The high gas prices prove the perfect bits of darkness in the cloudy mirror that that is our media. They've spent their lifetimes polluting the planet and making huge profits doing it. Now they want the very few bits of earth we've tries to set aside. What is more mysterious is why our media can't determine better what belongs in mainstream discourse and what does not. Just because a group maintains a noisy and extended hue and cry does not mean the matter merits serious attention. Yet the extended noise from business leaders and a bellicose right wing get attention for no other reason than their decibel level. Their logic is missing. I think if the flat earth people were super rich and super numbered and superloud, we would watch serious and protracted discussions of navigation and how the sun comes up. At this point in our American life, we don't so much have an invisible hand in the market place as invisible hands behinds the clouds in the mirror. And these hands are ringed and gloved. And super rich.
Sunday, July 13, 2008
The hand that rocks the market place
You have to hand it to the big energy men. High gas prices gives 'em adequate pretense to present and argue strenuously for the complete non sequitur that we should invade our coastline and national parks to drill for oil. Never mind that drilling in Alaska, even if it started tomorrow, would not change the price of gas. Never mind that they have tons of oil fields they haven't yet explored. Never mind that it is speculation that has driven up gas prices--and the incredibly self serving lifestyle of these very same big energy men.
Monday, July 7, 2008
Friday, June 27, 2008
There They Go Again!
Have they no shame? A flip through Fox News shows Fred Barnes, sleaseball extraordinaire, raving. The focus of his ire is the Dems. The Dems, huffs Barnes, won't let the legislature vote! They won't even let it vote! That's all the Republicans want. A vote. And the Dems, tyrants clearly in their brief time as majority party, are denying them that. Get it? All the Republicans want is democracy.
WRONG. The Republicans, as exemplified by Barnes, remain crass, unsportsmanlike, and, if corrupting the honest flow of information in a democracy is criminally disingenuous, criminally disingenuous. While the country struggles, Barnes and his buddies go about their business of introducing side issues and red herrings to keep the Reps from unseemly display of how they again and again support the oil lobby instead of their constituents. Barnes huffing and haranging about one of these particularly pink if not overtly red herrings keeps the nation's attention off its real business. Which is what? $4.00 a gallon gas and oil company profits busting through newly raised roofs. That's what.
Now the Dems, god bless their benighted souls, have had meaningful testimony on this matter. The testimony--from oil reps among others--has indicated that there is:
a) investment in oil by hedge funders as the dollar has collapsed thus driving up the price.
b) speculation run rampant.
c) increased demand from China and India.
If the cost of oil followed some kind of financial investment/profit margin formula, then it would cost less than $100 a gallon and maybe as little as $60 a gallon.
What do our disingenuous, not to say lying Republications do? They team up with the oil companies to yank the discourse away from real issues into the sidelight issue drilling on the small bits of land the government has set aside in the interest of the environment. They want the wildlife refuge in Alaska which they persist in calling "anwar" so presumably people will forget what their acronym stands for, and they want more land along the U.S. coast.
Never mind that they, according to their own testimony, own tons of land on which they are not drilling or that the oil under the land they want now will take at least 10 years to bring to market, or that refinery capacity will not change. Never mind that if they began destroying the envirnoment in their quest for profit tomorrow, the price of oil would not change.
Twist Twist Twist. Pick a slender truth from a complex issue, and twist it to serve a slender sliver of super rich people. This then becomes the issue that dominate our discourse.
Fred Barnes is a nothing, a blowhard who rips and runs and needs a bath. But the Republicans should be ashamed for betraying their constituents and the American people.
WRONG. The Republicans, as exemplified by Barnes, remain crass, unsportsmanlike, and, if corrupting the honest flow of information in a democracy is criminally disingenuous, criminally disingenuous. While the country struggles, Barnes and his buddies go about their business of introducing side issues and red herrings to keep the Reps from unseemly display of how they again and again support the oil lobby instead of their constituents. Barnes huffing and haranging about one of these particularly pink if not overtly red herrings keeps the nation's attention off its real business. Which is what? $4.00 a gallon gas and oil company profits busting through newly raised roofs. That's what.
Now the Dems, god bless their benighted souls, have had meaningful testimony on this matter. The testimony--from oil reps among others--has indicated that there is:
a) investment in oil by hedge funders as the dollar has collapsed thus driving up the price.
b) speculation run rampant.
c) increased demand from China and India.
If the cost of oil followed some kind of financial investment/profit margin formula, then it would cost less than $100 a gallon and maybe as little as $60 a gallon.
What do our disingenuous, not to say lying Republications do? They team up with the oil companies to yank the discourse away from real issues into the sidelight issue drilling on the small bits of land the government has set aside in the interest of the environment. They want the wildlife refuge in Alaska which they persist in calling "anwar" so presumably people will forget what their acronym stands for, and they want more land along the U.S. coast.
Never mind that they, according to their own testimony, own tons of land on which they are not drilling or that the oil under the land they want now will take at least 10 years to bring to market, or that refinery capacity will not change. Never mind that if they began destroying the envirnoment in their quest for profit tomorrow, the price of oil would not change.
Twist Twist Twist. Pick a slender truth from a complex issue, and twist it to serve a slender sliver of super rich people. This then becomes the issue that dominate our discourse.
Fred Barnes is a nothing, a blowhard who rips and runs and needs a bath. But the Republicans should be ashamed for betraying their constituents and the American people.
The Great O-What-if-Bama
Wednesday night, we strivers and strugglers with our water and our wine and tuna fell to discussion the gobal tragedy that is Africa. Darfur. Zimbawe. Niger. Ruanda. Kenya. Sierra Leone. The countries of the continent where humanity began is not getting it together. In fact it is going down. In flames.
One woman had taught in African countries for 15 years. She left for the last time when gunfire was exchanged between embassy and insurgents while she huddled away from the windows of her home which was located between them on the street. She refused to get under the bed as her husband suggested. She knew that if they fell into the clutches of the rebels, she wouldn't just be killed like her husband. They would rape her first. Better to be meet your fate standing.
Then someone wondered out loud--in a voice so tentative that it didn't qualify as suggesting--if a different US government would make a difference. If the unilateral U.S. only-ers who have so far not only to managed to avoid jail were tossed out (if not into the garbage where they belong), and we had decent government? What if the policy of the strongest country in the world were...oh say the words softly in anticipation of being mocked...wise and compassionate and moral?
"I assume you mean with the election of Barack Obama?" asked one particularly clear eyed conversant.
"Yeah," the tentative talker said. "Yeah, I do..."
The tenor of the conversation changed. Frustration, despair, impatience faltered. It wasn't like long ago when a doctor named Mugabe became the first black leader of a country formerly called Rhodesia and its team of white females sang a triumphant zulu song at the Olympics and the whole world trembled at the possibility of rightness making an important in-road, of decency scoring a victory as white rule over the country that was called the breadbasket of Africa finally evaporated. We couldn't know then what would happened, and our hope raged.
Not Wednesday night. Wednesday night hope barely flickered. But hope was there. We're American after all by birth, residence, adoption, habit. don't know what difference Obama will make. We do know that we've been let down before.
Thursday was reminder of other leaders who let down their nation to the blood and tears of humanity. This time they were ours. David Addington, whose ignorance is only exceeded by his arrogance, and John Yoo, who like the Nazis seems to think that what's done on federal typewriters has no relation to the blood that flows in the fields, indulged in a bit of verbal play that Congress and the rest of the world called "hearings," and c-span carried their unforgivable pompous inanity into rooms around the world. Addington, who first denied knowing what it meant and then denied that he believed the congressmen knew what it meant, authored the "unitary theory" of the presidency that says that the pres can do anything anything anything anything ("torture a child?" he was asked; he wouldn't say no). Yoo wrote the famous memo that defined torture in such a way things like waterboarding, sleep deprivation, arm twisting, kicking, threats of death to loved ones, would be okay provided there was no permanent harm (huh???) I'm scribing here. Scribes don't comment even when the words they type make them sick. Both men were ugly and rude and made former President Clinton's "depends on what the meaning of "is" is..." circumluction sound friendly and funny.
My dear friend says it isn't enough to banish these Addington, Yoo and the junta that is the W's administration. It isn't even enough to jail them, she says. Hell. Maybe that's enough. If not all eternity at least the next 200 years. My friend is right.
The Obama may not be enough to undo the destruction that men like these have effected. I can't sing no zulu victory song. But hope is creeping in. O-What-i-Obama?
I want my country back.
One woman had taught in African countries for 15 years. She left for the last time when gunfire was exchanged between embassy and insurgents while she huddled away from the windows of her home which was located between them on the street. She refused to get under the bed as her husband suggested. She knew that if they fell into the clutches of the rebels, she wouldn't just be killed like her husband. They would rape her first. Better to be meet your fate standing.
Then someone wondered out loud--in a voice so tentative that it didn't qualify as suggesting--if a different US government would make a difference. If the unilateral U.S. only-ers who have so far not only to managed to avoid jail were tossed out (if not into the garbage where they belong), and we had decent government? What if the policy of the strongest country in the world were...oh say the words softly in anticipation of being mocked...wise and compassionate and moral?
"I assume you mean with the election of Barack Obama?" asked one particularly clear eyed conversant.
"Yeah," the tentative talker said. "Yeah, I do..."
The tenor of the conversation changed. Frustration, despair, impatience faltered. It wasn't like long ago when a doctor named Mugabe became the first black leader of a country formerly called Rhodesia and its team of white females sang a triumphant zulu song at the Olympics and the whole world trembled at the possibility of rightness making an important in-road, of decency scoring a victory as white rule over the country that was called the breadbasket of Africa finally evaporated. We couldn't know then what would happened, and our hope raged.
Not Wednesday night. Wednesday night hope barely flickered. But hope was there. We're American after all by birth, residence, adoption, habit. don't know what difference Obama will make. We do know that we've been let down before.
Thursday was reminder of other leaders who let down their nation to the blood and tears of humanity. This time they were ours. David Addington, whose ignorance is only exceeded by his arrogance, and John Yoo, who like the Nazis seems to think that what's done on federal typewriters has no relation to the blood that flows in the fields, indulged in a bit of verbal play that Congress and the rest of the world called "hearings," and c-span carried their unforgivable pompous inanity into rooms around the world. Addington, who first denied knowing what it meant and then denied that he believed the congressmen knew what it meant, authored the "unitary theory" of the presidency that says that the pres can do anything anything anything anything ("torture a child?" he was asked; he wouldn't say no). Yoo wrote the famous memo that defined torture in such a way things like waterboarding, sleep deprivation, arm twisting, kicking, threats of death to loved ones, would be okay provided there was no permanent harm (huh???) I'm scribing here. Scribes don't comment even when the words they type make them sick. Both men were ugly and rude and made former President Clinton's "depends on what the meaning of "is" is..." circumluction sound friendly and funny.
My dear friend says it isn't enough to banish these Addington, Yoo and the junta that is the W's administration. It isn't even enough to jail them, she says. Hell. Maybe that's enough. If not all eternity at least the next 200 years. My friend is right.
The Obama may not be enough to undo the destruction that men like these have effected. I can't sing no zulu victory song. But hope is creeping in. O-What-i-Obama?
I want my country back.
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Obama --Hope and the Presidency
An African American stranger who saw my Obama sign told me that he was "scared" by Obama. He was so used to being disappointed. He was so used to knowing more in his gut and in his mind than those who make the most important decisions that have sculpted the trajectory of his life and that of his family. He was so used to writing off--and being able to write off--the folks who govern our country as lucky imbeciles. Alienation and dissatisfaction were such long time companions, they were almost his friends.
And he was afraid that his hope in Obama would be proved wrong. He was afraid that, as Stephen Colbert said, Obama's call for change would be significant because it would mean no change at all. Obama would talk the talk-and walk like all the rest.
I share his fear. Who wants to hope and be let down? Still I believe (what an astounding concept--that first person singular noun and that first person singular verb) we have to indulge our hope. We even have to bet on it. Obama himself addressed this issue in a book he called "the audacity of hope."
It is a brave thing to hope. It is a hurting thing.
The alternative is to accept that America continues to lead our world to destruction on scales large and small, needless, petty, overwhelming, tedious, and bloody. The alternative is to believe greed, self interest, and material gain are the only yardsticks by which we measure success. The alternative is to believe that the Reaganites are right.
So I'm crossing my fingers. I'm hurting--but I'm hoping.
And he was afraid that his hope in Obama would be proved wrong. He was afraid that, as Stephen Colbert said, Obama's call for change would be significant because it would mean no change at all. Obama would talk the talk-and walk like all the rest.
I share his fear. Who wants to hope and be let down? Still I believe (what an astounding concept--that first person singular noun and that first person singular verb) we have to indulge our hope. We even have to bet on it. Obama himself addressed this issue in a book he called "the audacity of hope."
It is a brave thing to hope. It is a hurting thing.
The alternative is to accept that America continues to lead our world to destruction on scales large and small, needless, petty, overwhelming, tedious, and bloody. The alternative is to believe greed, self interest, and material gain are the only yardsticks by which we measure success. The alternative is to believe that the Reaganites are right.
So I'm crossing my fingers. I'm hurting--but I'm hoping.
Obama - Press Conference--Presidential
Okay I'm not political. I barely can keep on my own shoes, let alone worry about the yammerings that pass for politics in my country. Plus for the last 10 years--at least since the years of Ronald Reagan, that secret Darth Vader of nastiness and navel gazing--the politicians and the press have been so incredibly out to lunch, off the mark, full of excrement that I've not been able to stomach too much extended watching of anything. The Republicans waved a magic wand and produced demons that were fake though genuinely scary. And the Democrats. Lord how the Democrats let themselves, their party, and the country down, and again and again and again. In the name of what? Compromise? Fear of looking "non patriotic?" Impotence before a discourse that was crafted by the right and the righter-than-thou?
But this guy. Oh lord. This guy has raised my hopes. This guy makes me ashamed that it has taken so long to rise up against the radical representatives of very rich people that run our country. Partly because things have gotten so bad, Barack Obama may be a gift to America on the level of Abraham Lincoln and George Washington. And this press conference shows he responds with the grace of John Kennedy. My god, after 8 years of Little Lord WonterWoy, any person who speaks in declarative sentences is enough to catch one's attention. But Obama shows a burning intelligence and a general willingness to stand up for what he believes is right. Zimbabwe? He didn't just memorize 16 words at a pre-press conference briefing. He knows the names of the politicians. He knows the stances of the Europeans. He's scathing in his evaluation of Mugabe. Socrates says when we see the truth, we know it. And I feel like with Barack Obama, I'm seeing if not "the truth," then an honest and well articulated perspective.
Obama, this young man fielding questions of import with compassion, grace, and shining intelligence at his press conference, didn't smile at all. He was serious, even somber. After a year or so in office. When he makes some changes--or as his campaign crafters might specify--after he enables America to make some changes, he may smile again.
I've seen him smile, and it is great when it comes--and I'm confident it will come again. And when it does, I'll remember this, just like I remember the day I went to hear him speak. And I'll remember how I felt it was a trial press conference for an Obama presidency--and he handled it beautifully.
But this guy. Oh lord. This guy has raised my hopes. This guy makes me ashamed that it has taken so long to rise up against the radical representatives of very rich people that run our country. Partly because things have gotten so bad, Barack Obama may be a gift to America on the level of Abraham Lincoln and George Washington. And this press conference shows he responds with the grace of John Kennedy. My god, after 8 years of Little Lord WonterWoy, any person who speaks in declarative sentences is enough to catch one's attention. But Obama shows a burning intelligence and a general willingness to stand up for what he believes is right. Zimbabwe? He didn't just memorize 16 words at a pre-press conference briefing. He knows the names of the politicians. He knows the stances of the Europeans. He's scathing in his evaluation of Mugabe. Socrates says when we see the truth, we know it. And I feel like with Barack Obama, I'm seeing if not "the truth," then an honest and well articulated perspective.
Obama, this young man fielding questions of import with compassion, grace, and shining intelligence at his press conference, didn't smile at all. He was serious, even somber. After a year or so in office. When he makes some changes--or as his campaign crafters might specify--after he enables America to make some changes, he may smile again.
I've seen him smile, and it is great when it comes--and I'm confident it will come again. And when it does, I'll remember this, just like I remember the day I went to hear him speak. And I'll remember how I felt it was a trial press conference for an Obama presidency--and he handled it beautifully.
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