Gryphen's Sarah Palin checklist. A work in progress.

When Sarah Palin burst on the scene as John McCain's VP candidate and started fanning the flames of racism against Barack Obama, as well as making incredibly dangerous and fraudulent claims against our future President, I made a mental list of priorities that I wanted to help accomplish. (By the way this list evolved over time and now includes subjects that I was not even aware were coming down the pike in 2008.)

1) Stop John McCain and Sarah Palin from making it to the White House.

2) Reveal the truth behind the fantasy that Sarah Palin is a good and effective Governor.

3) Get her out of office!

4) Reveal the pathetic and controversial truth about Sarah Palin's personal mythology.

5) Provide a platform for those who know truthful stories about Palin, yet are afraid to report them to the press.

6) Direct focus on Palin, and her family's, attempts to grift money from her ignorant supporters, and report on how frivolously she spends that money.

7) Help journalists, authors, documentary makers, and anybody willing to tell the truth about Sarah Palin, make contact with sources willing to tell of their experiences with the Grizzled Mama.

8) Reveal to the widest segment of the American public possible, one of the BIGGEST, and most egregious, hoaxes ever perpetrated on them by a politician in our country's history. Babygate!

9) Draw back the cloak of secrecy that shields those that supported, and used Sarah Palin for their own nefarious reasons, to reveal them to the American public.

10) Help to make sure that another potentially dangerous politician, like Sarah Palin, George Bush, or John Edwards never gets close to the White House again. (I only include Edwards because his adultery could have made him a very easy person to blackmail into supporting policies that could have done our country great harm.)

So let's see how I've done.

1) After her defeat I received a lot of heartfelt thanks from many of the visitors here.

But in my opinion it was mostly undeserved.

I did only a small part in getting the truth out about Sarah Palin, John McCain, and the Republican party.

Others like Katie Couric, Keith Olbermann, Charlie Gibson, and even Tine Fey deserve FAR more credit than I do.  Of course ultimately the real thanks should go to Sarah Palin herself for being such an incredibly unqualified, and gaffe prone candidate.

(Half-check mark for me.)

2) I helped to found the Alaskans for Truth, and used my blog and networking, to get the truth out about Troopergate, the per-diems she paid herself to stay in her own house, the free travel vouchers she got on behalf of family members, the cronyism that riddled her administration, etc., etc., etc., to my fellow Alaskans.

(Check mark!)

3) I don't actually know how much I helped to accomplish this, but she's out! (Check mark!)

4) I don't believe there are too many people who are now unaware that the idyllic life that the Palins paint for themselves is pure mooseshit. Check mark!

5) I helped Mercede start her blog, wrote posts containing information from anonymous sources about the Palins that they could not get published in other places, helped Shailey get her story out in the National Enquirer, on this blog, and later on her own blog, tried to help Levi get his book written two years ago when it would have made a huge impact, and have maintained a blogroll linking to blogs ("Sarah Palin's Least Favorite Blogs") that have done some truly ground breaking work on getting the truth out about Klondike Kardashian. (Check mark!)

6) From SarahPAC, to "Sarah Palin's Alaska", to Dancing with the Stars, and even to Palin's 2012 Political Prick Tease, I have tried to rake away the Palin bullshit to lay bare what is REALLY taking place as often as possible.

(Half check mark. I could have done better.)

7) I have provided support to Geoffrey Dunn, Nick Broomfield, Joe McGinniss,  as well as others, and I have helped them as much as I could to make contact with people living in Wasilla, and around Alaska, that have stories to tell about the REAL Sarah Palin. I have certainly not provided ALL of their sources, and in fact all of them have made very impressive contacts of their own, but I did what I could. Some truths remain unrevealed.

(Half check mark.)


8) Most of this work has taken place right here on this blog, or on one of the blogs in the IM blogroll, but with Joe's book we are finally seeing the bizarre story reaching a much larger audience, and hopefully with the release of Fred's book , a much larger audience still.

(Pending check mark I hope to give myself soon.)

9) The Koch brothers, Fox News, the Dominionists, and the Republican party have all had their hands up the back of Sarah Palins blouse working her like a ventriloquist dummy voicing on their behalf crazy inflammatory things like "death panels," or "palling around with terrorists.'" Or ginning up racial hatred toward Barack Obama or the Muslim community.  This is clearly a work in progress, but I believe that we have made some significant connections between Palin and her puppeteers that have caused them some serious blowback and have forced them to abandon her in order to move on to less controversial marionettes.  However now that we know how they operate we can remain vigilant and help to identify the NEXT empty vessel that they fill up with their rhetorical poison.

Looking at you Rick Perry!

(Half check mark.)

10) This has ALWAYS been my ultimate goal, even while I am recognizing the possible futility of ever making it a reality.

Sarah Palin was chosen to be McCain's VP for the most superficial reasons imaginable.  She was attractive, she had faked having a Down Syndrome child to cement her pro-life position, she had hacked various polls to make herself seem popular in Alaska, and she was considered a Christian.

And that my friends was the whole package.

The fact that this occurred should have sent an electric shock of realization to the American population that candidates for the most important political positions in our country were being selected by shadowy figures who have determined that we are so simple minded that we could be seduced by a horribly unqualified pretty face, trained to read talking points off of cue cards.

If this had worked, and it came much closer to working than I think most of us want to admit, it would have furthered a continuing change in the political realities of our country that could have proved devastating.

This change has been orchestrated by the Republican party and started with Ronald Reagan, an actor who played the President, to George W. Bush, a simpleton who played a cowboy playing a President, to a Sarah Palin, a telegenic spokes model who played a Governor, who could have been groomed to play the President, once John McCain kicked the bucket served out his term and she ran in 2012. (Insert scream of horror here.)

Ultimately THIS is what the American voting population needs to be educated about, and Sarah Palin is the perfect example to illustrate that lesson. After reading what Frank Bailey, Geoffrey Dunn, and Joe McGinniss have written, it is clear that the information is now available for any of those who want to really understand how completely broken the political system is in this country.

Now all we have to do is help to encourage people to read the information that is now available, and the information that is still coming, about Sarah Palin, and then use that to vet the shiny new politicians that are just over the next horizon.

That sounds simple, right?  Yeah right.

Well I am not giving up.  After coming this far, there is NO WAY I am just walking away now.

Are you with me?

If you are then I perhaps someday this item will have a check mark as well. But not yet.

Nick Broomfield needs our help to get his documentary film "Sarah Palin: You Betcha!" into theaters.

From Kickstarter:

Nick Broomfield's quest for the real Sarah Palin involves battling the icy snows of Alaska in mid-winter to speak to the school friends, family, and Republican colleagues that in previous days gave their heart, soul and belief to the charismatic, charming, intoxicating ex-hockey mom. But it's not all plain sailing. People are frightened to talk; Wasilla makes Twin Peaks look like a walk in the park. It's a devout evangelical community – 76 churches with a population of only 6 thousand, and the Crystal meth capital of Alaska. Broomfield brings his celebrated wit and determination to cracking her story. 

The provocative and entertaining documentary is directed by Nick Broomfield (Aileen: Life and Death of a Serial Killer, Heidi Fleiss: Hollywood Madam,Kurt & Courtney) and Joan Churchill. The film is produced Marc Hoeferlin (Battle for Haditha). 

But producing the documentary was only half of the process. We need YOUR help to raise enough money that he can distribute the film. The release of Nick’s film before the potential candidates of 2012 announce their candidacy is a pivotal moment. Getting this film into theaters, and educating the public on Palin needs to happen as soon as possible to truly allow Nick’s vision to be achieved. This Kickstarter will help raise the capital to fund the nuts and bolts of the distribution (print and advertising fees) and help get SARAH PALIN: YOU BETCHA! into theaters.

As of last night when I wrote this post, Nick had about  $1,893.00 ($100 of it was from me), however he needs about $30,000 to start the wheels moving toward distributing the documentary and making it available to movie audiences.

I can attest to the struggle that Nick went through to find people to go on record, and allow their images to be filmed, for this important documentary (Hell even I balked at first!)  I would really hate to see all of that hard work go to waste.

And remember, unlike Palin's propaganda film "The Undefeated," THIS  movie did not have anybody with one million dollars to help finance it or a panting flock of sycophants ready and willing to pimp this movie to friends and family on behalf of their idol.

That movie failed miserably because it was telling an obvious lie, however this movie is trying to get the truth about Snowdrift Snooki, to a wider audience of Americans who may not be interested in sitting down with a good book.

Anyhow I know that Nick and his team would appreciate anything you could do to help.  And so would I.

(P.S. The link to donate is the Kickstarter link at the top.)

Thank you ahead of time, for your support.

Before I turn in for the night let me leave you with a little gift. Keith Olbermann's first Special Comment from his new home on Current TV.

Ahh, now I shall sleep like a baby, knowing all is right with the world again.

Right Wing Authoritarians [Torture is Good for You]

¡Hola! Everybody...
I am not the greatest Obama supporter, in fact I believe there are legitimate critiques of his policies -- especially his (mostly wrong-headed conservative) economic policy decisions. However, much of the right-wing criticism of Obama is fueled by hatred and, yes, racism. I quantify that last assertion here, but today I find myself SMDH at the revolting scumbags on the right. I mean, they have no sense of fuckin decency, no fuckin shame at all. I believe these cretins would fuck their own mothers over without a second thought...

* * *

-=[ Torture is Good for You ]=-

Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that. Hate Multiplies hate, violence multiplies violence, and toughness multiplies toughness in a descending spiral of destruction.

-- Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. p 53, The Strength to Love, 1963

First things first. It seems there’s a mini storm over the above quote by MLK. The quote, with the leading line, I mourn the loss of thousands of precious lives, but I will not rejoice in the death of one, not even an enemy... went viral immediately after the news of the murder of Osama Bin Laden was released. A rather irresponsible article penned by Megan McArdle at The Atlantic, noted that after having Googled said quote, she couldn’t find verification. Therefore, the reporter surmised, the quote isn’t accurate, and MLK never said it.

Actually, as I have correctly cited, the quote is a genuine MLK quote. What isn’t part of the quote, is the first line and here’s what happened. The sentiment was first posted as a Facebook status, and it read (verbatim):

I mourn the loss of thousands of precious lives, but I will not rejoice in the death of one, not even an enemy, “Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.” -- mlk [emphasis added]

Note the placement of the quotation marks. As the status was repeated, the quotes were misplaced, giving the impression that the leading sentence -- the sentence not part of the MLK quote -- was attributed to MLK. This then led other reporters, bloggers, commenters to assert that MLK never said it. And that’s a false conclusion. But the larger point here is that journalists are doing a piss-poor job of research. Indeed, the research can be found in the comments section of The Atlantic article. Has this journalist ever heard of... books? Direct sources? *The article has been picked in places like the WashPo, The CS Monitor, and if you Google the first line, you’ll easily get 50-60k hits (the last time I looked).

This is bullshit, lazy, hack writing, plain and simple.

Now on to the important stuff...

I guess it was to be expected. No sooner than the news of OBL’s assassination was released, that the right wing cretins went into feces flingin’ mode, and started patting themselves in the back for the deed. What’s that? Yes, the Bush administration spent trillions, sent us to two unnecessary wars where about 50,000 of our men and women were killed or maimed, and spent almost a decade without even getting close to OBL, but Bush should be given the honors. Obama is just the lawn jockey. he can’t possibly be smart enough to capture/ kill OBL, right?

Except that it isn’t true. In fact, only six months after 9/11, The Village Idiot publicly admitted he was no longer concerned about OBL. Let’s take it to the videotape, Johnny:

Spin that bitches. More importantly, Bush shut down the CIA unit weighted with the responsibility of capturing Bin Laden. Guess who opened it up again? Yup... Obama.

As I understand it, Bush depended almost exclusively on the Pentagon more than the intelligence community, which is why we cannot credit him with this specific form of strategy. I think it’s a real stretch (or... bullshit!) for the right wing twats to try to include Bush in this. Obama issued the order and he took all the risks. If it hadn’t gone well, you can be sure these racist sons of bitches would've attempted to lynch him on the White House lawn. This wasn’t an on-going operation; the operation, in fact, had been abandoned and this team, which was working under Leon Panetta, and Obama had five meetings about this after August. Bush was not involved.

One more thing, the next time some inbred, right-wing, twat motherfucker © tells you, “The soldiers, and only the soldiers, should get credit because they were the ones that were on the ground fighting,” let them know that Bush’s “Mission Accomplished” debacle was a failure not because he didn’t fight, but because the mission was not accomplished. In this case, Obama’s mission was accomplished and as it was the Commander in Chief who ordered the hit and helmed the high-level meetings about it, he gets credit for it. Yes, the President was in charge of the plan and no, it doesn’t matter that they don’t think he was.

Presidents are not supposed to be involved in the fighting. Something the inbred right-wing twat motherfuckers © might want to brush up on their history to understand why. It has something to do with civilian leadership of the military. Civilian control of the military is the proper subordination of a professional military to the ends of policy as determined by civilian authority (the civilian authority being the U.S. President). The civilian authority (our President) issues policy statements that are then implemented by the military. In this instance, the President had five high-level meetings in which he directed the implementation of the strategy. The President doesn’t go into the field to fight. The “gun” does not command the country for obvious reasons. This is how your country operates. It is how it is intended to operate. I gather that the inbred right-wing twat motherfuckers © would like to change this, but thankfully for us all, they are not in charge.

But that’s not even what’s truly important here. What really gets to me, what uncovers the naked Right Wing Authoritarianism in its naked ugliness is that they are now trying to use Obama’s accomplishment as justification for torture. The morning after President Obama announced that Osama bin Laden had been killed in Pakistan, the inbred, right-wing, twat motherfuckers © started crowing that credit should be given to Bush for having the foresight and courage to torture the people who provided the intel that led the CIA to OBL’s McMansion in Islamabad.

The meme began circulating Monday based on one important piece of the larger puzzle: several years ago, intelligence agencies obtained the pseudonym of OBL’s favorite courier from Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Abu Faraj al-Libi. Inbred, right-wing, twat motherfuckers © and like-minded activists -- including notorious chickenhawks Dick Cheney, Karl Rove, and others, jumped to a conclusion: U.S. officials gained the information via torture.

Except, for one minor detail: that’s not what happened.

None other than infirm incompetent, Donald Rumsfeld (of all people), disputed the talking point yesterday on the right wing propaganda site, Newsmax, noting that Bush-era torture policies weren’t responsible for obtaining the information.

The Associated Press thoroughly dismantled this lie, reporting, “Mohammed did not reveal the names while being subjected to the simulated drowning technique known as waterboarding, former officials said. He identified them many months later under standard interrogation.” [emphasis added]

In this way, the strongest rationale for giving Bush any props for this falls apart like a house of cards or a Heritage Foundation economic theory.

Joan McCarter, Marcy Wheeler, and Brian Buetler have more on this, offering an even more detailed take down of the argument. For example, the case can be made that torture delayed procurement of important intel. What’s truly at stake here is not just about who should get credit (it’s Obama’s, for good or bad), but the spinning of one of the darkest moments of our history -- a time in which elected officials brazenly trumpeted war crimes -- as something noble or even effective. It wasn’t noble then and it still isn’t.

My name is Eddie and I’m in recovery from civilization...

* All the articles getting the MLK quote wrong did publish updates, but still. It’s unprofessional...

The Friday Sex Blog [The Heart of the Truth]

¡Hola! Everybody...
First, I get shanghaied into dinner with a former supervisee. Actually, I suggested dinner, but I didn't count on it becoming an extended convo about my project and a drinking binge (his). By the time I convinced to go home it was late.

Drunk people are boring, BTW.

On my way home, I'm stoked because I have a fire in my belly about a post I have germinating -- inspired by the recent events in Wisconsin. But before I get to my place, I get a call from a former lover and she needs to talk. She's a dear friend, and she's always been there for me. Besides, she's like, one of the hawtest women I have ever known (I'm superficial, shoot me). Already long story shorter: By the time I get home, it's really late and that fire in my belly -- the story I had germinating for a few days -- it's gone...

It's Friday and that means it's all about sex...

* * *

-=[ Knowing, Feeling & Living ]=-

Go through the motions and look as if...

My father loved telling us to “go through the motions” and appear as if we knew what we were doing. I don’t think he meant it as a way of life, but as a way to adapt temporarily to a strange situation. I think what he meant was that sometimes taking your cue from keen observation was necessary before knowing the truth.

Everybody knows at least some truth. For example, most people know it’s unhealthy to overeat. Of those who know this truth, less feel the truth as they go through a gallon of Rocky Road ice cream. Fewer still are able to change their behavior based on knowing and feeling the truth.

The truth, as many of us know, is harder to live than to feel or know. Knowledge is easiest. The mind is more easily changed than emotions or the body, so the mind is quicker to change. Of course, political and religious fundamentalists are the exception. For the rest of us, you can hear something and almost immediately, you know the truth of it. You might feel inspired to run around and tell others this truth. You might even write or blog about it. You can create a whole way of life based on this truth. And still not much will have changed in your life. For example, you might now the truth that exercise improves your cardiovascular fitness and still sit on your butt.

After your mind has understood a truth, the next to change are your emotions. It often takes years of suffering before the truth of something sinks in deep enough for your tears to flow and enthusiasm to grow in response to a truth. Yet even your capacity to feel truth with great sensitivity -- your emotional intelligence -- is not enough for real transformation.

The last part of you to be touched by the truth is your body. Being more solid than your mind or emotions, your body changes last. You can know what you are supposed to do, and you can feel the truth of it, long before you are willing to live it with your body. You may know that you shouldn’t date that asshole, you may feel the truth sending you messages from the pit of your stomach, but you may not be ready to live that truth, so you go through the guilt-ridden motions for yet another bout of suffering.

Your body’s habits, the motions you go through, are the least open to accept truth and last to change.

Because your body is the densest part of your self-process, sex is often the last part of your life to be transformed by the truth. For example, you might know that love could be the foundation for sex. Eventually, you learn to feel your lover emotionally during the clinch of passion. Finally, you learn to live your motions as love during sex.

Even during the most intensely erotic, pleasurable, or painful sexual moments, you can learn to breathe as love, thrash as love, thrust as love, receive as love, and speak as love with your entire body. Sexually, and in every moment throughout the day, you can be love by opening up, feeling, breathing in the moment whether it be pain or pleasure, and exhaling love from the deepest part of your heart as you go through the motions as love. Sex can become the doing of love with your entire being.

You can train your body, like an athlete, to reach the farther reaches of love -- to go the distance as love. And when you feel you are about to collapse from exhaustion, you can give love through your breath and through your actions just a little bit more. Something as simple as the offer of a smile, the invitation of an open hand, or a caress, for just a moment more than your habit would allow you. What happens is that over time your life blossoms as love’s doing stretched -- again and again.

Today, and throughout your days, try to slow down and feel your heart beating. Go in and feel deeply the source of the stream of love flowing through you. Let you body open as love, soften your belly, and imagine breathing in and out through your heart. Offer that. Offer the deepest part of your heart and allow more love to move your body every conscious moment.

Ask yourself, "How would love walk down the street?" Walking, breathing love in and out of your heart, feeling the outer edge of your carnally fashioned form, how do your hips sway as you walk down the street?

How can you make a gift of the truth of your heart to your co-workers, even when you find them disagreeable? Should you smile, tell a joke, act kindly, touch, or walk away to give them space? Every day, practice opening as love as your body’s offering. From deep in your heart out to a moments infinite possibilities.

Knowing truth, of it self, is pretty much useless; feeling it is profound; but living it makes all the difference in the world.

Love,

Eddie

Monday Myth Busters [Blue Mondays]

¡Hola! Everybody...
Just days after the shooting tragedy in Arizona, New York's Mayor Bloomberg ordered an investigation on gun sales and this is what he found... yes in Arizona as well:

It's Monday, the day I sometimes deconstruct popular myths!

* * *

-=[ Monday, Monday ]=-

It's common folk wisdom that Monday is the most depressing day of the week. Seems like many popular songs get a lot of mileage out of the accepted notion that Mondays are uniquely depressing. On the surface, it would appear logical enough that if we enjoy the freedom and activities of the weekend more than weekday work, then it should follow that Mondays suck.

In fact, some studies found that more suicides take place in the United States than on any other day of the week. However, when we focus on how the average person feels, we see a different story unfolding. A group of researchers at SUNY at Stony Brook, foe example, decided that if a blue Monday syndrome really existed, they would have to do more than ask people whether they believed their moods were foul on Mondays. And in fact, when asked, most people do say this (duh?!). However, what people often say about their emotional state may be more about their internalized assumptions than about what really happens.

Without revealing what they were looking for, the SUNY researchers asked forty-six married men to answer some questions about their moods every day for three months. Then they did the same thing with another fifty-eight men -- this time simultaneously getting the men's wives to report on how their husbands were feeling. All the results pointed in the same direction: The men were most cheerful during the weekend, but Mondays didn't depress them more than any other day of the week.

Taking on yet another approach, the researchers asked more than 600 men to fill out a questionnaire designed to measure, or be sensitive to, depression. Each subject filled out the form only once, but different people got it at different times of the week. It turned out that Monday's subjects didn't feel any worse, on average, than those who received the measure on other days. It would seem then that -- at least for men -- Mondays are really no more depressing than the rest of the week.

My name is Eddie and I'm in recovery from civilization

Cuckoos and Neocons

¡Hola! Everybody...
If you’re throwing stones at Ines Sainz (for having to experience sexual harassment), then perhaps you suffer from a rape mentality. I’m sorry, what a woman wears never excuses sexually predatory behavior. Besides, sexual harassment and rape are still against the law.

* * *

-=[ Of Cuckoos & Neocons ]=-

Facts are stupid things.

-- Ronald Reagan, 1988

The best analogy I’ve heard regarding the neoconservative movement is the one using the nesting habits of the cuckoo bird comparison. Cuckoos employ a rather interesting reproductive strategy involving what is known as “nest parasitism.” Briefly, the female cuckoo lays an egg in the nest of another species of bird (after first removing an egg from the host’s nest). Upon hatching, the baby cuckoo goes on to banish the remaining eggs and hatchlings of the host, at which point it becomes the sole focus of the host parent’s interest.

By now you’re probably asking why the host parents don’t push out the alien egg before the troubles begin, or at the very least abandon the parasitic baby cuckoo once it has grown to a size far larger than host parents themselves.

The problem, of course, is that birds lack the thinking skills necessary to recognize the parasite. They take note of the eggs, of the sight of a baby bird’s features and cries, and follow a “care for egg/hatchling in nest” instinctual pattern. It does not demand much of a masquerade on the part of the cuckoo to abuse the host’s instincts. All that is necessary is the initial neural imprinting by the parent host on the baby parasite’s signals.

One cannot help but be struck by the remarkable parallels between the nesting line of attack of the cuckoo and the infiltration of the conservative movement beginning in the 1970s by the neo-conservatives or “neocons.”

Just as the parasitical cuckoo bird ingratiates itself into the nest of an unsuspecting host, eventually driving out the rightful offspring, so did the neocons come to dominate, to the point of exclusion, what passes today for “conservatism” and “the right.”

Intelligent men and women assure me that there are reasonable conservatives capable of logic, so this will be the only point I will cede on their behalf. I’m told by good sources that republicans were once conservatives -- a political philosophy which literally encompasses the notion of conservation. Those Republicans wanted to conserve important things -- like the public infrastructure, the rule of law, public education, and even our environment. During the last 30 years, though, like my cuckoo birds, the GOP has systematically dumped these classic conservatives from office, replacing them with right-wing, laissez-faire parasites. The neoconservative movement, which bloomed during the Reagan years, is a warped mutation of true conservative ideals. Furthermore, neo-conservatism grew out of racist and classist ideology. Modern conservatism is characterized by a resistance to change and a tolerance for inequality; and some of the common psychological factors linked to it include fear and aggression, dogmatism, and an intolerance of ambiguity.

First, I have to begin with the Biggest Lie -- the myth of Ronald Reagan. I have had it up to here

::grabs testicles::

... with the constant idolization of what was in fact an incompetent (and very likely cognitively impaired) president. In the pantheon of the neocon iconography, Reagan is only slightly lower than the Baby Jesus.

Even Reagan disciples like David Stockman have long since admitted that no one was home at the Reagan White House, that then-Vice President George Bush the Elder was out of the loop, and who today in the right mind could deny that the “Trickle Down” approach to tax reform was a disaster? Today, the Randroids, starting with Greenspan, admit those policies were ineffective and destructive. Even Reagan shill Peggy Noonan admitted in her book “What I Saw at the Revolution,” that he didn’t “really hear very much,” and that his appearance of constant good humor was connected to his deafness. He missed much of what was not said directly to him, but he assumed it was good.

In other words, he was not all there -- nobody home!

Now, I don’t say this to poke fun at a very serious disease, Alzheimer’s. I know people struggle with this disease and I am aware of the suffering it entails. However, we had a president who was quite likely not all there and his adherents constantly attempt to paint him as something great when in actuality, he set in motion many of the dynamics that have contributed to the collapse we’re now experiencing. It didn’t start with Bush the Younger, it started with Reagan.

Hopefully, historians will prove less easily convinced, I dunno...

Love,

Eddie

The Most Dangerous Place in the World

¡Hola! Everybody...
Our politicians and journalists, who serve the corporations that own them, love the term “just war.” It’s one of those terms so easily bandied about. Almost no one questioned Obama’s historical revision of war during his Nobel Prize acceptance speech, for example.

Please justify the war, or any other war, described below. Even WWII (a supposedly just war) wasn’t necessary (nor just). But we like to talk about it as the “good” war, and an “unavoidable” war. And that’s a bunch of bullshit...

* * *

-=[ The Forgotten War ]=-

The first casualty of war is the truth...

Euphemistically described as a conflict, the war in the Congo is the deadliest war since World War II. After reading about it and watching the videos, I was reminded of the book by Danny Schechter, The More You Watch, The Less You Know. The title precisely describes how I feel writing this blog today.

In one of the most isolated and dangerous places on earth, in the conflict dubbed “Africa’s Forgotten War,” 45,000 people are killed every month (or 1500 per day), half of them children. However, this isn’t unusual, considering most scientists declare civilians, mostly women and children, make up the bulk of war casualties. Defend that. Tell me that killing, maiming, and raping children is somehow justifiable. Go ahead and use the utilitarian principle that justifies some deaths for the good of the many. That philosophy was implemented as a justification when nuclear bombs were dropped on Japan, though historical facts show that dropping the bombs wasn’t necessary. The Japanese were ready to surrender before the decision to use nuclear force was made.

Unlike Matt Taibbi, who recently wrote of the fracturing of the Left, I never fooled myself into thinking Obama a progressive. In fact, I think Taibbi's premise is flawed: Obama never was and never will be a progressive by any stretch. Still, I have to grant that many progressives voted for Obama in the hopes that he would veer leftward, even if just a little bit. And believe me, actually framing health care as a right rather than privilege is deemed left only in America. The rest of the free world has already ceded that point.

When President Obama introduced his “just war” doctrine to rationalize his accepting a Nobel Peace Prize while escalating the war on Afghanistan, he cited mass rape in the Congo as one reason wars are needed. What he didn’t explain is causes of this war and the abuse -- and how the US contributed to it over the years. He also didn’t mention that to the parties fighting here, this is their own version of a “just war” with each side rationalizing its conduct, denying abuses, and fighting on in the name of higher principles.

Don’t take my word for it. Human Rights Watch has a full chronology online so you can see for yourself how one crisis led to another...

It’s time for Obama to start walking the walk and not merely talking the talk. So far, his leadership on health care reform was abominable. His responses to the economic mess has amounted to “more of the same” -- help the economic elites and pray they rain piss on the rest of us (aka Reaganomics). As it stands, he’s now merely a darker (though admittedly more articulate) version of the Worst President in History.

Get it together brother. You may have inherited a large portion of this mess, but your actions today will assure you will own it a year or two down the road.

Yours,

Eddie

Fear and Loathing as Policy [Immigration Myths]

¡Hola! Everybody...
Starting tomorrow, I will be posting on Latino/as in America, “Eddie-Style.” If you’re interested in a look at Latino/as from an “engaged Latino scholar’s” perspective, then, by all means, stop by... I am posting the following as a public service. (Fuck you Lou Dobbs)

I will be in court most of the afternoon trying to save a kid from needlessly going to prison. Wish me luck...

* * *

-=[ Immigration Myths ]=-

Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence.

-- John Adams (1735–1826)

“Argument in Defense of the Soldiers in the Boston Massacre Trials,” December, 1770

* * *

Common misperceptions regarding immigration and its effects on American society often result in suspicion, discrimination, racism, and violence. Fear leads to hate. If you feared no one, you would hate no one. The only antidote is knowledge, the only sin, ignorance...

Immigrants don’t pay taxes

All immigrants pay taxes, whether income, property, sales, or other. As far as income tax payments go, sources vary in their accounts, but a range of studies find that immigrants pay between $90 and $140 billion a year in federal, state, and local taxes. Even undocumented immigrants pay income taxes, as evidenced by the Social Security Administration’s “suspense file” (taxes that cannot be matched to workers’ names and social security numbers), which grew $20 billion between 1990 and 1998.

Sources: National Academy of Sciences, Cato, Institute, Urban Institute, Social Security Administration

Immigrants come here to take welfare

Immigrants come to work and reunite with family members. Immigrant labor force participation is consistently higher than native-born, and immigrant workers make up a larger share of the U.S. labor force (12.4%) than they do the U.S. population (11.5%). Moreover, the ratio between immigrant use of public benefits and the amount of taxes they pay is consistently favorable to the U.S., unless the “study” was undertaken by an anti-immigrant group. In one estimate, immigrants earn about $240 billion a year, pay about $90 billion a year in taxes, and use about $5 billion in public benefits. In another cut of the data, immigrant tax payments total $20 to $30 billion more than the amount of government services they use.

Sources: American Immigration Lawyers Association, Urban Institute

Immigrants send all their money back to their home countries

In addition to the consumer spending of immigrant households, immigrants and their businesses contribute $162 billion in tax revenue to U.S. federal, state, and local governments. While it is true that immigrants remit billions of dollars a year to their home countries, this is one of the most targeted and effective forms of direct foreign investment.

Sources: Cato Institute, Inter-American Development Bank

Immigrants take jobs and opportunity away from Americans

The largest wave of immigration to the U.S. since the early 1900s coincided with our lowest national unemployment rate and fastest economic growth. Immigrant entrepreneurs create jobs for U.S. and foreign workers, and foreign-born students allow many U.S. graduate programs to keep their doors open. While there has been no comprehensive study done of immigrant-owned businesses, we have countless examples: in Silicon Valley, companies begun by Chinese and Indian immigrants generated more than $19.5 billion in sales and nearly 73,000 jobs in 2000.

Source: Brookings Institution

Immigrants are a drain on the U.S. economy

During the 1990s, half of all new workers were foreign-born, filling gaps left by native-born workers in both the high- and low-skill ends of the spectrum. Immigrants fill jobs in key sectors, start their own businesses, and contribute to a thriving economy. The net benefit of immigration to the U.S. is nearly $10 billion annually. As Alan Greenspan points out, 70% of immigrants arrive in prime working age. That means we haven’t spent a penny on their education, yet they are transplanted into our workforce and will contribute $500 billion toward our social security system over the next 20 years.

Sources: National Academy of Sciences, Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University, Federal Reserve

Immigrants don’t want to learn English or become Americans

Within ten years of arrival, more than 75% of immigrants speak English well; moreover, demand for English classes at the adult level far exceeds supply. Greater than 33% of immigrants are naturalized citizens; given increased immigration in the 1990s, this figure will rise as more legal permanent residents become eligible for naturalization in the coming years. The number of immigrants naturalizing spiked sharply after two events: enactment of immigration and welfare reform laws in 1996, and the terrorist attacks in 2001.

Sources: U.S. Census Bureau, U.S. Department of Homeland Security (Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services)

Today’s immigrants are different than those of 100 years ago

The percentage of the U.S. population that is foreign-born now stands at 11.5%; in the early 20th century it was approximately 15%. Similar to accusations about today’s immigrants, those of 100 years ago initially often settled in mono-ethnic neighborhoods, spoke their native languages, and built up newspapers and businesses that catered to their fellow émigrés. They also experienced the same types of discrimination that today’s immigrants face, and integrated within American culture at a similar rate. If we view history objectively, we remember that every new wave of immigrants has been met with suspicion and doubt and yet, ultimately, every past wave of immigrants has been vindicated and saluted.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau

Most immigrants cross the border illegally

Around 75% have legal permanent (immigrant) visas; of the 25% that are undocumented, 40% overstayed temporary (nonimmigrant) visas.

Source: INS Statistical Yearbook

Weak U.S. border enforcement has lead to high undocumented immigration

From 1986 to 1998, the Border Patrol’s budget increased six fold and the number of agents stationed on our southwest border doubled to 8,500. The Border Patrol also toughened its enforcement strategy, heavily fortifying typical urban entry points and pushing migrants into dangerous desert areas, in hopes of deterring crossings. Instead, the undocumented immigrant population doubled in that time frame, to 8 million -- despite the legalization of nearly 3 million immigrants after the enactment of the Immigration Reform and Control Act in 1986. Insufficient legal avenues for immigrants to enter the U.S., compared with the number of jobs available to them, have created this current conundrum.

Source: Cato Institute

The war on terrorism can be won through immigration restrictions

No security expert since September 11, 2001 has said that restrictive immigration measures would have prevented the terrorist attacks -- instead, they key is good use of good intelligence. Most of the 9/11 hijackers were here on legal visas. Since 9/11, the myriad of measures targeting immigrants in the name of national security have netted no terrorism prosecutions. In fact, several of these measures could have the opposite effect and actually make us less safe, as targeted communities of immigrants are afraid to come forward with information.

Sources: Newspaper articles, various security experts, and think tanks

* * *

The above was prepared by the National Immigration Forum, June 2003

For a more thorough contextual look click here

* * *

Love,

Eddie

Sunday Sermon [Beliefs]

¡Hola! Everybody...
Buried under the conservative hysterics surrounding President Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize was the little story of three Americans who won the Nobel Prize for Medicine. They received the award for discovering the existence of an enzyme, telomerase, and the role it plays in repairing damaged DNA strands (actually something quite important for the future of medical treatments for genetic diseases and many cancers).

Yet one of the winners, Elizabeth Blackburn, wasn’t good enough for our last President George Bush, because he fired her from the Federal government's Council on Bioethics. Why? Because she refused to swallow the GOP Kool Aid on stem cell research and that made her persona non grata to the Bush and the Republican Party’s faith-based war on science. Another Nobel laureate, Paul Krugman, wrote an excellent piece in the Times on the disinvestment of education and its consequences.

The two stories are connected in that as a nation we once revolutionized public education, leading to an enlightened democracy. Today, we cut school budgets while increasing budgets for prisons and fire Nobel-caliber scientists from government positions.

* * *

-=[ Beliefs ]=-

Wisdom tells me I am nothing. Love tells me I am everything. Between the two my life flows

-- Nisargadatta Maharaj

Your state of mind and your understanding of what contains depends on what you believe about your mind. Whatever those beliefs may be, they are the filters and premises that will determine what you will accept into your mind. When you believe something, you have made it true -- for you.

At the same time, what you believe acts as a limitation of what you will accept into your mind.

There is no such thing as a neutral belief. Every belief has the power to dictate each decision you make. For what is a decision but a conclusion based on everything you believe? And what are beliefs but answers to life’s questions? And what value do our beliefs hold if we have forgotten the questions they were designed to answer?

It is this recognition that you do not understand that is the preparation for the undoing of your false beliefs. The truth, my friends, will correct the errors in your mind. Or, as my friend liked to say, “Free your mind, your ass will follow.”

Love,

Eddie

The TGIF Sex Blog (The Heart's Truth]

¡Hola! Everybody...
I’m going to disappear this weekend...

* * *

-=[ Knowing, Feeling & Living ]=-

Go through the motions and look as if...

My father loved telling us to “go through the motions” and appear as if we knew what we were doing. I don’t think he meant it as a way of life, but as a way to adapt temporarily to a strange situation. I think what he meant was that sometimes taking your cue from keen observation was necessary before knowing the truth.

Everybody knows at least some truth. For example, most people know it’s unhealthy to overeat. Of those who know this truth, less feel the truth as they go through a gallon of Rocky Road ice cream. Fewer still are able to change their behavior based on knowing and feeling the truth.

The truth, as many of us know, is harder to live than to feel or know it. Knowledge is easiest. The mind is more easily changed than emotions or the body, so the mind is swift to change. Of course, political and religious fundamentalists are the exception. You can hear something and almost immediately, you know the truth of it. You might feel inspired to run around and tell others this truth. You might even write or blog about it. You can create a whole way of life based on this truth. And still not much will have changed in your life. For example, you might now the truth that exercise improves your cardiovascular fitness and still sit on your butt.

After your mind has understood a truth, the next to change are your emotions. It often takes years of suffering before the truth of something sinks in deep enough for your tears to flow and enthusiasm to grow in response to a truth. Yet even your capacity to feel truth with great sensitivity -- your emotional intelligence -- is not enough for real growth.

The last part of you to be touched by the truth is your body. Being more solid than your mind or emotions, your body changes last. You can know what you are supposed to do, and you can feel the truth of it, long before you are willing to live it with your body. You may know that you shouldn’t date that asshole, you may feel the truth sending you messages from the pit of your stomach, but you may not be ready to live that truth, so you go through the guilt-ridden motions for yet another bout of suffering.

Your body’s habits, the motions you go through, are the hardest to accept truth and last to change.

Because your body is the densest part of your self-process, sex is often the last part of your life to be transformed by the truth. For example, you might know that love could be the foundation for sex. Eventually, you learn to feel your lover emotionally during the clinch of passion. Finally, you learn to live your motions as love during sex.

Even during the most intensely erotic, pleasurable, or painful sexual moments, you can learn to breathe as love, thrash as love, thrust as love, receive as love, and speak as love with your entire body. Sexually, and in every moment throughout the day, you can be love by opening up, feeling, breathing in the moment whether it be pain or pleasure, and exhaling love from the deepest part of your heart as you go through the motions as love. Sex can become the doing of love with your entire being.

You can train your body, like an athlete, to reach the further reaches of love -- to go the distance as love. And when you feel you are about to collapse from exhaustion, you can give love through your breath and through your actions just a little bit more. Something as simple as the offer of a smile, the invitation of an open hand, or a caress, for just a moment more than your habit would allow you. What happens is that over time your life blossoms as love’s doing stretched -- again and again.

Today, and throughout your days, try to slow down and feel your heart beating. Go in and feel deeply the source of the stream of love flowing through you. Let you body open as love, soften your belly, and imagine breathing in and out through your heart. Offer that -- the deepest part of your heart -- through your breath, and allow more love to move your body every conscious moment.

How would love walk down the street? Walking, breathing love in and out of your heart, feeling the outer edge of your carnally fashioned form, how do your hips sway as you walk down the street?

How can you make a gift of the truth of your heart to your co-workers, even when you find them disagreeable? Should you smile, tell a joke, act kindly, touch, or walk away to give them space? Every day, practice opening as love as your body’s offering. From deep in your heart out to a moments infinite possibilities.

Knowing truth, of it self, is pretty much useless; feeling it is profound; but living it makes all the difference in the world.

Love,

Eddie

The Chains of Fools

¡Hola! Everybody...
I need to stop working weekends! Having only one day off sucks dead dawg farts. It seems I have no rest. This is a busy time of the year, what with the end of the fiscal year upon us and the unending parsing og budgets.. anyway, all this stops me from writing for myself...

* * *

-=[ Entertaining Ourselves to Death ]=-

Reality doesn't bite, it's our perception of reality that bites.
-- Anthony J. D'Angelo

I have lived long enough to witness the fabrication of the greatest lie ever told: “Reality TV.”

What’s his name, Orwell, is doing a triple Salchow as I write.

Of all the shackles we willingly wear, two of the most powerful are those of spectacle and illusion. the chains we wear today are expensive, they have names like Coach, Hilfiger, and Chanel. That our ancestors fought to rid themselves of the brands we so readily accept (and pay huge sums for), has to be one of the greatest and tragic ironies in history. What difference does it make whether your chains are made of iron or gold?

Chains are expensive, as are surveillance tools and armed guards. A less expensive, more efficient strategy is to keep the slave entertained. Sublimation is the best cure for rebellion. Give them something inconsequential to think about or a dream that leads to a dead end.

I love sports, but I also know that sports as spectacle are perfect for these ends. More people will watch the Superbowl than an election. Shit, Ferdinand Marcos distracted a whole revolutionary movement in the Philippines by hosting the Thrilla in Manila, the epic battle between Joe Frazier and Muhammad Ali.

And while even the Romans knew sports are good distractions, we all know sex is better. Movies, celebrations, mud-slinging elections, or even a grisly string of murders are excellent distractions that work to pacify the masses.

All the while, you’re paying for gaudy trinkets embedded with the names of your masters, and for the most part they are nothing but the modern equivalent of shackles.

There is a way out, but it will take your turning away from the glow of the television screen and actually looking at reality.

Love,

Eddie

The Neocons, pt. I

¡Hola! Everybody...
Ok, first? Stop it with the beating up on PETA. They ain’t say nuthin’ too harsh. OTOH, what I noticed immediately was that the brother snatched the fly right out of the air! As my friend, Rippa, noted that is some ninja shit right there! LOL

BTW, while we’re talking about swatting flies, the SCOTUS may very likely trash the Voting Rights Act. Yeah, that’s right... today. Let's see you take your black or brown ass to the election booth next time!

Which reminds me... time to take the kid gloves off, eschew the Astroglide, and shove some truths up the neocon gazoo! While they’re reeling from two consecutive electoral defeats and the specter of having to face the cold facts of their failed economic policies, I want to kick these bastids while they’re down (because I do not fight fair).

First in a series (to be posted next week) -- a [brief] history of the modern neoconservative movement. Or...

* * *

-=[ Of Cuckoos & Neocons ]=-

Facts are stupid things.

-- Ronald Reagan, 1988, a misquote of John Adams, “Facts are stubborn things.”

The best analogy I’ve heard regarding the neoconservative movement is the one using the nesting habits of the cuckoo bird. Cuckoos employ a rather interesting reproductive strategy involving what is known as “nest parasitism.” Briefly, the female cuckoo lays an egg in the nest of another species of bird (after first removing an egg from the host’s nest). Upon hatching, the baby cuckoo goes on to banish the remaining eggs and hatchlings of the host, at which point it becomes the sole focus of the host parent’s interest.

By now you’re probably asking why the host parents don’t push out the alien egg before the troubles begin, or at the very least abandon the parasitic baby cuckoo once it has grown to a size far larger than host parents themselves.

The problem, of course, is that birds lack the thinking skills necessary to recognize the parasite. They take note of the eggs, of the sight of a baby bird’s features and cries, and follow a “care for egg/hatchling in nest” instinctual pattern. It does not demand much of a masquerade on the part of the cuckoo to abuse the host’s instincts. All that is necessary is the initial neural imprinting by the parent host on the baby parasite’s signals.

One cannot help but be struck by the remarkable parallels between the nesting line of attack of the cuckoo and the infiltration of the conservative movement beginning in the 1970s by the neo-conservatives or “neocons.”

Just as the parasitical cuckoo bird ingratiates itself into the nest of an unsuspecting host, eventually driving out the rightful offspring, so did the neocons come to dominate, to the point of exclusion, what passes today for “conservatism” and “the right.”

Intelligent men and women assure me that there are reasonable conservatives capable of logic, so this will be the only point I will cede on their behalf. Next week, I plan to post a series of blogs showing that the neoconservative movement, which came into prominence during the Reagan years, is a mutation of true conservative ideals. I will also show that neo-conservatism grew out of racist and classist ideology. I will show that neo-conservatism is characterized by a resistance to change and a tolerance for inequality; and that some of the common psychological factors linked to neo-conservatism include fear and aggression, dogmatism, and an intolerance of ambiguity

First, I have to begin with the Biggest Lie -- the myth of Ronald Reagan. I have had it up to here

::grabs testicles::

with the constant idolization of what was in fact an incompetent (and very likely mentally impaired) president. In the pantheon of the neocon iconography, Reagan is only slightly lower than the Baby Jesus.

What? ::blank stare::

Even Reagan disciples like David Stockman have long since admitted that no one was home at the Reagan White House, that then-Vice President George Bush the Elder was out of the loop, and who today in the right mind could deny that the “Trickle Down” approach to tax reform was a disaster? Even Reagan shill Peggy Noonan admitted in her book “What I Saw at the Revolution,” that he didn’t “really hear very much,” and that his appearance of constant good humor was connected to his deafness. He missed much of what was not said directly to him, but he assumed it was good.

In other words, he was not all there -- senile!

Now, I don’t say this to poke fun at a very serious disease, Alzheimer’s. I know people struggle with this disease and I am aware of the suffering it entails. However, we had a president who was quite likely not all there and his adherents constantly attempt to paint him as something great when in actuality, he set in motion many of the dynamics that have contributed to the collapse we’re now experiencing. It didn’t start with Bush the Younger, it started with Reagan.

Hopefully, historians will prove less easily convinced, I dunno...

Love,

Eddie

The Kool Logic of Late Capitalism

¡Hola! Everybody...
I’m going to evolve into a “Safe Negro” -- I mean! -- a “Safe NegroRican”! This will entail a huge sacrifice on my part. My passion for facts and love for empiricism in discussing complex social issues with far-reaching consequences will have to be scrapped for whatever I can pull out of my (preferably unwashed) arse. Safe NegroRicans don’t wash their arses. Heck, we don’t even call them arses, we call them culos! So there'll have to be some vigilance on my part. (Maybe some condescendingly compassionate white person will take it upon his/ herself to smell my nicotine stained fingers to make sure my ass is just the right smell of shite?)

* * *

-=[ Kool Logic ]=-

The Cultural Logic 0f Late Capitalism, Frederic Jameson

-- by Urayoán Noel

1
I hope this finds you in good health (Or at least gainfully employed). We're here to discuss the hologram-self In the era of the void.

Some say modern man is hollow, Others say it's a condition Called "postmodern." Do you follow Could this use some exposition?
2
O.K. See the common graves Rotting in the ancient cities? The Fast food? The porous borders? The ambiguous sexualities? The debt-bludgeoned ethnicities? The wars of chemical roses?
Cash flows from Utopian rivers And the market never closes!

"This is the kool logic
Of late capitalism."

3
In the Prozac marketplaces People hoard new models of leisure; Love has been deregulated: Plastic breasts! Prosthetics! Seizures! In the suburebs neighbors mourn The death drive of their libidos, Late summers full of soft porn, Stolen Wonder Bras, torn Speedos.

"This is the kool logic
Of late capitalism."

4
You can consume what you please: From work music to new age; Ricky Martin and John Cage Are touring the Basque Pyrenees; You can sing your song of peace (Pop! Punk! Folk! Tribal! Assorted!) But the violence will not ceasae, Hate's fetus can't be aborted!

"This is the kool logic
Of late capitalism."

5
Macrobiotic-cybernetic- Fiber-optic folderol! Neo-gothic supermodels! Satellites and virtual malls! Vegan power lunch grand slams! Word elites! Money-go-rounds! Free will or free (pillow?) shams In the global shantytown?

"This is the kool logic
Of late capitalism."

6
NBTFA, Mercosur, Hamas! DVDs and open mikes! Watercross and motocross! SUVs and mountain bikes! Trailer parks! Gated communities! High-rise ghettoes and favelas! Acquired diplomatic immunities! Self-help prophets! Braille novelas! Mexico, Miami, Rio! Euro-Disney, Bollywood! Dell, Intel, Taco Bell, Geo! Stanford post-docs in da hood! I'll stop fronting pedagogical... One last question (extra credit): This kool logic ain't too logical But it's still "kool." Do you get it?!

"This is the kool logic
Of late capitalism."

[About Urayoán Noel (click here): Puerto Rico-born and Bronx-based performance poet Urayoán Noel has been delighting and confounding the enlightened masses since the late 1990s. Solo and as part of the rock band objet petit a, he has performed-sung-scatted throughout the U.S. and Puerto Rico, as well as in the Dominican Republic and Perú. His laugh-tracked new wave guarachas have rocked the rafters and/or emptied the room at the Nuyorican Poets Café, Bowery Poetry Club, Bar 13, Cornelia Street Café, Instituto Cervantes, and Roka Espacio.]

* * *

Love,

Eddie