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Saturday, March 02, 2002
The forgotten corollary... ...to my pal Dave's words of wisdom just came back to me: Bad things are wrong. So, to summarize the starting point of my new quest for common ground, this hopeful--though admittedly borrowed and somewhat musty--launchpad of understanding: --Bad things are wrong. I think we can all agree on that much.
Blog blog blog I have no intention of allowing this space to become infested with links to other blogs which themselves link to still more blogs, until the whole thing starts to feel like you're trapped in a hall of mirrors, wandering around staring into the illusion of infinity for hours and hours before you finally stumble across the exit and emerge into the harsh light of day, dehydrated and confused, wondering what the hell just happened. But this bit in Lileks' Daily Bleat made me laugh out loud: Read a little piece in the WSJ today about the Post Office’s gradual demotion and removal of the blue deposit boxes. Hmm - can I find a less elegant way to put that? Let’s try. Regarding the classic blue mailbox for the receiving of mail, less are soon to be on corners, the Wall Street Journal said. No, that’s not clunky enough. Give it that old Engrish twist. For the mailing of the items in your life, everyone must blue corner box, and why not? Can you resist? Wall Street Journal story - for the love in our feet. There, that’ll do. You get the point. And while we're on the topic of other blogs, I've been meaning to tip my imaginary hat to the real inspiration for this thing, this insatiable beast which threatens to consume my every spare moment...and I'm not talking about any of the political bloggers or the "warbloggers" (a vaguely cringe-inducing word, which sounds like a misguided attempt to combine "waterlogged" and "blowhard")...no, the real inspiration was none other than young Wesley Crusher of the Starship Enterprise--or at least the actor who portrayed him, Wil Wheaton. Seriously. I hadn't really been paying much attention to this whole blog thing--which is to say, I was completely unaware of this whole blog thing--until I ran across Wil's site after following a random link from Fark or RetroCrush or someplace like that, and was immediately fascinated by the informality and elasticity of the format, as well as the fact that one of the first entries I ran across was a link back to one of my own cartoons. At any rate, this was when the little light bulb went off over my head, and I started paying more attention to Wil's site in particular and blogging in general (and discovered that many sites I kept up with, such as Cursor and Romenesko were actually blogs--who knew?)... and ultimately realized that I, too, could spend endless hours engaged in a running monologue with myself, like any sad delusional soul shambling down the street alone at night talking to his invisible friends--but in a socially acceptable fashion! So, props to Wil, and never let it be said that this space does not give credit where due.
Because I can  This amazing photo of an unpainted Big Boy statue is courtesy of thom.org , where I also learned the answer to one of life's enduring mysteries--where do all those big fiberglass statues come from? The answer can be found here.
Shadow government? Activating an old, never-implemented Cold War plan, a hundred or so executive branch bureaucrats have been hiding out in a couple of those old fortified self-contained bunkers that are buried in various East Coast locations. The bureaucrats take turns rotating in and out at ninety day intervals, ready to assume command of the country if Washington DC suffers a debilatating attack. I saw Tom Daschle responding to this on a newscast, and it was apparently a complete surprise to him. Which raises one of many, many questions: if the purpose of this exercise is to ensure "Continuity of Government," why is the legislative branch not a part of the exercise? From day one, those who have expressed any mild concern about the potentially irreperable damage being done to democracy in the name of this ongoing, Orwellian war on a noun have been either shouted down, ignored, or dismissed as hysterical. Yet...when I read that the executive branch has a shadow government in place, ready to assume command...with no apparent provision for either the legislative or judicial branches to ensure real continuity of government...well, let's call it what it is: a plan to impose martial law. And that gives me a cold, sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. I mean, what's the scenario here? DC gets hit by some devastating terrorist attack--and some bureaucrat in a bunker shows up on TV or on the radio, and says, "Howdy, I'm your new leader? You haven't heard much about this, and the Constitution makes no provision for this whatsoever--but in the meantime, please do exactly as I say?" Even if the face of our government-in-a-bunker turned out to be the familiar, comforting personage of Dick Cheney, do you imagine for one moment that our rickety old system of checks and balances, pretty much held together with chewing gum and baling wire as it is, could possibly survive this? It's always disturbing to think of the plans that are being concocted in DC at any given time, the worst case scenarios in which your government's only concern is how best to contain you, rather than how best to serve you. (I have no doubt, for example, that in the event of some sort of attack, the city in which I live is viewed primarily as a problem in triage.) If memory serves, Ollie North used to amuse himself by drawing up various scenarios for martial law--and if the thought of that doesn't set off a screaming gibbering fit of paranoia in at least some small part of your brain, then we might as well just toss in the towel right now, just forget all this nonsense about the rule of law and representative democracy and just go ahead and coronate King George Junior the Second as our Supreme Leader and Beloved Enlightened Commander and be done with it. For all we gripe about its stewardship, this is an extraordinary country--make no mistake about that. And within the space of my lifetime, this country has faced enormous trials, and survived. It's easy to look back on the past through rose colored lenses--the tribulations of history, successfully confronted, are eventually accorded a perverse sort of nostalgia. Aw, remember the Cuban Missile Crisis? The Cold War? The isolation and paranoia of the Nixon administration? The assassinations, riots and upheavals? We made it through all of that, relatively intact, and the very real fear and terror of these events no longer has any power over us--it is now the stuff of textbooks and movies and kaleidoscopic montages on History Channel promotional spots. But as they say in the mutual fund business, past performance is no guarantee of future results. The hands on the Doomsday Clock are now closer to midnight than they have been in fourteen years. Blind, unreasoning hatred is the flavor of the month. The world's religions are at violent odds with each other, and the stage is set for the mother of all grudge matches. The Crazy Years are here, and our founding fathers' little experiment in self determination could easily be one of the casualties. In the 1936 novel It Can't Happen Here, Sinclair Lewis warned of just how easily it can happen here, and how it could happen under the guise of patriotism and apple pie and homeland security. This should transcend political squabbling. This is not a matter of Democrats or Republicans, right or left, up or down, any damn thing. It is about preserving the very freedoms which define us--and to be blunt, not doing the terrorists' work for them. And this is why you should care, whether you support the President or not, whether you listen to NPR or Rush Limbaugh, no matter who you voted for or who you think "really" won the 2000 election--this is why you should care, when people in this country are being detained indefinitely, and when John Ashcroft starts compiling secret lists of what you've been reading, and shadow governments lie in wait, ready to assume command. As any internist will tell you, it's just not a good idea to ignore early symptoms, to wait until the cancer has ravaged your body before seeking treatment, for fear of being labeled "hysterical." We can get through this, but not with our eyes closed. -------------------- Friday, March 01, 2002
So much controversy So little we can agree on. Sometimes, I am just tired of it all. And in that spirit, I would like to offer the words of my old pal Dave Eggers, a catchphrase of sorts he used to include in his weekly cartoon before he made the foolish choice to abandon cartooning and go back to law school. See, I knew he wasn't going to stick it out, and sure enough, last I heard he was working the night shift at some Kinko's somewhere. But back in the day, back when he still had a career as a rising young cartoonist, back in a magical far away land when he danced down rainswept streets and I shambled after as I've been doing all my life after people who interest me, because the only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes "Awww--" No wait-- that was Sal Paradise and Dean Moriarty. Actually all Eggers and I ever did was grab the occasional beer. But there were words of wisdom he shared with his readers on occasion in those days, and I reprint them here because, in these troubled times, we need something we can all agree with, something that transcends the incessant partisan bickering, the ideological divide, the constant anger so many people feel right now for their neighbors and fellow countrymen. We need common ground, to remind us of our shared heritage, our very humanity. That common ground can, I believe, be found in these words:  Kittens are adorable...  ...and ice cream is delicious! Note: I am quoting from memory, and I have this nagging feeling that there may have been a third corollary, such as "roller coasters are fun," or "Ben Affleck is dashing," but I just can't remember what it might have been. Also, if you are interested, the paper which ran Eggers' cartoon still hosts an incomplete archive here, and while none of the samples available mention kittens or ice cream, it is a chance to see what might have been if this young man, so full of hope and ambition, had actually found the courage within himself to fulfill his early potential. -------------------- Thursday, February 28, 2002
The bottomless mailbag An Air Force officer currently stationed in the States sends this perspective: As a member of the fighting force that Dennis Kucinich seems to have such a low opinion of, a small reminder. I am a pilot in the USAF. I am not a murderous pycho who would intentionally target innocent civilians. I mean, really, does he think we're grown in some lab? I grew up in the same society he did. Believe me, I KNOW the Afghan people had nothing to do with Sept 11. Why would I or my buddies go out and do anything that would hurt anyone not affiliated with the terrorists who blew up the WTC? Believe it or not, I've had more classes on the Law of Armed Conflict, the Geneva Convention, Just War, etc... than you can shake a stick at. Yes, mistakes happen. If you think your personal computer crashes at inconvinient times, stick the damn thing on an F-16 and see what happens. We're only human, just trying to do the best job with the tools we have. And no, I'm not some conservative drone who thinks we need to throw money at the problem. There is plenty of money in the DOD, we just spend it on useless programs and worthless building construction. As a matter of fact, I'm a registered Democrat (probably the first officer in US history to actually admit that). So please, if you have to post some guy who hasn't a clue as to what's really going on, go to the source. Find some guy in uniform and ask him questions. We don't bite, I promise. Well, enough of that, back to torturing innocent Muslims-Americans and strafing orphanages. (One small comment on this, which I've already shared with this writer by email: I very much doubt that Congressman Kucinich has any disagreement with the troops themselves, as much as with the generals and politicians who lead them.)
A most amazing sight In an interview with a Canadian journalist last week last week (as reported in the New York Post), Prozac Nation author Elizabeth Wurzel described the collapse of the World Trade Center as "a most amazing sight in terms of sheer elegance. It fell like water. It just slid like a turtleneck going over someone's head. It was just beautiful." Despite numerous frantic phone calls to her Greenwich Street apartment, not far from the World Trade Center, the emotionally stunted scribe couldn't be bothered to get out of bed until the second plane crashed, reports the Toronto Globe and Mail. When she finally did drag herself to a window and saw the towers collapse, Wurtzel says, "I had not the slightest emotional reaction. I thought, 'This is a really strange art project.' " Cartoonist Jim Treacher brought this to my attention with his piece on the topic, which is either a parody of, or an homage to, the Get Your War On guy. (Update: Jim demurs at being labeled a "cartoonist." Just to set the record straight, he prefers to be known as a "3rd-hand-clip-art-typer-over.")
-------------------- Wednesday, February 27, 2002
Now for something completely different These are actual Halloween costumes from the eighties, which I found on this page at RetroCrush , an amazing online archive of pop culture weirdness. (Be warned--you can spend hours there if you're not careful.) Imagine the poor kids who had to go trick-or-treating in these things. (Heck, maybe you were one of them...)   
Hangman a-comin' Reader David Cohen forwards this link from Salon, which I'm embarassed to say I missed when it was first posted. Missouri is determined to execute Joseph Amrine for murder even though every prosecution witness and the jury foreman now say he's innocent and new witnesses point to another man. Why? A federal law says the evidence came in too late... To put my opposition to the death penalty in the simplest possible terms, we are all human, and prone to error. Too many people on death row have been exonerated by DNA evidence and released to ever believe that every single person facing this most ultimate of penalties is guilty beyond question. The possibility of executing a single person in error is simply too great a price to pay, and the complicity of such an error must surely be shared by all of us, as citizens of this democracy. And this may be the worst of all worst-case scenarios: new evidence has come to light, yet an apparently innocent man wrongly accused of a jailhouse slayng is likely to be executed anyway-- because his appeals have been exhausted. You've all heard the horror stories about vicious criminals who get off on technicalities--well, here's the flip side of that coin--an innocent man about to be executed on a technicality. (And just to head off the argument I can already hear some of you composing--he's not an innocent man, he was in jail!--Amrine was serving a short sentence for check kiting, which to the best of my knowledge is not a capital offense.) The way Amrine's lead appellate attorney, Sean O'Brien, describes his client's legal odyssey might be darkly comic, if a man's life wasn't at stake. When the first two of the prosecution's three witnesses recanted their testimony, the federal judge hearing Amrine's appeal, Fernando Gaitan Jr., ruled that they weren't credible, because the third witness had not disavowed his testimony that Amrine was the killer. But later, after that third witness came forward to say that he too had lied at the trial, the same Judge Gaitan ruled that this recantation was not credible. The judge went on to muse that none of those recanting could really be believed because they were all prison inmates, and thus inherently not believable -- reasoning that of course could have been used to dismiss their earlier testimony against Amrine, but wasn't. Gaitan also ruled that he didn't need to reconsider the earlier recantations, in light of the third one, because he had already considered and rejected them, so they were no longer "new." The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, after describing Gaitan's rulings in a May 5, 2000, editorial headed "Executing Without Justice," asked rhetorically, "Should the state execute a person when no evidence is left standing against him?" But that appears to be exactly what Missouri is set to do. Amrine, who was featured in controversial Benetton ads spotlighting death-row prisoners in 2000, could be executed as soon as the governor signs off on a state Supreme Court death warrant, which could happen at any time. If you want to weigh in on this issue, Governor Bob Holden's office can be contacted by email here, or by phone, fax or snail here: Governor's Office In Jefferson City -------------------- Tuesday, February 26, 2002
Profiles in Courage From a speech by Dennis Kucinich, a Democratic Congressman from Cleveland, Ohio (and the only politician I've ever met who was excited to meet me--obviously a man of impeccable taste). Let us pray that our country will stop this war. "To promote the common defense" is one of the formational principles of America. Our Congress gave the President the ability to respond to the tragedy of September the Eleventh. We licensed a response to those who helped bring the terror of September the Eleventh. But we the people and our elected representatives must reserve the right to measure the response, to proportion the response, to challenge the response, and to correct the response. Because we did not authorize the invasion of Iraq. Yet we are upon the threshold of a permanent war economy. The President has requested a $45.6 billion increase in military spending. All defense-related programs will cost close to $400 billion. Consider that the Department of Defense has never passed an independent audit. Consider that the Inspector General has notified Congress that the Pentagon cannot properly account for $1.2 trillion in transactions. Consider that in recent years the Dept. of Defense could not match $22 billion worth of expenditures to the items it purchased, wrote off, as lost, billions of dollars worth of in-transit inventory and stored nearly $30 billion worth of spare parts it did not need. Yet the defense budget grows with more money for weapons systems to fight a cold war which ended, weapon systems in search of new enemies to create new wars. This has nothing to do with fighting terror. This has everything to do with fueling a military industrial machine with the treasure of our nation, risking the future of our nation, risking democracy itself with the militarization of thought which follows the militarization of the budget. The entire speech can be read here. Dennis Kucinich's home page can be found here. -------------------- Monday, February 25, 2002
Insidious liberal bias Andrew Sullivan seems to see evidence of it in the Times' mention of me in the blogging article. I think it's more likely that I have a recognizable name, and have been featured as one of Blogger's "Blogs of Note" this month. But, whatever. If you're not familiar with Andrew's site, you should check it out--I don't agree with much that is said there, but it is comprehensive, well written and always provocative.
Your wish, the sequel Many of you have asked for a "source" for the Coulter quote in today's cartoon. Sources! Bah! We don't need no steenking sources! Oh, all right, but don't forget to use those search engines once in awhile, okay? The quote was all over the net last week after Ms. Coulter gave a speech at something called the Conservative Political Action Conference. She acknowledged its validity a few days later on Fox News. Here's a column by Jay Bookman of the Atlanta Journal Constitution on the same topic.
Monday, Monday There's an article in the business section of today's New York Times about blogs, in which I am quoted (low in the article), because I have after all been keeping a blog for at least a month now. Because it is the business section, the focus of the article is, well, business. And because I am not so foolish as to pass up an opportunity to introduce new readers to my work, I tried in all seriousness to think of it on this level, and to answer the reporter's questions appropriately. But just to be clear: I do not approach this blog as some sort of marketing tool. That's not why I started it up. I didn't realize I was getting in on the Next Big Internet Fad. I wasn't trying to chase the zeitgeist. It's a labor of love, pure and simple. I just wanted a place to post your email, post links to whatever oddities or outrages might happen to catch my eye, and generally ramble on about things that interest or trouble me. And of course, a place to post pictures of my dog. But that goes without saying. I mean, isn't that the whole point of the internet? So you can post pictures of your dog? * * * If you read French, there's also an article in the online version of Le Monde on this whole blogging craze. First hula hoops, now this. What're these kids going to get into next? I am mentioned in this one as well, because, um, you know, I've been doing this. For a month. * * * Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to cop an attitude and I don't mean to sound ungrateful to these reporters. I just feel a little silly about the whole thing. A lot of people have been blogging for a lot longer than I have. I'm the newbie, the guy who TYPES IN ALL CAPS and doesn't bother to read the faq. And I know it. * * * Switching gears now: some of you took issue with a certain line in this morning's cartoon about Gore voters and liberalism. Okay. So maybe the sarcasm didn't drip from that panel quite as heavily as I might have wished, or perhaps I was trying to squeeze too many thoughts into too small a space. I was trying to say that someone who was enough of a crazed left-winger to vote for Al Gore--which is to say, not very crazed or left-wing at all--is one step away from treason, as far as Ann Coulter is concerned. That's all. But I do believe that the majority of voters in this country fall somewhere along the spectrum from moderate Democrat to left-wing radical, though that's such a broad spectrum, it probably renders the statement meaningless. -------------------- Sunday, February 24, 2002
Bipartisan scandal, my ass Ran across this while catching up with the latest from Media Whores Online: While the Bush administration was drafting its national energy policy, a leading lobbyist for Enron Corp. was plotting strategy to turn the plan into a political weapon against Democrats, according to a newly obtained memo. Edward Gillespie, who parlayed his close ties to the Bush White House into a lucrative contract representing the energy giant, warned that the administration faced "a classic
Dancing Santa joins the war effort  This is "American Patriot," who, according to the box he came in, can "sway his body with 'sax' music, standing or squatting." I saw him at a little Chinese import place near my subway stop, and of course bought him immediately. And what a show he provides. The picture just doesn't do it justice. You push the little red button, and an Asian-sounding voice declares heartily, "God Bless...AMERICA!" And American Patriot does in fact start swaying and squatting, waving the flag he holds, in time to the music. It's Dancing Santa, with more articulation and a patriotic theme, courtesy of some unknown Chinese manufacturer. My dog finds the whole thing very disturbing.  
If you kids keep squabbling, I'm going to turn this car around Just kidding. But the debate over inalienable rights, etc., continues, with these thoughts from Nick Sweeney: Dean's right to say that Jefferson et al got their ideas from Locke about 'inalienable rights', but the theory of inalienable rights is itself an ideological creation -- we're always subject to government, so any theory on how government comes about is always a back-reference, an extrapolation designed to justify the existence of the status quo, whether presented as a And Dean's actually a little wrong when he talks about Locke's theory of government 'protecting the freedom they naturally possess'. In fact, Locke says that government is about *giving up* total autonomous (libertarian) freedom in order to guarantee 'life, liberty and property' within the framework of the commonwealth. And it's that framing which is transformative, because human rights *don't exist* in hostile climates, just as plants don't grow on the moon. --------------------
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