The wind is out of the south and the sky is starting to cloud over. My wife calls to tell me that our son got a D on his latest math quiz. Going in the boy assured us he had this one in the bag, that the extra study time he’d invested would pay off; when he came home on quiz day he was confident of at least a B.
The kid is by no means incapable, he just dislikes math, and perhaps he comes by his aversion naturally, via the gene pool. I did okay with basic math but tanked when it came to algebra and geometry, to equations, solving for x; the language of math was like a buzz in my head, annoying and discordant, and no matter how hard I tried or how many hours I spent working out problems, I still felt like a man lost in a strange country.
My wife is better at math than I am, but understanding never came easily for her, either; she had to work extra hard at it.
What’s a parent to do in this anxious age, when the school curriculum moves like lightning, teachers are stressed and constantly under fire, school administrators and State officials are obsessed with standardized test scores, education budgets are gutted year after year because politicians in California don’t have the stones to confront the unintended consequences of Prop 13, and principals spend most of their time fund raising?
The public education system that was for many years the envy of the nation is a shell of its former self, and California now swims at the bottom of a muddy pool with Mississippi and Louisiana and Arkansas.
The Golden State, for reasons of politics and money, which in this era are indistinguishable from one another – decided to put prisons ahead of public education. It doesn’t seem to be working that great.
But back to my son and math: what to do? Private tutoring? Done that. Peer tutoring? Kid refuses. Threats, rewards, pleas? Tried them all.
People who hate exercise won’t go to the gym and kids who equate Algebra with torture shy from the subject. If you don’t like something, you won’t do it, at least not willingly.
When I lived in Japan in the early 1980’s, I remember the annual ritual of “Examination Hell,” a week of intense testing for high school seniors that determined what colleges they could enter. The better the college or university, the better the job prospects, and a position with a prestigious corporation often meant the difference between an affluent life and a mediocre one. Exam Hell Week was high stakes and even higher anxiety and stress, and every year some poor kid slashed his wrists or leaped to his death from an elevated train platform because his test scores didn’t measure up. Not only had the kid failed himself, he had failed his parents, his grandparents and his ancestors, shamed them all.
I always thought Japan’s system insane and inhumane, but in large part, America has adopted the same sort of madness. The curriculum has become dangerously narrow, focused on math and language arts and prepackaged “aligned standards,” and weeks before the annual standardized tests the kids are prepped and prodded and exhorted, while parents are bombarded with pre-recorded telephone messages reminding them to make sure their children are well rested and fed a nutritious breakfast on testing day.
It’s the AA age but by that I mean anxiety and austerity. The kid tanked on his test and I sit here feeling as if I let him down.
Wednesday, February 08, 2012
Saturday, February 04, 2012
Big Box Blues
My wife and I went to Costco the other day to pick up a few items. Generally, I avoid big box stores in the same way I avoid beehives or jellyfish, but my wife promised we’d be in and out in no time. When it comes to shopping my wife is very adept, organized and disciplined, prepared to buy what she needs and no more, not the type of customer I associate with Costco.
I caught the big box heebie-jeebies right away. The entrance was jammed with people pushing mammoth carts. Before we got past the girl checking membership cards, a woman behind us rammed her cart into my heel. “That’s one reason I avoid this place,” I muttered under my breath. “Don’t start,” my wife said. I watched the woman who almost severed my Achilles veer left and make straight for the electronics, disappearing among the fifty and sixty inch HDTV’s. I felt dizzy, overwhelmed by the sheer size of the store, the industrial pallet racks stretching toward the ceiling, the sea of merchandise: stacks of books, piles of sweaters, jeans, shirts, tires, throw rugs, bath towels, BBQ grills, bicycles, golf clubs, vacuum cleaners, cases of wine, blocks of cheese. It’s enough to make my head spin. Everyone around us seemed to know one another and a quick vision of a Renaissance market passed through my mind. But this was a public square under a privately owned roof, a meticulously crafted business model, a machine of commerce.
570 stores, worldwide. South Korea, Mexico, Canada, Britain, and down under in Australia.
We’ve come to take it for granted, but the “warehouse” store is an innovative idea in the retail racket, and Costco has it wired. Concrete floor, no frills, no manufacturer’s coupons or blue light specials, big discounts on certain items, and the sense of being on a grand treasure hunt for something you didn’t know you had to have until you see it. Even in the midst of a hopeless recession the aisles are jammed with shoppers. Who has money to spend? I wondered.
A group of students from UCSB loaded a cart with breakfast cereal, toilet paper, bread, frozen burritos, Diet Coke and Dr. Pepper, orange juice, Cool Whip, dill pickles and bananas. By contrast, our cart is still empty. This makes me feel conspicuous, like an imposter. A woman in a red apron hands out Greek yogurt in tiny white cups. Two kids in soccer garb, parents nowhere to be seen, battle over a cup. “She gave it to me!” “No she didn’t!” “You can’t steal my yogurt!” “It’s not yours!” I told my wife that if we wanted to hear children squabble we could stay home. She shook her head at me and dropped a two and a half pound bag of coffee in our cart. Seattle Mountain, Costa Rican, whole bean. Alone in the big cart the coffee looked lonely.
“I feel like we should buy something large and substantial,” I said, “like 55 gallons of white vinegar. Something you have to wheel out with a pallet jack.”
She said, “Look for feminine hygiene products. I need maxipads.”
“How about five gallons of BBQ sauce?” I asked.
“Stop yourself.”
“Ketchup? We can always use ketchup.”
“Follow me, look for maxipads.”
By the time we finished our cart contained a whopping three items – the coffee, a jumbo pack of maxipads, and an oversized bottle of generic allergy medicine. The check out lines were backed up into the aisles and moving at a sloth’s pace. On the other side of the check-out area I watched people strain to roll carts overflowing with merchandise; once they got home with all that booty they would spend at least an hour putting it away. A squat woman in an eggplant sweat suit and black UGG’s pushed one cart and pulled another; she reminded me of a prospector during the gold rush, urging her pack mules up the trail.
“Let’s get a hotdog when we get out of here,” my wife said. “I’m hungry.”
“At this pace that will be tomorrow morning.”
“It’s not that bad. You up for a hotdog?”
“Can we get two or do they sell them by the dozen?”
I caught the big box heebie-jeebies right away. The entrance was jammed with people pushing mammoth carts. Before we got past the girl checking membership cards, a woman behind us rammed her cart into my heel. “That’s one reason I avoid this place,” I muttered under my breath. “Don’t start,” my wife said. I watched the woman who almost severed my Achilles veer left and make straight for the electronics, disappearing among the fifty and sixty inch HDTV’s. I felt dizzy, overwhelmed by the sheer size of the store, the industrial pallet racks stretching toward the ceiling, the sea of merchandise: stacks of books, piles of sweaters, jeans, shirts, tires, throw rugs, bath towels, BBQ grills, bicycles, golf clubs, vacuum cleaners, cases of wine, blocks of cheese. It’s enough to make my head spin. Everyone around us seemed to know one another and a quick vision of a Renaissance market passed through my mind. But this was a public square under a privately owned roof, a meticulously crafted business model, a machine of commerce.
570 stores, worldwide. South Korea, Mexico, Canada, Britain, and down under in Australia.
We’ve come to take it for granted, but the “warehouse” store is an innovative idea in the retail racket, and Costco has it wired. Concrete floor, no frills, no manufacturer’s coupons or blue light specials, big discounts on certain items, and the sense of being on a grand treasure hunt for something you didn’t know you had to have until you see it. Even in the midst of a hopeless recession the aisles are jammed with shoppers. Who has money to spend? I wondered.
A group of students from UCSB loaded a cart with breakfast cereal, toilet paper, bread, frozen burritos, Diet Coke and Dr. Pepper, orange juice, Cool Whip, dill pickles and bananas. By contrast, our cart is still empty. This makes me feel conspicuous, like an imposter. A woman in a red apron hands out Greek yogurt in tiny white cups. Two kids in soccer garb, parents nowhere to be seen, battle over a cup. “She gave it to me!” “No she didn’t!” “You can’t steal my yogurt!” “It’s not yours!” I told my wife that if we wanted to hear children squabble we could stay home. She shook her head at me and dropped a two and a half pound bag of coffee in our cart. Seattle Mountain, Costa Rican, whole bean. Alone in the big cart the coffee looked lonely.
“I feel like we should buy something large and substantial,” I said, “like 55 gallons of white vinegar. Something you have to wheel out with a pallet jack.”
She said, “Look for feminine hygiene products. I need maxipads.”
“How about five gallons of BBQ sauce?” I asked.
“Stop yourself.”
“Ketchup? We can always use ketchup.”
“Follow me, look for maxipads.”
By the time we finished our cart contained a whopping three items – the coffee, a jumbo pack of maxipads, and an oversized bottle of generic allergy medicine. The check out lines were backed up into the aisles and moving at a sloth’s pace. On the other side of the check-out area I watched people strain to roll carts overflowing with merchandise; once they got home with all that booty they would spend at least an hour putting it away. A squat woman in an eggplant sweat suit and black UGG’s pushed one cart and pulled another; she reminded me of a prospector during the gold rush, urging her pack mules up the trail.
“Let’s get a hotdog when we get out of here,” my wife said. “I’m hungry.”
“At this pace that will be tomorrow morning.”
“It’s not that bad. You up for a hotdog?”
“Can we get two or do they sell them by the dozen?”
Monday, January 30, 2012
Dispatch from Florida
Orlando, Florida, Gingrich 2012 Campaign HQ
The mood in the Gingrich campaign isn’t as upbeat as it was immediately after the South Carolina primary. Mitt Romney regained his footing after the last debate and once again looks like the presumptive GOP nominee.
Despite being despised and mistrusted by many members of his own party, Romney has opened a double digit lead over Gingrich in Florida.
Helping Romney’s cause is the fact that the GOP establishment -- or what remains of it, anyway -- hates Newt Gingrich with passion and prejudice. Bob Dole, a relic of the Establishment, always believed that Gingrich was a crackpot and a megalomaniac -- and now he’s not afraid to say so publicly. “Oh sure,” Dole said the other day, “Gingrich had a lot of ideas when he served in Congress -- and every one was nutty. He was never as smart as he thought he was, and all his grandstanding and grandiosity pissed off a lot of people. If he’s the nominee, the GOP is dead meat come November.”
Gingrich’s campaign staff play it close to the vest most of the time, but late at night, after a couple of rounds of drinks, when only the most intrepid reporters are still around, they let down their guard. While there are a few true believers in the group, most of the staff thinks Gingrich is full of shit, arrogant, and living in his own fantasy world where people like him get elected president.
“He’s serious about colonizing the moon,” one staffer said in the bar of the Sheraton. It was past 1:00 a.m. and the guy looked fried, like he’d been mainlining Red Bull for days. “Newt’s plan is to colonize and then send our illegal aliens and undesirables up there, in the same way Britain once sent convicts to Australia. Newt’s nuts, man.”
“The other day,” another chimed in, “Newt walked in and stood in the middle of the office and apropos of nothing announced, and I quote: ‘I am the smartest man in America and one of the great minds in the history of the world. I consider myself the equal of Aristotle and Plato and far superior to Socrates, and it’s a surprise to me -- truly a surprise -- that no sculptor has come forward to render my likeness in marble or granite. That will change when I’m elected president. The White House grounds will be peppered with statues of me.’ And then he turned around and left. How fucking bizarre is that?”
Nobody is willing to talk in detail, on or off the record, about Newt’s wife, Calista, though rumor has it that by comparison Calista makes Hillary Clinton look friendly and warm.
A female staffer looked up from her iPad and said, “The word is that Newt likes his sex kinky. He dresses like Julius Caesar and Calista like a slave girl, and they play out scenes involving leather restraints and oversized dildos. There’s videotape, apparently.”
It’s a weird vibe for sure, and South Carolina feels like a long time ago. National political campaigns are always strange, part circus, part revival meeting, part freak show. The candidate is “on” twenty-four hours a day, the pace is exhausting, and the news cycle short and unforgiving. A candidate as voluble as Gingrich is always one slip of the tongue away from disaster.
The mood in the Gingrich campaign isn’t as upbeat as it was immediately after the South Carolina primary. Mitt Romney regained his footing after the last debate and once again looks like the presumptive GOP nominee.
Despite being despised and mistrusted by many members of his own party, Romney has opened a double digit lead over Gingrich in Florida.
Helping Romney’s cause is the fact that the GOP establishment -- or what remains of it, anyway -- hates Newt Gingrich with passion and prejudice. Bob Dole, a relic of the Establishment, always believed that Gingrich was a crackpot and a megalomaniac -- and now he’s not afraid to say so publicly. “Oh sure,” Dole said the other day, “Gingrich had a lot of ideas when he served in Congress -- and every one was nutty. He was never as smart as he thought he was, and all his grandstanding and grandiosity pissed off a lot of people. If he’s the nominee, the GOP is dead meat come November.”
Gingrich’s campaign staff play it close to the vest most of the time, but late at night, after a couple of rounds of drinks, when only the most intrepid reporters are still around, they let down their guard. While there are a few true believers in the group, most of the staff thinks Gingrich is full of shit, arrogant, and living in his own fantasy world where people like him get elected president.
“He’s serious about colonizing the moon,” one staffer said in the bar of the Sheraton. It was past 1:00 a.m. and the guy looked fried, like he’d been mainlining Red Bull for days. “Newt’s plan is to colonize and then send our illegal aliens and undesirables up there, in the same way Britain once sent convicts to Australia. Newt’s nuts, man.”
“The other day,” another chimed in, “Newt walked in and stood in the middle of the office and apropos of nothing announced, and I quote: ‘I am the smartest man in America and one of the great minds in the history of the world. I consider myself the equal of Aristotle and Plato and far superior to Socrates, and it’s a surprise to me -- truly a surprise -- that no sculptor has come forward to render my likeness in marble or granite. That will change when I’m elected president. The White House grounds will be peppered with statues of me.’ And then he turned around and left. How fucking bizarre is that?”
Nobody is willing to talk in detail, on or off the record, about Newt’s wife, Calista, though rumor has it that by comparison Calista makes Hillary Clinton look friendly and warm.
A female staffer looked up from her iPad and said, “The word is that Newt likes his sex kinky. He dresses like Julius Caesar and Calista like a slave girl, and they play out scenes involving leather restraints and oversized dildos. There’s videotape, apparently.”
It’s a weird vibe for sure, and South Carolina feels like a long time ago. National political campaigns are always strange, part circus, part revival meeting, part freak show. The candidate is “on” twenty-four hours a day, the pace is exhausting, and the news cycle short and unforgiving. A candidate as voluble as Gingrich is always one slip of the tongue away from disaster.
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Rise of the Toad
I’ll be damned if the Human Toad (Newt Gingrich) didn’t win the South Carolina GOP popularity contest, easily besting Mitt “Easy Money” Romney. Now the Toad is atop this sad heap of would-be rulers and heading to Florida with what the politicos like to call the Big Mo’.
If the Toad appears capable to a segment of the Republican base it’s only because Easy Money is so incredibly wooden on the campaign trail, and so totally out of step with the people of this country. Referring to more than $350,000 in speaking fees (nine speeches in all) as chump change -- not that Romney said it quite like that, but the way he brushed off the income as almost not worth counting, like finding a couple of dollars in quarters between the sofa cushions -- is damned insulting when millions of Americans are struggling to put enough food on their tables.
Romney clearly doesn’t get it, and neither does the Toad -- the Toad is simply better at appealing to the baser instincts of his audience.
An egomaniacal crackpot without peer, the Toad treated his marriage vows like political promises, and did his best to have his cake (an open marriage) and eat it too (keep his mistress,) and now passes himself off as a righteous man, a reformed and rehabilitated philanderer, bathed in the light of the Catholic faith.
Make no mistake, the Toad is no stranger to hypocrisy and if the adulterer’s loafer was on Romney’s foot, you can bet the Toad would be howling about “character” from every rooftop. He’d quote Churchill, Gandhi and Rabbi Hillel on the dangers of backing a leader with questionable character.
More amusing still, Gingrich makes the incredible claim that he is a Washington DC outsider, the only candidate with sufficient independence to disrupt the culture of corruption in our capitol. Thieves, perverts, and con artists beware! Sheriff Toad is coming to town.
The claim strains credulity to the breaking point. Word to those of you not paying attention: Gingrich served in the House, and was in fact Speaker of that body, around the time P.J. O’Rourke dubbed it a Parliament of Whores. What P.J. meant was that almost every one of those so-called “public” servants was on the take in one way or another, doing political favors in exchange for campaign dough, plum private sector jobs, or sky box seats for the Super Bowl.
Not much has changed; the whores still have the run of the place.
When Gingrich left government covered by a shroud of disgrace and failure, he became a shill for private interests, using his contacts and knowledge of the political machinery to enrich his corporate clients and himself. Basically, the Toad graduated from common streetwalker to high-class hooker. Instead of servicing clients in the Men’s Room he began entertaining them in luxurious boardrooms. But let’s not split hairs here -- a blowjob is a blowjob no matter where it is administered. You can dress it up, call it fellatio, but it’s still a blowjob.
OK, glad we got that out of the way.
It doesn’t require any genius to see that the GOP is in disarray, tearing itself apart from within, lurching so far right that the party faithful would reject Dwight Eisenhower if he were running today. Gingrich is banking on naked fear to carry him along, and by that I mean the fear white people have of blacks, Mexicans, lesbians, gay men, skateboarders, transsexuals, vegans, and any person who drives a Prius.
Romney, on the other hand, believes that his business background qualifies him for the Oval Office, the theory being that he knows how to grow the economy and create jobs. While this may sound logical, it’s utterly batshit. I ask you this: after the colossal failure of corporate America during the first decade of this century, why would anyone trust a businessman?
Today the Toad may be rising, but we can take comfort in the fact that gravity is on our side.
If the Toad appears capable to a segment of the Republican base it’s only because Easy Money is so incredibly wooden on the campaign trail, and so totally out of step with the people of this country. Referring to more than $350,000 in speaking fees (nine speeches in all) as chump change -- not that Romney said it quite like that, but the way he brushed off the income as almost not worth counting, like finding a couple of dollars in quarters between the sofa cushions -- is damned insulting when millions of Americans are struggling to put enough food on their tables.
Romney clearly doesn’t get it, and neither does the Toad -- the Toad is simply better at appealing to the baser instincts of his audience.
An egomaniacal crackpot without peer, the Toad treated his marriage vows like political promises, and did his best to have his cake (an open marriage) and eat it too (keep his mistress,) and now passes himself off as a righteous man, a reformed and rehabilitated philanderer, bathed in the light of the Catholic faith.
Make no mistake, the Toad is no stranger to hypocrisy and if the adulterer’s loafer was on Romney’s foot, you can bet the Toad would be howling about “character” from every rooftop. He’d quote Churchill, Gandhi and Rabbi Hillel on the dangers of backing a leader with questionable character.
More amusing still, Gingrich makes the incredible claim that he is a Washington DC outsider, the only candidate with sufficient independence to disrupt the culture of corruption in our capitol. Thieves, perverts, and con artists beware! Sheriff Toad is coming to town.
The claim strains credulity to the breaking point. Word to those of you not paying attention: Gingrich served in the House, and was in fact Speaker of that body, around the time P.J. O’Rourke dubbed it a Parliament of Whores. What P.J. meant was that almost every one of those so-called “public” servants was on the take in one way or another, doing political favors in exchange for campaign dough, plum private sector jobs, or sky box seats for the Super Bowl.
Not much has changed; the whores still have the run of the place.
When Gingrich left government covered by a shroud of disgrace and failure, he became a shill for private interests, using his contacts and knowledge of the political machinery to enrich his corporate clients and himself. Basically, the Toad graduated from common streetwalker to high-class hooker. Instead of servicing clients in the Men’s Room he began entertaining them in luxurious boardrooms. But let’s not split hairs here -- a blowjob is a blowjob no matter where it is administered. You can dress it up, call it fellatio, but it’s still a blowjob.
OK, glad we got that out of the way.
It doesn’t require any genius to see that the GOP is in disarray, tearing itself apart from within, lurching so far right that the party faithful would reject Dwight Eisenhower if he were running today. Gingrich is banking on naked fear to carry him along, and by that I mean the fear white people have of blacks, Mexicans, lesbians, gay men, skateboarders, transsexuals, vegans, and any person who drives a Prius.
Romney, on the other hand, believes that his business background qualifies him for the Oval Office, the theory being that he knows how to grow the economy and create jobs. While this may sound logical, it’s utterly batshit. I ask you this: after the colossal failure of corporate America during the first decade of this century, why would anyone trust a businessman?
Today the Toad may be rising, but we can take comfort in the fact that gravity is on our side.
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
American Mishmash
It’s been a number of years since Bob Dylan made the claim that “people are crazy & times are strange,” but the claim remains valid as ever. Here’s a case in point: according to the latest Harper’s index, today more Americans believe that human activity isn’t a cause of global warming than did so a decade ago. That’s a tribute to the power of massive PR from corporations and their media flacks and political allies. The more conclusive the science, the more industry -- and its vocal mouthpieces -- call science into question. BP is particularly masterful in this game of smoke and mirrors, having restored the Gulf of Mexico to its former condition less than a year after one of the worst oil spills in US history. What, you doubt BP’s sincerity? According to BP’s chirpy TV ads, the Gulf’s beaches are pristine, restaurants are open, restitution has been paid to anyone with a valid claim, and fish harvested from Gulf waters are free from deadly contaminants...enjoy your meal.
Moving on to more corporate manure...of late I’ve heard and seen many commercials for Anthem Blue Cross, all pumping the theme that Blue Cross is made up of kind and caring people who only have your health in mind; they have kids of their own, dreams of a healthy retirement, grandchildren and dogs, exotic birds and horses, so therefore they understand your needs. Clearly, none of these kind and caring people work in Anthem’s underwriting department, where denying care to patients is an art form. Your personal physician may possess sound medical reasons for ordering an MRI on your ailing knee, but if the underwriters at Anthem happen to be in an uncharitable mood, you can forget the MRI. Despite the self-reverent advertisements, Blue Cross is only in it for the dough. Nowhere does the average American get hosed more thoroughly than when it comes to health care. But we plow forward with our absurd, inefficient and wasteful for-profit system, paying more for treatment and medications than any other industrial nation. Bow and pay homage to the Free Market God and the angels from Big Pharma.
How many times did Madonna refer to “my film” on the Golden Globes the other night? She was nominated for a song she wrote, but in Madonna’s mind the song was an afterthought; she wanted only to talk about her film, her creation, her baby, her pride & joy. Good to know that Madonna’s ego is still intact after all these years, even though on her best day Madonna had as much talent as Lady Gaga on her worst. Lady Gaga with a wicked hangover, menstrual cramps, and an out of tune Steinway is still better than Madonna ever was. I can see why Sir Elton John was aghast, but then again, it’s the Golden Globes.
By the way, is it just me or does Angelina Jolie resemble an alien from a galaxy far, far away...?
Finally, a moment of levity from the campaign trail. Newt “The Human Toad” Gingrich’s presidential hopes were bolstered yesterday when Todd Palin, husband of Sarah, endorsed Gingrich. Wow! Talk about a seismic shift...Todd Palin is such an important political figure that his endorsement just may propel the Human Toad right to the top of the GOP heap. Perhaps Todd and the Toad will hit the campaign trail together, wow patrons of roadside diners and VFW posts with their wit and charm. I can see the reality TV show now...it will air right after My Strange Addiction...
Moving on to more corporate manure...of late I’ve heard and seen many commercials for Anthem Blue Cross, all pumping the theme that Blue Cross is made up of kind and caring people who only have your health in mind; they have kids of their own, dreams of a healthy retirement, grandchildren and dogs, exotic birds and horses, so therefore they understand your needs. Clearly, none of these kind and caring people work in Anthem’s underwriting department, where denying care to patients is an art form. Your personal physician may possess sound medical reasons for ordering an MRI on your ailing knee, but if the underwriters at Anthem happen to be in an uncharitable mood, you can forget the MRI. Despite the self-reverent advertisements, Blue Cross is only in it for the dough. Nowhere does the average American get hosed more thoroughly than when it comes to health care. But we plow forward with our absurd, inefficient and wasteful for-profit system, paying more for treatment and medications than any other industrial nation. Bow and pay homage to the Free Market God and the angels from Big Pharma.
How many times did Madonna refer to “my film” on the Golden Globes the other night? She was nominated for a song she wrote, but in Madonna’s mind the song was an afterthought; she wanted only to talk about her film, her creation, her baby, her pride & joy. Good to know that Madonna’s ego is still intact after all these years, even though on her best day Madonna had as much talent as Lady Gaga on her worst. Lady Gaga with a wicked hangover, menstrual cramps, and an out of tune Steinway is still better than Madonna ever was. I can see why Sir Elton John was aghast, but then again, it’s the Golden Globes.
By the way, is it just me or does Angelina Jolie resemble an alien from a galaxy far, far away...?
Finally, a moment of levity from the campaign trail. Newt “The Human Toad” Gingrich’s presidential hopes were bolstered yesterday when Todd Palin, husband of Sarah, endorsed Gingrich. Wow! Talk about a seismic shift...Todd Palin is such an important political figure that his endorsement just may propel the Human Toad right to the top of the GOP heap. Perhaps Todd and the Toad will hit the campaign trail together, wow patrons of roadside diners and VFW posts with their wit and charm. I can see the reality TV show now...it will air right after My Strange Addiction...
Thursday, January 12, 2012
Race to Nowhere
Mitt and Barrack. Romney versus Obama. Rich white guy against rich mixed race guy.
There’s your presidential sweepstakes match-up come November and everybody knows it, even the nitwits on Good Morning America. Gingrich and Huntsman and Ron Paul and Santorum will hang around a while longer, but when push comes to shove, Republicans will hold their noses and select Romney. Evangelical Republicans will demand that Romney throw them a bone, so Romney will come out in support of one or more of the Bible thumper’s pet issues. He will say that he has always supported this or that, even if his past statements or actions contradict his assertion.
It’s going to be a long year of political blather, and you can bet the farm that neither Obama nor Romney will say jack shit about the real issues facing our country. Persistent high unemployment. Continuing foreclosures. State budget deficits. Income inequality. Rising poverty. With Romney it will always be morning in America, while Obama will claim that if not for his crack team of ex-Clintonistas, things would be much worse than they are.
My wife watches our local ABC affiliate every morning and by default we are subjected to the GMA team -- George, Robin, Josh and Sam -- not to mention the hacks they habitually turn to for “expert” commentary and analysis. Top flight journalism it’s not, unless you happen to be a believer in corporate media, and extremely gullible to boot. I will give this group credit for being sunny and upbeat, but I can go no further than that. Most mornings they incite my inner crank and make me want to hurl a shoe through the TV.
Don’t expect Obama or Romney to challenge the stranglehold that corporations have on the country, or the fact that “predatory” capitalism doesn’t work worth a damn -- unless the goal is to enrich the few at the expense of the many. For doing that, predatory capitalism is unbeatable, and Republicans – and far too many wimpy Democrats -- have supported this atavistic version of capitalism since Reagan. But if the goal is to create a vibrant middle class, with decent jobs at living wages, with reasonable access to medical care and higher education, with due respect for the fragility of the environment, predatory capitalism isn’t the answer.
Romney claims that his experience running a venture capital firm makes him uniquely qualified to create jobs. This is one of those Republican tropes that sounds good on the morning news but means absolutely nothing in the real world. At the heart of the claim is the belief that the private sector can do no wrong, and that government is always wasteful, inefficient, and inept. The answer, of course, is to kneel before the all-powerful, infallible Market God.
There’s nothing left in the Republican economic playbook. The pages are torn and yellowed, stained with bourbon and blood. In a nutshell here’s what they’ve got: tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations, privatization of public assets, massive military spending, further deregulation, and a never-ending assault on “entitlement” programs. These ideas have failed. If you don’t believe me, look around.
Obama is vulnerable on the economy, but Republicans conveniently forget that Obama inherited an economic calamity from George W. Bush. This doesn’t excuse Obama – he’s governed far too timidly – but it does place his four years in the proper context.
Romney’s focus group tested attempts to pass himself off as a regular Joe are risible. He can roll up the sleeves on his plaid shirt all he wants, trot his wife and kids out for the obligatory photo, and eat corn on the cob with the yokels, but it cannot erase the fact that Romney is a man of privilege with a limited sense of what life is like for average folks.
The race is on, but it’s less a race to Pennsylvania Avenue than it is a race to nowhere.
There’s your presidential sweepstakes match-up come November and everybody knows it, even the nitwits on Good Morning America. Gingrich and Huntsman and Ron Paul and Santorum will hang around a while longer, but when push comes to shove, Republicans will hold their noses and select Romney. Evangelical Republicans will demand that Romney throw them a bone, so Romney will come out in support of one or more of the Bible thumper’s pet issues. He will say that he has always supported this or that, even if his past statements or actions contradict his assertion.
It’s going to be a long year of political blather, and you can bet the farm that neither Obama nor Romney will say jack shit about the real issues facing our country. Persistent high unemployment. Continuing foreclosures. State budget deficits. Income inequality. Rising poverty. With Romney it will always be morning in America, while Obama will claim that if not for his crack team of ex-Clintonistas, things would be much worse than they are.
My wife watches our local ABC affiliate every morning and by default we are subjected to the GMA team -- George, Robin, Josh and Sam -- not to mention the hacks they habitually turn to for “expert” commentary and analysis. Top flight journalism it’s not, unless you happen to be a believer in corporate media, and extremely gullible to boot. I will give this group credit for being sunny and upbeat, but I can go no further than that. Most mornings they incite my inner crank and make me want to hurl a shoe through the TV.
Don’t expect Obama or Romney to challenge the stranglehold that corporations have on the country, or the fact that “predatory” capitalism doesn’t work worth a damn -- unless the goal is to enrich the few at the expense of the many. For doing that, predatory capitalism is unbeatable, and Republicans – and far too many wimpy Democrats -- have supported this atavistic version of capitalism since Reagan. But if the goal is to create a vibrant middle class, with decent jobs at living wages, with reasonable access to medical care and higher education, with due respect for the fragility of the environment, predatory capitalism isn’t the answer.
Romney claims that his experience running a venture capital firm makes him uniquely qualified to create jobs. This is one of those Republican tropes that sounds good on the morning news but means absolutely nothing in the real world. At the heart of the claim is the belief that the private sector can do no wrong, and that government is always wasteful, inefficient, and inept. The answer, of course, is to kneel before the all-powerful, infallible Market God.
There’s nothing left in the Republican economic playbook. The pages are torn and yellowed, stained with bourbon and blood. In a nutshell here’s what they’ve got: tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations, privatization of public assets, massive military spending, further deregulation, and a never-ending assault on “entitlement” programs. These ideas have failed. If you don’t believe me, look around.
Obama is vulnerable on the economy, but Republicans conveniently forget that Obama inherited an economic calamity from George W. Bush. This doesn’t excuse Obama – he’s governed far too timidly – but it does place his four years in the proper context.
Romney’s focus group tested attempts to pass himself off as a regular Joe are risible. He can roll up the sleeves on his plaid shirt all he wants, trot his wife and kids out for the obligatory photo, and eat corn on the cob with the yokels, but it cannot erase the fact that Romney is a man of privilege with a limited sense of what life is like for average folks.
The race is on, but it’s less a race to Pennsylvania Avenue than it is a race to nowhere.
Sunday, January 08, 2012
Too Many Questions, Not Enough Answers
God doesn’t climb up to the Balcony very often. I figure the Lord (good Lord, bad Lord? I don’t know) has better things to do than visit an obscure man living quietly with his family on the California coast. But since I’ve been reading Christopher Hitchens, religion is on my mind, and I can’t help but ruminate on my own religious background and experience. Not that I can identify the year, month, week or day when the notion of a God, benevolent or otherwise, became impossible for me to accept. It must have been the moment when my questions about religion far outnumbered the answers religion offered.
I don’t believe that religious faith is a prerequisite for ethical or moral behavior in the world. Quite the contrary, some of the most unethical and immoral people can easily quote scripture, wear religious medallions, cross themselves for no particular reason or bow their heads in prayer at the dinner table, and then proceed to lie, cheat, steal and kill. Look at all the sexual scandals and child abuse episodes in the Catholic Church for a perfect illustration of my point. Priests known to the church hierarchy to be dangerous and predatory were protected rather than prosecuted.
My mother was raised a Catholic and so, carrying on the family practice, my brother and I were baptized into the faith without being consulted beforehand or given any other option. This seems cruel and unusual to me now, and is the reason my wife and I didn’t baptize our children. Having stood in the delivery room when they came into this world, all purplish-blue and covered with blood and fluid, it was perfectly clear to me that they arrived completely innocent, with no proverbial sin to pay for. When they’ve had an opportunity to consider the notion of religion for themselves they are welcome to adopt a faith and practice it. I will no doubt be disappointed if this should happen, but I won’t stand in the way or try to change their minds. If they choose to put faith in biblical fables like Adam & Eve or the Ten Commandments or Moses and the burning bush, that’s their choice, though I would obviously be far happier if they choose to believe in reason, skepticism and rational inquiry.
Religion is most obnoxious when it comes to sex. I was poking around a website called Catholic Answers and found this gem regarding contraception and procreation:
“Contraception is wrong because it’s a deliberate violation of the design God built into the human race, often referred to as "natural law." The natural law purpose of sex is procreation. The pleasure that sexual intercourse provides is an additional blessing from God, intended to offer the possibility of new life while strengthening the bond of intimacy, respect, and love between husband and wife. The loving environment this bond creates is the perfect setting for nurturing children.
But sexual pleasure within marriage becomes unnatural, and even harmful to the spouses, when it is used in a way that deliberately excludes the basic purpose of sex, which is procreation. God’s gift of the sex act, along with its pleasure and intimacy, must not be abused by deliberately frustrating its natural end—procreation.”
Well, isn’t that nice? Infantile, but very nice.
First of all, I don’t buy the proposition that God was involved in any way, shape or form in the design of the human species. Forget the six days to create the universe and everything in it; forget as well that humankind was forged in God’s image. Only humans, operating under the delusion of following God’s will, would place absurd and impossible prohibitions on something as pleasurable as sex. More often than not humans fuck for pure pleasure, not procreation, and I see nothing wrong with this. More marriages run off track because sex isn’t pleasurable rather than the other way around. How many times have you heard a married person complain that his or her sex life is too good?
I often see the unfortunate and inevitable result of religious indoctrination like that promulgated by the likes of Catholic Answers on the side of Santa Barbara where I live, near the eponymous high school or on the corner of Milpas and Cota streets. The sight is common: a Hispanic mother in her early to mid-20’s, pushing a baby stroller, with two young kids trailing behind and another in her belly. Quite possibly poor to begin with, she becomes poorer still every time she has another child. Perhaps she believes the tripe that bearing a lot of children is her duty and renders her rich in the eye of God, and that foregoing birth control scores her piety points and punches her ticket to heaven, but when it comes to feeding and clothing and educating her brood, she will receive no practical help from God.
Christopher Hitchens liked to say that religion was necessary when mankind was in its infancy, unable to rationally explain the workings of the physical world. When a volcano erupted or an earthquake rattled the ground, the explanation that the gods were angry made some sense. But just as children outgrow their fear of monsters hiding in the bedroom closet, our species matured and invented complex methods of scientific inquiry and rational analysis to explain the mysteries of the world.
I have no axe to grind with believers as long as they refrain from imposing their faith on me. I don’t appreciate having a posse of Jehovah’s Witnesses knock on my door, but neither do I run them off with a pitchfork. Faith and atheism can coexist. What really boils my blood is watching American political aspirants – regardless of party affiliation – pander to and grovel before the Christian faithful. Every candidate tries to out “Jesus” his or her opponents, clearly forgetting Article VI of the Constitution. Adding God to the corrosive cocktail of money and influence peddling only makes our political process more of a travesty.
I don’t believe that religious faith is a prerequisite for ethical or moral behavior in the world. Quite the contrary, some of the most unethical and immoral people can easily quote scripture, wear religious medallions, cross themselves for no particular reason or bow their heads in prayer at the dinner table, and then proceed to lie, cheat, steal and kill. Look at all the sexual scandals and child abuse episodes in the Catholic Church for a perfect illustration of my point. Priests known to the church hierarchy to be dangerous and predatory were protected rather than prosecuted.
My mother was raised a Catholic and so, carrying on the family practice, my brother and I were baptized into the faith without being consulted beforehand or given any other option. This seems cruel and unusual to me now, and is the reason my wife and I didn’t baptize our children. Having stood in the delivery room when they came into this world, all purplish-blue and covered with blood and fluid, it was perfectly clear to me that they arrived completely innocent, with no proverbial sin to pay for. When they’ve had an opportunity to consider the notion of religion for themselves they are welcome to adopt a faith and practice it. I will no doubt be disappointed if this should happen, but I won’t stand in the way or try to change their minds. If they choose to put faith in biblical fables like Adam & Eve or the Ten Commandments or Moses and the burning bush, that’s their choice, though I would obviously be far happier if they choose to believe in reason, skepticism and rational inquiry.
Religion is most obnoxious when it comes to sex. I was poking around a website called Catholic Answers and found this gem regarding contraception and procreation:
“Contraception is wrong because it’s a deliberate violation of the design God built into the human race, often referred to as "natural law." The natural law purpose of sex is procreation. The pleasure that sexual intercourse provides is an additional blessing from God, intended to offer the possibility of new life while strengthening the bond of intimacy, respect, and love between husband and wife. The loving environment this bond creates is the perfect setting for nurturing children.
But sexual pleasure within marriage becomes unnatural, and even harmful to the spouses, when it is used in a way that deliberately excludes the basic purpose of sex, which is procreation. God’s gift of the sex act, along with its pleasure and intimacy, must not be abused by deliberately frustrating its natural end—procreation.”
Well, isn’t that nice? Infantile, but very nice.
First of all, I don’t buy the proposition that God was involved in any way, shape or form in the design of the human species. Forget the six days to create the universe and everything in it; forget as well that humankind was forged in God’s image. Only humans, operating under the delusion of following God’s will, would place absurd and impossible prohibitions on something as pleasurable as sex. More often than not humans fuck for pure pleasure, not procreation, and I see nothing wrong with this. More marriages run off track because sex isn’t pleasurable rather than the other way around. How many times have you heard a married person complain that his or her sex life is too good?
I often see the unfortunate and inevitable result of religious indoctrination like that promulgated by the likes of Catholic Answers on the side of Santa Barbara where I live, near the eponymous high school or on the corner of Milpas and Cota streets. The sight is common: a Hispanic mother in her early to mid-20’s, pushing a baby stroller, with two young kids trailing behind and another in her belly. Quite possibly poor to begin with, she becomes poorer still every time she has another child. Perhaps she believes the tripe that bearing a lot of children is her duty and renders her rich in the eye of God, and that foregoing birth control scores her piety points and punches her ticket to heaven, but when it comes to feeding and clothing and educating her brood, she will receive no practical help from God.
Christopher Hitchens liked to say that religion was necessary when mankind was in its infancy, unable to rationally explain the workings of the physical world. When a volcano erupted or an earthquake rattled the ground, the explanation that the gods were angry made some sense. But just as children outgrow their fear of monsters hiding in the bedroom closet, our species matured and invented complex methods of scientific inquiry and rational analysis to explain the mysteries of the world.
I have no axe to grind with believers as long as they refrain from imposing their faith on me. I don’t appreciate having a posse of Jehovah’s Witnesses knock on my door, but neither do I run them off with a pitchfork. Faith and atheism can coexist. What really boils my blood is watching American political aspirants – regardless of party affiliation – pander to and grovel before the Christian faithful. Every candidate tries to out “Jesus” his or her opponents, clearly forgetting Article VI of the Constitution. Adding God to the corrosive cocktail of money and influence peddling only makes our political process more of a travesty.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)