil is going to come from exceedingly unstable places of the world. A guy named M.K. Hubbert came up with this bell-shaped curve aptly called “Hubbert’s Curve” that shows when oil production and consumption both peak and then abruptly drops off. This took place in December 1970 when the oil production in the U.S. peaked and then we had to go elsewhere for our oil. Everyone has because the only place in the world that hasn’t peaked is the Middle East, and evidence suggests that they too have actually peaked though getting accurate numbers out of them is exceedingly difficult. Once the peak of oil has been reached it probably means the peak of sustainable life. Once that happens then holy shit. Cities in the U.S. are built around the need to drive, unlike in Europe where cities were in place before the car was invented.[*]

Not only that but Saudi Arabia’s instability is a formula for major, major conflict. In the last 20 years there has been a huge drop in the per capita income of the Saudi, from $28,000 to $6,000 a year. Islamic fundamentalists are being bred by the minute as their government is seen as corrupt and sending all their country’s money to the U.S. and they hate both America and their own leaders who use our military capabilities against them. One commentator says “What we are looking at is a multigenerational resource war.” He later explains that even if you hybridize every car on the road right now, we would still be consuming the same amount of gas in a decade because of the ever increasing need. Biodeisel, hydrogen, ethanol, nuclear, wind, none of these things are really more than a drop in the bucket compared to the amount of oil we depend on.

Once we hit Hubbert’s Peak unprepared as we are, then its only a matter of time before economic collapse. When that happens, poof, no more technological society and things will get incredibly, incredibly grim because the financial system is built on petro-dollars, it all comes down to cheap energy. Only the top one percent of the top one precent will drive a car or fly in an airplane. Your grandkids may never ride in an airplane.

By the time the film was over I was stockpiling water and gasoline and trying to figure out how I would make it from Winston Salem to Indianapolis on foot or whatever now that World War III was going to happen at any second now since we are very clearly going to run out oil in a couple of weeks or years or what have you. Outkast’s song “Da Art of Storytellin Part 2” came to mind and I considered buying a rocket launcher for when raiders came once we go beyond Thunderdome if you will. But once the female companion came home, of course, she was able to make my neurosis apparent as only she is really able to do when it occasionally springs up. And seriously, it is hard not to feel sort of insane just thinking “when we reach peak oil, I am going to be prepared,” but who knows. The female companion, who grew up having heard that Jesus was going to return at any moment to usher in the apocalypse, basically told me that this was just another form of the craziness that she had to deal with everyday from like birth until college where she became, like me, an existentialist.

However, I do think we greatly need to curb our dependency on oil—I mean it’s not going to last forever. This film, though it is probably propaganda, does end up being pretty solid and informative. I only hope that it is information that should be taken with a grain of salt.

[*] Something to think about: a 16 oz. bottle of drinking water will run you around $1. With 128 ounces in a gallon that comes out to $8 for a gallon of good old H2O, with which we could not live with out. The last time I got gas it cost me $1.58. Gasoline is just about the least expensive liquid we can get here in the United States.

I am Rejestered to Vote!!!

I just got my voter registration card in the mail yesterday, several months after I registered and two-and-a-half weeks after the election. Well, I guess I could still be outraged or whatever but I still got to vote and the election turned out in my party’s favor so I am not, for once. However, Rock the Vote is now on the “Dead to Me” list that I have resurrected from like junior high after watching “The Colbert Report” back when I had cable.

An Obama Nation

These are notes that I put together in the days leading up to the election and some thoughts from the day of. I am adding to this and trying to get it published. As always, comminents are much appreciated.

AB

T-minus six days until our great and beautiful nation has a peaceful and wonderful regime change, or to be technical begins one, since the change of power doesn’t become official until the twenty something of the next year. We take it for granted, but this doesn’t happen everywhere in the world. Either way, McCain or Obama, I believe it is going to wind up an improvement, but honestly one would prove slightly better while the other will be a huge milestone and a huge improvement.

With that said, this paragraph is something of personal voter history so feel free to skip ahead, but be warned, there are some pertinent voter controversy tidbits that you may want to read. Ever since I have been of voting age, I have witnessed voting controversy, some of these controversies, I have been directly involved in while others I was forced to watch from a distance. Growing up, I was raised to vote as a liberal, and today I am as far left as you can get, the product of a working class, Irish-American background with an old man who said things like “a working class man voting republican is like a chicken voting for the colonel” and a mother who has spent most of her adult life cleaning the homes of wealthy people (including the home of an ex-girlfriend), I have considered myself too poor to vote for the Republican Party. So in 2000, eighteen-years of age, I voted third party (Green) and watched as the party I second (perhaps third considering I am a registered socialist) most identified with celebrate prematurely and have the election stolen away from them. In all my years as an American citizen, 26-years running, I have only been sicker with the democratic system one other time, which came in November 2004, when I had to wait in line for ten and a half hours just to express my constitutionally guaranteed right of voting. The so called “ground zero” of long waits, this “longest line in America” was the most attention paid to my little college until David Foster Wallace’s commencement speech to my graduating class blew up with popularity after the writer’s suicide. On that day, once I was finished up with the frustrating but inspiring experience of casting our votes after thinking that the election was really going to come down to us, suffering through the rain and ridiculous wait, I vowed to never vote again. Immediately after voting, when Fox News was already calling the election a “Bush victory” while other networks were showing some restraint after the 2000 fiasco, I thought I was going to throw up. The next day, in a Shakespeare seminar I was so depressed that I almost skipped, when asked to interpret a portion of a “Macbeth” soliloquy, I responded with basically, “who fucking cares,” and it went over pretty well considering my professor was only a few spots behind me in line and it was no secrete who she was going to vote for, God bless her. But 2006 rolled around, I registered at the last minute, still not really expecting to vote. Plus my congresswoman at the time, up for reelection, a democrat who was bat-shit insane, the now deceased Julia Carson, wasn’t worth the trouble of casting a vote.[*] The night before the election though, a friend of mine who was then in Iraq, fighting for this country that I still naively believe in, told me not to forget to vote. Coming from a combat veteran who was fighting in a war that he doesn’t support, I found my own petty gripes about the democratic system to be insufficient in justifying my staying home and denouncing the system that had previously let me down. So this year, having registered on “Rock the Vote,” I am involved in yet another voter controversy, this time having to do with whether or not I can vote rather than whether or not I choose to. I am afraid that I am one of the many whose voter registration cards has not yet come because my application has gone unprocessed like many other thousands of people who went through that agency. Every four years and some bullshit happens and I am outraged at my American government. Goddamn it, why is it so fucking hard to vote? This is not a good thing and it shouldn’t be stood for, but this too seems to be the rights ploy, making it as difficult as possible for a young, poor voter’s voice to be heard.

* * *

T-minus three. Once I came to terms with the fact that my voter registration card would presumably never come, I got up a little earlier than usual today and took some initiative by going down to the Forsyth County Government Building to register and vote early. With only three hours separating the time I got in line to vote from the time I had to be at work, I was gambling on the efficiency of governmental officials. After the 2004 debacle, I didn’t think this wise, but what was I to do if I wanted to vote? Not too bad this time around, only a two hour wait to cast my ballot. Still infuriating, plus this time I wasn’t surrounded by my nearest and dearest as I was four years ago, though I wasn’t completely alone in the line either, a girl I went to school with was about 15 spaces ahead of me so I did get to talk to her when the winding line snaked just right and we could chat for a couple of minutes until we got too far away from each other and then a few minutes later again converse face-to-face when our spots in line met up. But two hours of wait isn’t nearly as taxing as ten and half. If I would have been in Gambier, I wouldn’t have voted. But I did get to vote and that was that. Now I am done with it and can chill at home watching election coverage on TV while many go out and wait. And wait.

Recently, I heard someone say that “Obama looks presidential while McCain looks like the guy who doesn’t want Barrack Obama to be President.” This turns out to be apt but that seems to be the republican way and it has worked for them in the past. Actually, going back over the past damn near 40-years, it has worked very well with five of the last seven presidents sporting elephants instead of donkeys. Tonight on SNL, McCain made an appearance on “Weekend Update” where he was sort of funny, I guess, in telling of his last minute strategies going into Tuesday, one of which was called the “Old Grandpa” where he basically says “come on people, Barrack Obama has plenty of chances to be President, let me have my turn.” I fail to see how this is all that different from his actual strategy.

* * *

T-minus two. The following is somewhat of a response to a New York Times article from two months ago entitled “The Final Days” written by Peter Baker. According to Baker, the Shrub’s, George W. Bush, legacy depends on McCain winning this election. Though neither likes the other all that much, they found themselves once again connected on the campaign trail. The question that McCain is now asking himself in the Shrub’s 11th hour is whether or not Bush will beat him twice. Win or lose, he is running against a legacy as much as he is a democrat.

McCain knows this. And so does Bush. And so does Obama and most everyone else. Hence the ads that claim McC is a Bush clone and we “can’t afford four more years” and Will Ferrell on SNL doing his W saying “a vote for McCain is a vote for George W. Bush.” For McC’s part, he has been distancing himself as far as humanly possible from the sinking ship that goes way past anything Gore mustered in 2000 with his relationship with Clinton. Unlike Gore though, McC can afford to and he must. Far enough away from the President’s circle of trust and with a well documented history of piss and vinegar candor, McC can criticize W while not seeming like someone who stood back while he screwed up the country or got a blow job from a government intern and then was wishy-washy about it or whatever. Bush, on the other hand, doesn’t seem to be all that pissed off about comments like “we’re worse off than we were four years ago,” which is quite the statement since it refers to the ineptitude of a leader from his own party. He lets McC be an asshole and trounce on his Presidency because that's the guy who can validate it. Obama though no doubt went negative (both candidates went negative, of course), at first setting his sites on the past 8-years, and then on the Bush clone himself. Going after the Republican nominee though may give people just the excuse they need to lose interest and stay at home and do bong rips on Election Day instead of taking the trip to the polling station.

Getting people disinterested is therefore going to benefit the GOP just as it did for Bush in 2000 when he nearly lost to the anti-candidate (McCain). But when the anti-candidate has a realistic shot, the candidate begins to do all those things he or she denounced and did not do before that made him or her popular and standout in the first place. We not only get bored of this stuff, we find it uninteresting and toxic to our ideals.[†] Being popular, in other words, barely matters. What is important is maintaining power. This is what Bush has done, to be sure, after all, many admired the man for “sticking with his gut” and not heeding to things like information and deliberation and history that in the days pre-9/11 get in the way of swift, decisive actions. And thus, we have had the Joker for a President from 2001-2008—“I don’t plan, I just do.”[‡] So, of course he found his presidency a “joyous experience,” he was obeying what he thought was a call from God after all. So sure he is with his rightness in his “principles” and his “values” that he doesn’t even toy with the notion that it could theoretically be mistaken. Maybe it’s not God talking to you there good buddy, its Dick Cheney (who may very well be Satan).

* * *

T-minus one. Got around to reading the Rolling Stone piece on Obama from the October 30 issue and it is amazing, actually the second most amazing thing that I have read about the candidate. He is, no doubt, a historic candidate and this is a historic turning point in American history. He has always been popular. He has become even more popular as of recent days because of this whole economic crisis. Iraq has become second fiddle to this whole “Second Great Depression” and McCain handled it poorly. This shift has put Obama over the top with the “meltdown” on Wall Street as well as McCain’s “equally impressive meltdown” by erratically/recklessly handling of the crisis not to mention his smear campaign that resembles Bush’s tactics he was so pissed about back in 2000. But much of the credit needs to go to Obama himself for “displaying precisely the kind of character and judgement we need in a president: renouncing the politics of fear, speaking frankly on the most pressing issues facing the country and sticking to his principles.” He has had a big couple of weeks, of course, with the wear and tear of a presidential campaign, a wedding anniversary, the death of his grandmother, and win or lose, the coming days are going to prove extremely difficult and even bigger than the days leading up to Election Day.

Part of his appeal has to be his sense of outrage as most Americans have been outraged for quite some time. In Philly two weeks ago, he called the financial crisis “a direct result of the greed and irresponsibility that has dominated Washington and Wall Street for years” and this has been the GOP economic philosophy supported by McCain that insists “the market is king” and believes in the value of Trickle Down Economics that says the super wealthy are the most deserving of massive tax breaks. So when McCain tries to change his tune, America is wise to his tactics.

Things are not good right now, the Bush administration has damaged our country in so many ways. Who would want the job of leading this bruised and battered nation? Obama does. And he is rising to the occasion. Pray for it. Pray for us. God help us.


* * *

Underworld. Woke up and went with my female companion while she went and voted, I having already done so. She gets ready. Dresses like a first lady. I wear track pants, a sleeve on my head, and a hooded sweatshirt.

Once I get back home, I pop in the documentary “Out Foxed” to get me syked for the day’s festivities. There in, Jeff Cohen, former Fox News Contributor, says, “Media is the central nervous system of democracy” and when that it doesn’t run properly, neither does the democracy. So the point is, when right wing propaganda is played around the clock, they distort the news and make it next to impossible to make an informed decision. They misrepresent and then when they are contradicted they speak over the ones contradicting them and claim that they are speaking “the truth” and “facts” when they are being deliberately misleading.

The best part of the video is a segment about Jeremy Glick, a young man that lost his dad in the 9/11 attacks who was on the O’Reily Factor and said that Papa Bear used the 9/11 attacks to project his narrow right wing viewpoint. O’Reily, of course “spins” it after he kicks the kid off his program, calling him “out of control” and claiming the he said that Bush had planned the terrorist attacks. When he tried to sue Bill for defamation, he couldn’t because the guy lies so pathologically that it was almost impossible to prove that he knew he was lying.

I watched the election at a friends house, a partisan house, most of the kids there have parents that voted for McCain. Some are obnoxious, others are cool, all are drunk. When states get called, someone colors them in red or blue on poster-boards of the country. Once the election gets called, we toast to champagne.

I called my parents, we talked for hours, it was a great time and great day the country. I couldn’t enjoy most of it though, the female companion and I were fighting.

One of the first commercials after Obama’s speech I notice is for Vagisil. This is history. History books are being written right now. No time in my life has been more exciting. I am drunk. So is Tom Brokaw. What a country. What a fucking country. I end the night looking at white guys with bad tupes while my beautiful redhead sleeps upstairs while Indiana, the state I was born, goes blue.

[*] A few days before, a friend of my dad’s, an Irish-Catholic guy much like my father, who is very racially conscious, and is married to a black woman, went to a JC political rally and was appalled by the congresswoman who he witnessed attempt to leave a limousine to only fall back in which caused her to lose her hairpiece. In this reported bit of damn near slapstick comedy, JC ended up leaving the wig in the car and some guy ran up to her just as she was about to go on stage for some political rally and threw on her crooked hair which she barely noticed and she had some clueless look on her face throughout the entire speech she read off a piece of paper and the whole thing looked terrible but she still got reelected. She died not long after. That is the system working for us.

[†] For a more eloquent and informed explanation, see David Foster Wallace’s Rolling Stone essay “The Weasel, Twelve Monkeys, and the Shrub” on John McCain’s 2000 run for the Republican Presidential Nomination and political apathy among the young.

[‡] But where does he get the balls big enough? Well, as it turns out, his religious convictions have the same stink of absolutes that drive his foreign policy. There is a deep need to protect the capacity to will such certainty in the face of daunting complexity and opposition that tere is no way he is doing anything other than what he truly believes is right. Like a Norman Rockwell painting, he is going to stand up there as everybody listening looks pissed and do what he damn well wants. But when you think about his supporters in the Evangelical Right he looks more like a Manchurian Candidate who is a puppet for some group of constituents who want things a certain way and are unwilling to budge. Facts don’t need to stand in the way of bold decisions of unshakable faith when there is need for “righteous actions” in the form of a “crusade” where “evil” is attacked and “God’s gift” of democracy is spread to all.

Former Bush speech writer and religious nut job Michael Gerson (the one who coined “The War on Terror”) calls the Shrub’s non-negotiation “unrewarded heroism/courage” in “doing the right thing under pressure.” As Mike Conway says, “he believes he’s got a role and he’s doing what God wants him to do.” To go again God is certainly something I not going to advocate but to put all you’re faith into something that just isn’t going to work is to turn a democracy into what W wants to eliminate in the Middle East—an oppressive, sectarian government where church and state are one.

An Amendment to “Black Friday”

On a day that I posted about how in the service industry “there is no such a thing as being human,” I witnessed one of the most tender, least bull shitty acts human understanding I have seen in some time, and I must say, it actually moved me. The act, described below, was performed by a girl around 18-yearsold who is somewhat self-conscious and insecure and seemed to desperately want to make an impression on her new co-workers—which is understandable—but these things have nothing to do with why she did what she did or the act itself. While I don’t know what to make of it, in an act of full disclosure considering what I wrote yesterday in my piece Black Friday, here it is.

Sometime during the dinner rush around 7:30 or so, with every table occupied and on a 25-minute wait and the big screen playing the UNC-Notre Dame contest in a town where everyone either loves UNC or goes to Wake and people are intent and focused on food and football, a kid with severe mental disabilities starts shouting very loudly some general football terms that are audible even from the recesses of the kitchen. And people getting uncomfortable in a really bad way—I have people asking for their checks and holding their temples looking down at their crotch and whispering about the kid and the scene he is making—and this isn’t really good for anyone. Servers begin whining, people are staring, I here someone say “why don’t they just leave.”

But just as people are about to stampede for the door, a hostess who started a week ago to the day, came over to the clearly frightened severely mentally disabled boy and his ancient companion (who I assume was his grandfather[*]) and squeezed her way into a one person booth, taking up very little of the kid’s space but still setting with him and just talking and listening to his pleas of “score!” and “touchdown!” Maybe part of it was the fact that he had a very pretty young girl sitting next to him actually giving him her undivided attention that calmed him down, I know it works for me when I am freaking out and my unbelievable female companion shows me that I am worthy of such lavish and unwarranted attention. But as with the case with my female companion, there was something else that transcended simple circumspection. It is shown in words and tone and body language that all say it is ok and you are a person and you are human and you are worthy without having to actually say it.

So as she sat there talking to the unlikely pair, she provided comfort for everyone around her. Obviously for the kid, but also for the grandpa in listening to their story, which she barely mentioned afterwards to the inquiring minds, and then the paying customers who were annoyed with the outbursts and the servers who were having to damage-control their tables and on down the line of employees and customers all with a single act of kindness. It visually illustrated the fact that we all are connected and that can be a good thing. When it was over and the two were gone, I told her something along the lines of “nice job” but it was insufficient sounding like some work related issue which it was not, not really. It went beyond that and I hope she realizes this and retains this quality.

After I had some time to reflect on this event, this lone instance of actual, really deep caring, I started to think that maybe this actually shows how most of us are broken by such places. In this line of thinking, I figured it would take someone who has only been working at it for only a week to do something like this. Later, a newer server who has worked at other branches of the company who is one of the most negative people I work with and bitches a lot and calls people “redneck” or “ghetto” depending on race and is pissed off about something virtually every night though he is a nice enough guy for the most part and has been doing this far longer than I have and is also “educated” apparently had some sort of talking to with the hostess because it was late and she was forced to set people in his section around the bar (though she tried to sit at least two of these tables in my section but the TVs aren’t over there and who wouldn’t rather sit in a table around the bar anyway) and it didn’t look like these folks really gave a shit about when we close (20 and then 15-minutes from when they moseyed on in) and were only drinking water (often times a sign of how cheap the table is comes from the drink order which tells you a lot about the way they are going to tip you[†]) and never even acted like they wanted to be there and have you prepare their drinks and dinners for them.

Afterwards, she was pretty upset and said that she is now “thinking about leaving.” Here is a young female who did an unbelievably kind thing that greatly benefited the restaurant in a way that pretty much went unacknowledged by anyone but me because everyone in there was so self-absorbed. I mean, this was a place where two weeks ago a severely mentally disabled employee (who is so handicapped he is actually appears happy) was coming out of the back when he not only slipped and fell on the hard tile but after landing awkwardly, he like sort of slid, sort of bounced, and racked himself on a pole of the platform where the guys in the back wash dishes. It was incredible as far as falls go. It was the worst one I had ever personally seen in that it was a double edged sword of wounded pride with the initial fall and then the skid into pole resulting in genital anguish. It was also, I hate to say, slapstick comedy. When it happened I couldn’t believe he had actually went down the way that he did, the odds had to be astronomical, and I was frozen for a second, everyone was. But, being right there only a couple of feet away dropping off dirty plates, I went over and helped the poor guy up. Once on his feet, he simultaneously grabbed his elbow with his uninjured arm and his crotch with the arm being held. That is when some people began laughing. It made me sick to my stomach but I can’t say that I blame them. Maybe in the future she will be one of those that laugh and say things like “he really shouldn’t be here” but today she is not. She is human. It is the staying human that I pray she keeps and pray that we all keep.

[*] Something that a lot of times will happen in cases like this is the severely mentally disabled will go unwanted by their biological parents and instead of institutionalizing this person, a family member will take the person in and care for them. My grandpa did this with a second cousin or something who was maybe ten years older than my dad who remembers my grandpa telling him to stick up for him and not let anyone give the guy any shit. So my grandpa and my dad took on a lot of the responsibility with this guy whose story was a very sad one indeed—he was dropped as an infant not once but twice by nurses and went unloved and uncared for by his own parents who wanted nothing to do with the burden of caring for a child with special needs (though it was a different time then, I suspect things like this still happen as they did back 40-years ago). When this guy died in 2003, my grandpa and my dad were the only attendees of his funeral, marking the sad end to a excruciatingly sad life. The point is, I suspect this was a situation similar with a relative stepping in to raise a child with special needs.
[†] For example, it has happened on occasion that a family will come in and when you prepare to ask about maybe bringing them a Samuel Adams Oktoberfest, which really are delicious btw, they cut you off mid-sentence and act offended like you are one of the many salesmen in their lives trying to dictate your purchasing/spending, which technically you are, or like you are stupid for not like knowing that they would never drink ever or at a restaurant that overcharges or in front of children or late on a Saturday night or while operating a motor vehicle or whatever. These people do not tip well. You are extremely lucky to get 10% out of them. The most telltale sign thoughthat your tip is going to be lousy, in my experience, is when the adults in this situation order “water with lemon” and then order the drink for the kids however diminutive such an action appears to everyone involved and makes a point of stating that their offspring would like whatever beverage of their choosing “in a kids cup” as in “he’ll have a kid’s coke” which is free and they typically know is free and involves extra work for you because they are tiny and have lids that make refilling and knowing when to refill a pain because they want to make sure you don’t charge them the buck fifty for a regular sized glass, which I never do anyway, and is yet another way of telling you you are too stupid to see this person is a child and thus gets a free beverage all before the adult themselves try and order a ½ order of ribs or steak off the kids menu to save a couple of duckets because it is the same quality of food at a slightly cheaper price and the whole thing just makes you want to quit and tell them they need to get with the fucking program here and acknowledge what they already know in that servers get paid like shit for an hourly wage and depend on your gratuity to make rent and we are working hard to get a paid just like you are and so on and so forth.