Tuesday, July 31, 2007

Sex And The Single Load

Good points on the last post, AC. I'm just going to add a couple of points and then I'll stop bitching. People who have never had to deal with obesity just don't know how awful it is. They just don't understand that the "financial incentives" cooked up by insurance companies (obviously for added profit) are not going to help a single person to lose weight. There are countless other reasons to do so, and if they don't compel, nothing will. It's up to the individual, and it requires Herculean strength even after the decision to get in shape is made.

Last night I couldn't sleep, and I was thinking about this and that. I had just polished off a bottle of pinot grigio and was literally sitting in my closet with Toulouse (my cat) curled up in my lap, and reading Bertrand Russell's Why I Am Not A Christian. I was wearing my night shirt and had a Suzy Q in my breast pocket. In case you don't know, a Suzy Q is a delightful, mass produced confection made up of two pieces of cake with a strange, slightly oily "creme filling" in the middle. I couldn't quite focus on my reading since I was drunk (again, this is a rare thing for me) and fighting off an incredibly nasty, punctuated depression. It was that scary angst and melancholy that led to the bottle of wine in the first place. At around 2am, as I gently stroked my dear Toulouse, I opened up and starting eating my creamy delight (sounds like gay erotica). It was the mindless act of a drunk, fat man, as I wasn't hungry. But food has always been a comfort for me, although less so now that the surgery has made it impossible to binge. Suddenly, I got really mad at myself for turning to food. At 35, I thought, I should know better. A deep chasm of past experience opened up and I looked into it and didn't like what I saw. Violently, I smashed that Suzy Q against the wall of the closet. Some cream shot out and landed on Toulouse as I twisted a dark arc of cake across the wall. Then I made a fist and the remains smushed out between my fingers. The absurd spectacle and sudden violence amused me, and for once food did chase the blues away without me actually having to eat anything. I would have thought it a dream, but this morning I woke up and found what looked like a crime scene involving a piece of cake.

The point is, dear reader, to the extent that there is one is that people who struggle with obesity frequently have an eating disorder that is fueled by thoughts and emotions beneath the fatty surface. Insurance companies are not going to cause a single person to lose weight, nor will further stigmatizing obesity help anyone. I think of all the things I tried in my life to lose weight. When I was 17 I tried OptiFast, which was a program where you drank all your meals. I lost 100lbs, but gained it back. I could go on and on and on. Until I finally decided to have Roux-n-Y gastric bypass surgery, open surgery, a prodecure that is extremely painful and difficult to get used to. Not to mention the 1-2% of people who actually die from it. And even though I lost a lot of weight and kept it off, I'm still obese! And while most people are not obese, they do understand how difficult it is to lose weight, even 5 pounds. And yet that still doesn't stop people from vastly over-simplifying this illness, and even insulting those who suffer from it.

I mentioned the reasons that exist to lose weight, and there are so many. I can think of one off the bat which is more compelling than every other one put together: sex. I'm not just talking about the physical act of love, but sex appeal, as well. Yes, health is a reason to lose weight, but it's nothing compared to wanting to look sexy. Think of how people smoke and drive when they have a buzz from drinking, or do drugs, even though it is to the detriment to their health. When I was in high school and was obese, I cared about my health, yes. But that was a moon cast shadow in importance compared to my desire to look good naked, or in jeans. Hell, a lot of people take up smoking just to look sexy! So if my desire to get laid, or at least want women to want to fuck me, didn't turn me into a health fiend, what could? Most people at the gym have only a vague notion of getting into shape for their health. It's philosophical. The real pay off, however, is a tight ass and to leave a trail of swooning women (or men, or both).

If you think I'm being crass or simple-minded, just look at how sex is used to sell. They even have that saying...sex sells. The car you drive, the clothes you wear, and most of the products you consume are sold to you using a very simple pitch: this will make you desirable. It's primal. Yes, it's true that one doesn't have to be fit to get ass. I've had more ass than a toilet seat in my life...ok, maybe not, but I do like that saying. But I've always been pretty lucky when it come to tricking members of the opposite sex into thinking I'm worth the time of day...at least for one night. But it would have been so much easier if I weren't a fat fuck. And I love women, and sex, a whole hell of a lot. Sex, sex, sex. I lost my virginity when I was 14, to a girl in my middle school who was my age. She was a virgin, too, and I think I got more out of the experience than she did. After the deed, we held each other in a sweaty, post-coital embrace. I remember feeling a bit guilty for hurting her, but we talked and laughed and she put me at ease. As she drifted to sleep, her tiny body curled up next to my girth, I remember thinking, "I like this...I want to do this as much as possible."

After that, there was a long dry spell. A couple of sticky encounters in high school, once with a man, but nothing worth talking about. About the time that I joined the Socialist Party (age 17), I came to three conclusions about sex. One, I enjoy the company of women on a level that language cannot adequately explain. Certainly a thought common to those whose sexual tastes are for the fairer sex. I also realized that even beyond sex I just got along much better with women and they generally got along well with me. To this day, I just hit it off with women as friends with great ease and comfort. but that's another issue. Two, I have to lose weight if I'm going to get laid as often as I would like. And three, I'm an ass man. I later realized that even a woman's elbow or ear would drive me nuts, but the ass was just...wow. Anyway, I had to lose weight. Either that, or get to know my hand.

I thought that when I served as a delegate at a SP convention in Chicago, at 17, I would try some moves and get me some radical ass. Late one night, in someone's hotel room as a group of us got to know each other, I thought for sure I would hook up. It just didn't happen. I hit it off as a friend and comrade, but fat just isn't sexy. And that's what fueled my constant attempts at losing weight. When I used to work out every morning at the Boston YMCA, back when I worked the overnight shift at a hotel nearby, I would pass the mirror in the locker room and (if nobody was looking) would look at my naked body and ask the same question...would I fuck me? The answer? Perhaps after a few drinks...maybe.

College provided several one night stands, three relationships, and one love affair with a married woman (it felt so grown up...an actual affair!). So I think I did pretty well, and am oddly pressed to conclude that there logically must be something attractive about my personality, because my man boobs and gut weren't helping me bed women. A friend at UMass Boston, a beautiful actress with whom I had a serious crush (that I tried to hide, with varying degrees of success) was pretty frank about my plight. I can't remember what she said, but it amounted to, "Would you rather be an obnoxious misogynistic hunk or a fat guy who women liked?" I responded, "Why can't I be a hunk that women like?" I didn't realize it at the time, but it was a compliment. I just remember being fixated for days on how she openly called me "fat." I never courted her, but at least I didn't kill our friendship by pushing her for sex. I wonder where she is now.

But I digress. I'm allowed to do that since it's my fucking blog. As for the weight loss surgery, was that motivated by a desire to be more desirable? Definitely. On the surface, my doctor and surgeon and friends all talked about "quality of life" and, of course, better health. No doubt that was a motivating factor. Deep down, though, I looked forward to that magical moment when you walk into a new girls' bedroom.

Monday, July 30, 2007

An Epidemic Of Judgmental Cruelty

Excellent commentary, Apocalypse Cow. I couldn't have said it better myself. It just occurred to me that a friend of mine is writing a dissertation about obesity in America, as part of her endeavor to get a Master's degree. If memory serves, part of it has to do with the way the media refers to an "obesity epidemic." So some good will come from this study about "socially contagious" obesity; Clare will have more to write about.

Just think of how many stereotypes exist about obesity. It's supposedly indicative of a lack of moral fiber, stupidity and laziness. These depictions in popular culture are pretty common, and those who complain about them are considered overly-sensitive. I have a fantastic sense of humor and don't really have a problem with fat jokes. But this New England Journal of Medicine study is different from Eddie Murphy in a fat suit, or Monty Python's exploding obese bastard. As I mentioned in my last post, one of the scientists involved in the study said (on CNN) that he didn't want to stigmatize or socially isolate obese people. Then in the very next sentence he stated that having fat friends "normalizes" obesity and will cause weight gain. He went on to say that even if you don't have fat friends directly, fat friends in your social circle (a friend of a friend) can lead to the aforementioned normalization and increase your weight. In a society that celebrates youth and thinness and attacks fat people as dumb gluttons, I can't think of a better way to socially isolate and stigmatize than to say what he did. The fact that it was a peer-reviewed study provides a patina of respectability to the poorly drawn conclusions, which are mostly made by lay people who hear or read about the study but never actually read it themselves.

There's nothing good about being obese. My brother and I have been that way all our lives. And it really pisses me off when people diminish our stuggle. Eat less and exercise is what I hear and read. Writer Betsy Hart of the Scripps Howard News Service puts it this way, "[obesity is] about a generation of us who just can't say no to anything, including food. But it's becoming increasingly clear that it's also very much about a food culture that feeds that lust, pun intended." The myth is embraced and even celebrated. Given the abject misery that obesity causes, if losing weight was an easy thing we would have done it a long time ago. I can't speak for myself, but my brother is extremely intelligent and a very hard-worker. He also has a strong will and when he is determined to do something, it gets done. Back in the day he played and taught tennis. Hours and hours of hard work and dedication paid off...he was outstanding. He even went to a high-priced tennis camp in Vermont and stood out in the crowd. He also used to be a chef. When he realized that there was no real future in it, and that the work-to-pay ratio didn't add up, he went to school and learned about computers. The result of that was a considerable increase in his quality of life. He knows how to put himself into something totally, and is a thoughtful, hard working fellow.

My point is that he has the desire to lose weight, and his abilities are considerable. Yet he struggles with obesity. The advice to "eat less and exercise" is a cruel and dismissive insult. But people never pass on an opportunity to feel superior to others. I do it, too. Like Apocalypse Cow, I look down on southerners, too. But that's different. I've been down south many times, and those people are really twisted, in general. Ha!

I don't mean to go on a rant here, but I feel compelled to mention that "overweight" and "obese" are terms used in the media as if they were synonymous. They aren't. I sometimes hear the figure that 2/3's of Americans are obese or overweight. That includes people who are 5 or 10 pounds over. The social stigma attached to obesity, as well as the pathology that causes it, is very different than having a few extra pounds. For one, the "ideal" weight, as defined by doctors, is somewhat arbitrary. Ten pounds above your ideal weight does not have any concrete negative health impact. In a sense, overweight is an aesthetic judgment while "obese" is a more concrete clinical assessment.

Certainly, environment contributes greatly to obesity. But studies also show that "multiple genes" make the problem much more likely, and difficult to overcome, in some people. This may even be true in select populations, based on shared heredity. The recent obesity studies, and news stories, that have come out lately have revealed a sad truth about Americans. Not that we are weak gluttons that can't say no to cookies and cake, but that we are simple-minded and keen to judge others. I guess that's more fun than looking at the science and understanding that obesity is based on environmental, social and genetic factors. The deck is stacked against some of us.

As I mentioned before, the media stories about being fat have bothered me more than they should. I dropped out of high school simply to avoid gym class. I got my diploma by making a unique arrangement with the school. I'm not sure what my weight was back then, but I was "morbidly obese." I was treated like a punk for skipping PE, and only one teacher spoke to me about how my weight contributed to my truancy, and my desire to quit. Everyone else acted like it was a mystery why I acted the way I did. Now I realize that I should have stood up for myself and related my problem more openly. But those teachers who treated me like shit are not blameless. That's all past now, but the way I felt back then about how my body made my life so miserable is definitely contributing to my anxiety and self-loathing now. Even with all the weight I lost, I'm still fat. The thoughts of suicide, the self-harm and the isolation that have taken place in the past couple of weeks are connected with this "socially contagious" study. I just turned 35, and my weight loss surgery took almost 200 pounds off my body, yet the judgmental attitude and over-simplification of my plight still has fantastic emotional currency with me. It's like I'm back in high school, hiding in an empty classroom and reading, waiting for gym class to end.

Friday, July 27, 2007

Obese Pariah and Me Losing My Mind...Again

I'm not proud of many of my personality quirks, if you'll allow me to be so kind to myself. Well, it's my blog, so I'm going to be. If you know me, or have read more than a handful of posts, you know that I'm not the picture of mental health. I'm not going to delve into all the ways that mental illness has impacted my life; that would take to long and be humiliating. Sometimes I get very upset, and possibly suicidal, about things that most other people easily shake off. Most of the things that get to me have to do with how much I hate myself. You can only take so much of the whole self-loathing thing before you start to collapse, like a black hole. A critical mass is reached, and then there is an explosion. It could manifest as a bout of severe anxiety and depression, self-injury, suicidal thoughts or behavior, or hiding out in my flat. These moments are more frequent than I'd like to admit, but I've developed countless strategies to get past them. Sometimes they work, sometimes they don't, but there was once a time in my life when I didn't have them. I was totally at the mercy of the illnesses from which I suffer. At least I'm a little better off now. Progress.

Unfortunately, one of those survival strategies consists of (as I mentioned) hiding out and eliminating human interaction for days at a time, sometimes longer. In that vein, I also try to stay away from situations that could trigger a hospital stay or a suicide attempt. For example, a couple of months ago I had a chance at what was for me a dream job, or close to it. An opportunity was provided to get back to work, and as a writer, no less. Against my better judgement (but in line with hope) I jumped at the chance. Then some familiar anxieties and fears started massing in my brain. And from there a little bit of madness ensued, and I knew I was in danger. So I backed off and was ashamed. I had disappointed my friends and family. Those closest to me had yet another reason to see me as sad and pathetic. And I gave it to them.

But I digress. A couple of news stories recently have put me on edge, and I feel that need to hide again. Emotions are too intense, fueled by a shattered ego. Usually I touch the raw nerves myself. Rarely does anyone else. I try at keeping them hidden, or at finding privacy so I can wince and guage the damage done, and then from there heal a bit.

The news stories I mentioned have to do with obesity. As I said in my last post, it hasn't been an easy month for the fat. But the "socially contagious" obesity story, along with the report of a man who was told he couldn't adopt his nephew because he was too overweight (500 lbs), have me snapping at strangers, reaching for the lorazepam, and closing my bedroom door. There are other signs, as well, that I won't bore you with. Why do I feel so under attack personally?

Part of the reason has to do with how we're supposed to be a society that is becoming more and more tolerant of differences. And we seem to be moving the other way with people who suffer with the eating disorder responsible for obesity. A doctor on television this morning said, "We don't want to add to the negative stigma of obesity, or to socially isolate anyone, we just want people to be aware that being around overweight friends could contribute to your gaining weight, too." I would hate to hear what he would have said if he DIDN'T want to socially isolate obese people. He went on to say that being around obese people "normalizes" obesity, and that is a health threat.

I heard the doctor and the story, and then thought about it for a few minutes. I felt the tell-tale emotional outrage growing within me, and I sought privacy. Suddenly, the lack of self respect I feel because of my weight fused with a strange sense of guilt. I felt like a pariah. J'accuse! Sirens were blaring. I was getting more irritable, was on the verge of tears, and at one point had to resist the urge to take 6 or 8 lorazepam so I could just knock myself out for the rest of the day. Then I was on the telephone with an SP comrade l and just started crying. I made an excuse and got off the phone. This made me angry, so I hit myself in the face twice.

I don't know what conclusions to draw from all this. All I know is that it's true, and that I'm glad I have no plans for the weekend. And I'm ashamed to admit that part of me wants to physically hurt the people who are further stigmatizing obesity. The aforementioned doctor on television this morning is over in Cambridge. Some dark part of me wants to beat the shit out of him. I feel judged by a society that has no place judging anyone. I'm a good, reasonable and compassionate person who doesn't deserve to be told that he is a health risk to others just by existing.

I'll leave you with what some CNN correspondant said about all this. She was thin from what I could tell. She said, "If your social network starts to spread out and include obese friends, you may find parts of your body spreading." Very funny. I'm glad she could find humor in an illness that leaves the patient socially crippled, mentally anguished and physically in danger of his or her life. Not to mention reduced quality of life. Fuck her. I hope she gets AIDS and then loses a leg to a bear. Twice. Now that's funny.

Thursday, July 26, 2007

Land Of Plenty

Finally got around to changing the picture. Now you see Frieda Kahlo's Broken Column, something she painted in the '40's, around the time she was having a lot of surgery on her spine. I was going to post a nude by photographer Milos Sadik, but I couldn't find it. When I do I'll put it up.

It's been a hard month for the fatties. First you have an obese woman played on the Silver Screen by John Travolta in a "fat suit." I don't hold it against him, as it is a strangely common thing these days for a slim actor to do. But it irks me, and I'm not sure why. Then in the last week came word that United HealthCare wants to "reward" clients for living healthy lifestyles. That's sounds super, but what it means is that smokers, the overweight and obese, police officers, rock climbers, etc. (anyone who emerges as a special risk on the actuarial tables) will be charged through the nose. Now this really pisses me off to no end, especially since a lot of people seem to think it's a good idea. On CNN yesterday, one fellow they asked naively spoke about how wonderful it is that financial incentives will exist to make people healthier. This is not a good thing. The government already takes care of the elderly, poor and disabled through Medicare. But that's not enough for America's private insurers. They want to price out anyone they can and cover people who basically only need check-ups and protection against the costs associated with catastrophic illnesses. These HMO's and insurance companies have shown again and again that they are too inefficient and unscrupulous to be allowed to provide such a necessary service. It's yet another indication of how we need national, socialized medicine. If you disagree, I'm sorry, but you're just not paying attention.

I'm most offended, however, by the recent study that refers to obesity as "socially contagious." And I know that I shouldn't be, but I am. It's a large study, and everyone involved with it is reputable. I just can't help seeing the irony of a consumer culture that collectively loathes/mocks those suffering from an eating disorder. We really are a fucked up society. Let's hope our attempts at spreading our "values" around the world fail, because those values indicate that we are 330 million people with myriad mental illnesses that need treating (body dysmorphic and narcissistic personality disorders, to name two). I'll just leave it at that. But it won't be long before insurance companies will want to know how fat your friends are. The letter is in the mail. I can see it now...

Dear Mr. Higginbottom,

Our operatives couldn't help but notice your recent inclination towards socializing with people of generous proportion. As a result, we're going to have to request that you establish monthly appointments with your physician so that we may better monitor wellness trends in your lifestyle. Failure to do so will result in an automatic increase in your premium.

Oh, and the stock market just closed at -300 points or so. And on my birthday, no less! Sweet.

Wednesday, July 25, 2007

Flight of the Conchords

I just discovered the show, "Flight of the Conchords" on HBO and fucking loved it. Just, wow, man. So good. It raised the philosophical question, "Is it gay if I put a wig on my friend and pretend he's a woman and have sex with him when he's asleep?"

A Decadent Zagnut

Just for the record, which is all this is, I really hate that photograph of the girl with the baguette. I hate it so much that I had to put it up. It won't be there for long, though, of that I'm sure. It was done by Mark Velasquez, a douchebag pseudo-intellectual photographer who must be an absolute fucking delight to talk to.

I once read that, "everything that is decadent speeds up revolution." I was probably eating a Zagnut at the time. And I just got a notice in the mail that there is a Socialist Party meeting coming up. Well ring-a-ding-ding. My psychiatrist once told me to keep passing the open windows. That's from John Irving, and it's damn good advice, at least in the abstract.

It's hot outside, and moist. Sultry. Thus, I have the air conditioner on in my boudoir. I also happen to live with a little old man who never, ever thinks it's hot. So a battle has begun. There's no doubt that it's hot out, and that it will get even hotter tomorrow. But he won't complain, except maybe to say that it's too cold. The subjective experiences here are so bipolar. I'm a fat man in my 30's and he's a thin man in his 70's, and we may as well be on different planets when it comes to feeling temperature. I hope nothing of import will ever rely on us coming to an agreement on how hot it is, because that's not going to happen. Ever.

Suck, suck you fiend! Suck the moisture out of the air and make it cool for my fat body! Suck!

Anyway, my compromises are killing me. The older I get, the more whatever I was erodes away. Thank Christ.

About the last post, which certainly is different that the others; I was just having fun writing, in a strange way. It's true, in a sense, but it never happened.

Saturday, July 21, 2007

Gray, Loose and Deserved

Gaping maw of a grisly ghost gnawing on my skull and searing my heart with white-hot talons of steel. A garden below my window contains a cage of my own design. A song makes its way down my back and a filthy blade is held in my hand. A lock within a lock that will not open. A horse that will not settle into the barn. Rain that falls in all the wrong places and a dial tone after the most meaningful conversation of my life, but I still hold the phone in my hand. Blood trickles down my wrist, then my hand. Finally, a drop breaks free and a small red flower blooms on the dirty white floor. And in my hand semen, warm from having produced it mere seconds ago. I am repulsed. It get's wiped on a piece of toilet paper and, in a moment of crude loathing and vandalism, is pressed onto the stall wall and smeared.

I open my eyes slowly and feel the cold, white porcelain of the toilet pressing against my scrotum and upper thighs. The relatively comfortable plastic seat is broken off. More blood is on my legs now, from the same wound. Some spotting on the toilet and floor, as if I were having a heavy period. I stop a minute and think that I wish I were a woman. The thought passes as my stomach turns and twists into a knot, and my flank twitches as I deposit a small pile of wet shit on a part of the toilet where the water doesn't reach. The smell is horrible.

I'm sweating profusely now.

And the blood keeps on coming, so much that it is creating a puddle that is drawn to a recessed drain at the center of the floor. I feel something inside me and press down hard. The result is more piss and shit. I flush the toilet and wipe myself. Soon, I find it hard to be comfortable. I'm getting weak, so I lean on the wall. There is writing there, about politics and teenage love and hate, I leave a bloody noseprint on the beige tile, which is greasy. Suddenly, I stand and pull up my pants. A ball of underwear is in the corner of the stall, which contains my own shit from my "accident." My mind is having a hard time with the world after so much to drink; beer, whiskey, wine, shots of vodka. The razor in my hand takes another slash, and I smile as it finds purchase on my skin, across my stomach. I climb down onto the floor and curl up in a puddle of unknown origin and quantity; probably piss. A used condom is one foot from my face and I don't care.

Forever I am there. I am timeless. At some point, however, the door is voilently kicked in. I barely notice. A world revealed for him, but I have been invaded. I can't see anything as I try and fail to get up. With shocking violence, I am pressed into a filthy puddle, my pants now around my ankles. I can make out a shape, the shape of a person. I hear a man's voice over me, from behind. The floor tile is broken beneath my face and it smells of vomit. I begin to drift off when I feel a jarring motion, a stabbing pain. Then another. Someone is on top of my behind. I'm very drunk, but I feel a hard cock moving inside my ass cheeks. I approach passing out, despite knowing what is about to happen. The stranger thrusts and finds his target. My anus feels torn and a small, hard cock enters me painfully. I'm too out of it to know enough to care. I can feel his thrusts as he pushes my head down into the dirt and grime. My legs flail, and catch a cool breeze coming in from outside. I hear someone moaning and spitting under his breath, then nothing. I pass out.

A minute or a day later, I come to. Before me is a condom, used and a little bloody. I close my eyes for a much needed nap.

Friday, July 20, 2007

Tough To Describe

Yet another new today. I feel compelled to relate something. Someone very close to me was upset not too long ago when she found out that I still thought of killing myself. Indeed, I even crave death sometimes, as an escape. But from what am I escaping? I'm not complaining about my life. Outside of a little bit of poverty and some health problems, I know I'm a lucky man. I can walk into my kitchen or bathroom and produce hot water. My ice box has butter, cream, milk, eggs and jam. My pantry has plenty of food; canned fruit, cereal, pancake mix and lots of other goodies. I have a bed and a computer, and heat and air conditioning. My cats and family are relatively well, too.

However, the reason I sometimes want to blow my head off is simple, at least to label. I'm driving myself crazy. Paranoia and anxiety sometimes make it impossible for me to appreciate any of the things I mentioned. Right now, I feel certain that all of my friends despise me for something that I did. I don't know what it is, and on some level I know that I've done nothing, but emotionally and in many other hard to define ways, I feel like all I want to do is escape my reputation. I feel the need to escape, because there is no forgiveness, as I've learned from experience. My dear brother, whom I love, hates and resents me. Why? I don't know. It's absurd, but I feel that it is true. That he is out there right now, hating me. It makes me sick. The same is true of every single person I call a friend. I know you're all out there, shaking your heads and secretly wishing that I'd go away. I'm blocking happiness for so many. I'm an enzyme that speeds a reaction to pain. Removing myself from judgement helps a bit, which is why I like my room so much. But even here I feel heavy guilt, on my chest and churning my stomach. Why would I hurt the people I love so much? When I love, I love deeply. But it's a delicate thing. Those I love I love so much that I fear that I'm causing hurt and pain and humiliation. I live in absolute terror of that irony.

Whenever I get close to finding freedom from this by declaring, "I didn't do anything" there is an unseen force that pulls me back and forces me to consider that yes, maybe I am responsible for unspeakable pain. Maybe I'm evil, or so fucked up I'm blind to how much pain I'm causing all of you.

I'm so tired of it. I wish it could lift again, as it has briefly in the past. Instead, I sit here under a barrage of whispers. And the whispers are telling me things, about the bad things I've done, or creating feelings of guilt for things I didn't even do. HELP!

I'm angry now, and more tears, of course. I don't deserve this, as if "deserve" ever had anything to do with it. Could you deal well with the guilt of having profoundly and deeply hurt your family, friends and lover? That's what is fucking Darren W. Lyle up. When they write my obituary, make good mention of that...that his mind wasn't right at all. That he felt under attack. That he was so inept and awful that his loved ones hated him. I'm taking some lorazepam and heading to bed for now.

4 Ativan Long

Good morning, comrades. My blog has been silent for several days now, and what could be worse than Silent Blog Syndrome (SBS)? It's not due to newfound reticence on my part, or depression, or a date rape, or some such thing. Instead, Blogger.com was doing some sort of scan of blogs in order to find spam. They do it at random. It made it impossible to post for four days, which is fine. It gave me more time to look at naked people online and read about Nick Nolte at the airport, among other things.

As I perused the Internet and wrote endless replies to online discussion groups, I discovered a story that just made me simultaneously sad and curious. In the Loess Plateau region of China, there exists the custom of providing a "ghost bride" to men who died alone. The idea being that it's lonely in the afterlife, so a wife should be provided. No such concern exists for young women who die single. Long story short, a fellow "bought" a mentally-challenged girl from her parents, telling them that she would be married to someone and would have a better life. They agreed. Unfortunately, this white-slave trader couldn't find a living man to whom she could be sold. So instead he and his friends poisoned and strangled her (either one would have done it, methinks) and sold her dead body to an undertaker, who sold her for the equivalent of $2,077 to a family that recently lost a bachelor son. They were buried in the same grave so they could be together forever. When they caught the murderer he said that he had done it before and would have kept doing it, and that dead women often sell for more money.

This is not an easy world for women, with genital mutilation; honor killings, white sex slavery, institutional patriarchy, abortion restrictions, and on and on. It's not easy for men, either, but women definitely win the contest of who has it harder. Disagree? Reply to Gocrapinyourhat@shutup.com.

Last night I was watching No Pants Dance Off, writing to a friend (off email) and eating a can of peaches. Ate the whole fucking thing. I was a little disgusted with myself for drinking the syrup, and for watching No Pants Dance Off, and the "Pancers" (that's what they call the stripping dancers on the show, isn't that just so fucking witty?). It's a testament to the crap I'll watch so long as the possibility exists of me seeing a woman's ass. After 15 minutes, I gathered myself and turned the channel. It was so demeaning and stupid that's all I could take. Plus, a male dancer took the stage...that probably contributed to my leaving.

Alone in my room, except for Toulouse, I lifted my girth off my bed and floated over to my computer. At that point I turned on the movie Destination: Infestation. It's a Snakes On A Plane rip-off about ants on a plane. That had to go when there happened to be a sexy entomologist on the plane. E.O. White with tits and a vagina. Even I have limits. There's good camp and bad camp. The ants actually launched an attack on the captain, rendering him blind. They were super-intelligent ants, you see. But even a super-intelligent ant is probably no smarter than, say, George Bush. Anyway, the actors looked embarrased, and I took that as a cue to watch CNN.

Lately I've been up very late at night, and up early in the morning. The other night I didn't sleep at all. At around 3am I went for a walk, down to the diner on Broadway. That took me through a field used by an adjacent school. Walks like that are usually comforting, but this one led to tears. A little back story here. For shits and giggles I've been re-reading Marks' Human Biodiversity, a book I got at university. On page 44, near an article about evolutionary patterns in species and culture, I found some coffee stains on the paper. Just a few drops. It caused me to remember a friend of mine back then; Eve, a beautiful African-American woman with an admirable mind. We were having coffee at Wit's End, a cafe in the Wheatley building. I made a joke about something and she spit out her coffee (she was like that, very emotive). A couple drops landed on that page.

So that has been on my mind for two days. Sometimes, I see my work and school history as being something from my imagination. I find artifacts that reveal (or re-reveal) that I was once something more than I am now; that coffee, a name tag from the Socialist Scholars' Conference in NYC, a letter of commendation from the Fairmont Copley Plaza for helping guests during a flood, papers I wrote for school, etc. They always make me sick, and very anxious. Sometimes I'm compelled to vomit, as if I couldn't take the pain of being reminded of a lost love. The "lost love" here is my former self, when I was proud and had a modicum of ambition. I wanted to go to grad school for evolutionary biology.

So, with that in mind, I cried my fucking eyes out as I crossed that baseball field. So pathetic. I could embrace a lie and say that I don't know how I got where I am today. But I do. There are some blank patches in my memory, to be sure, but I remember most of it.

This is what they call a "pity party." Although I once almost got into a fight with a fellow in the men's dorm at The Arbour in Jamaica Plain (that's a locked nuthouse) because he told a friend of mine that she was having a pity party. I don't like the term, and that experience didn't help. She was talking to me about how her husband beat her, and she felt trapped. The story was graphic and upsetting. Some guy overheard us, and he chimed in about how she was having a pity party. I lost it. I remember getting in his face and the young lady pulling at my left arm, trying to indicate that it was ok, she wasn't upset. But I was. Finally, a Polish woman got between us and he retreated to another part of the wing. We spoke about it in group therapy. I have only one regret about that late winter afternoon; I wish I hit him.

Anyway. I'm a lucky man and shouldn't complain. I'm in love with a beautiful woman who loves me in return (rather important). Methinks that it's ok to ensconce oneself in self-pity now and again, so long as it's not a career. How about you, dear reader? Do you think the universe is picking on you? Or rather, like me, do you think it is indifferent that that is somehow worse? Do you find comfort in belief in god? I'm an atheist, but I don't hate god as some people think. One doesn't hate things that don't exist. If I did believe in god I would think of him/her/it as an under-achiever, as writer and pedophile Woody Allen once said.

Spalding Gray was in there somwhere, in these hours of existential angst and reflection. I miss him, and always felt close to him somehow, even though I had never met him. His suicide poured acid on my gentle wings and kept me from rising for several weeks after they found his body in the East River, two months after he had flung himself off of the Staten Island Ferry. I strongly feel that suicide will be the way I leave this world, but perhaps I'm wrong. Vonnegut thought that, as well, and he lived a long life.

I just noticed that I've eaten 4 mg of lorazepam while writing this blog entry. Sorry if it's boring.

Sunday, July 15, 2007

The Al-Mahmudiyah Incident

Not much to report today. I'm suffering from some sort of medication issue, or possible pernicious anemia, or maybe something else, who knows? The result, however, is that I'm pretty much house bound. The nausea and dizziness is just miserable. And yesterday I blacked out for about a minute and apparently landed on my left arm, which is now painful and black and blue. I may go into hospital today, or wait until tomorrow and see if I can get in to see my regular physician. I'm still up in the air on that one. Honestly, though, I'm hoping that I die. This is humiliating and strangely upsetting.

And who gives a shit, really?

Read this, it reminds me of My Lai Massacre in Vietnam. Remember Qasim Hamza Raheem when you think of Bush and Cheney and how they badly want this war. About a half-hour ago a story, completely unrelated to this one, was released. It's about Cpl. Saul H. Lopezromo and how he testified Saturday at the murder trial of Cpl. Trent D. Thomas.

"We were told to crank up the violence level," said Lopezromo, testifying for the defense.

When a juror asked for further explanation, Lopezromo said: "We beat people, sir."

This war is evil. These things happen in war, I know, I'm well read but not well experienced. Since they do happen in war, we need to choose our wars VERY CAREFULLY. This is NOT a carefully chosen war. It's a huge mistake, the biggest in living memory.

And Abu-Ghraib is worse than most people remember or know about. Women and men were sodomized with broomsticks, and raped. A father and son were forced to have sex with one another. This is our military, people. Most of them are fine young men and women, but the stress of this fucking ridiculous war is too much to take. This is the result. History is not this presidents thing. War should be the last course of action considered, not the first. And now we learn that Maliki says we can leave Iraq, that it's under control. Ladies and gentlemen, THAT IS OUR CUE.

DWL

The Al-Mahmudiyah incident occurred on March 12, 2006 in a house located to the west of the larger town of Al-Mahmudiyah, south of Baghdad, Iraq in which five United States soldiers with the 502nd Infantry Regiment allegedly gang-raped and murdered a 14-year-old Iraqi girl named Abeer Qasim Hamza, after murdering her mother Fakhriyah Taha Muhsin, 34; her father Qasim Hamza Raheem, 45; and her sister Hadeel Qasim Hamza, aged 5. As of February 2007 Barker and Cortez have been sentenced for this crime.

The matter came to light when a private first class in the same platoon, Justin Watt, reportedly revealed the crime during a counseling session on June 22, 2006 following the deaths of two other soldiers in the same regiment.

One of the soldiers, Steven Green, was honorably discharged from the Army on May 16, 2006, due to "antisocial personality disorder" and has been charged with these crimes by the FBI, not the military, as his discharge released him from military jurisdiction. Steven Green has been arrested as a civilian within the United States and as such has received the majority of press coverage related to the incident. The other four soldiers, SGT Paul E. Cortez, SPC James P. Barker, PFC Jesse V. Spielman and PFC Bryan L. Howard, were on active duty when charged by the United States military.Currently they remain confined to the Forward Operating Base in Mahmudiyah, Iraq. According to military spokesman Maj. Gen. William B. Caldwell they could face the death penalty.

The Qasim family lived in an isolated farm house situated approximately 200 meters away from a traffic checkpoint manned by US soldiers. The soldiers, who noticed Abeer as she worked in the field next to the house, formed a 6-man unit responsible for the traffic checkpoint. According to the neighbors, the accused soldiers had previously entered the farmhouse several times, ostensibly to search it, and had made advances towards Abeer in the days before the actual killing took place. Abeer's brother Mohammed, aged 13, who survived the attack along with his younger brother because they were in school at the time, said he witnessed one of the soldiers stroke Abeer's face during one of their visits to the house, a gesture that had terrified the girl.

Abeer's mother was concerned enough about the soldier's advances to request that Abeer be allowed to spend her nights at the neighbor’s house. Abeer’s father did not think a significant danger was imminent, saying “it was no problem and that she was just a small girl.” Nevertheless, Abeer started to sleep at her neighbor’s house at nights, which proved to be an ineffective deterrent as the attack took place in broad daylight the day after Abeer spent her first night with neighbors.

According to the affidavit written by the FBI in support of an arrest warrant for Steven Green, the accused had discussed raping the girl in the days preceding the event. On the day in question, five soldiers of the six-man unit responsible for the checkpoint left their posts for the Qasim farmhouse. Four of the soldiers are alleged to have directly participated in the attack, while a fifth (PFC Howard) acted as lookout. A sixth soldier SGT Anthony W. Yribe, is charged with failing to report the attack but is not alleged to have been a direct participant.

The affidavit goes on to state that the soldiers entered the house and ordered Abeer’s father, mother and sister into another room where Steven Green summarily shot all in the head, emerging to say, "I just killed them, all are dead." As the rest of the family was shot in the other room, Abeer was held down to the floor by another soldier. After killing the other family members, Green and at least one other soldier raped Abeer, and then Green shot and killed her.

Based on reports, after the rape the lower part of Abeer’s body, from her stomach down to her feet, was set on fire. The fire eventually spread to the rest of the room and the smoke alerted neighbors who ran to tell Abu Firas Janabi, Abeer’s uncle, that the farmhouse was on fire and that dead bodies could be seen inside the burning building. Janabi and his wife rushed to the farmhouse and doused some of the flames to get inside. Upon witnessing the scene inside, Janabi went to a checkpoint guarded by Iraqi soldiers to report the crime.

The Iraqi soldiers immediately went to examine the scene and thereafter went to a checkpoint manned by U.S. soldiers to report the incident. This was a different checkpoint than the one manned by the accused. After approximately an hour, some soldiers from the checkpoint went to the farmhouse.

These soldiers were accompanied by at least one of the accused.

On July 11, the Mujahideen Shura Council (now a part of the group, Islamic State of Iraq) released a graphic video showing the bodies of PFC Thomas Lowell Tucker and PFC Kristian Menchaca, soldiers from the same unit as the accused, who were allegedly kidnapped, tortured and beheaded. This was accompanied by a statement saying that the group carried out the killings as "revenge for our sister who was dishonored by a soldier of the same brigade."

Saturday, July 14, 2007

Dispatch From The Front

From what I can see, it's a lovely day outside, weather-wise. I just read an AP article about President Maliki of Iraq, and how he now says that the US forces can go home. He claims that we're not needed in his country any more. In my opinion, it's the most important development in the war since it began. We should leave immediately. We should leave regardless of what Maliki says, but saying that is just...wow.

I'm so sick. The details are unsavory, but it's really uncomfortable. I'm going to seal myself up in my flat and try to shake it, whatever "it" is. I'm dizzy, and find a modicum of relief only when I close my eyes, and that causes everyone to think I'm really tired. And I need to hold my head at a queer angle to stave off hickups that lead to coughing, which leads to the physical manifestations one associates with nausea. I'm starting to think that it has something to do with my altered stomach...something feels askew. I feel drunk and sea sick and have a fantastic headache. This morning I tried taking my last Zomig, which is a very expensive migraine medication. It didn't help. I'm starting to get annoyed because I had plans for this weekend that are getting fucked up. Oh, well...it beats living in South Dakota.

I'm listening to Dvorak's Klavirní Skladby in e-minor and eating a banana. A nap is imminent.

The Idea of You

Before the flooded bog
on a chill autumn morn
revealed blood-red berries
beneath a broad azure sky

or...

A lush, misty fen
jewel in an Emerald Necklace
drew my eyes from the Boston skyline
and posed endless riddles

or...

A spring Nor'easter
tore away April buds
and thundered like a summer storm
mocking us with flakes instead

or...

Black, hollow jealousy
manifested within and blinded me
made me deaf and hardened my heart
Robbing me of a companion and a friend

Before I experienced any of those, or a million other common spectacles and everyday tragedies

Preceding every blessed milestone; first word, first step, first birthday, first day of school

When there was no me to take you in; no mind to consider our first, lingering gaze in the dark

There was the idea of you

And it was shared by everyone who ever dreamed of getting lost in something uncommon

And now that you are gone, so too is my innocent faith in a promise I thought I heard, but was never made

Now I know that there was a world before you, and a world with you, and despite every weary effort, a world after you

And a return to the magnificent and common and lonely place where I began, with a hard lesson taught; Nothing lasts forever, and there are no promises

Thursday, July 12, 2007

The Account Of A Full-Blown Tuna Melt

Fucking tuna melt. It was good, but it's gone now, except for the picture to the right. It's more than half gone there, but we still had some good times ahead of us. You can see how well-toasted the bread was, and the sadness on my face as I became increasingly aware that our time together was short. I didn't think it was going to be a very good sandwich when I started making it, and the cheese that made it a "melt" was put on cold, as an afterthought. Little did I know how well the cheese, tuna, mayonnaise and bread would lovingly embrace each other and, simply put, create one hell of a sandwich.

I would like to thank my lover and confidante, Linda, for providing the "club" bread that made this whole endeavor possible. Without it, it's impossible to know what bread I would have had, probably scali bread. Scali bread is wonderful, although it's baked locally in Cambridge and Somerville (different loaves, that is, they never bake a single loaf in both towns) and they don't put any preservatives in it. Sounds great, doesn't it? Well, it's not. I can't eat a whole loaf of bread every day and a half. So as great as scali bread is, I only buy it once or twice a week. So the bread that is carrying the load, as it were, is Pepperidge Farm Very Thin white bread. But Linda brought me over a large loaf of white bread that I thought was going to suck. Obviously, it didn't. It rocked my world, turned night into day, Coke into Pepsi, all that shit. And it was labeled for foodservice only, so Linda apparently has some stories to tell, too. It was very soft and very white.

Incidentally, that's what it said underneath my UMass Boston yearbook picture.

The tuna was shoplifted, but that's a long story. I don't shoplift much these days, having had a good look at what a monumental pain in the ass it is when you have to go to probation. It really is. And probation officers aren't in the business of being nice. They really poop on you. Regardless, I'm fond of Bumble Bee solid white tuna in water.

Got that, assholes?

I'm sorry, I got a little carried away there. The mayonnaise was Cain's, not Hellmann's or Kewpie, and certainly not fucking Miracle Whip. I don't like Miracle Whip on any level; how it tastes, looks, smells, and how it makes me feel when I eat it. Successful, fulfilled people probably never go near the stuff. But who am I to judge.

What else, what else...oh, yes, the cheese was Kraft Deli Deluxe American, because it was in the icebox. And that's it, the story of my sandwich. I shared some of the tuna with Impy, and she insists upon the good, snow-white stuff. Naturally, I try to give her the cheap stuff, or just the tuna "juice." She doesn't go for that. She's a little coal bin connoisseur who refuses to shit in her litter box, and instead prefers going under the basement stairs. If this flat didn't have basement stairs she'd have to actually shit in her box. Life is a game of inches, ladies and gentlemen.

Oh, one last thing. The toaster I used in the making of my tuna on toast that evolved into a full-blown tuna melt was a Toastmaster two slice toaster model TT2CTBB, set on "5." It's hot out, and I'm usually averse to making toast when it goes above 78 degrees (it's complicated and a very strange quirk), but something compelled.

What else is happening out there, worthy of my commentary? I read that they pulled a giant squid out of Australian waters that is the size of a bus, but they didn't elaborate on what kind of bus. Seriously, you can't use "bus" as a unit of measurement. They have huge Willie Nelson buses and small half-size buses that High Schools use for retards. And then there is the VW micro-bus. Either way, it doesn't matter. To me, it's just another reason to stay the fuck out of the water in Australia.

I thought it was amusing that I was figuring out my monthly bills while on the computer, and when I got stuck I spent five minutes looking for a calculator. And then I sat at my computer with a calculator in my hand. I'm an idiot.

Well, I think that's it for this afternoon. I'm not well, this time physically, and I'm a dizzy mess. And last night was just...awful. It could be due to my starting a new psychiatric drug, but I'm skeptical. In any event, I'm going to drink some icewater and try not to throw up or pass out. I'm prone to the occassional seizure, and I'm just waiting for one to happen. It's in the pipe, I can feel it.

That's what she said!

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Watch It Spread

My addiction to Coca-Cola is total and complete. Coke and I are now one. We are risen. Anyway, my brother send me a riveting little clip from YouTube that I'd like to share. It's an "untitled JJ Abrams project" that depicts a group of young partygoers in Manhattan going about their business when something strange and deeply terrifying starts to happen. It looks as if something has landed amid the skyscrapers and is now kicking ass. This Abrams fellow is behind the show Lost, which I only watch sporadically, and yet Abrams somehow goes on living. You can see the clip here, and you'll probably feel compelled to send it to your friends. In that manner, this clip will spread...almost like a virus. Pfffthpt.

Of Mental Health and Fortune Cookies

Good day to you, comrades. Another day older and deeper in debt, as it were. The picture of me on the right is all about that scrap of paper I'm holding in my left hand, which is a fortune from an aptly-named fortune cookie. I got it on Independence Day, when some fellow mysteriously brought Chinese food to a cookout. A young lady who had a bit too much to drink was all over me about the proper way to pick your cookie, and thus get the right fortune. Her tenacity and knowledge of Chinese culture ensured that the fortune I was about to open was the right one. The one I opened read as follows, "The greatest danger could be your stupidity." I'm not kidding. It was the meanest cookie fortune mine eyes hath ever seen. Granted, it's probably true given my past that I might let emotion rule over reason and as a result do something stupid. Given how I've tried to off myself, and the way I've given myself scars, it's a safe bet that my stupitidy is the greatest threat to me, anyway. But still...a little tact. I'm trying to enjoy my boneless pork spareribs.

I'm in love right now, and not that many people know it. I need to call Clare and Donna and talk to them more often. I miss them. And I'm sure they'll be happy to learn of my being in love, a condition in which I rarely find myself. She's a lot more outgoing and social a person, although I can be a bit wild in public, as well. Generally speaking, I'm increasingly fond of isolation, which isn't a great habit, but there it is. Social anxiety and Avoidant Personality Disorder and all that.

Right now I'm a little woozy, and I'm not sure why. So I'm going to go crash. More later, folks!

Thursday, July 05, 2007

Peace And Struggle

I gave a lot of thought to trying to say something profound for Independence Day. Something about how much I love this country even as many would accuse me of being anti-American because I'm a Red civil libertarian who values dissent. For some reason, probably linked strongly to stupidity, passive acceptance of war, greed, cynical manipulation and crass maneuvering by our elected officials has become synonymous with patriotism. And I have to admit, there's a patina around claiming to be a patriot that is unflattering. It implies a "my country right or wrong" attitude. It's because I love this country that I'm so compelled to help guide it with my most noble attributes. Namely, my strong conviction that compassion and ability to reason are the greatest things we naked apes have going for us.

I got this letter from a man I respect perhaps more than any person I've ever met, David McReynolds. He sent it out to a group of socialists and won't mind my posting it to my little corner of the Internet. The article to which he is referring is posted beneath his letter.

Letter from David McReynolds...
For those who may have missed this statement from last night's MSNBC broadcast, it is important. Not important simply because of what Olbermann said, but that it was said on MSNBC.

I'm sending this out to several lists because I think the "left" can scare itself to death.(One of the popular pieces that has been around and around the internet is the one on the 14 defining characteristics of fascism - the assumption being that is where we are). We have been inundated by 9.11 conspiracy material - a whole movement of its own which wastes our time and diverts us from the real and open conspiracy which is the Administration.

Bush and Cheney didn't cause 9.11 - but they certainly used it, as the GOP candidates are trying to ride that horse of fear in a desperate gamble to avoid defeat in 2008. In the same way that historians are agreed Hitler didn't set the Reichstag fire, but leaped on it as his way of destroying the German Left. (Historians may not fully agree but most evidence suggests the fire was set by a mentally unstable Dutch anarchist).

First, if we were in a fascist period I wouldn't be able to send this and you wouldn't be able to get it - we'd all be safely locked up. The internet would have been closed down. The Democrats - timid and divided as they are - would have done even less than they have done. Which God knows is little enough - they can and must stop funding the war, sending back the same bill again and again no matter how often Bush vetoes it.

And most of all, the media would not be carrying Olbermann. It is a Commentary on our democracy - which is indeed in peril, and in large part because of the role of the corporate control - that we can tell how things are going to seeing what the media is willing to tell us.

The Washington Post, which has supported the Iraq War, ran a devastating five part series on Cheney. Material enough to merit his impeachment. Bush's act of saving Libby from prison is not the act of power but of a President who is down to 26% in the polls and has nothing left to lose, and who may well be buying Libby's silence (what might he have said if he was finally left to sit in jail?). The New York Times, which let Judith Miller help sell the Iraq War by her now-infamous articles on the alleged Weapons of Mass Destruction, has also hit hard at Bush with information on the rendition program, and on the torture centers the US maintains abroad.

Yes, the events in Guantanamo, Bagram, Abu Graib and elsewhere are deeply shocking. The arbitrary arrest of hundreds of Muslims after 9.11 was a violation of the Bill of Rights. But Moveon.org hasn't been stopped. The various peace coalitions - United for Peace and Justice, ANSWER, World Can't Wait - all function. Not always wisely, never in unity, but they are alive and well.

Rarely have we seen a President fall so desperately far in so short a time. When Bush won his election in 2000 it was only because a slim majority of the Supreme Court gave it to him. He had lost both the popular vote and, had the Florida vote been fairly counted, the electoral vote as well.

He won 2004 by a narrow margin but said he had earned real capital and that he would spend it.

What has he done? He lost totally on his efforts to alter Social Security. He lost totally on his efforts at Immigration Reform. The situation in Iraq is a desperate mess, in which the only thing on which everyone can agree is that "there are no good options". Aside from the rabid Ann Coulter, who runs her hands through her hair so restlessly one can't help but think she has bugs in her scalp, there are few real defenders left.

The right wing, which owns Fox News (and much else) has not been able to buy or build any real competition to the Daily Show. Not even the Supreme Court can be counted on when it comes to issues such as torture. (The Supreme Court has always followed the election returns).

As you read Olbermann's devastating (and quite sound) indictment of Bush and Cheney, keep in mind that unless Olbermann is fired tomorrow, unless Jon Stewart is taken off the air, our job is to focus on Congress. Both in letter campaigns, in phone calls, and in sit-ins at Congressional offices. And by civil disobedience at other points which make sense. By vigils, protests, and demonstrations.

We are not losing - we are winning. There is a danger that Bush might still try a nuclear strike on Iran, and he has been egged on by the half-mad neo-con, right wing Zionism's very own Ann Coulter, Norman Podhoretz. But I think we are in a situation where the military might refuse orders which would clearly lack a legal mandate. A President with the support of only 1/4 of the public not only has no right to launch yet another war, but very possibly will not be able to do so.

Among the letters we should write would be to anyone serving in the military, urging them to consider their obligations to obey only orders which are legitimate.

The media has moved as it has because there is major opposition within the higher echelons of the Establishment to Bush and the damage he has done to American interests, the extreme isolation he has created for our foreign policy. We have seen something that has not happened before in the past century - a revolt by Generals, who have spoken out against Bush.

Remember, after 9.11 the leading French newspaper ran a headline saying "We Are All Americans Now" and all of Europe stood by us. How distant is that time. The world is on our side, not that of Bush. It wouldn't hurt to drop a note to MSNBC to let them know we support Olberman. It wouldn't hurt to write your member of Congress and say that finally there may be no alternative but to seek to remove both the President and Vice President from office. (Something I have until now considered so unlikely that I've not endorsed it). The quasi-pardon of Libby puts Bush on a moral part with Clinton's pardons as he left office. (And those pardons are part of the stain on Bill Clinton's record which liberals should not forget).

Peace, and struggle,
David McReynolds


Olbermann: Bush, Cheney should resign
‘I didn’t vote for him, but he’s my president, and I hope he does a good job.’
SPECIAL COMMENT
By Keith Olbermann
Anchor, 'Countdown'
Updated: 8:13 p.m. ET July 3, 2007

“I didn’t vote for him,” an American once said, “But he’s my president, and I hope he does a good job.”

That—on this eve of the 4th of July—is the essence of this democracy, in 17 words. And that is what President Bush threw away yesterday in commuting the sentence of Lewis “Scooter” Libby.

The man who said those 17 words—improbably enough—was the actor John Wayne. And Wayne, an ultra-conservative, said them, when he learned of the hair’s-breadth election of John F. Kennedy instead of his personal favorite, Richard Nixon in 1960.

“I didn’t vote for him but he’s my president, and I hope he does a good job.”

The sentiment was doubtlessly expressed earlier, but there is something especially appropriate about hearing it, now, in Wayne’s voice: The crisp matter-of-fact acknowledgement that we have survived, even though for nearly two centuries now, our Commander-in-Chief has also served, simultaneously, as the head of one political party and often the scourge of all others.

We as citizens must, at some point, ignore a president’s partisanship. Not that we may prosper as a nation, not that we may achieve, not that we may lead the world—but merely that we may function.

But just as essential to the seventeen words of John Wayne, is an implicit trust—a sacred trust: That the president for whom so many did not vote, can in turn suspend his political self long enough, and for matters imperative enough, to conduct himself solely for the benefit of the entire Republic.

Our generation’s willingness to state “we didn’t vote for him, but he’s our president, and we hope he does a good job,” was tested in the crucible of history, and earlier than most.

And in circumstances more tragic and threatening. And we did that with which history tasked us.

We enveloped our President in 2001.And those who did not believe he should have been elected—indeed those who did not believe he had been elected—willingly lowered their voices and assented to the sacred oath of non-partisanship.

And George W. Bush took our assent, and re-configured it, and honed it, and shaped it to a razor-sharp point and stabbed this nation in the back with it.

Were there any remaining lingering doubt otherwise, or any remaining lingering hope, it ended yesterday when Mr. Bush commuted the prison sentence of one of his own staffers.

Did so even before the appeals process was complete; did so without as much as a courtesy consultation with the Department of Justice; did so despite what James Madison—at the Constitutional Convention—said about impeaching any president who pardoned or sheltered those who had committed crimes “advised by” that president; did so without the slightest concern that even the most detached of citizens must look at the chain of events and wonder: To what degree was Mr. Libby told: break the law however you wish—the President will keep you out of prison?

In that moment, Mr. Bush, you broke that fundamental com-pact between yourself and the majority of this nation’s citizens—the ones who did not cast votes for you. In that moment, Mr. Bush, you ceased to be the President of the United States. In that moment, Mr. Bush, you became merely the President of a rabid and irresponsible corner of the Republican Party. And this is too important a time, Sir, to have a commander-in-chief who puts party over nation.

This has been, of course, the gathering legacy of this Administration. Few of its decisions have escaped the stain of politics. The extraordinary Karl Rove has spoken of “a permanent Republican majority,” as if such a thing—or a permanent Democratic majority—is not antithetical to that upon which rests: our country, our history, our revolution, our freedoms.

Yet our Democracy has survived shrewder men than Karl Rove. And it has survived the frequent stain of politics upon the fabric of government. But this administration, with ever-increasing insistence and almost theocratic zealotry, has turned that stain into a massive oil spill.

The protection of the environment is turned over to those of one political party, who will financially benefit from the rape of the environment. The protections of the Constitution are turned over to those of one political party, who believe those protections unnecessary and extravagant and quaint.

The enforcement of the laws is turned over to those of one political party, who will swear beforehand that they will not enforce those laws. The choice between war and peace is turned over to those of one political party, who stand to gain vast wealth by ensuring that there is never peace, but only war.

And now, when just one cooked book gets corrected by an honest auditor, when just one trampling of the inherent and inviolable fairness of government is rejected by an impartial judge, when just one wild-eyed partisan is stopped by the figure of blind justice, this President decides that he, and not the law, must prevail.

I accuse you, Mr. Bush, of lying this country into war.

I accuse you of fabricating in the minds of your own people, a false implied link between Saddam Hussein and 9/11.

I accuse you of firing the generals who told you that the plans for Iraq were disastrously insufficient.

I accuse you of causing in Iraq the needless deaths of 3,586 of our brothers and sons, and sisters and daughters, and friends and neighbors.

I accuse you of subverting the Constitution, not in some misguided but sincerely-motivated struggle to combat terrorists, but to stifle dissent.

I accuse you of fomenting fear among your own people, of creating the very terror you claim to have fought.

I accuse you of exploiting that unreasoning fear, the natural fear of your own people who just want to live their lives in peace, as a political tool to slander your critics and libel your opponents.

I accuse you of handing part of this Republic over to a Vice President who is without conscience, and letting him run roughshod over it.

And I accuse you now, Mr. Bush, of giving, through that Vice President, carte blanche to Mr. Libby, to help defame Ambassador Joseph Wilson by any means necessary, to lie to Grand Juries and Special Counsel and before a court, in order to protect the mechanisms and particulars of that defamation, with your guarantee that Libby would never see prison, and, in so doing, as Ambassador Wilson himself phrased it here last night, of becoming an accessory to the obstruction of justice.

When President Nixon ordered the firing of the Watergate special prosecutor Archibald Cox during the infamous “Saturday Night Massacre” on October 20th, 1973, Cox initially responded tersely, and ominously.

“Whether ours shall be a government of laws and not of men, is now for Congress, and ultimately, the American people.”

President Nixon did not understand how he had crystallized the issue of Watergate for the American people.

It had been about the obscure meaning behind an attempt to break in to a rival party’s headquarters; and the labyrinthine effort to cover-up that break-in and the related crimes.

And in one night, Nixon transformed it.

Watergate—instantaneously—became a simpler issue: a President overruling the inexorable march of the law of insisting—in a way that resonated viscerally with millions who had not previously understood - that he was the law.

Not the Constitution. Not the Congress. Not the Courts. Just him.

Just - Mr. Bush - as you did, yesterday.

The twists and turns of Plame-Gate, of your precise and intricate lies that sent us into this bottomless pit of Iraq; your lies upon the lies to discredit Joe Wilson; your lies upon the lies upon the lies to throw the sand at the “referee” of Prosecutor Fitzgerald’s analogy. These are complex and often painful to follow, and too much, perhaps, for the average citizen.

But when other citizens render a verdict against your man, Mr. Bush—and then you spit in the faces of those jurors and that judge and the judges who were yet to hear the appeal—the average citizen understands that, Sir.

It’s the fixed ballgame and the rigged casino and the pre-arranged lottery all rolled into one—and it stinks. And they know it.

Nixon’s mistake, the last and most fatal of them, the firing of Archibald Cox, was enough to cost him the presidency. And in the end, even Richard Nixon could say he could not put this nation through an impeachment.

It was far too late for it to matter then, but as the decades unfold, that single final gesture of non-partisanship, of acknowledged responsibility not to self, not to party, not to “base,” but to country, echoes loudly into history. Even Richard Nixon knew it was time to resign

Would that you could say that, Mr. Bush. And that you could say it for Mr. Cheney. You both crossed the Rubicon yesterday. Which one of you chose the route, no longer matters. Which is the ventriloquist, and which the dummy, is irrelevant.

But that you have twisted the machinery of government into nothing more than a tawdry machine of politics, is the only fact that remains relevant.

It is nearly July 4th, Mr. Bush, the commemoration of the moment we Americans decided that rather than live under a King who made up the laws, or erased them, or ignored them—or commuted the sentences of those rightly convicted under them—we would force our independence, and regain our sacred freedoms.

We of this time—and our leaders in Congress, of both parties—must now live up to those standards which echo through our history: Pressure, negotiate, impeach—get you, Mr. Bush, and Mr. Cheney, two men who are now perilous to our Democracy, away from its helm.

For you, Mr. Bush, and for Mr. Cheney, there is a lesser task. You need merely achieve a very low threshold indeed. Display just that iota of patriotism which Richard Nixon showed, on August 9th, 1974.

Resign.

And give us someone—anyone—about whom all of us might yet be able to quote John Wayne, and say, “I didn’t vote for him, but he’s my president, and I hope he does a good job.”
© 2007 MSNBC Interactive

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19588942/

Sunday, July 01, 2007

Running For President

Recently, I received an invitation to join the Communist Party of Massachusetts, from the State Committee of that stone-cold dead political entity. Actually, the meeting (at the Center for Marxist Education) was held this morning. It doesn't feel like a missed opportunity. I was, of course, a member and officer of the Socialist Party for many years, and as amazing as it sounds the SPUSA is vital by comparison. It's likely that both parties will go the way of the Whigs, but being a Socialist and an romantic I like to imagine that my political ideals have a future. If they do, however, it will most likely be through the Democratic Party. Trying to set up a viable third-party in the USA is a fucking nightmare. Trust me. Right now, I'm a member of Democratic Socialists of America, which is not a political party but an organization that tries to raise awareness and pretty much acts as an insurance policy for the Democrats in case socialism makes a return. The devolution of radical left parties in this country, as they have become more sectarian and less relevant, is incredibly complicated and painful to behold if you actually give a shit about worker solidarity, national health care and civil liberties. I have no doubt that, had I stayed in the SPUSA, I would have lost years off my life and suffered from psychosomatic illnesses.

But it's not much better in the Democratic Party, if it's better at all. Hillary Clinton? Are you fucking kidding me? She'd support mandatory nipple removal if she thought it would get her the presidency. Whomever wins that office will have to spend hundreds of millions of dollars. I actually personally know two people who ran for president, and neither of them are millionaires (J. Quinn Brisben and David McReynolds), which is why you've never heard of them. David made history by being the first gay man to run for the highest office in the land, back in 1980. Both men are fantastic human beings, but I'm not sure if they would have been good presidents. Back in 1992, Quinn got about 3,000 votes. Mary Cal Hollis, whom I've met but don't really know, got about 5,000 votes in 1996. The last campaign I worked on in any capacity was for David in 2000, when he ran again and got about 6,000 votes. That doesn't sound like much, but keep in mind that they were only on the ballot in a few states. Getting a third-party candidate on the ballot is almost impossible in most states. The only successful office-seeking Socialist I knew was Frank P. Zeidler. He was very old when I met him in 1992, and died just a couple of years ago. He was the mayor of Milwaukee between 1948 and 1960. I'm so proud to have worked with him at a couple of conventions, and for our correspondance.

The Democratic Party offers no experiences like that. I've worked for Dukakis and Kerry and some other Democrats in my life, and it's an absolutely thankless experience unless you plan on using your volunteer efforts to get experience and later seek paid work within the party. Or to run for yourself. That's why I don't regret joining and working for the SPUSA, because I met brilliant wonderful people. For years I lied to myself that socialist's like myself would surpass the success of Eugene V. Debs...I'm not sure if I ever really believed it.

Political blue balls.

Running for president is pretty sexy, but there are a lot of people who worked hard and won lesser seats, or lost lesser seats. Third parties can't package a message, or a candidate, and put on a pretty bow. They rely on activism and real passion. Naturally, they've withered in this environment of apathy and misplaced faith in capitalism. But that's a post for another day.

I'm sure a lot of fascinating people met this morning in Cambridge, and that they are willing to work hard for their noble goals. As for me, I slept in and then went out to get the paper.