Friday, February 25, 2005
Read this Before you Hump
Alf’s Rules of Dating
After a hugely unsuccessful relationship of two years, I find myself sifting through the wreckage of my life, stamping out the black plumed oil-flames of my emotions, and picking out tiny shards of broken dreams from my unprotected eyes. One thing I know, and that’s; I know more now than before, but I’m pretty sure I know very little. Follow?
I have however, established a few rules that I think we should all follow as once more I take the deep dive into the ever-shallowing dating pool. Whatever. My Blog. You don’t like it, click off
Rule 1. Sex is the fulfillment of a contract, it is not the drafting of one.
Someone once told me “Sex is the shortcut to everything.” They are right. If you have sex on the first date, the only preliminary agreement you had with that person was established during that date. Same goes with someone you went home from a bar with, hooked up at a party with, met at work, were friends with. Sometimes it’s strong, sometimes it’s not. You know the risks, do not set up expectations after the contract has been fulfilled, it’s unrealistic and annoying. If you choose to make new negotiations after the first contract has run its term, so be it. But After the first shag you are starting from the beginning.
Rule 2. Emotions are the great assassin of romance.
You feel a bit upset, you are really irked, your work sucks, these things are outside of the relationship, and especially the dating, kindly leave them out of . Do not have a heart to heart until you guys have been married for 10 years, and even then, don’t cry. We are trying to form a bond, not a therapy session.
Rule 3. Uneven playing fields make for lousy matches.
You have money, she’s destitute. She’s spiritual, you fart on people’s heads. She’s a vegan, Jerky is an essential food group. You’re Immature, she’s a Nazi. They say opposites attract, and that may be true if the opposites are very similar. Wow! You both come from the same background, hold similar jobs, have similar tastes, but you like girly films, and he likes action films…I guess opposites DO attract. “They” are often retarded.
Rule 4. The Ducky Rule.
She will never like you, no matter what you do, no matter how quirky and clever you are. Women are like that. They are thick skulled, and obtuse about what they have “Planned” for themselves. Best bet is to drop it and stop torturing yourself. I hate Meg Ryan for propagating this myth. In 98% of her films she has a discovery moment where she tilts her head , opens her maw , and incredulously says “Oh my god! I LOVE him. He’s Been here all along, and I never saw him! It was his quirky antics that I TRULY love.” Double damn Meg Ryan and her mediocre skills.
Rule 5. The Prince Charming Rule
He doesn’t exist. Girls, If you are older than 15 and are still waiting to get swept off your feet, you need a heavy dose of reality through the breast plate and into the heart. The princess bride…ISN’T REAL. Wesley is gay, and Andre the giant is dead.
Rule 6. Don’t be THAT guy
Jealous? Suck it up. It doesn’t matter how insecure you are, we are all insecure, the moment you say “No you can’t.” they’ll prove otherwise. Be cool, be smooth, and remember, at the end of the night they’re going home with you. If not, THEN you can punch someone in the face.
Rule 7. They’re not crazy, YOU are
Let me guess, she’s crazy and irrational. Or he’s distant and can’t communicate. You know what? You’re not original or alone. Cavemen would wonder why their women would suddenly start bawling at the site of a bunny being quashed, while retaining the ability to skin and gut a mammoth in less than 30 minutes. Likewise, had they lived, Juliet would often wonder why Romeo is so distant after sex. If you want something else, date your own gender (But I hear that doesn’t help either) it’s not that men or women are crazy, but rather that we’re crazy about each other. Be prepared to deal with it, but don’t forget to set your limits.
Rule 8. No such thing as “Out of my league”
Ladies pretty much know this for a fact. Guys will often find attraction simply based on the availability factor. 3 guys, 1 girl, 1 couple, guess who the most attractive person in that scenario is. For guys, all it takes is bravura, confidence, and a plan. No girl too hot, no goal unattainable. If you believe it, it works. In fact, other than in fairy tales I think this is the only time belief makes it so.
Homework: Believe in a BMW (Did it work?)
Now believe in yourself, and bring contraception.
Rule 9. Be noble in breaking up.
Try, please, please TRY not to be psychotic. Believe me, I know. The potential for really creepy shit is in all of us. But the more surgical the break, regardless of the ache, the faster the wound will heal.
Rule 10. Scarred for life.
Remember love is forever. If you loved someone, that love, and the accompanying pain will never be gone. You learn to live with it, and eventually you can function again. Wear those scars proudly, and with the battlefield knowledge that they warrant. Don’t get the same wound twice though! Remember, war heroes have many wounds. Casualties have one.
Now get outta here, you’re bothering me.
Wednesday, February 23, 2005
Observations on a violent end
Hunter Thompson put a bullet in his skull this previous Sunday. I’ve been wondering how long it would take me to get this out. I consider my blog to be an ego-trip. The sad assumption that anyone cares to read it isn’t what keeps me writing in it, but rather the queer therapy that throwing my minced words, and my bizarre life out into the ether for the enjoyment, analysis, and scorn of anyone. When the news of his death reached me, I was away from my home doing things that would make my mother worry.
It’s almost embarrassing what fans of HST will say and do. There are hundreds of websites dedicated to him, and the amount of wannabes who believe that excess will lead to a career in journalism is a real tragedy. His followers will grin when he burns them with a cigarette, and they thrill to obscenity and tales of VD. For a huge group of people he’s become the druggie’s Boba Fett.
An outsider to outsiders.
Unfortunately, outsiders have a desperate need for validation. HST seemingly never sought that. He was a monster , a madman, and his life seemed a tribute to the ability to live hard and outside of the confines of a society which continues to alienate more and more. To those that felt like many rules did not apply he was the validation of all their suspicions. I wager the good doctor didn’t necessarily appreciate or understand that. Not that he needed to. But the adulation of him by freak nation was important to those of us who he inspired to be unapologetic. His old friend Ralph Steadman, his son Juan, and those who knew him best all seem to be more understanding than I. They all say that it was premeditated, a matter of when, not if. To them it makes more sense. To me it left the famed Fear and Loathing.
What the hell am I bound to do? Are all high-powered mutants doomed to a bullet through the skull? Was it his doom or his choice? To go out in a bang? A bloody, meaty, crimson stain on the collective shirt and tie? A reminder that such Idealism will always be pinned to despair, the inevitable companion of all our heroes.
I’ve been in a spiral for the last few days. An uneasy feeling that perhaps I mistook Hunter for something that he was not. Hemmingway always struck me as a bit of a mook for offing himself, but HST was no mook. No, his remains will be shot out of a cannon, no sepulchre for fat boys wearing aviators to get drunk at, no bust to be decorated and splattered by hordes of unoriginal adulators. In the end Thompson proved he was an individual. Beholden to no one, especially the geeks who made him the icon. As the end came for Hunter, he reminded me specifically why he was important. The raw and unabashed personality that he threw and individualism that he stood for. The sense of Hope,and right against the forces of old and evil, are attached to no movement, no party, and no group of nerdy fans, for the true individual even death must be on his terms. Damn Thompson for the ugly lesson, and damn him for knowing what to do.
"I would feel real trapped in this life if I didn't know I could commit suicide at any time." -HST
It’s almost embarrassing what fans of HST will say and do. There are hundreds of websites dedicated to him, and the amount of wannabes who believe that excess will lead to a career in journalism is a real tragedy. His followers will grin when he burns them with a cigarette, and they thrill to obscenity and tales of VD. For a huge group of people he’s become the druggie’s Boba Fett.
An outsider to outsiders.
Unfortunately, outsiders have a desperate need for validation. HST seemingly never sought that. He was a monster , a madman, and his life seemed a tribute to the ability to live hard and outside of the confines of a society which continues to alienate more and more. To those that felt like many rules did not apply he was the validation of all their suspicions. I wager the good doctor didn’t necessarily appreciate or understand that. Not that he needed to. But the adulation of him by freak nation was important to those of us who he inspired to be unapologetic. His old friend Ralph Steadman, his son Juan, and those who knew him best all seem to be more understanding than I. They all say that it was premeditated, a matter of when, not if. To them it makes more sense. To me it left the famed Fear and Loathing.
What the hell am I bound to do? Are all high-powered mutants doomed to a bullet through the skull? Was it his doom or his choice? To go out in a bang? A bloody, meaty, crimson stain on the collective shirt and tie? A reminder that such Idealism will always be pinned to despair, the inevitable companion of all our heroes.
I’ve been in a spiral for the last few days. An uneasy feeling that perhaps I mistook Hunter for something that he was not. Hemmingway always struck me as a bit of a mook for offing himself, but HST was no mook. No, his remains will be shot out of a cannon, no sepulchre for fat boys wearing aviators to get drunk at, no bust to be decorated and splattered by hordes of unoriginal adulators. In the end Thompson proved he was an individual. Beholden to no one, especially the geeks who made him the icon. As the end came for Hunter, he reminded me specifically why he was important. The raw and unabashed personality that he threw and individualism that he stood for. The sense of Hope,and right against the forces of old and evil, are attached to no movement, no party, and no group of nerdy fans, for the true individual even death must be on his terms. Damn Thompson for the ugly lesson, and damn him for knowing what to do.
"I would feel real trapped in this life if I didn't know I could commit suicide at any time." -HST
Tuesday, February 22, 2005
Where did you plant that bullet?
I want to say something. But that evil bastard knocked the wind right out of me.
Friday, December 17, 2004
Bodyworlds Uber Alles
In a Move reminiscent of Scientology, the gang at bodyworks sent me an E-mail.
My friend Mac says that I'm next, and they'll pose me doing Jazzercize, with legwarmers and a headband.
What's bizzare to me is how quickly they responded, and how immediately they refer me to their own literature as a valid reference point. The Lady Invoked Von Hagen's name with some eerie Messianic undertones. Or maybe I'm overreacting. Here's the e-mail.
Dear Alf,
Thank you for your interest in the Body Worlds Exhibition.
We value all suggestions, criticism and praise, as these provide us with important information for improving our work.
For your info, please find below an extract from the chapter “On Gruesome Corpses, Gestalt Plastinates and Mandatory Interment†by: Gunther von Hagens
published in: "Brave New Body Worlds - The Question of the Exhibition",
Klett Cotta Verlag, Stuttgart 2001
You can find the whole article on our webpage http://www.koerperwelten.de/en/pages/snk_einstiegseite.asp.
Best regards from Heidelberg
-----
Christiane Casott
Organization
BODY WORLDS
Institut für Plastination
Rathausstrasse 11
D-69126 Heidelberg
Phone: +49 6221-33 11 54
Fax: +49 6221-3311 24
E-Mail: c.casott@plastination.com
http://www.bodyworlds.com
My friend Mac says that I'm next, and they'll pose me doing Jazzercize, with legwarmers and a headband.
What's bizzare to me is how quickly they responded, and how immediately they refer me to their own literature as a valid reference point. The Lady Invoked Von Hagen's name with some eerie Messianic undertones. Or maybe I'm overreacting. Here's the e-mail.
Dear Alf,
Thank you for your interest in the Body Worlds Exhibition.
We value all suggestions, criticism and praise, as these provide us with important information for improving our work.
For your info, please find below an extract from the chapter “On Gruesome Corpses, Gestalt Plastinates and Mandatory Interment†by: Gunther von Hagens
published in: "Brave New Body Worlds - The Question of the Exhibition",
Klett Cotta Verlag, Stuttgart 2001
You can find the whole article on our webpage http://www.koerperwelten.de/en/pages/snk_einstiegseite.asp.
Best regards from Heidelberg
-----
Christiane Casott
Organization
BODY WORLDS
Institut für Plastination
Rathausstrasse 11
D-69126 Heidelberg
Phone: +49 6221-33 11 54
Fax: +49 6221-3311 24
E-Mail: c.casott@plastination.com
http://www.bodyworlds.com
Wednesday, December 15, 2004
The Night Before Break...
'Twas the night before break, when in Paradigm
Not an Agent was stirring, not even Ol’ Stein ;
The Agents had gone to their homes and affairs,
And assistants were left, with their woes and their cares.
The mailroom was huddled in the south basement,
While the copiers hummed to Marshall’s contentment.
Sabrina and Whitney kept guard at the lobby,
While Chad from security worked on his hobby
When out on courtyard there was such a clatter,
The assistants took five to study the matter.
Away to the doors went the gals and the blokes,
Stepped into the courtyard, and lit up their smokes.
The music that came from the Platinum side,
Made us all think they have something to hide,
When, what to my wondering eyes should ascend,
But an Aston Martin, and several agents
With a little old driver, smiling with glee,
I knew in a moment it must be Sam G.
More rapid than eagles the Agents they came,
And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name;
"Now, BENSEN! now, COHEN! , ALADJEM and KLEIN!
On,PATMAN! On LAZO! MARGULES, and STEIN!
To the crescent hotel! to the top of the wall!
Now dash away! dash away! dash away all!"
As a parade of people who work way too hard,
They slowly, but surely came into the yard,
So up to the courtyard the agents they flew,
With Sharon, and Margo and our bonuses too.
And then, in a twinkling, I heard on the ground
The jingle of a barman pouring a round
As I stretched out my hand, and was turning around,
Into the courtyard Glassman came with a bound.
She was dressed â€Festiveâ€, from her head to her toe,
And she looked like a pimp who was missing his ho;
She welcomed us all to the holiday party
And introduced Sam who spoke then, quite hearty.
His eyes -- how they twinkled! his dimples how merry!
His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry!
His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow,
And the beard of his chin was as white as the snow;
I think he was poignant, I wasn’t quite sure
By this time the evening was becoming a blur;
I remember Doug Fronk and some weird kid, Chris Smith,
Who claimed he was an agent, yeah right, as if.
Ruf’s style of dancing had become just that,
And Balkin was donning some sort of hat;
Clossey and Barkett were commiserating,
And I think Nick and Sam are suddenly Dating;
Arthur and Judith drank shot after shot,
Injured Douglass and Hess, brought medicinal pot.
Cal was breaking boards with his head,
And JSI made a barstool his bed.
The Night as it goes got even weirder,
As I heard Blatt and Stein argue which one was Greener.
And the last thing I heard as I lost my sight was,
"HAPPY HOLIDAYS TO ALL, AND TO ALL A GOOD-NIGHT!...
You Don’t have to go home but you can’t stay here.
Seriously, we have Taxis for you, let’s go!
I Know you have work tomorrow, maybe you should leave.
Not an Agent was stirring, not even Ol’ Stein ;
The Agents had gone to their homes and affairs,
And assistants were left, with their woes and their cares.
The mailroom was huddled in the south basement,
While the copiers hummed to Marshall’s contentment.
Sabrina and Whitney kept guard at the lobby,
While Chad from security worked on his hobby
When out on courtyard there was such a clatter,
The assistants took five to study the matter.
Away to the doors went the gals and the blokes,
Stepped into the courtyard, and lit up their smokes.
The music that came from the Platinum side,
Made us all think they have something to hide,
When, what to my wondering eyes should ascend,
But an Aston Martin, and several agents
With a little old driver, smiling with glee,
I knew in a moment it must be Sam G.
More rapid than eagles the Agents they came,
And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name;
"Now, BENSEN! now, COHEN! , ALADJEM and KLEIN!
On,PATMAN! On LAZO! MARGULES, and STEIN!
To the crescent hotel! to the top of the wall!
Now dash away! dash away! dash away all!"
As a parade of people who work way too hard,
They slowly, but surely came into the yard,
So up to the courtyard the agents they flew,
With Sharon, and Margo and our bonuses too.
And then, in a twinkling, I heard on the ground
The jingle of a barman pouring a round
As I stretched out my hand, and was turning around,
Into the courtyard Glassman came with a bound.
She was dressed â€Festiveâ€, from her head to her toe,
And she looked like a pimp who was missing his ho;
She welcomed us all to the holiday party
And introduced Sam who spoke then, quite hearty.
His eyes -- how they twinkled! his dimples how merry!
His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry!
His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow,
And the beard of his chin was as white as the snow;
I think he was poignant, I wasn’t quite sure
By this time the evening was becoming a blur;
I remember Doug Fronk and some weird kid, Chris Smith,
Who claimed he was an agent, yeah right, as if.
Ruf’s style of dancing had become just that,
And Balkin was donning some sort of hat;
Clossey and Barkett were commiserating,
And I think Nick and Sam are suddenly Dating;
Arthur and Judith drank shot after shot,
Injured Douglass and Hess, brought medicinal pot.
Cal was breaking boards with his head,
And JSI made a barstool his bed.
The Night as it goes got even weirder,
As I heard Blatt and Stein argue which one was Greener.
And the last thing I heard as I lost my sight was,
"HAPPY HOLIDAYS TO ALL, AND TO ALL A GOOD-NIGHT!...
You Don’t have to go home but you can’t stay here.
Seriously, we have Taxis for you, let’s go!
I Know you have work tomorrow, maybe you should leave.
Monday, December 13, 2004
Von Hagens
Just so you can get a taste for who it is behind the "Marvels" of bodyworks, it's this creepy little fellow. He does his work in a lab in China, because the EU wouldn't allow him to chop people up and use them questionably. To be fair, all his sculptures donated their bodies , but to be honest, isn't it a German who also offered up to be eaten by another German? The good doctor sees himself as a pioneer, but truthfully, his exhibit leaves you with a feeling of QUACK. A guy who sits next to me at work, said he found it "fascinating", and "beautiful", he also wears Dockers, so you be the judge.
Bodyworlds Exhibit: Less Science, more Fetish
Ok, so I visited the Bodyworlds Exhibit at the california science center this weekend, and I'm a little on the disturbed side for it.
Originally, my friends and I were all for it. Who can't stand a bit of the grotesque, in the name of science? And assuredly, the first part of the exhibit was disgusting, but educational. The bodies are plastisiced (sp?) and all the innards are then in view in their natural state.
Amazing yes? Well, then we go upstairs. The second part of the exhibit plummets into a bizzare danse macabre, where the skinned bodies of people are posed into horrible poses simulating life, but not necessarily informing. Most horribly is the flayed man pictured above (With my camera phone against the rules). His skin and muscles are drawn out, his hands in a "Boo" sort of manner and a weird straw hat on his head. How educational is this? I admit, the woman and fetus was impressive, the Vascular bodies are AMAZING, but as the exhibit continues...a baketball player, a gymnast, a swimmer, a CHESS PLAYER? What? Why are we seeing all these things? Are we now at an art exhibit? A Guy on a horse, holding his brain. Isn't that excessive?? Ridiculous? We get no perception of the human body with this model, all it is is an exercise in the technique that Dr. Gunter Van Hagens loves so much, and in the end, as far as art goes, it sucks, and as far as science goes, it sucks. This exhibit is to Science and anatomy, what the London Dungeon is to Art and History. A sideshow, devoid of class and value, brought to a general public by euro-trash, who know how to appeal to our worst instincts.
Tuesday, November 16, 2004
RORD OF THE LINGS
Ok, so this is the last stop on my tour of Asia. Japanese Businessmen, North Korean children and now this!
Here's the concept. Pirated copies of LORD OF THE RINGS dubbed in Chinese, make their way back to the US with Engrish subtitles. Unfortunately our asian friends can't quite grasp the tounges of middle earth, so they give it their best shot.
Enjoy.
Monday, November 15, 2004
Creepy North Korean Children
North Korea is probably the most militarized society in the world. Most of their Currency, artwork, and emtertainment stems from two things: The adulation of their Impish Dictator, or the Destruction of their enemies.
As charming as this family programming is, the North Korean Government has a secret weapon against naysayers in the west. The children of the People's Rpublic of Korea, are propped up by the government as an example of how well the country is doing. Nevermind the Famine, and overwhleming poverty. The performing arts schools of Pyongyang are pumping out creppy little Jon Benets by the handful.
Here are the creepiest ones, thanks to our Japanese Friend RobPongi
The most Bizzare Exercise Video Ever
My Parent's Kiss
Little Girls Bending Themselves
Grapes Of Love
Xylophone Girl
What sort of Lawrence Welk hell this is all coming from is beyond me, but maybe they should spend more time feeding their own than pretending like everything his hunky-dory.
We attacked Saddam under the belief that he was murdering his own people, and preparing WMDs against us. Here is an entire society ruled by a dictator, with a CULTURE of "Death to the US" and a real and obvious Nuclear program. Why do we leave them alone?
Why is North Korea not attacked, but Afghanistan and Iraq who barely have two sticks to rub together are blasted back to the stone age?
Bush: Real Problems - No Solutions.
Wednesday, November 10, 2004
Namesake
I've finally decided to accept my furry namesake, in a detached sor of way. Admittedly there's a lot of funny ALF stuff out there. This Kinder-Puff was the straw that broke the proverbial camel's back. Quite simply, if he can stand pleased as punch with that thing emblazoned on his bitty man boobs, then I think I can handle it. I like to imagine he's decked out and has a lunchbox to match. This Lardy Lad is putting on the ritz, and I have to grin and say "Uncle".
Tuesday, November 09, 2004
Potty-Mouth
OK, so I showed My dad the Blog, and he expressed displeasure at some of the course Language. I'm thinking, Should I change or edit it so my dad can see it? Or is this my mini corner of the world where I can say what I feel? Ashcroft has resigned, and Dad, sorry but I'm afraid the pottymouthedness stays.
Monday, November 08, 2004
Working 9 to 5 (In the morning the next day)
Ok, I work hard, I enjoy working. The Busier, the better. But duuuude, don't let it come to this. Never ever let it hapen to you. Japan, we have to change this. This is why your suicide rates are the highest in the world.
New Yorker To Angelino
Angelinos is how it's spelled, not Angelenos as certain magazines would have you beleive. People who reside in El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Angeles de Porciúncula are Angelinos. People who don't understand the nuances of foreign tounges and move here from the midwest thinking they can slaughter language and monikers through ignorant misspellings, they can be Angelenos if they like. So my initial and extremely snotty remarks on my adopted city aside, I have noticed how strangely apologetic Angelinos are about our fair city. Perhaps my latin blood feels a greater affinity for the Spanish heritage of los angeles than the pasty Anglo roots of northern cities, but I beleive Los Angeles to be superior to New York in many ways.
Oh the scoffs from the New Yorkers who adore their cramped lifestyles and unsanitary public transport. Take you embittered and frozen island, and shove it. Seriously, I've had enough of this. Don't get me wrong there's cool stuff there, but nothing cooler than here, and certainly no viable beaches or weather to write home about. People aren't as attractive, the cuisine is a bit heavier, the health stores more sparse. There something like three supermarkets in New York, and people wig out when they see a Target or a Best Buy. So maybe Fast food sucks, but when youre poor it's a lifesaver. And maybe you can run on fumes when youre driving, but you certainly can't get anywhere in NYC without cash for the subway. New York is cool, yeah, maybe as cool as LA, but certainly not cooler. Clubs? We got em. Bars? We Got Em. Museums? We got those things as well, AND we have Celebrities and the beach.
My Friend Sam just moved here from NY she has lived there all her life, and she will be my ultimate test subject. She is a child of the city to be sure, raised on the false notion that New York has anything to do with the entertainment industry. A talented, and attractive young lady who recently came of a show very dear to my heart, I have no doubt that she is of the right stuff, not only to make an Angelino, but a sucessful working actress. She will be my proof to all my struggling artistic friends of NY that the tanned laid back manner of LA is not only more comfortable, but more profitable. What can I say? I Love LA!
Oh the scoffs from the New Yorkers who adore their cramped lifestyles and unsanitary public transport. Take you embittered and frozen island, and shove it. Seriously, I've had enough of this. Don't get me wrong there's cool stuff there, but nothing cooler than here, and certainly no viable beaches or weather to write home about. People aren't as attractive, the cuisine is a bit heavier, the health stores more sparse. There something like three supermarkets in New York, and people wig out when they see a Target or a Best Buy. So maybe Fast food sucks, but when youre poor it's a lifesaver. And maybe you can run on fumes when youre driving, but you certainly can't get anywhere in NYC without cash for the subway. New York is cool, yeah, maybe as cool as LA, but certainly not cooler. Clubs? We got em. Bars? We Got Em. Museums? We got those things as well, AND we have Celebrities and the beach.
My Friend Sam just moved here from NY she has lived there all her life, and she will be my ultimate test subject. She is a child of the city to be sure, raised on the false notion that New York has anything to do with the entertainment industry. A talented, and attractive young lady who recently came of a show very dear to my heart, I have no doubt that she is of the right stuff, not only to make an Angelino, but a sucessful working actress. She will be my proof to all my struggling artistic friends of NY that the tanned laid back manner of LA is not only more comfortable, but more profitable. What can I say? I Love LA!
Friday, November 05, 2004
Thursday, November 04, 2004
Wednesday, November 03, 2004
Final Thoughts
My friend Alex, who is probably one of the most literate and well-spoken people I know summed it all up in this tidy note.
We have just witnessed the profound failure of the democratic agenda. While the numbers (economic, war-related costs and casualties, etc.) may favor John Kerry, democrats faced an insurmountable wall of resistance in trying to win the minds of opinionated Americans. Though America experiences a costly war, a national debt that climbs a few billion per week, a Presidential approval rating in the fortieth percentile, and a Massachusetts Senator who emerged victorious from three straight National debates, the voters of America decided that they could not trust Mr. Kerry to lead the country. Why, or How, we ask, could Bush votaries admit the tremendous faults of this administration, yet, when given the opportunity to opine, they shrivel up into a tight ball of resentment, distrust, or even hate, for the alternative? Popular opinion has become so generalized, so abstract, that nuance, detail, facts and figures now fail to sway individual minds. Rationality and reason, which at one time was the great promise of American democracy, have failed. These generalizations, such as "freedom" and "our traditional values" have erased the possibility for any critical reflection on what these terms actually mean. They now have a shallow definition, and the result is the individual American now submits to majority opinions, just as the medieval prince submitted to the knowledge of the Priest. The project of our founders - a society meant to free individuals from the slavery of opinion (divine, aristocratic, or majority) - has finally failed.
It may take years of educational reform to address this decline of the American mind.
We have just witnessed the profound failure of the democratic agenda. While the numbers (economic, war-related costs and casualties, etc.) may favor John Kerry, democrats faced an insurmountable wall of resistance in trying to win the minds of opinionated Americans. Though America experiences a costly war, a national debt that climbs a few billion per week, a Presidential approval rating in the fortieth percentile, and a Massachusetts Senator who emerged victorious from three straight National debates, the voters of America decided that they could not trust Mr. Kerry to lead the country. Why, or How, we ask, could Bush votaries admit the tremendous faults of this administration, yet, when given the opportunity to opine, they shrivel up into a tight ball of resentment, distrust, or even hate, for the alternative? Popular opinion has become so generalized, so abstract, that nuance, detail, facts and figures now fail to sway individual minds. Rationality and reason, which at one time was the great promise of American democracy, have failed. These generalizations, such as "freedom" and "our traditional values" have erased the possibility for any critical reflection on what these terms actually mean. They now have a shallow definition, and the result is the individual American now submits to majority opinions, just as the medieval prince submitted to the knowledge of the Priest. The project of our founders - a society meant to free individuals from the slavery of opinion (divine, aristocratic, or majority) - has finally failed.
It may take years of educational reform to address this decline of the American mind.
The Day After
This is a conversation that I had with my friend the day after the election, about half an hour after Kerry's concession speech.
BenPatrickW: I can't believe I have to take 4 more years of this garbage
GrnLntrnAlf: You don't have to take it
GrnLntrnAlf: We can fight every inch of the wayBen
PatrickW: it is just such a dissapointment
BenPatrickW: we should have a system of checks and balances...what good is it to have Republican's control all 3 branches?
GrnLntrnAlf: It's not
GrnLntrnAlf: Let them wring their own necks.
BenPatrickW: why do you think the pilgrams escaped Europe...it was to escape this religious bullshit and be free
BenPatrickW: our nation is going right back to the fucking problems of our origin
GrnLntrnAlf: Ben I thought this was our time to finsih it off, you need to understand that the country will need a jolt. This slumber, this distraction, the blindness and self-importance will eventually reap what is deserved. It was Fiorello LaGuardia under pressure of a huge bribery scandal who said to the citizens of New York, "The People will get the government they deserve"
GrnLntrnAlf: As it stands our country in it's ridiculous, blind, rage does not deserve a good man like John Kerry.
GrnLntrnAlf: Keep the faith, fight the fight, and when the time comes for us to step-up and say "I told you so" let's be gracious.
BenPatrickW: I know
BenPatrickW: I just really lost a lot of faith in our nation
GrnLntrnAlf: I did too
GrnLntrnAlf: I feel like a foreigner
BenPatrickW: YES
BenPatrickW: I feel like I don't belong in this country
BenPatrickW: or we need to branch off and start a new nation
GrnLntrnAlf: Something tells me we are not the only ones
BenPatrickW: why waste all this time...we should be disputing issues that we are split on...serious issues
BenPatrickW: not dealing with fucking gay marriage and religious bullshit
GrnLntrnAlf: Ben, you and I know that this country is irresponsible towards it's citizens. There is a growing gap between the poor and rich, there is a health care crisis looming, the world no longer takes us seriously, and sees us as "Dangerous", we have wars we cannot pay for, we haven't enough troops, and our anti-terrorism measures are still harassing innocent citizens and seriously ignoring gaping holes in our security.
GrnLntrnAlf: These are facts. Eventually, the facts catch up with you, no matter how many gay people you manage to prevent from being happy, no matter how many flags you wave, and no matter how many prayers you send upwards.
BenPatrickW: the health care issue is a fucking mess. I was listening to the Sentate Majority leader this morning. He doesn't have a fucking clue how to improve the situation. They are incouraging people to set aside a savings for an emergency. That is a scary concept. We need to have a national healthcare plan.
GrnLntrnAlf: How's your savings acct.?
BenPatrickW: 0
BenPatrickW: yours?
GrnLntrnAlf: Same
GrnLntrnAlf: How do you manage to live on our salary?
BenPatrickW: I'm thinking of pushing drugs...or pimping ho's
GrnLntrnAlf: Seriously though, it's tough isn't it?
BenPatrickW: yes
BenPatrickW: my brother was given a $7000 tax break last year
BenPatrickW: do you think he needs that money?
GrnLntrnAlf: Most of our co-workers receive extra income from family, or trust-funds
BenPatrickW: do you know what he does with that money?
BenPatrickW: he gambles
BenPatrickW: meanwhile...I don't get shit for tax breaks
GrnLntrnAlf: We make more than the minimum wage, and we're not able to cover ourselves for an emergency.
GrnLntrnAlf: Who are the people making up these plans?
GrnLntrnAlf: Have they any idea of what a dishwasher does, makes, and how he lives?
GrnLntrnAlf: What are we going to do about Iran who recently passed overwhelmingly a resolution to continue their nuclear weapons program, to the shous of "Allah is Great, Death to the U.S"?
GrnLntrnAlf: This government will continue to ignore it, and truth be told, it's what this country needs. We need to buckle down and do what we can. Keep our fellow man in mind in our actions, and keep the voice of true moral opposition loud and clear.
BenPatrickW: I seriously don't know what to think anymore
GrnLntrnAlf: Me neither.
BenPatrickW: I can't believe I have to take 4 more years of this garbage
GrnLntrnAlf: You don't have to take it
GrnLntrnAlf: We can fight every inch of the wayBen
PatrickW: it is just such a dissapointment
BenPatrickW: we should have a system of checks and balances...what good is it to have Republican's control all 3 branches?
GrnLntrnAlf: It's not
GrnLntrnAlf: Let them wring their own necks.
BenPatrickW: why do you think the pilgrams escaped Europe...it was to escape this religious bullshit and be free
BenPatrickW: our nation is going right back to the fucking problems of our origin
GrnLntrnAlf: Ben I thought this was our time to finsih it off, you need to understand that the country will need a jolt. This slumber, this distraction, the blindness and self-importance will eventually reap what is deserved. It was Fiorello LaGuardia under pressure of a huge bribery scandal who said to the citizens of New York, "The People will get the government they deserve"
GrnLntrnAlf: As it stands our country in it's ridiculous, blind, rage does not deserve a good man like John Kerry.
GrnLntrnAlf: Keep the faith, fight the fight, and when the time comes for us to step-up and say "I told you so" let's be gracious.
BenPatrickW: I know
BenPatrickW: I just really lost a lot of faith in our nation
GrnLntrnAlf: I did too
GrnLntrnAlf: I feel like a foreigner
BenPatrickW: YES
BenPatrickW: I feel like I don't belong in this country
BenPatrickW: or we need to branch off and start a new nation
GrnLntrnAlf: Something tells me we are not the only ones
BenPatrickW: why waste all this time...we should be disputing issues that we are split on...serious issues
BenPatrickW: not dealing with fucking gay marriage and religious bullshit
GrnLntrnAlf: Ben, you and I know that this country is irresponsible towards it's citizens. There is a growing gap between the poor and rich, there is a health care crisis looming, the world no longer takes us seriously, and sees us as "Dangerous", we have wars we cannot pay for, we haven't enough troops, and our anti-terrorism measures are still harassing innocent citizens and seriously ignoring gaping holes in our security.
GrnLntrnAlf: These are facts. Eventually, the facts catch up with you, no matter how many gay people you manage to prevent from being happy, no matter how many flags you wave, and no matter how many prayers you send upwards.
BenPatrickW: the health care issue is a fucking mess. I was listening to the Sentate Majority leader this morning. He doesn't have a fucking clue how to improve the situation. They are incouraging people to set aside a savings for an emergency. That is a scary concept. We need to have a national healthcare plan.
GrnLntrnAlf: How's your savings acct.?
BenPatrickW: 0
BenPatrickW: yours?
GrnLntrnAlf: Same
GrnLntrnAlf: How do you manage to live on our salary?
BenPatrickW: I'm thinking of pushing drugs...or pimping ho's
GrnLntrnAlf: Seriously though, it's tough isn't it?
BenPatrickW: yes
BenPatrickW: my brother was given a $7000 tax break last year
BenPatrickW: do you think he needs that money?
GrnLntrnAlf: Most of our co-workers receive extra income from family, or trust-funds
BenPatrickW: do you know what he does with that money?
BenPatrickW: he gambles
BenPatrickW: meanwhile...I don't get shit for tax breaks
GrnLntrnAlf: We make more than the minimum wage, and we're not able to cover ourselves for an emergency.
GrnLntrnAlf: Who are the people making up these plans?
GrnLntrnAlf: Have they any idea of what a dishwasher does, makes, and how he lives?
GrnLntrnAlf: What are we going to do about Iran who recently passed overwhelmingly a resolution to continue their nuclear weapons program, to the shous of "Allah is Great, Death to the U.S"?
GrnLntrnAlf: This government will continue to ignore it, and truth be told, it's what this country needs. We need to buckle down and do what we can. Keep our fellow man in mind in our actions, and keep the voice of true moral opposition loud and clear.
BenPatrickW: I seriously don't know what to think anymore
GrnLntrnAlf: Me neither.
Monday, November 01, 2004
To our Conservative Friends
In your heart of hearts you know Bush is a miserable failure. From having no plan on what to do in Iraq once he conquered Baghdad to the 380 missing tons of explosives that could be used to kill our brave young men and women, this guy doesn¹t have a clue how to fight and win a war. You should see the mail I¹ve been getting lately from our troops over there. They know how much the Iraqi people hate them. They are sitting ducks anytime they go out on the road. Many believe we are not that far away from a Tet-style offensive inside the Green Zone with hundreds of Americans and Brits killed. Bush refused to go after and capture Osama bin Laden. He fought, every step of the way, the investigation into the 9/11 attacks. Who on earth would oppose such a thing? If 3,000 people died at your place of work and your boss said we don¹t need to find out why or how it happened, he¹d be thrown out on his ear. Bush¹s behavior after this great tragedy alone is reason enough for his removal. You already know that George W. Bush is the farthest thing from a conservative. He¹s a reckless spender who has run up record-breaking deficits and the biggest debt in our history. He believes in having the government pry into everything from your library records to your bedroom. He has hit you with hidden taxes with his tax cuts for the rich. I know many of you don¹t like Bush, but are unsure of Kerry. Give the new guy a chance. He won¹t raise your taxes (unless you are super-rich), he won¹t take your hunting gun away, and he won¹t make you visit France. He risked his life for you many years ago. He¹s asking for the chance to do it again. Scott McConnell at The American Conservative magazine has endorsed him. What more do you need?
Wednesday, October 27, 2004
Nader is a worthless Judas Goat with no Moral Compass.
Armageddon came early for George Bush this year, and he was not ready for it. His long-awaited showdowns with my man John Kerry turned into a series of horrible embarrassments that cracked his nerve and demoralized his closest campaign advisers. They knew he would never recover, no matter how many votes they could steal for him in Florida, where the presidential debates were closely watched and widely celebrated by millions of Kerry supporters who suddenly had reason to feel like winners.
Kerry came into October as a five-point underdog with almost no chance of winning three out of three rigged confrontations with a treacherous little freak like George Bush. But the debates are over now, and the victor was clearly John Kerry every time. He steamrollered Bush and left him for roadkill.
Did you see Bush on TV, trying to debate? Jesus, he talked like a donkey with no brains at all. The tide turned early, in Coral Gables, when Bush went belly up less than halfway through his first bout with Kerry, who hammered poor George into jelly. It was pitiful. . . . I almost felt sorry for him, until I heard someone call him "Mister President," and then I felt ashamed.
Karl Rove, the president's political wizard, felt even worse. There is angst in the heart of Texas today, and panic in the bowels of the White House. Rove has a nasty little problem, and its name is George Bush. The president failed miserably from the instant he got onstage with John Kerry. He looked weak and dumb. Kerry beat him like a gong in Coral Gables, then again in St. Louis and Tempe -- and that is Rove's problem: His candidate is a weak-minded frat boy who cracks under pressure in front of 60 million voters.
That is an unacceptable failure for hardballers like Rove and Dick Cheney. On the undercard in Cleveland against John Edwards, Cheney came across as the cruel and sinister uberboss of Halliburton. In his only honest moment during the entire debate, he vowed, "We have to make America the best place in the world to do business."
Bush signed his own death warrant in the opening round, when he finally had to speak without his TelePrompTer. It was a Cinderella story brought up to date in Florida that night -- except this time the false prince turned back into a frog.
Immediately after the first debate ended I called Muhammad Ali at his home in Michigan, but whoever answered said the champ was laughing so hard that he couldn't come to the phone. "The debate really cracked him up," he chuckled. "The champ loves a good ass-whuppin'. He says Bush looked so scared to fight, he finally just quit and laid down."
Ali has seen that look before. Almost three months to the day after John Fitzgerald Kennedy was murdered in Dallas, the "Louisville Lip" -- then Cassius Clay -- made a permanent enemy of every "boxing expert" in the Western world by beating World Heavyweight Champion Sonny Liston so badly that he refused to come out of his corner for the seventh round.
This year's first presidential debate was such a disaster for George Bush that his handlers had to be crazy to let him get in the ring with John Kerry again. Yet Karl Rove let it happen, and we can only wonder why. But there is no doubt that the president has lost his nerve, and his career in the White House is finished. NO MAS.
*****
Presidential politics is a vicious business, even for rich white men, and anybody who gets into it should be prepared to grapple with the meanest of the mean. The White House has never been seized by timid warriors. There are no rules, and the roadside is littered with wreckage. That is why they call it the passing lane. Just ask any candidate who ever ran against George Bush -- Al Gore, Ann Richards, John McCain -- all of them ambushed and vanquished by lies and dirty tricks. And all of them still whining about it.
That is why George W. Bush is President of the United States, and Al Gore is not. Bush simply wanted it more, and he was willing to demolish anything that got in his way, including the U.S. Supreme Court. It is not by accident that the Bush White House (read: Dick Cheney & Halliburton Inc.) controls all three branches of our federal government today. They are powerful thugs who would far rather die than lose the election in November.
The Republican establishment is haunted by painful memories of what happened to Old Man Bush in 1992. He peaked too early, and he had no response to "It's the economy, stupid."
Which has always been the case. Every GOP administration since 1952 has let the Military-Industrial Complex loot the Treasury and plunge the nation into debt on the excuse of a wartime economic emergency. Richard Nixon comes quickly to mind, along with Ronald Reagan and his ridiculous "trickle-down" theory of U.S. economic policy. If the Rich get Richer, the theory goes, before long their pots will overflow and somehow "trickle down" to the poor, who would rather eat scraps off the Bush family plates than eat nothing at all. Republicans have never approved of democracy, and they never will. It goes back to preindustrial America, when only white male property owners could vote.
Things haven't changed all that much where George W. Bush comes from. Houston is a cruel and crazy town on a filthy river in East Texas with no zoning laws and a culture of sex, money and violence. It's a shabby sprawling metropolis ruled by brazen women, crooked cops and super-rich pansexual cowboys who live by the code of the West -- which can mean just about anything you need it to mean, in a pinch.
Houston is also the unnatural home of two out of the last three presidents of the United States of America, for good or ill. The other one was a handsome, sex-crazed boy from next-door Arkansas, which has no laws against oral sex or any other deviant practice not specifically forbidden in the New Testament, including anal incest and public cunnilingus with farm animals.
Back in 1948, during his first race for the U.S. Senate, Lyndon Johnson was running about ten points behind, with only nine days to go. He was sunk in despair. He was desperate. And it was just before noon on a Monday, they say, when he called his equally depressed campaign manager and instructed him to call a press conference for just before lunch on a slow news day and accuse his high-riding opponent, a pig farmer, of having routine carnal knowledge of his barnyard sows, despite the pleas of his wife and children.
His campaign manager was shocked. "We can't say that, Lyndon," he supposedly said. "You know it's not true."
"Of course it's not true!" Johnson barked at him. "But let's make the bastard deny it!"
Johnson -- a Democrat, like Bill Clinton -- won that election by fewer than a hundred votes, and after that he was home free. He went on to rule Texas and the U.S. Senate for twenty years and to be the most powerful vice president in the history of the United States. Until now.
*****
The genetically vicious nature of presidential campaigns in America is too obvious to argue with, but some people call it fun, and I am one of them. Election Day -- especially a presidential election -- is always a wild and terrifying time for politics junkies, and I am one of those, too. We look forward to major election days like sex addicts look forward to orgies. We are slaves to it.
Which is not a bad thing, all in all, for the winners. They are not the ones who bitch and whine about slavery when the votes are finally counted and the losers are forced to get down on their knees. No. The slaves who emerge victorious from these drastic public decisions go crazy with joy and plunge each other into deep tubs of chilled Cristal champagne with naked strangers who want to be close to a winner.
That is how it works in the victory business. You see it every time. The Weak will suck up to the Strong, for fear of losing their jobs and their money and all the fickle power they wielded only twenty-four hours ago. It is like suddenly losing your wife and your home in a vagrant poker game, then having to go on the road with whoremongers and beg for your dinner in public.
Nobody wants to hire a loser. Right? They stink of doom and defeat.
"What is that horrible smell in the office, Tex? It's making me sick."
"That is the smell of a Loser, Senator. He came in to apply for a job, but we tossed him out immediately. Sgt. Sloat took him down to the parking lot and taught him a lesson he will never forget."
"Good work, Tex. And how are you coming with my new Enemies List? I want them all locked up. They are scum."
"We will punish them brutally. They are terrorist sympathizers, and most of them voted against you anyway. I hate those bastards."
"Thank you, Sloat. You are a faithful servant. Come over here and kneel down. I want to reward you."
That is the nature of high-risk politics. Veni Vidi Vici, especially among Republicans. It's like the ancient Bedouin saying: As the camel falls to its knees, more knives are drawn.
*****
Indeed. the numbers are weird today, and so is this dangerous election. The time has come to rumble, to inject a bit of fun into politics. That's exactly what the debates did. John Kerry looked like a winner, and it energized his troops. Voting for Kerry is beginning to look like very serious fun for everybody except poor George, who now suddenly looks like a loser.
That is fatal in a presidential election.
I look at elections with the cool and dispassionate gaze of a professional gambler, especially when I'm betting real money on the outcome. Contrary to most conventional wisdom, I see Kerry with five points as a recommended risk. Kerry will win this election, if it happens, by a bigger margin than Bush finally gouged out of Florida in 2000. That was about forty-six percent, plus five points for owning the U.S. Supreme Court -- which seemed to equal fifty-one percent. Nobody really believed that, but George W. Bush moved into the White House anyway.
It was the most brutal seizure of power since Hitler burned the German Reichstag in 1933 and declared himself the new Boss of Germany. Karl Rove is no stranger to Nazi strategy, if only because it worked, for a while, and it was sure as hell fun for Hitler. But not for long. He ran out of oil, the whole world hated him, and he liked to gobble pure crystal biphetamine and stay awake for eight or nine days in a row with his maps & his bombers & his dope-addled general staff.
They all loved the whiff. It is the perfect drug for War -- as long as you are winning -- and Hitler thought he was King of the Hill forever. He had created a new master race, and every one of them worshipped him. The new Hitler youth loved to march and sing songs in unison and dance naked at night for the generals. They were fanatics.
That was sixty-six years ago, far back in ancient history, and things are not much different today. We still love War.
George Bush certainly does. In four short years he has turned our country from a prosperous nation at peace into a desperately indebted nation at war. But so what? He is the President of the United States, and you're not. Love it or leave it.
*****
War is an option whose time has passed. Peace is the only option for the future. At present we occupy a treacherous no-man's-land between peace and war, a time of growing fear that our military might has expanded beyond our capacity to control it and our political differences widened beyond our ability to bridge them. . . .
Short of changing human nature, therefore, the only way to achieve a practical, livable peace in a world of competing nations is to take the profit out of war.--RICHARD M. NIXON, "REAL PEACE" (1983)
Richard Nixon looks like a flaming liberal today, compared to a golem like George Bush. Indeed. Where is Richard Nixon now that we finally need him?
If Nixon were running for president today, he would be seen as a "liberal" candidate, and he would probably win. He was a crook and a bungler, but what the hell? Nixon was a barrel of laughs compared to this gang of thugs from the Halliburton petroleum organization who are running the White House today -- and who will be running it this time next year, if we (the once-proud, once-loved and widely respected "American people") don't rise up like wounded warriors and whack those lying petroleum pimps out of the White House on November 2nd.
Nixon hated running for president during football season, but he did it anyway. Nixon was a professional politician, and I despised everything he stood for -- but if he were running for president this year against the evil Bush-Cheney gang, I would happily vote for him.
You bet. Richard Nixon would be my Man. He was a crook and a creep and a gin-sot, but on some nights, when he would get hammered and wander around in the streets, he was fun to hang out with. He would wear a silk sweat suit and pull a stocking down over his face so nobody could recognize him. Then we would get in a cab and cruise down to the Watergate Hotel, just for laughs.
*****
Even the Fun-hog vote has started to swing for John Kerry, and that is a hard bloc to move. Only a fool would try to run for president without the enthusiastic support of the Fun-hog vote. It is huge, and always available, but they will never be lured into a voting booth unless voting carries a promise of Fun.
At least thirty-three percent of all eligible voters in this country are confessed Fun-hogs, who will cave into any temptation they stumble on. They have always hated George Bush, but until now they had never made the connection between hating George Bush and voting for John Kerry.
The Fun-hogs are starving for anything they can laugh with, instead of at. But George Bush is not funny. Nobody except fellow members of the Petroleum Club in Houston will laugh at his silly barnyard jokes unless it's for money.
When young Bush was at Yale in the Sixties, he told the same joke over and over again for two years, according to some of his classmates. One of them still remembers it:
There was a young man named GreenWho invented a jack-off machineOn the twenty-third strokeThe damn thing brokeAnd churned his nuts into cream.
"It was horrible to hear him tell it," said the classmate, who spoke only on condition of anonymity. He lifted his shirt and showed me a scar on his back put there by young George. "He burned this into my flesh with a red-hot poker," he said solemnly, "and I have hated him ever since. That jackass was born cruel. He burned me in the back while I was blindfolded. This scar will be with me forever."
There is nothing new or secret about that story. It ran on the front page of the Yale Daily News and caused a nasty scandal for a few weeks, but nobody was ever expelled for it. George did his first cover-up job. And he liked it.
*****
I watch three or four frantic network-news bulletins about Iraq every day, and it is all just fraudulent Pentagon propaganda, the absolute opposite of what it says: u.s. transfers sovereignty to iraqi interim "government." Hot damn! Iraq is finally Free, and just in time for the election! It is a deliberate cowardly lie. We are no more giving power back to the Iraqi people than we are about to stop killing them.
Your neighbor's grandchildren will be fighting this stupid, greed-crazed Bush-family "war" against the whole Islamic world for the rest of their lives, if John Kerry is not elected to be the new President of the United States in November.
The question this year is not whether President Bush is acting more and more like the head of a fascist government but if the American people want it that way. That is what this election is all about. We are down to nut-cutting time, and millions of people are angry. They want a Regime Change.
Some people say that George Bush should be run down and sacrificed to the Rat gods. But not me. No. I say it would be a lot easier to just vote the bastard out of office on November 2nd.
*****
BULLETIN
KERRY WINS GONZO ENDORSMENT; DR. THOMPSON JOINS DEMOCRAT IN CALLING BUSH "THE SYPHILLIS PRESIDENT""Four more years of George Bush will be like four more years of syphilis," the famed author said yesterday at a hastily called press conference near his home in Woody Creek, Colorado. "Only a fool or a sucker would vote for a dangerous loser like Bush," Dr. Thompson warned. "He hates everything we stand for, and he knows we will vote against him in November."
Thompson, long known for the eerie accuracy of his political instincts, went on to denounce Ralph Nader as "a worthless Judas Goat with no moral compass."
"I endorsed John Kerry a long time ago," he said, "and I will do everything in my power, short of roaming the streets with a meat hammer, to help him be the next President of the United States."
*****
Which is true. I said all those things, and I will say them again. Of course I will vote for John Kerry. I have known him for thirty years as a good man with a brave heart -- which is more than even the president's friends will tell you about George W. Bush, who is also an old acquaintance from the white-knuckle days of yesteryear. He is hated all over the world, including large parts of Texas, and he is taking us all down with him.
Bush is a natural-born loser with a filthy-rich daddy who pimped his son out to rich oil-mongers. He hates music, football and sex, in no particular order, and he is no fun at all.
I voted for Ralph Nader in 2000, but I will not make that mistake again. The joke is over for Nader. He was funny once, but now he belongs to the dead. There is nothing funny about helping George Bush win Florida again. Nader is a fool, and so is anybody who votes for him in November -- with the obvious exception of professional Republicans who have paid big money to turn poor Ralph into a world-famous Judas Goat.
Nader has become so desperate and crazed that he's stooped to paying homeless people to gather signatures to get him on the ballot. In Pennsylvania, the petitions he submitted contained tens of thousands of phony signatures, including Fred Flintstone, Mickey Mouse and John Kerry. A judge dumped Ralph from the ballot there, saying the forms were "rife with forgeries" and calling it "the most deceitful and fraudulent exercise ever perpetrated upon this court."
But they will keep his name on the ballot in the long-suffering Hurricane State, which is ruled by the President's younger brother, Jeb, who also wants to be the next President of the United States. In 2000, when they sent Jim Baker down to Florida, I knew it was all over. The fix was in. In that election, 97,488 people voted for Nader in Florida, and Gore lost the state by 537 votes. You don't have to be from Texas to understand the moral of that story. It's like being out-coached in the Super Bowl. There are no rules in the passing lane. Only losers play fair, and all winners have blood on their hands.
*****
Back in June, when John Kerry was beginning to feel like a winner, I had a quick little rendezvous with him on a rain-soaked runway in Aspen, Colorado, where he was scheduled to meet with a harem of wealthy campaign contributors. As we rode to the event, I told him that Bush's vicious goons in the White House are perfectly capable of assassinating Nader and blaming it on him. His staff laughed, but the Secret Service men didn't. Kerry quickly suggested that I might make a good running mate, and we reminisced about trying to end the Vietnam War in 1972.
That was the year I first met him, at a riot on that elegant little street in front of the White House. He was yelling into a bullhorn and I was trying to throw a dead, bleeding rat over a black-spike fence and onto the president's lawn.
We were angry and righteous in those days, and there were millions of us. We kicked two chief executives out of the White House because they were stupid warmongers. We conquered Lyndon Johnson and we stomped on Richard Nixon -- which wise people said was impossible, but so what? It was fun. We were warriors then, and our tribe was strong like a river.
That river is still running. All we have to do is get out and vote, while it's still legal, and we will wash those crooked warmongers out of the White House.
-HST Oct. 2004
Kerry came into October as a five-point underdog with almost no chance of winning three out of three rigged confrontations with a treacherous little freak like George Bush. But the debates are over now, and the victor was clearly John Kerry every time. He steamrollered Bush and left him for roadkill.
Did you see Bush on TV, trying to debate? Jesus, he talked like a donkey with no brains at all. The tide turned early, in Coral Gables, when Bush went belly up less than halfway through his first bout with Kerry, who hammered poor George into jelly. It was pitiful. . . . I almost felt sorry for him, until I heard someone call him "Mister President," and then I felt ashamed.
Karl Rove, the president's political wizard, felt even worse. There is angst in the heart of Texas today, and panic in the bowels of the White House. Rove has a nasty little problem, and its name is George Bush. The president failed miserably from the instant he got onstage with John Kerry. He looked weak and dumb. Kerry beat him like a gong in Coral Gables, then again in St. Louis and Tempe -- and that is Rove's problem: His candidate is a weak-minded frat boy who cracks under pressure in front of 60 million voters.
That is an unacceptable failure for hardballers like Rove and Dick Cheney. On the undercard in Cleveland against John Edwards, Cheney came across as the cruel and sinister uberboss of Halliburton. In his only honest moment during the entire debate, he vowed, "We have to make America the best place in the world to do business."
Bush signed his own death warrant in the opening round, when he finally had to speak without his TelePrompTer. It was a Cinderella story brought up to date in Florida that night -- except this time the false prince turned back into a frog.
Immediately after the first debate ended I called Muhammad Ali at his home in Michigan, but whoever answered said the champ was laughing so hard that he couldn't come to the phone. "The debate really cracked him up," he chuckled. "The champ loves a good ass-whuppin'. He says Bush looked so scared to fight, he finally just quit and laid down."
Ali has seen that look before. Almost three months to the day after John Fitzgerald Kennedy was murdered in Dallas, the "Louisville Lip" -- then Cassius Clay -- made a permanent enemy of every "boxing expert" in the Western world by beating World Heavyweight Champion Sonny Liston so badly that he refused to come out of his corner for the seventh round.
This year's first presidential debate was such a disaster for George Bush that his handlers had to be crazy to let him get in the ring with John Kerry again. Yet Karl Rove let it happen, and we can only wonder why. But there is no doubt that the president has lost his nerve, and his career in the White House is finished. NO MAS.
*****
Presidential politics is a vicious business, even for rich white men, and anybody who gets into it should be prepared to grapple with the meanest of the mean. The White House has never been seized by timid warriors. There are no rules, and the roadside is littered with wreckage. That is why they call it the passing lane. Just ask any candidate who ever ran against George Bush -- Al Gore, Ann Richards, John McCain -- all of them ambushed and vanquished by lies and dirty tricks. And all of them still whining about it.
That is why George W. Bush is President of the United States, and Al Gore is not. Bush simply wanted it more, and he was willing to demolish anything that got in his way, including the U.S. Supreme Court. It is not by accident that the Bush White House (read: Dick Cheney & Halliburton Inc.) controls all three branches of our federal government today. They are powerful thugs who would far rather die than lose the election in November.
The Republican establishment is haunted by painful memories of what happened to Old Man Bush in 1992. He peaked too early, and he had no response to "It's the economy, stupid."
Which has always been the case. Every GOP administration since 1952 has let the Military-Industrial Complex loot the Treasury and plunge the nation into debt on the excuse of a wartime economic emergency. Richard Nixon comes quickly to mind, along with Ronald Reagan and his ridiculous "trickle-down" theory of U.S. economic policy. If the Rich get Richer, the theory goes, before long their pots will overflow and somehow "trickle down" to the poor, who would rather eat scraps off the Bush family plates than eat nothing at all. Republicans have never approved of democracy, and they never will. It goes back to preindustrial America, when only white male property owners could vote.
Things haven't changed all that much where George W. Bush comes from. Houston is a cruel and crazy town on a filthy river in East Texas with no zoning laws and a culture of sex, money and violence. It's a shabby sprawling metropolis ruled by brazen women, crooked cops and super-rich pansexual cowboys who live by the code of the West -- which can mean just about anything you need it to mean, in a pinch.
Houston is also the unnatural home of two out of the last three presidents of the United States of America, for good or ill. The other one was a handsome, sex-crazed boy from next-door Arkansas, which has no laws against oral sex or any other deviant practice not specifically forbidden in the New Testament, including anal incest and public cunnilingus with farm animals.
Back in 1948, during his first race for the U.S. Senate, Lyndon Johnson was running about ten points behind, with only nine days to go. He was sunk in despair. He was desperate. And it was just before noon on a Monday, they say, when he called his equally depressed campaign manager and instructed him to call a press conference for just before lunch on a slow news day and accuse his high-riding opponent, a pig farmer, of having routine carnal knowledge of his barnyard sows, despite the pleas of his wife and children.
His campaign manager was shocked. "We can't say that, Lyndon," he supposedly said. "You know it's not true."
"Of course it's not true!" Johnson barked at him. "But let's make the bastard deny it!"
Johnson -- a Democrat, like Bill Clinton -- won that election by fewer than a hundred votes, and after that he was home free. He went on to rule Texas and the U.S. Senate for twenty years and to be the most powerful vice president in the history of the United States. Until now.
*****
The genetically vicious nature of presidential campaigns in America is too obvious to argue with, but some people call it fun, and I am one of them. Election Day -- especially a presidential election -- is always a wild and terrifying time for politics junkies, and I am one of those, too. We look forward to major election days like sex addicts look forward to orgies. We are slaves to it.
Which is not a bad thing, all in all, for the winners. They are not the ones who bitch and whine about slavery when the votes are finally counted and the losers are forced to get down on their knees. No. The slaves who emerge victorious from these drastic public decisions go crazy with joy and plunge each other into deep tubs of chilled Cristal champagne with naked strangers who want to be close to a winner.
That is how it works in the victory business. You see it every time. The Weak will suck up to the Strong, for fear of losing their jobs and their money and all the fickle power they wielded only twenty-four hours ago. It is like suddenly losing your wife and your home in a vagrant poker game, then having to go on the road with whoremongers and beg for your dinner in public.
Nobody wants to hire a loser. Right? They stink of doom and defeat.
"What is that horrible smell in the office, Tex? It's making me sick."
"That is the smell of a Loser, Senator. He came in to apply for a job, but we tossed him out immediately. Sgt. Sloat took him down to the parking lot and taught him a lesson he will never forget."
"Good work, Tex. And how are you coming with my new Enemies List? I want them all locked up. They are scum."
"We will punish them brutally. They are terrorist sympathizers, and most of them voted against you anyway. I hate those bastards."
"Thank you, Sloat. You are a faithful servant. Come over here and kneel down. I want to reward you."
That is the nature of high-risk politics. Veni Vidi Vici, especially among Republicans. It's like the ancient Bedouin saying: As the camel falls to its knees, more knives are drawn.
*****
Indeed. the numbers are weird today, and so is this dangerous election. The time has come to rumble, to inject a bit of fun into politics. That's exactly what the debates did. John Kerry looked like a winner, and it energized his troops. Voting for Kerry is beginning to look like very serious fun for everybody except poor George, who now suddenly looks like a loser.
That is fatal in a presidential election.
I look at elections with the cool and dispassionate gaze of a professional gambler, especially when I'm betting real money on the outcome. Contrary to most conventional wisdom, I see Kerry with five points as a recommended risk. Kerry will win this election, if it happens, by a bigger margin than Bush finally gouged out of Florida in 2000. That was about forty-six percent, plus five points for owning the U.S. Supreme Court -- which seemed to equal fifty-one percent. Nobody really believed that, but George W. Bush moved into the White House anyway.
It was the most brutal seizure of power since Hitler burned the German Reichstag in 1933 and declared himself the new Boss of Germany. Karl Rove is no stranger to Nazi strategy, if only because it worked, for a while, and it was sure as hell fun for Hitler. But not for long. He ran out of oil, the whole world hated him, and he liked to gobble pure crystal biphetamine and stay awake for eight or nine days in a row with his maps & his bombers & his dope-addled general staff.
They all loved the whiff. It is the perfect drug for War -- as long as you are winning -- and Hitler thought he was King of the Hill forever. He had created a new master race, and every one of them worshipped him. The new Hitler youth loved to march and sing songs in unison and dance naked at night for the generals. They were fanatics.
That was sixty-six years ago, far back in ancient history, and things are not much different today. We still love War.
George Bush certainly does. In four short years he has turned our country from a prosperous nation at peace into a desperately indebted nation at war. But so what? He is the President of the United States, and you're not. Love it or leave it.
*****
War is an option whose time has passed. Peace is the only option for the future. At present we occupy a treacherous no-man's-land between peace and war, a time of growing fear that our military might has expanded beyond our capacity to control it and our political differences widened beyond our ability to bridge them. . . .
Short of changing human nature, therefore, the only way to achieve a practical, livable peace in a world of competing nations is to take the profit out of war.--RICHARD M. NIXON, "REAL PEACE" (1983)
Richard Nixon looks like a flaming liberal today, compared to a golem like George Bush. Indeed. Where is Richard Nixon now that we finally need him?
If Nixon were running for president today, he would be seen as a "liberal" candidate, and he would probably win. He was a crook and a bungler, but what the hell? Nixon was a barrel of laughs compared to this gang of thugs from the Halliburton petroleum organization who are running the White House today -- and who will be running it this time next year, if we (the once-proud, once-loved and widely respected "American people") don't rise up like wounded warriors and whack those lying petroleum pimps out of the White House on November 2nd.
Nixon hated running for president during football season, but he did it anyway. Nixon was a professional politician, and I despised everything he stood for -- but if he were running for president this year against the evil Bush-Cheney gang, I would happily vote for him.
You bet. Richard Nixon would be my Man. He was a crook and a creep and a gin-sot, but on some nights, when he would get hammered and wander around in the streets, he was fun to hang out with. He would wear a silk sweat suit and pull a stocking down over his face so nobody could recognize him. Then we would get in a cab and cruise down to the Watergate Hotel, just for laughs.
*****
Even the Fun-hog vote has started to swing for John Kerry, and that is a hard bloc to move. Only a fool would try to run for president without the enthusiastic support of the Fun-hog vote. It is huge, and always available, but they will never be lured into a voting booth unless voting carries a promise of Fun.
At least thirty-three percent of all eligible voters in this country are confessed Fun-hogs, who will cave into any temptation they stumble on. They have always hated George Bush, but until now they had never made the connection between hating George Bush and voting for John Kerry.
The Fun-hogs are starving for anything they can laugh with, instead of at. But George Bush is not funny. Nobody except fellow members of the Petroleum Club in Houston will laugh at his silly barnyard jokes unless it's for money.
When young Bush was at Yale in the Sixties, he told the same joke over and over again for two years, according to some of his classmates. One of them still remembers it:
There was a young man named GreenWho invented a jack-off machineOn the twenty-third strokeThe damn thing brokeAnd churned his nuts into cream.
"It was horrible to hear him tell it," said the classmate, who spoke only on condition of anonymity. He lifted his shirt and showed me a scar on his back put there by young George. "He burned this into my flesh with a red-hot poker," he said solemnly, "and I have hated him ever since. That jackass was born cruel. He burned me in the back while I was blindfolded. This scar will be with me forever."
There is nothing new or secret about that story. It ran on the front page of the Yale Daily News and caused a nasty scandal for a few weeks, but nobody was ever expelled for it. George did his first cover-up job. And he liked it.
*****
I watch three or four frantic network-news bulletins about Iraq every day, and it is all just fraudulent Pentagon propaganda, the absolute opposite of what it says: u.s. transfers sovereignty to iraqi interim "government." Hot damn! Iraq is finally Free, and just in time for the election! It is a deliberate cowardly lie. We are no more giving power back to the Iraqi people than we are about to stop killing them.
Your neighbor's grandchildren will be fighting this stupid, greed-crazed Bush-family "war" against the whole Islamic world for the rest of their lives, if John Kerry is not elected to be the new President of the United States in November.
The question this year is not whether President Bush is acting more and more like the head of a fascist government but if the American people want it that way. That is what this election is all about. We are down to nut-cutting time, and millions of people are angry. They want a Regime Change.
Some people say that George Bush should be run down and sacrificed to the Rat gods. But not me. No. I say it would be a lot easier to just vote the bastard out of office on November 2nd.
*****
BULLETIN
KERRY WINS GONZO ENDORSMENT; DR. THOMPSON JOINS DEMOCRAT IN CALLING BUSH "THE SYPHILLIS PRESIDENT""Four more years of George Bush will be like four more years of syphilis," the famed author said yesterday at a hastily called press conference near his home in Woody Creek, Colorado. "Only a fool or a sucker would vote for a dangerous loser like Bush," Dr. Thompson warned. "He hates everything we stand for, and he knows we will vote against him in November."
Thompson, long known for the eerie accuracy of his political instincts, went on to denounce Ralph Nader as "a worthless Judas Goat with no moral compass."
"I endorsed John Kerry a long time ago," he said, "and I will do everything in my power, short of roaming the streets with a meat hammer, to help him be the next President of the United States."
*****
Which is true. I said all those things, and I will say them again. Of course I will vote for John Kerry. I have known him for thirty years as a good man with a brave heart -- which is more than even the president's friends will tell you about George W. Bush, who is also an old acquaintance from the white-knuckle days of yesteryear. He is hated all over the world, including large parts of Texas, and he is taking us all down with him.
Bush is a natural-born loser with a filthy-rich daddy who pimped his son out to rich oil-mongers. He hates music, football and sex, in no particular order, and he is no fun at all.
I voted for Ralph Nader in 2000, but I will not make that mistake again. The joke is over for Nader. He was funny once, but now he belongs to the dead. There is nothing funny about helping George Bush win Florida again. Nader is a fool, and so is anybody who votes for him in November -- with the obvious exception of professional Republicans who have paid big money to turn poor Ralph into a world-famous Judas Goat.
Nader has become so desperate and crazed that he's stooped to paying homeless people to gather signatures to get him on the ballot. In Pennsylvania, the petitions he submitted contained tens of thousands of phony signatures, including Fred Flintstone, Mickey Mouse and John Kerry. A judge dumped Ralph from the ballot there, saying the forms were "rife with forgeries" and calling it "the most deceitful and fraudulent exercise ever perpetrated upon this court."
But they will keep his name on the ballot in the long-suffering Hurricane State, which is ruled by the President's younger brother, Jeb, who also wants to be the next President of the United States. In 2000, when they sent Jim Baker down to Florida, I knew it was all over. The fix was in. In that election, 97,488 people voted for Nader in Florida, and Gore lost the state by 537 votes. You don't have to be from Texas to understand the moral of that story. It's like being out-coached in the Super Bowl. There are no rules in the passing lane. Only losers play fair, and all winners have blood on their hands.
*****
Back in June, when John Kerry was beginning to feel like a winner, I had a quick little rendezvous with him on a rain-soaked runway in Aspen, Colorado, where he was scheduled to meet with a harem of wealthy campaign contributors. As we rode to the event, I told him that Bush's vicious goons in the White House are perfectly capable of assassinating Nader and blaming it on him. His staff laughed, but the Secret Service men didn't. Kerry quickly suggested that I might make a good running mate, and we reminisced about trying to end the Vietnam War in 1972.
That was the year I first met him, at a riot on that elegant little street in front of the White House. He was yelling into a bullhorn and I was trying to throw a dead, bleeding rat over a black-spike fence and onto the president's lawn.
We were angry and righteous in those days, and there were millions of us. We kicked two chief executives out of the White House because they were stupid warmongers. We conquered Lyndon Johnson and we stomped on Richard Nixon -- which wise people said was impossible, but so what? It was fun. We were warriors then, and our tribe was strong like a river.
That river is still running. All we have to do is get out and vote, while it's still legal, and we will wash those crooked warmongers out of the White House.
-HST Oct. 2004
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