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Thoughts on culture, politics, music and stuff by Eric Olsen, Marty Thau and Mike Crooker, who are among other things, producers.
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Saturday, February 23, 2002
Tour O the Sink I will get caught up with the Tour O the Blogs tomorrow as right now I have to go fix the kitchen sink. In Defense of the Raj? Autocracy has been getting some interesting support lately. Robert Kaplan, author of Warrior Politics, the book currently under discussion in Andrew Sullivan's book club, states in response to reader’s questions, that non-democratic regimes have done a good job
Tunisia's dictator Zine elabdin Ben-Ali has increased the size of the middle class from around 6 percent to 50 percent while fostering stability with little repression. Jordan's mixed regime is far healthier for the country than if fundamentalists were to rule in an unfettered democracy.” Also, in today’s NY Times writer Michael Massing notes that “a growing number of experts caution against introducing too much democracy too soon in failed states,” because elections are a nonessential luxury that can “divert attention from providing more immediate basic services essential to making people's day-to-day lives more livable,” and lead to a greater likelihood of violence in countries that are still heavily armed, like Afghanistan. In failed states, many experts are now recommending “a more intrusive form of intervention” that establishes security as the bedrock upon which democracy can then be built. This reinforces my view that we cannot abandon Afghanistan to warlords and chaos after clearing out the Taliban, who an exhausted people weakly welcomed to power six years ago as an antidote to catastrophic chaos and conflict between warlords. The numbers tell the tale: 60,000 peacekeepers were initially sent to Bosnia, where the peace has been largely kept; only 3,500 have been sent to Afghanistan, a country 12 times as large, and the cycle of chaotic factionalism seems to have already begun again. The people of Afghanistan have suffered enough; until old habits are broken they must be saved from themselves. The number of peacekeepers must be increased by at least a magnitude of ten until a sense of shared security can mitigate animosities and the habit of violent resolution. Call it “paternalism,” call it “colonialism,” call it whatever you like. Just do it. Of Time and Space Perception isn’t everything, but it’s a lot. As a result of increased scrutiny of passports, birth certificates, and visa applications in the wake of September 11 and last year’s Danny Almonte Little League scandal, at least 20 baseball players, most from the Dominican Republic, have aged in the offseason. The Indian’s ace Bartolo Colon suddenly went from 26 to 28, and while everyone involved is downplaying the ramifications, the difference of one, two, even four years (in the case of Reds right-hander Luis Pineda) can be enormous for the projection of a player’s career, especially for that most important of all statistics: salary. As baseball stat guru Bill James has discovered, “Ballplayers, as a group, reach their peak value much earlier and decline much more rapidly than people believe.” A year or two can make a huge difference in what can be statistically expected of a player throughout the rest of his career, and as a result, the length and value of contract he is offered. Using James’ "favorite toy" projection tool, a 20-year-old player can be expected to play 12 more years, 25=9 more years, 30=6 more years, 35=3 more years. Would you offer a longer contract to a star 26-year-old, or a star 28-year-old? In addition, pitchers (on average) peak somewhere between 28-30, so the difference between 26 and 28 is a player with two more years of “upside” and a player who isn’t expected to get much better. Think about that. None of this necessarily has any bearing on what Colon actually does or has done - he’s still the same (fat and getting fatter) guy in the uniform, but it makes a big difference in our impression of him, and perhaps, his impression of himself. As Yogi Berra said, ”Baseball is 90% mental, the other half is physical.” One’s impression of oneself as “youthful and on the way up” is very different from “mature and in the peak of my career.” Since Colon - who has all of the tools necessary to be a superstar - has exhibited wandering concentration from time to time, this new vision of himself may actually help. Time will tell. In an unrelated story connected only by the theme of perception, Space.com and the SETI Institute conducted an online survey as to the perceived altruism of aliens should they be found. In a result that should surprise no one, they found their most socially "alienated" respondents believed that aliens would be much more hostile than did those respondents who are least socially alienated. If you think the world sucks, it is likely you think aliens will suck as well. This has practical implications if at some point SETI does pick up some sign of nonterrestrial intelligent life in the universe. Do we respond? Of course if we think they will be jolly little ET-types, spreading good will and high technology. No, if we think of them as predatory monsters bent on stealing our women and eating our spleens. Perception counts. Of course, if you’re interested in signing a Dominican alien, be sure to check his birth certificate. Friday, February 22, 2002
Gold or Fold? I am a person plagued with imperfections. I am not sad, nor full of self-pity (not usually anyway). I try to be grateful every day for the blessings God has given me, however small: I didn't spill my coffee on myself, I was only mildly impatient with my daughter today, I still have a job. The little things. So when I see someone who has been graced with more than her share of blessings and is completely ungrateful, I find it...well...grating. I excitedly awaited the Women's Figure Skating finals last night. With each skater I said a silent prayer that they would do their best and skate with perfection. Some did better than others. My secret hope was for Sasha Cohen to win. She seemed so graceful and confident in her short program, far better than third in my opinion. Michelle Kwan, who was certainly favored to win gold, did well, but I wasn't overwhelmed with her performance. Slutskaya seemed so heavy and thick in her program that I was sure it was between Kwan and Cohen. Hughes, the youngest of the four, didn't even enter my mind as a contender. But as the drama unfolded, it was crystal clear that Hughes skated better than anyone else. Period, end of discussion. Now, less than 24 hours later, Russian officials filed a formal protest of the women's Olympic figure skating final, saying silver medalist Irina Slutskaya should get her own gold medal because of biased judging. Obviously they were not witness to the entire evenings performances. Also, it's noteworthy to mention that Slutskaya's reaction is completely indicative of her abilities: coarse, rough and without graciousness. Kwan was clearly devastated by the results, but had to look no further than herself for the reasons of her failure. That is class. My heart went out to all who did their best and fell short of their goal. For most the goal was to compete well at the Olympic level, clearly for others it was gold or nothing at all. Of all the scandals I have seen surrounding the 2002 Olympics, this is the most ridiculous: equating anything less than gold with failure. The silver and bronze medals have been relegated to insults. Perhaps we should do away with silver and bronze medals completely, since anything less than gold is worthless. Whatever happened to doing your best and having fun? Winning is great, but there can only be one winner. What's to become of the rest of us? I think I have one more thing to be grateful of, I have perfected being imperfect. Yeah for me! Dawn Olsen Cool Tunes On this week's show, great new tunes, hot soundtrax, concert previews, and the posthumous return of Josh Clayton-Felt. We preview (Cleveland area) concerts by Danish horror-billy trio Nekromantix, veteran hard core punks Sick of It All with great young emo band Thursday, venerable alt-retro aces the Fleshtones (featured on Marty’s Songs of the Naked City compilation), excellent L.A. retro-drone from the Warlocks, Rock and Roll Hall of Famer and soul legend Sam Moore (Sam and Dave), Louisiana lightning from Buckwheat Zydeco, and house legend Carl Cox - that's a week. Cool Tunes is a radio show in a magazine format Saturday nights at 10pm on WAPS, "The Summit," in Akron, Ohio, and available via the Internet right here. Musically it is among the widest-ranging 2 hours in the country: modern rock, punk, electronica, jazz, reggae and ska, roots rock, Americana, blues, world, funk, hip hop, avant garde, etc. - if it's cool I play it. This week’s feature is the bittersweet coda to Josh Clayton-Felt’s recording career, Spirit Touches Ground. The bitter part of the story comes from the fact that Clayton-Felt died of cancer at the age of just 32 in 2000. The sweet part is the rootsy, warm rock found on the album (you can listen to whole CD here). Though the name may be only vaguely familiar, Clayton-Felt’s voice and songwriting came to prominence in the early ‘90s with his L.A.-based band School of Fish. Clayton-Felt’s high, penetrating voice and magic realist lyrics combined with Michael Ward’s (now of the Wallflowers) massive wall-of-chords guitar work to make their self-titled debut album a neo-psychedelic classic in 1991. Best-known is the buzzing iconic odyssey song “Three Strange Days,” but other standouts include the stomping “King of the Dollar,” moderate, insistent “Speechless,” the melancholia and backbeat of “Rose Colored Glasses,” and best of all, the hook-crazy, poignant study of self-deception, “Wrong.” The band’s second album, Human Cannonball, though still fine, was less immediate and got lost in the flood of grunge two years later. Clayton-Felt’s first solo album, Inarticulate Nature Boy, on A&M was a lighter, funky departure and confused School of Fish fans in 1996. He got caught up in the record industry turmoil of the late-’90s, had a finished record shelved, then was dropped by A&M. Clayton-Felt, originally from Boston, worked on Spirit for three years prior to his death. The album highlights his persuasive humanity, gift for mainline rock singing and songwriting (from a magical land where John Fogerty, Billy Squier and Jeff Buckley can sing and play together) and a newfound, relaxed maturity. “Building Atlantis” bounces along on a classic acoustic and electric guitar progression and memory-lodging melody (I kept humming it in my sleep last night), “Diamond In Your Heart” is hard-edged power pop from Squier-land, “Too Cool For This World” is a touching, delicate ballad, “Kid On the Train” and the title track bring back some of the funky groove of his first solo album, and “Dragonfly” is an eerie, tom-tom driven rumination on spiritual transcendence. “Building Atlantis” and School of Fish’s “Wrong” are featured in this week’s Cool Tunes. September 11 Continues I am sickened, horrified, and enraged by the killing of WSJ reporter Daniel Pearl. I pray for him, his wife and unborn child. If, in fact, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz is right that Americans "are beginning to act as if the threat from terrorism is over,” it is my most fervent hope that this ritualistic, subhuman act by Pakastani Islamic radicals likely aligned with al Qaeda, snaps us out of it with prejudice. The icy, calculated, video-taped cruelty of this act should reassert the reality of September 11, and the threat that hangs over our every breath, to the forefront of every brain and arrest our wandering attention. Perhaps we need a refresher in the details of the events of September 11, where 3,000 Daniel Pearls were taken from us. This is not in the past - September 11 is occurring every day for the people who lost fathers, mothers, sons, daughters, husbands, wives, friends, family, and those injured in the attacks. In a sense, September 11 hasn’t even happened yet for the newborn and unborn whose fathers (now including Daniel Pearl) were taken from them without a single glimpse or touch. Below is a recap of the events of 9/11, taken from the forthcoming America.com: On September 11. We cannot forget, we cannot become complacent.
Over 3,000 souls - including hundreds of rescue workers - from over 80 nations were lost, the preponderance literally disintegrated before a horrified, transfixed TV audience’s gaze. The 110 story twin towers of the World Trade Center, New York’s tallest buildings and the workplace of over 40,000 people, were impaled from the air and fatally injected with spite and hellfire jet fuel: American Airlines flight 11, scheduled Boston to Los Angeles carrying 92 people, struck north tower floors 95-102 at 8:48 a.m.; United Airlines flight 175, scheduled Boston to Los Angeles carrying 65, struck south tower floors 86-92 at 9:03 a.m. The inferno created by the raging jet fuel weakened the steel girders causing first the south (9:50 a.m.), then the north (10:29 a.m.) towers to crumble pathetically upon themselves generating great toxic tsunamis of gray ash and debris. A third building, 7 World Trade Center, collapsed in sympathy later that afternoon; there was extensive damage from the deluge of debris to all buildings surrounding the WTC complex. The horrifying visions of the planes embedding themselves in the buildings, the effulgence of flames springing from the wounds, and the subsequent implosion of the buildings were rerun on TV over and over before billions of eyes, burning themselves indelibly into the collective retina, focusing attention on one time and place as perhaps never before in world history. The redoubtable command center of American military might, Washington’s geometrically named Pentagon, was struck by another airliner-turned-missile - American Airlines flight 77, scheduled Washington to Los Angeles carrying 64, struck at 9:43 a.m. - killing almost 200 more. A fourth plane, presumably headed for another Washington-area governmental target, slammed into the earth in rural southwestern Pennsylvania - United Airlines flight 93, scheduled Newark to San Francisco carrying 45, crashed at 10:10 a.m. - killing all aboard after passengers learned of the fates of the three other hijacked planes via cell phone, resolved to not become a fourth implement of untold destruction, and physically attacked the hijackers with the fateful last words of passenger Todd Beamer, “Okay, let’s roll,” trailing off into history. The nation came to a virtual halt, its inertia stalled in black despair and red alerts. The borders were sealed and all flights grounded; most governmental and many downtown high-rise buildings were shut down throughout the nation. In New York, Wall Street, the U.N., and lower Manhattan south of Canal St. were shut down and evacuated, bridges and tunnels were closed. After one, two, three, then four planes went down, the potential for destruction seemed limitless - no rumor too farfetched - our very national fabric flapping in the breeze, in danger of unraveling. The President, George W. Bush, visiting an elementary school in Sarasota, Fla. when informed of the crashes, was spirited away to U.S. Strategic Command at Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska, by way of Louisiana, in his capacity as Commander-in-Chief in time of military assault upon the nation. Though Bush’s (mandatory) peregrinations contributed somewhat to the day’s tone of open-ended trepidation, by early afternoon he had decisively set the course of action which the nation has followed ever since: stating firmly that the U.S. would “hunt down and punish” those responsible. The president cast the net more widely than it had ever been cast before with the fateful sentence, “We will make no distinction between terrorists who committed these acts and those who harbor them,” thus dooming at the Taliban - in the minimum - as aiders and abettors. Bush was back in Washington by 7 p.m.; by 7:30 Congress had declared its bipartisan support for the effort and was singing a rousing, if musically wobbly, version of “God Bless America” on the Capitol steps. At 8:30 Bush addressed the nation on television, quoting scripture (Psalm 23 - “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil for you are with me”) and talking tall: “Terrorist attacks can shake the foundations of our biggest buildings, but they cannot touch the foundation of America. These acts shattered steel, but they cannot dent the steel of American resolve.” Bulimia in the Jurassic? My brother Kirk, always on the prowl for news to digest, found this story. We hurl thanks at him. Sanity The following is a response to some of the ideas discussed on Tres Producers - your ideas are welcome as well... It is often said that we can understand why a person who has a hard and bad childhood turns into a hard or bad adult. It is also often said that we cannot understand why a person who has a hard and bad childhood doesn't grow into a hard or bad adult. I say that the person who has a hard and bad childhood and yet becomes a good and caring adult is simply an intelligent and pragmatic person. Look at the results. Is the bad and hard adult happy? It takes most of their energy to hate. They usually have no real friends. On the other hand the person who can forgive their unhappy (hard and bad) childhood is usually happier and much more adjusted. They are much more able to deal with all of the troubles life hands down and stay happy inside. I call that intelligent and pragmatic not unexpected or unusual. The death penalty. We hung onto slavery long after the rest of the world abandoned the practice. We abused the Native Americans long after we knew it to be wrong. We never honored a treaty with Native Americans. We don't need the death penalty. If we changed our laws and if we applied our rules without discrimination, If a life sentence meant a life sentence then we would not need the death penalty. If we did not allow plea bargains and if we start to look for justice not just for the criminal but for the victims of their crimes. If we didn't allow the lawyers to treat the law as a very complicated word game where the trick is to outwit the jury or the judge, or find a technicality. If the purpose of a trial was to find out the truth instead of trying to let the criminal go free. Then we wouldn't need a death sentence. I don't want to ask anyone to do something I wouldn't allow myself to do. That includes pulling the switch. We shouldn't need a death penalty and we need to change the law about insanity to “guilty by reason of insanity. “ Our government and our citizens expect the governments of other countries to be held to a high standard of human rights; but on the whole our citizens don't hold the citizens of other countries responsible for the actions of their governments. I suppose that is because we think the citizens of other countries have no control over what their governments do or what the current terrorist soldiers within those countries do. Many people in other countries think that we, the citizens of the US should be held culpable for the actions of our government and they are correct. We set that expectation up. We say we are the government and our government is us: of the people, by the people, and for the people. After all we elect the officials and we take note of what they do. We have the power to remove them from office. We have some of the strongest legislation in the world to protect people from governmental abuse of power. At least so far. We are in danger of loosing the battle for freedom as well as our expectation of being treated in a humane manner. We as citizens must protect our human rights or they will be taken from us. We must protect every persons human rights. The laws must be fair and they must apply to everyone not just U.S. citizens. If something is right it is right for every instance. In order to have a stable government we must have rules which most of us agree to abide by otherwise there is chaos and anarchy. There is no law which is strong enough to protect us or unite us if we don't respect them and honor them or if anyone is exempt from any of them. That is happening in the U.S. Our system of law has become a joke. A word game. When is a crime not a crime? If you are declared legally insane. What a joke. We need to simplify our laws and apply them without bias to every human who runs afoul of them. If there is a rule that we must pay social security then every person who works in the U. S. must pay social security. People who work for the government must not be exempt. How can we allow the people making the laws to be exempt from them? We have not been vigilant enough in protecting our rights. As ordinary citizens we need to take a more active roll in our governing. We need to accept the responsibility for what our government officials do. That is what is happening all over the world. Where there is war or terrorism going on it is almost always because there is no stable government. It is my contention that many times a government goes unstable because someone with power has no respect for other humans and is therefore free to create chaos. They gain the power buying weapons from so called stable nations. No government, not any government, is altruistic. Not even ours. The government does not have our best interests at heart. There may be individuals within the government who are benevolent but they are not many, they are not the most powerful nor do we always recognize them. Jimmy Carter may have been such a man and we judged him a milquetoast. There is a saying that fits. "Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely." As inhabitants of a free country it is our duty to protect the public when the misuse of power threatens. It is not that we shouldn't trust our officials we just need to be ever watchful and we need to take a more active role. Freedom and human rights don't just happen. It takes people with conscience to make it happen and then to protect it from those who would abuse others when they have the power. Because we have freedom we must teach the rest of the world what it means; but we must do it by example. We must not see ourselves as the parent who says "Don't do as I do, do as I say." That doesn't mean that we need to overlook terrorism or let the terrorists have free reign. We must hunt them down and when we find them we treat them the same as we would treat any other criminal. We follow our own rules. Just as we are not exempt neither are they; but they must get fair and equal treatment. We must not lower our standards and become like them. If we do they win and we lose. And when we do this then we can hold other countries citizens to our standards and make it stick. We need to stop looking at ourselves as though we are better, smarter, or more deserving of what the world has to offer. We need some humility and we need to look at other people as our equals. Not the same as us but equal in every way. When we do that then we can expect the ordinary citizens in other countries to take responsibility for their own freedom. The same way they look at us. We can work with them in attaining the goals they have for their own country. This is the way we handled Germany and Japan after the war. We didn't gloat or feel the need to incorporate them into our country or our beliefs. They had to pay the price for losing the war but we didn't continue to punish them. We helped them attain some sense of security within their borders and participate in the world commerce. Leslie Darling Thursday, February 21, 2002
In Response to "Death Penalty" Regarding the death penalty...................... Before I get to the core of my dissertation, I must comment on the A (American - make sure the Taliban have all necessary luxuries) C (Civil - let's throw another demonstration) L (Liberty - Don't let the prudish, anal retentives deny my freedom of thought) U (Union - an antiquated vehicle no longer necessary). The death penalty is controversial only because of the way we arrive at it. The implementation of the sentence is miniscule compared to the corrupt, putrid, exploitive joke we call the Judicial System. If the system worked in the impartial and morally upright way it was designed, then the outcome of the charge would be absolute and indubitable. If you want to talk about unfair application, let's examine not only the racial aspect, but also the monetary and political aspects as well. Our courts are full of devious, biased and greedy people, looking for sensationalism, a favor payback, or the Almighty Dollar and often the truth is obscured or absent. The judicial system has wreaked havoc on our penal system and until we correct this travesty, the end product will never be right. Unfortunately, we are responsible - through the actions of our government - for far more heinous actions than the death of a criminal that a jury of our peers has declared (often more than once) guilty. As for the glamorization of violence, I can't see the connection that when a person snuffs out the life of another in a most horrific way, we simply put the perpetrator to "sleep". Julie Meade The Legend of Ohno A quick note on the Olympics (I’ll do a wrap-up when it’s wrapped): last night was beautifully symmetrical poetic justice for budding legend Apolo Anton Ohno. With the same Australian judge presiding as had overseen Saturday’s demolition derby, Ohno seemed to outsmart himself in the 1,500, waiting until the last half lap of the race to attempt to pass leader South Korea’s Kim Dong-Sung, who appeared to successfully fend off Ohno’s bid and was first across the finish line. But no - proving that mysterious, Darwinian Short Track is a fair as well as brutal sport - the judge ruled that the Korean unfairly cut off Ohno in his pass attempt, and awarded the gold to the American. Reversal upon reversal! Ohno transcends fate, winning by losing after winning by losing, all with the eerie equanimity of someone with FORBIDDEN KNOWLEDGE and SPECIAL POWERS. Just how does he pass THE ENTIRE PACK in the blink of an eye, on one skate, with no apparent effort, and with NO APPARENT PHYSICAL SPACE IN WHICH TO PASS?? Just what were he and his father doing in the basement? Have they cracked open the door to WORMHOLES? Have they captured fissures in SPACE/TIME and released them onto the Short Track? Is Apolo Anton Ohno really the Cartoon Network’s DEXTER? (note the suspicious similarities). Regardless, Ohno rocks and has surpassed even the frenzied media hype. Now, can he find Osama bin Laden? Emptying Out The Bookmarks #5 Poppin Panther awww yeah. Peter Sellers breaks out the Def Jam catalogue baby... (requires Flash 5) Tour O the Blogs Today’s blog is James Taranto’s Best of the Web Today, as featured in the Wall Street Journal’s online Opinion Journal. Taranto somewhat ploddingly runs through a list of the top political stories of the day, from a rather predictable mainstream Republican viewpoint, but he is thorough and if nothing else the site is a good place to go to get a sense of the web zeitgeist for the day. Those who wish to get an early jump on the news day will be somewhat frustrated by the fact that Taranto doesn’t post until midafternoon, and then posts all at once, as opposed to posting stories one at a time throughout the day as do most blogs. Yesterday’s edition takes on 16 different items, most at some length, including the buzz about the Pentagon’s Office of Strategic Influence, known on the street as the “Office of Disinformation.” He downplays the media’s (specifically the perceived left-leaning New York Times) concern over the moral implications of purposeful deception and suggests that the issue is really an internal “bureaucratic turf war” yet to be resolved, concluding with Defense Sec. Rumsfeld’s dismissive, “the Pentagon will not lie to the public or the press,” though Rumsfeld conceded it might do things to deceive the enemy regarding military matters (which strikes me as a sensible thing to do). In Taranto’s next item regarding a PR campaign by Arafat to improve his image, he cites a Jerusalem Post story that claims Arafat didn’t write his own editorial as published in the New York Times on Feb. 3, which leads Taranto to the seemingly inevitable dig at the Times: “Hmm, which paper was it that was complaining about "false news stories" again?” In the subsequent items tied to various news stories he: blames the Clinton administration for September 11 (not mentioning that Bush had been in office for 8 months by then), quotes the quite conservative Washington Times as authoritative on disputed matters twice, takes off after fat lefty targets Elizabeth Wurtzel (Prozac Nation author who gave a truly idiotic interview to the Toronto Globe and Mail, including the memorable line in reaction to 9/11: “I just felt, like, everyone was overreacting. People were going on about it. That part really annoyed me."), Ralph Nader, Ted Rall, and offers a grudging retraction regarding a post from the previous day on Edward Said, all in his Stupidity Watch section. He concludes with a few “weird news”-type items including karaoke wars in Manila and the arrest of a Florida man with a persistent combustible pants problem. All of this is well and good, and his targets for the day seem to deserve his needling, but it is all rather rote, predictable and cookie cutter: “these publications lean left and are suspect at best, these publications lean Right (capitalization intended) and are above reproach, these people lean left (or are simply Democrats) and are fools, these people are Republican and are Good, and, people do the darndest things.” A good site to see what’s going on and how the Republicans feel about it, go elsewhere for balance or originality. Wednesday, February 20, 2002
Why Do you Think They Call it Dopamine? Fascinating NY Times article on how the brain creates internal models of regular activities - like driving home from work - and conducts those activites unconsciously most of the time. That’s why you might not even remember driving home from work, but if something breaks the routine: you’re forced to take a detour, or even take the same route at a different time of day, then everything seems different and the brain snaps to attention, alert to novelty. Our old friend dopamine is also involved in the process, which has a bearing on addiction, compulsive behavior, and attendance at sporting events. Now that’s an article. Emptying Out The Bookmarks #4 Portrait Of The Artist As A Young Dude Hey, I know that guy! or Didn't Eric Just Talk About This? Two For One day here at Tres Producers... Justice Injected? In my rhetorical frenzy over the death penalty, I neglected to mention that my own state of Ohio injected convicted killer John W. Byrd yesterday after the usual waltz of “last-ditch” appeal efforts failed to save his sorry ass. People say, “If you’re against the death penalty, does it make you sad when they execute someone?” If he/she is guilty, no, I am not sad to see him/her go. Good riddance and don’t let the door to hell hit you on the butt on the way in. But I am mortified if there is a chance that Byrd was innocent (that would not appear to be the case), and I am saddened by my own culpability as a member of a society that has debased itself by taking a life unnecessarily, by renewing its membership in the club of killers. Notice I didn’t say “murderers”: there is a stark difference between the state carrying out a societally-sanctioned punishment for the worst of crimes - whether I agree with it or not - and the original crime itself. We are not murderers when we execute Byrd, who is doubtless a plague upon society, but we are killers. Digital Madness Thanks to my friend Mark for this one: as the clock ticks over to 8:02PM, today, February 20th, 2002, for sixty seconds time will be a symmetrical series of three palindromes, reading 20:02, 20/02, 2002. The last occasion that time read in such a symmetrical pattern, Islam was the most successful civilization on earth: 10:01AM, on January 10, 1001. And because the clock only goes up to 23.59, we will never see 30:03, 30/03, 3003. Death Penalty Regarding Andrea Yates and the death penalty dispute between Dawn and Marty: as in many things, my view lies somewhere in the middle. Dawn, with tongue largely in cheek, advocates a return to the Gladatorial days where punishment is harsh, public, and cathartic. Marty advocates for compassion, that Yates’ penalty should be living with the knowledge of what she did. He also states that the crime itself is proof of insanity: “There is no other explanation.” This of course brings up the delicate yet weighty issue of the insanity defense. To begin, I am against the death penalty. I basically buy half of the ACLU's position that the death penalty: Is not a deterrent to crime Is unfair in its application Is irreversible Fosters barbarity in society by sanctioning killing I either don’t care about, or disagree with their other concerns that the death penalty: Is unjustified retribution Costs more than incarceration Is less popular than the alternatives Makes us look inhuman and anachronistic internationally My opposition to the death penalty turns on two central issues: 1) the system is human and thereby flawed, and death is irreversible. 2) the death penalty sanctions the taking of human life by our collective entity, the government, thereby both raising the absolute level of violence and lowering the acceptable moral threshold for violence in our society. If self defense (as in a just war) isn’t involved - and protection of society by incarceration without possibility of parole is virtually as secure as protection via death - then an eye for an eye is simple revenge, not justice. If the death penalty only marginally better-protects society from violent criminals than incarceration, and if it isn’t a deterrent, then there is no practical reason that can overcome that fact that innocent people have and will be irrevocably terminated. While you can’t give innocent people back the time they have erroneously spent in prison, at least you don’t have to dig them up to tell them they have been exonerated. It is this simple. I won’t bog you down with statistics, please refer to the above linked ACLU site for stats and lawyerly arguments. It also concerns me that the penalty is unfairly administered: the below from the ACLU report is more than enough to convince me of this.
results of its review of empirical studies on racism and the death penalty. The GAO concluded: "Our synthesis of the 28 studies shows a pattern of evidence indicating racial disparities in the charging, sentencing, and imposition of the death penalty after the Furman [1972 Supreme Court decision that declared "the imposition and carrying out of the death penalty… constitutes cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments."] decision" and that "race of victim influence was found at all stages of the criminal justice system process...." These results cannot be explained away by relevant non-racial factors, such as prior criminal record or type of crime. Furthermore, they lead to a very unsavory conclusion: In the trial courts of this nation, even at the present time, the killing of a white person is treated much more severely than the killing of a black person. Of the 313 persons executed between January 1977 and the end of 1995, 36 had been convicted of killing a black person while 249 (80%) had killed a white person. Of the 178 white defendants executed, only three had been convicted of murdering people of color. Our criminal justice system essentially reserves the death penalty for murderers (regardless of their race) who kill white victims. This isn’t modern day invidious identity politics - this is clear racial prejudice in the administration of who dies for killing whom. This reinforces my view. The rest of the ACLU’s case I disregard. The “unjust retribution” argument means nothing to me. In many ways life without parole is a greater punishment than death. Facing years and decades of walls and guilt is certainly more of an ordeal than a quick and (more or less) painless death. Good. Nor do I care about the relative costs of imprisonment vs. execution: some things society does because it is right, not because it costs more or less; besides the figures are disputed and depend how you compute them. Execution itself isn’t nearly as expensive as the constitutionally required lengthy appeals system. I don’t care much about the public popularity of death vs incarceration, either. The majority of people are wrong about many of things much of the time (that’s why we need republicanism, not pure democracy where a mob mentality can be more easily fostered) and public opinion has varied much over the last half century on the death penalty depending upon the prevailing political winds. And I surely don’t care how our system makes us look to our “civilized” friends abroad - they didn’t want us to attack Afghanistan either and they were dead wrong about that (sometimes war is the road to peace - that’s just the way it is). So while I am firmly opposed to the death penalty because I don’t want to be responsible - through the actions of my government - for the killing of any innocent Americans, and because I believe it raises the overall level of acceptable violence in our society, I am also very sympathetic to the outrage of victims of violent crime, especially murder (the crime that can never be taken back) as well expresssed by Dawn. It seems that Dawn’s greatest outrage is reserved for those who would harm children: as a mother she is horrified at the thought of a mother turning on her own. This is the greatest betrayal and we all recoil at its blackness - I am made physically ill and can’t bear to hear the details - yet the details of any crime have no real bearing on the argument over the death penalty. Many times death penalty advocates have said to me, “Surely (insert a heinous murderer - Timothy McVeigh, Jeffrey Dahmer, etc) deserves to die, doesn’t he?” I always reply, “He certainly does if anyone does.” But the guilt or odiousness of the killer isn’t the point - the point is what’s best for society, and it is better for society to have the blood of no innocent American (I say American to preclude the anti-war argument against killing innocent civilians) on its hands, and to not increase the incidence of violence of its own accord. The Andrea Yates case also brings up the issue of the insanity defense. More on that later today. Tour O the Blogs Our blog of the day - though technically a “link” site rather than a blog per se - is the fecund and erudite Arts and Letters Daily. Affiliated with the now defunct and much lamented mag Lingua Franca, Arts and Letters Daily scours our finer web publications six-days-a-week for articles, reviews and opinion on “philosophy, aesthetics, literature, language, ideas, criticism, culture, history, music, art, trends, breakthroughs, disputes, gossip.” Its apt motto is from Seneca’s translation of Sophocles: “Veritas odit moras” (“Truth hates delay”). Daily, ALD offers up 3-10 or so new links, with a brief intro, into a world of pith under the headings, “Articles of Note,” “New Books” and “Essays and Opinion.” Today’s selections include obits on the philosopher R.M. Hare; a study on the psychological aspects of work; reviews of new books on Kipling and Middle Eastern Studies; the police log index from Arcata, California; a musician’s discussion on performance facial expressions (!); and the one-millionth defense of Marx in the history of the world. These suckers range far and wide. Besides the links to specific ariticles, ALD also yields a plethora of permanent links to newspapers, news services, journals and mags, radio, columnists, web zines, and miscellanea from the four corners of the earth. You could live there and never get bored, although they don't offer sandwiches. Thanks, Much More to Come We are deeply gratified by your response to Tres Producers and Mike's vegan offshoot thus far. After only two weeks, we are averaging a very steady 100 guests per day, generated by word of mouth. We also appreciate your forbearance with our host, Blogger. Though a brilliant concept to provide the software to make blogging easy for the layman, Blogger has not yet put commensurate thought into its hosting needs: it has been down a dismaying amount in the recent past as many of you have noticed. For now, we are stuck with Blogger. Please be patient: if our site is down, please check back a little later as the problems seem to be temporary and related to traffic congestion. We are looking into alternatives. Please continue to help spread the word about Tres Producers. We would also love your input on any issue - let us know who you are and what you are getting out of the site - we see it as a dialogue not a lecture. We have lot’s of new features in the offing: Cool Tunes will soon be archived so you don’t have to catch it live on Saturday nights. We will also offer more access to Elliptical music and have highlights from Marty’s amazing career (so far). In addition, we are about to enter into a co-promotion with Cleveland.com and WAPS on a reader’s poll of rock ‘n’ roll greats, with the results broadcast on Cool Tunes. Thanks again and have a great day! Tuesday, February 19, 2002
The Thrill of Scandal the Agony of De French I have always enjoyed watching the Olympics, and over my 32 years have seen some of its greatest moments. My first Olympic memories, though somewhat hazy, are of the 72' Olympics in Munich with Mark Spitz emerging as the American hero. Spitz went home with seven gold medals in swimming, and set four world records in individual events. Tragically, that Olympic memory is marred by the death of 11 Israeli athletes at the hands of Palestinian terrorists. The Olympics are the world's playground; we get to watch competition between nations where the only real consequence is possession of a piece of metal. Isn't the point of the Olympics to set aside political, racial and religious differences for the common goal of watching the world's best athletes, and appreciate their years of hard work, despite the winner? I’m afraid this noble view is in the minority amongst those who follow the Olympics; why else all the emphasis on medal count? My husband is a fine example of the nobles: a perfect Olympic spectator appreciating all that is good and pure in athletic competition. I'll ask, "Did the American's win?" He replies with sincere enthusiasm, "No, but you should have seen the great performance by the Slovenian team - they really poured their hearts out." I shrug and return my glassy gaze to People magazine (hey, I only read it for the articles). Please keep in mind he is not entirely without national preferences, being of 75% Norwegian heritage and a proud American. He will cheer with joy if the Norgies or Americans win, but he is just as happy to see a great performance by anyone. (I also wish the Norwegian team well, but this is out of fear rather than ancestral pride. Before I was permitted to marry my husband and bear almost half-breed Norwegian children, I was forced to undergo Norwegian conversion training, the nature of which I am not at liberty to reveal for fear of reprisals.) It isn’t just my husband: his is a family of OLYMPIC FREAKS! My father-in-law, a handsome and charming 100% Norwegian, is a professional sports spectator. The LA Olympics in ‘84 is where it all started, and he and the extended clan haven't missed a single summer Olympics since. The Winter Olympic trek began with Nagano in ‘98 and includes a contingent in Salt Lake City. My own experience began with a transglobal jaunt to Sydney in 2000 (with an 11-month-old in tow, no less). You could say I’ve heard a thing or two about the Olympics. Okay, so what is my point? Even if I am not a perfect example of good sportsmanship, graciousness and judiciousness, Olympic officials should be. The 2002 Olympics have been clouded by controversy, controversy that began long before the first athlete arrived in Utah. As if Olympic officials taking bribes from Salt Lake City officials wasn't tawdry enough, we now have learned of vote trading in the elegant and beloved sport of figure skating. According to a CNN on "Skategate," “As part of a back-room deal, [French skating judge] Le Gougne voted for Berezhnaya and Sikharulidze in exchange for a Russian judge's vote for the French ice dancers, USA Today reported, citing a skating official it did not identify. " What is it with the French? I have argued with my husband over how the French have become irrelevant in today's world and I why I hate them. Okay I don't actually hate individual French people, just the French attitude. They are so mortified by their obvious exclusion from anything important in the world - and the rejection of their precious French as the world’s language in favor of the dreaded English - that they have developed an inferiority complex. And now, to add insult to injury, they are a bunch of cheaters! Thanks France, way to sully the Olympics for the 10% who care about the glory of competition and not the thrill of scandal. “Psst...Hey French judges, women's figure skating starts tonight, I can't wait!” Dawn Olsen Emptying Out The Bookmarks #3 Fun With Photoshop If you remember "All Your Base Are Belong To Us", then this type of photo manipulation should look familiar... Winter Magic Though my viewing has been limited to a haphazard couple of hours per day, I have loved the Winter Olympics thus far and have no particular complaints about NBC's coverage. Though naturally focused on American competitors - they are an American network - the coverage has been a nice blend of sport-centered (bios of top competitors in the sport regardless of country of origin; the background and coverage of the remarkable rivalry between Norway and Italy in cross-country skiing was particularly compelling), and U.S.-centric emphasis. As mentioned in earlier blogs, my father, son, brothers, niece (as well as cousins and family friends - hello all!) are (or have been) at the Salt Lake City Games, calling via cell phone to rub it in from such choice locales as the super-G slopes Saturday, the top of the bobsled run Sunday (caught a glimpse of my father and son on TV waving their American flag along the fence just past the starting line), and at the Women's Aerials yesterday. The weirdest and most striking occurrence at the Games so far has been the shocking four-man wipeout in the last turn of the Men’s Short Track Skating 1000 Saturday night. American favorite Apolo Anton Ohno was leading with inches to go when South Korean Ahn-Hyun Soo, stumbling and flailing as if under attack by bees, took out himself, Ohno and two other competitors, clearing the way for a fifth skater - Australia’s Steven Bradbury whose only virtue was to trail the other four by a large enough margin to avoid the chaos - to cross the finish line ahead of the skidding Ohno, who had the presence of mind to stick out his skate like he was sliding into home with the winning run of the World Series. All of this happened in the blink of an eye: the last becoming first, #1 of Ohno’s four possible golds snatched away from his outstretched grasp as he floundered on the hard, cold ice, bleeding from a skate-blade gash. What could be more unfair? How could the Australian be literally rewarded for his pokiness, the erect tortoise to the fallen hares? But in a reversal of a reversal, what could have been greater? The 19-year-old Ohno, whose troubled youth was overcome with the steadfast love of his Japanese-immigrant father (as we have been ritually reminded by NBC every time poor Ohno’s face is shown; in fact, until I really started paying attention, I though the skater’s name was “Troubled-Youth-Was-Overcome-With-The-Steadfast-Love-Of-His-Japanese-Immigrant-Father Ohno”), seemed inexplicably cheerful, even buoyant after the race. He didn’t complain, he didn’t pout, he didn’t cry “foul.” He said his goal wasn’t a particular medal, but to come off the ice knowing he had given his all, done his best; he had done that and was therefore quite happy. Getting the silver, as opposed to nothing, I’m certain didn’t hurt, but this composure in the face of cruel fate entered Ohno into the pantheon of Olympic greats even if he never laces up another pair of razor-sharp, slice-your-arm-off, skates. Besides elevating Ohno to hero status, the other great thing about the mishap was that it reminded us how closely a reflection of life is sport. Sport has such mythic and emotional appeal because it is a distillation of the contingencies of life, with the added advantage of a certain ending (that’s why ties are such an affront), an agreed upon set of rules, and “impartial” judges (no comment on the figure skating fiasco) to supervise. In real life, certain victory is snatched from people’s hands every day of the week and twice on Sunday. Rarely do we react as well as Ohno did. Sport is all about grace under pressure, the Olympics most of all. It isn’t who has the most talent, who had the best time in the trials or practice, it’s who comes up with the best performance when it counts the most, under the most intense pressure. We love unexpected heroes - the gold and world record for speed skater Chris Witty who just hoped to finish in the Top 10, and who is still RECOVERING FROM MONO, for God’s sake - but we admire those who win when they are expected to win, with all of the pressure on them, and most especially those who win in spite of the pressure AND unfair adversity, most of all. If Ohno comes back to win even one gold in his next three races, he will be an all-time Olympic hero. To provide the depth-giving shadow to the warm glow of the light, we must also have losers - not just those who don’t win, after all, only a tiny percentage actually win anything - but real losers: those who crack under pressure, those who falter under the weight of history. There is never disgrace in not winning when one does one’s best - witness Ohno’s “golden” silver - but there is disgrace when one “chokes,” crumbles like a dried-out cookie by allowing the mental strain to interfere with what the body knows how to do in its sleep. For this we must turn to the benighted American alpine skier Caroline Lalive, a 22-year-old blessed with abundant talent, who fell in all three of her starts in this Olympics. In fact, she has fallen in her last NINE Olympic and world championship events. Though painful to watch, we need people like Lalive to remind us how difficult it is to perform under these extreme, or any competitive, conditions; and how precious are those who do not shrink, but grow to great height under the merciless light. Tour O the Blogs New feature on Tres Producers: a tour of my bookmarked blogs, starting with the subsection of the ones I visit most often. To simplify, I’ll just take it in alphabetical order. It is appropriate that I discuss Andrew Sullivan first as his was the first blog I became familiar with after seeing him on TV soon after September 11. Andrewsullivan.com has become his primary writing outlet, with his Daily Dish section focusing on his take on the top news of the day and his response to various other pundits. Sullivan edited the New Republic in the ‘90s and I was fan of his arguments for sensible centrism in a historically liberal political mag. A rather bizarre amalgam of conflicting intellectual and moral impulses, Sullivan is a gay Catholic, who is left-libertarian on social issues (government should stay out of the bedroom, legalize “soft” drugs, pro gay-rights including marriage), yet right of center on fiscal (low taxes, don’t throw money at domestic problems) and foreign policy (very pro-war, pro-business, free trade, defends the pharmaceuticals) matters. Sullivan has lately been on a crusade against real or potential conflicts of interest between pundits/journalists and companies/commercial entities who would pay them large sums for vague or nonexistent duties, thereby calling into question their impartiality and/or integrity. He has latched onto New York Times economic analyst Paul Krugman, who received $50,000 from Enron for attending a few meetings, with the ferocity and tenacity of a snapping turtle. Yet, for his eccentricities and obsessions Sullivan remains the most consistently interesting and cogent of the bloggers. He has also been innovative with what a blog can be: in an attempt to make his economically self-sufficient, he has just this week begun an Oprah-like book-club-of-the-blog, monthly taking a “serious” politically-minded book, explicitly encouraging his readers to purchase the book from Amazon via his site, thereby gaining him the income of a referral payment per-book-bought from Amazon - a very interesting idea. This month’s book is Robert Kaplan’s Warrior Politics. In what appears to be an ongoing exercise in very close reading, Sullivan’s first post takes on only the book’s Preface and first chapter in some detail. He has invited club members to enter into an email dialogue with him, and at some point members (around 1,000 so far) will get to grill author Kaplan as well. Kaplan should wear armor. Being that I am a regular Sullivan reader, and that I am studying computer communication (emails, chats, web sites, blogs) for the America.com: On September 11 book, I have joined Sullivan’s literary cyber-guild. Below is my first response to the book. Andrew, Between yourself and an army of 1,000 very close readers, I'm afraid this little book will suffer a dismemberment worthy of Hanibal Lector. As you mentioned in your opening, the book begins on an oddly self-conscious note - and through the first three chapters - has left me with no impression other than Churchill was a great historian and leader, Livy was a great historian and storyteller, and human nature hasn't changed all that much in the last few thousand years and is never to be trusted. Confining particular criticism to the very first page of the Preface, I am presented with none but folly. Kaplan's first paragraph would seem to place his narrative view squarely within the camp of the most arch postmodernists, who, embracing the validity of different viewpoints inherent in Einstein's theories of relativity, and the unreliability of sensory observations as expressed in Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle, and the open-endedness of all mathematical systems as established by Godel's incompleteness theorems, have rejected the certainty of ANY truth; as in Kaplan's second sentence, "Objectivity is illusory," and his quotation of Don Quixote: "This that appears to you as a barber's basin is for me Mambrino's helmet, and something else again to another person." I'm not sure that a serious political analyst should begin his book comparing himself to the charming but clearly delusional Spaniard. Absolute objectivity is, of course, impossible: we now speak in terms of probabilities rather than certainties, but are we to then throw up our hands and discount the possibility of pursuing the highest probabilities? After we acknowledge that "truth" carries an inherent degree of uncertainty, we can resume our pursuit of the closest approximation of truth. After all, the uncertainty of cause and effect among sub-atomic particles doesn't preclude us from being pretty damned sure that if we ram our heads into brick wall, it will hurt. All we can do is evaluate the "facts" as objectively as possible, then reach a conclusion (we know it is conditional), then act decisively as if we believe in the conclusion with all of our hearts until we are shown reason to believe otherwise. This is, in essence, the scientific method, and it applies equally well to the affairs of men (including politics, or the analysis thereof) as it does to atoms and frogs. Kaplan's second paragraph begins, "Often, what passes for analysis is merely an expression of one's life experiences applied to a specific issue." Well, yes. How could it be otherwise? Analysis is always the application of our wisdom - accumulated through experience, learning, and reflection - applied to a specific issue. This is how people arrive at conclusions, and do analysis. Otherwise one would have to poll all possible positions, compile them, and then publish the result (smacking of what has become the perception of Clintonism, is it not?), which is a decision to not make a decision. I agree with you that Pres Bush has taken the former, appropriate, approach to decision-making since the transformative day of September 11. Kaplan continues: "From that sin stems another - that of selecting facts and insights to defend a particular vision. To this dilemma there may be no solution." If one honestly and with purposeful balance reviews the facts, then arrives at a conclusion, obviously one would cite the facts that led to the decision. This is not a sin, simply common sense. A good debater (and any "analyst" worth a listen) would cite the contrary evidence, concede its merits, then muster the facts to support his own conclusion. A serious thinker of any stripe would conduct this process internally as part of his own decision-making process. Kaplan concludes the first page of his Preface conceding that he has never taught, been a think tanker or served in government. His credentials are of a more bloody hue: that of "a quarter-century's work" as an overseas, and often war, journalist. The shock of seeing conflicts and poverty firsthand "drew [me] to the classics of philosophy and politics." I'm not sure if Kaplan really regrets his lack of official thinker's credentials, or if he is subtly asserting that his firsthand experience of man's inhumanity to man trumps official credentials. Either way, he doth protest too much: either he will present his case convincingly or he won't (hasn't through three chapters), in the course of which his background will speak for itself. Having begun thus inauspiciously, Kaplan has nowhere to go but up; and things have improved, but I find enough of a similar thread of illogic and fuzzy thinking through the first three chapters that the most I can hope for are random moments of lucidity against a fog of confusion. Best Wishes, Eric Olsen I’ve never reviewed the first page of a book before, but this one really pissed me off. Monday, February 18, 2002
MERCY: WHATEVER HAPPENED TO IT? Andrea Yates had to be mentally unbalanced when she committed the heinous act of drowning her five children. There is no other explanation. Yates has a history of suicide attempts, depression and psychotic delusions and had to be incapable of controlling the urges that resulted in her children’s deaths. Her penalty is the realization that what she has done she must live with for the rest of her life. Send this poor woman to a mental institution and try to help her recover and rejoin society. Show some mercy, please, if that is possible. C’mon, don’t we have enough problems today without sending mentally unbalanced people to the death chambers and committing state sanctioned murder. MT Deathrow Mayhem According to CNN “Andrea Yates ‘did not appreciate the wrongfulness of her acts’ when she drowned her five children in a bathtub last year, a defense attorney said Monday during opening statements in her trial. Yates, 37, who has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity, confessed to drowning her children. She is charged with capital murder and could face the death penalty if convicted." The Death Penalty, “state sanctioned murder” as opponents might call it, is a controversial form of punishment. And if ever a person deserved it, Andrea Yates does. In fact, thinking about the sheer evilness of her actions leads me to think that, perhaps, rather than the benign gas chamber or lethal injection, she should instead be drowned, then resuscitated; drowned, then resuscitated; drowned, then resuscitated; so on and so forth, you get the point. (Mike Says: Orson Scott Card wrote a story called "A Thousand Deaths" set in a near future USA after the Russians had taken over, where the punishment of "death" was just like that. Endless variations where the accused was "killed" over and over only to be resuscitated and then "killed" again.) What better deterrent than the literal poetic justice of punishment in the form of the crime perpetrated. You steal, all your possessions are taken away; rapists are themselves raped; you torture animals, you are fed to caged animals. Then it clicked in my head: let's bring back the Gladiatorial Games. Imagine if you will: In this corner, Andrea Yates - the mother who methodically chased down and drowned each and every one of her five children. In the opposite corner, Barbara Atkinson - the mother who locked her 8-year-old daughter in the closet, depriving her of clean food, water, freedom, and most importantly, love. Add some hungry lions, a couple of crocodiles and you have yourself something. I bet one of the wrestling federations would sponsor these events. Make them pay-per-view and give the money to charity. The American public would love it. Fear Factor, The Chamber, Survivor, that's for the weak. Give me DEATH ROW MAYHEM. Okay, a little too much "Reality"? What is more real, more scary, more chilling, and more evil than any horror movie? The real life murderers, rapists, and child molesters who clog up our legal system, suck our hard-earned tax dollars while they sit and read porn, watch soap operas, and take up air every stinking day of their worthless lives. Monsters, modern day monsters, and what is to become of monsters? We slay them, simple! Why not the death penalty? I mean I understand the whole “better to let 10 guilty people go free, than put to death one innocent person” thing, but some cases are cut and dried. Quite honestly, mothers who murder, or torture and abuse their children deserve worse than the wrath of God. They deserve to have their faces mauled by lions and their limbs chomped my crocodiles. Call me cruel and sadistic, but I would pay to see these people suffer, and enjoy every minute of it! Dawn Olsen More Transglobal Debate This has turned into an interesting ongoing dialogue. If my South African friend and I can disagree so radically about America’s role in the world and still remain friends, maybe there is hope that we won’t have to kick the asses of everyone in the world who STRONGLY disagrees with us, only those who VIOLENTLY do so. I am preparing my response to his response to my response to his original letter. Readers are encouraged to contribute their own thoughts, as this one did to the original debate. “hey eric oops! looks like i hit a nerve sorry man - no offence intended towards you or the average american man. we love you - honest :) it's just the oilmen/politicians who run your government we'd like to see the back of. if you objectively analyse the ties between your senior government people and their roles in every big oil and weapons deal going on around the planet - as an outsider it's very, very difficult to maintain the opinion that the american government is acting for the good of all. and if cnn is seen in the usa as 'left-wing', i'd hate to see what your 'right' has to say! compared to the british, SA, german and web-based press i read, cnn is FUCKING biased!!! when innocent americans get killed, this is 'terror' or 'evil'; when innocent foreigners get killed, this is 'collateral damage'. your spin doctors clearly learned a thing or two from the nazis about propaganda! also, i believe if you carefully scrutinise the wording of the 'homeland security act', in particular the definition of what constitutes a 'terrorist' - you'll agree that while at present not being abused too badly by the thugs in power, it's seriously open to abuse...... this sentence is simply not true - pure propaganda: > The US cheerfully helps any country that is willing to play by the rules of > relatively free enterprise, individual human rights, free exchange of > ideas, and private property. These then eventually yield the prosperity of > capitalism and freedom of democracy. from where i'm sitting, an objective summary of american foreign policy would be "either you do what we tell you, or face the consequences".... your president keeps saying it, man.... "either you are with us, or against us...." who exactly is drawing the lines of battle? at the end of day, when the USA consumes more than half the world's resources, yet 45% of the world's population is starving (these are amnesty international's most recent stats - not mine!), and your government still continues to bully every country not strong enough to stand up to them into economic policies best suited to american companies' profits - surely, surely, whether you like it or not, you are giving the rest of the world a very, very clear message: we don't give a continental fuck about you! when your government refuses point-blank to contribute to improving the world environment, while unable to dispute that it produces more than half the world's pollution - aren't you giving exactly the same message? that is why you are resented..... you 'have' because we 'do not have'.... i could list endlessly examples of this, e.g. american music companies buying up airtime on SA stations, meaning no access for local music; coca cola being sold in places that don't even have water to drink; child labour by american companies like nike and reebok; the list of abuses is endless..... america's 2 biggest exports? 1. weapons 2. violent media why then, is it unreasonable to say that america's primary exports are war and violence? i think it's time to stop shifting the blame and shoulder some of the responsibility. i think all governments and big business are scum (ours ain't exactly covered in glory either) - yours just happens to be the most powerful and therefore the most callous about it's abuses, and most able to dictate what people are allowed to see or hear. your media is becoming more and more controlled and warmongering every day, from what we see here....... i challenge you to show me a single 'mainstream' american tv, radio or printed word media which is not directly stirring up xenophobia and hate towards people you know nothing about except the little that these selfsame media tell you..... whether you like it or not, your government are far from saints. your big business (which has diverted a full quarter of the world's wealth into their own pockets) continue to ruthlessly exploit the world's poorest places. your foreign policy is clearly not to the benefit of poor people outside of america (who continue to get poorer year after year while the rich in america get richer.....). and to simply brush aside all criticism as 'sour grapes because we're the leaders' is, i'm afraid naive and callous to the max. if you are not part of the solution you are part of the problem..... while osama and his madmen are doing quite a good job at stirring up hatred of the american people - your government's policies, attitudes and actions are making it really easy for him...... i can only urge you to read quality, nonaligned AMERICAN publications like www.rense.com and www.disinfo.com , for a very different version of the truth.... if you trust a scumbag like george bush, who clearly cheated his way into power in the first place and has gone out of his way to provoke instability in the world ever since, then i can only feel pity for you man, and pray that you don't pay for your indifference to the rest of the world's suffering through the blood of your innocent people. hopefully you can see that i have no ill will towards americans - only the shite your government and media promote. we're only too happy to trade, play with, be entertained by, share travel, have relationships etc. with ordinary americans - groovy humans just like us. we want nothing more than to live in global peace and harmony, without being dictated to or exploited by powerful countries. and yours is, like the uk, china, russia and france, a very powerful and very exploitative country indeed. is that too much to ask? once again, these are personal opinions, particularly designed to provoke reaction. i'm drawing clear and unmistakable parallels between the reasons for the gap between rich and poor in the world, and the reasons behind the 'war on terror' the american people find themselves paying for (with a 'defense' budget bigger than the entire budget of italy, the world's 5th richest country, i might add!!!) i look forward to your response..... peace” MARTY'S FAVORITES Who are considered the great ones? Here’s my two cents worth … 1. Beatles 2. Elvis 3. Bob Dylan 4. Led Zeppelin 5. Rolling Stones 6. The Who 7. Chuck Berry 8. Jimi Hendrix 9. Yardbirds 10. Pink Floyd 11. Buddy Holly 12. Santana 13. Jerry Lee Lewis 14. Hank Williams, Sr. 15. Bob Marley 16. Aretha Franklin 17. Ritchie Valens 18. Fats Domino 19. Curtis Mayfield 20. Frankie Lymon 21. James Brown 22. Little Richard 23. Everly Brothers 24. Ike & Tina Turner 25. Ray Charles 26. Isley Brothers 27. Otis Redding 28. Roy Orbison 29. Smokey Robinson & The Miracles 30. Van Morrison Bubbling under: Eddie Cochran – Clash - Nirvana - Sex Pistols - Ramones - Patti Smith - Janis Joplin Cream - Iggy & The Stooges - Muddy Waters - Kinks - Joan Baez - Gene Vincent Marvin Gaye – U2 - Creedence Clearwater Revival - The Byrds - Buffalo Springfield Jeff Beck – The Band - The Righteous Brothers - B.B. King - David Bowie New York Dolls - Velvet Underground - The Platters - The Drifters ... and let's not forget these great artists of yesteryear: Thelonious Monk - Nina Simone – Frank Sinatra – John Coltrane - Billie Holiday Louis Armstrong - Ella Fitzgerald - Miles Davis - Chet Baker - Sarah Vaughn Peggy Lee - Benny Goodman - Tito Puente – Woody Guthrie – The Weavers Mahalia Jackson - Sam Cooke - Fred Neil – Johnny Cash – Joe Turner - Bessie Smith Frank Zappa - Phil Ochs – Waylon Jennings – Jackie Wilson Sunday, February 17, 2002
Lord of the Sword We watched John Boorman’s 1981 Arthurian epic Excalibur on DVD last night. It’s one of my wife’s favorites, but I hadn’t seen it in 20 years. After adjusting to clunky special effects, staging, and production values (in unfair comparison to recent epics like Jackson’s Fellowship of the Ring and Scott’s Gladiator), and inevitable juxtapositions with Monty Pythyon and the Holy Grail, I became fully engrossed in the sweep of the tale, the morality play between Arthur, Lancelot and Guenevere, and the Boorman’s clear nostalgia for the values of the Age of Chivalry. Life may have been short, dirty and brutal, but at least it had purpose. I had also forgotten how influenced by Arthurian Legend Tolkein was in his Ring series: an unlikely hero is chosen by fate to create unity and grows into sacred mission, an object concentrates pure power and pure temptation, mentoring of the hero by a magician/wizard, the language and imagery of the Anglo-Saxon Chivalric Age, a time of crisis at the nexus between epochs. Regarding the last, Nicol Williamson’s Merlin notes that his power is on the wane because a single God is replacing the era of gods. This seems to assert, like Tom Robbins’ hugely underrated Jitterbug Perfume, that human belief has a direct bearing on the power of the numenous: that indeed, supernatural power derives from that belief. This is utterly at odds with monotheistic theology which posits a single God as all-powerful, unchanging creator. Boorman is clearly sympathetic to the Anglo-Saxon pagan past and even a mystical royalism, presenting the equation of Arthur and the land (“Arthur and the land are one”) as a Great Truth. Tolkein seems more drawn to a Manichaean absolute conflict between good and evil. After he’s finished with Rings, I want to see Jackson take on Arthur. Mike says: After Jackson is done with Rings I want to see him make a sequel to Meet The Feebles or Braindead2 ;) Fewer Felines Please The very last thing the world needs is a new way to make cats, although I'm sure it is quieter than the old way. Avatar Glad to see I’ve finally made it onto Andrew Sullivan's site, if only in the form of an S.J. Perelman insult I recommended to him via email: "Philomene was a dainty thing, built somewhat on the order of Lois De Fee, the lady bouncer. She had the rippling muscles of a panther, the stolidity of a water buffalo, and the lazy insolence of a shoe salesman." Ontologically speaking, an avatar of my cyber-avatar (one step further removed because my name isn’t mentioned, just the quote I sent in) might be said to have appeared in Sullivan-land. Now that I’ve been blogging for a couple of weeks, I understand the interest in blogland regarding identity and the blog. What aspect of “you” is your blog? The basic answer is that it isn’t “you” at all: your blog is a series of individual mental products that represent individual aspects of your personality. Taken together, they present a rough approximation of the outlines of your personality - an outline of a shadow in Platonic terms - and is no more “you” in any reductionist sense than any other composite projection of yourself into the social sphere: like, for example, a radio or TV persona; the oeuvre of a writer or musician; or the version of yourself you present at work, to your recreational softball team, to your parents, or at a nightclub. All of these are portions, projections, or versions of a person; they are variously “true” to the “real” person, but none “are” the person. Similarly, the blog persona, even at its most revealing, is still a conscious projection, and is, as a result, a product, not an aspect of the actual person. Whoa, now my head hurts. |
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