of course the times square (non)bomber is pakistani. i was genuinely hoping it was some crazy redhead or a blonde or a guy named Joe Brown or some other non-middle eastern man or woman. it would be the stereotypical subject in a terrorist attack, proliferating those wonderful prejudices that have intensified over the past ten years.

i really wish these people had an awareness of and cared about the kind of impact they have on other regular, law abiding people who look like them and have similar last names.

(obviously the possession of this awareness would probably stifle the desire harm the masses.)

my hands are barely holding up my head.

all the salt inside my body
ruins everyone i come close to.

wondering when we stop defining what we (don't) believe, and start examining why.

city air on
bare skin is
sandstorm.

In Newsweek's April 5th issue, Jonathan Alter's political editorial of the week focuses on "persistent progressivism," and the role of current democratic legislators in pushing for and executing tangible change in the face of the filibuster-happy right wing and its "gesture politics."

Says Alter,

"The question is whether the success of President Obama's emerging governing philosophy -- what might be called persisitent-progressivism -- can be extended into realms beyond health care."

Namely, can the Democrats keep the ruckus of the right wing to a minimum, and in doing so, stay on target and create the change that Obama's campaign promised?



We've already seen the first half of this administration's time come and go.



And after having read the article, the question that remains is, (not so) simply, when did the term "progressive" become a label that holds so much weight? I don't refer to Alter's interpretation, but to the left-wing, right-wing, choose-a-side-or-be-labeled-a-centrist, landscape that has developed into the contemporary political spectrum.

Behind the definitive lines by which red and blue have been divided lay the ideals and principles that have formed and continue to shape America's major political parties. But where are they?



When did the labels placed upon political parties begin to dictate values?



When was it that being a republican began to mean taking Fox news more seriously than the RNC chairperson, while democrats pitied and were embarrassed by the right wing? When was it that voters began to choose between the united, filibustering party of "no," and the whining party of seemingly reasonable but overtly unlikable policy?

It was probably in close proximity to the time when the word bipartisanship became the biggest joke since civil rights; great in theory, but never making much measurable progress when in practice.


Looking further into the differences between progressives and conservatives also begs the question, why do people align themselves with said poles of the socio-political spectrum?



When was it that the idea that every person could be the same, that every child could be in school, that every citizen could see a doctor, and eat, and live sustainably, became so radical? Why is it "socialist" to believe that people shouldn't die, simply because we were too busy buying shit that we don't need, with money that we didn't need?

And why is it so hard to believe that by providing each person with even one meal every day wouldn't put a dent into any of our bank accounts?

When was it that giving a damn began to translate to being a progressive, gay-loving, planet-saving, tree-hugging, peace-marching, granola-eating, baby-killing monster? (And what is so offensive about love, peace, trees, and granola? Though, obviously, that's not the point.)


What is it that cements the minds of the people that are, apparently, in charge of overseeing the democratic republic of the USA, from being able to change, accept, and protect the diversity that is found within this nation's borders? Votes. Money. Greed. Power.

And on both sides of party lines.

With so much partisan conflict, it's still unclear what the 2010 election season will bring about. There are several congressional and senatorial seats up for grabs; will an increasingly liberal social climate garner votes to help the left uphold the slim democratic majority, or are voters tired of waiting so long for effective change to take place? And whatever they choose, are they aware of how each candidate will behave once the race for votes wraps up?

to prove: to establish the truth or genuineness of, as by evidence or argument.

to justify: to show a satisfactory reason or excuse for something done.

satisfactory: competent, adequate, suitable, passable.




it has become unequivocally apparent that searching for more than what is presently existent is both completely inevitable and profoundly disappointing.

we are alone in our conciousness.


feeble attempts at making connections go
unfulfilled;

we seek to remedy the inherent
lonlieness that accompanies the
impermanence and fragility that is
the human condition.




or, at least, to ignore it.

stuck. sticking to sensibility separated from "happy." [whatever that is.] stuck, sticking to pragmatism and other big words relying on false gods and oppressive expectations following through with plans unsuitable. stuck, sticking to need-to-pay-the-rent-with-the-job-i-hate can't-afford-to-go-back-to-school, i-need-this-to-keep-my-insurance, will-never-feel-whole-or-content. stuck, sticking to nothing. moving nowhere. experiencing nothing. stuck with a college degree that got me nothing. a job that gets us nothing. a city that offers us nothing. stuck, let go of dreams when they told me i should. let go of plans when they told me i should. let go of me when they told me i should. wholly fully truly awesomely stuck.

society

an organized group of persons associated together for religious, benevolent, cultural, scientific, political, patriotic, or other purposes.

a highly structured system of human organization for large-scale community living that normally furnishes protection, continuity, security, and a national identity for its members.

those with whom one has companionship, companionship; company.

benevolent

characterized by or expressing goodwill or kindly feelings.

desiring to help others; charitable.

intended for benefits rather than profit.

health

the general condition of the body or mind with reference to soundness and vigor.

soundness of body or mind; freedom from disease or ailment.

care

protection; charge.

to watch over; be responsible for.

to act on; deal with; attend to.

society.

more

foer. just because.

"...the distance that wedged itself between me and my happiness wasn't the world, it wasn't the bombs and the burning buildings,


it was me, my thinking, the cancer of never letting go, is ignorance bliss, i don't know, but it's so painful to think,


and tell me, what did thinking ever do for me, to what great place did thinking bring me? i think and think and think, I've thought myself out of happiness one million times, but never once into it."

from el&ic, page 17

"Even though I'm not anymore, I used to be an atheist, which means I didn't believe in things that couldn't be observed...It's not that I believe in things that can't be observed now, because I don't. It's that I believe things are extremely complicated."



"I turned on the radio and found a station playing 'Hey Jude.' It was true, I didn't want to make it bad. I wanted to take the sad song and make it better. It's just that I didn't know how."


--foer

***

...

direction is arbitrary,
unless you're talking time.
traveling forward is the only true endeavor
that anyone can claim to be legitimate.
because rotating on a sphere in one of an
endless possibilities of galaxies
throws off one's sense of direction.
and when traveling in an eliptical pattern,
every direction is the same as every other direction.
clockwise verses counterclockwise,
north verses south,
east, west, up, down,
it's all relative,
none of it's relative,
and we have no clue as to who we are
or where we are
or what we are.

i read it somewhere...1.26 seconds. so what happens to those seconds? will we ever make up for them? will birthday minutes change?


will the end of the world come 1.26 seconds later than planned?
and what of the beginning of the next?

crazed.

nostalgia. longing for the past. comes from greek. returning home. pain, ache. idealistic. liberation. apparently, the act or fact of gaining equal rights or full social or economic opportunities for a particular group.


insane. not sane; not of sound mind; mentally deranged.
artist. not sane; not of sound mind; mentally deranged.
insane. characteristic of that which is not artistic.
artist.


health. the overall condition of an organism at a given time. soundness, especially of body or mind. freedom from disease or abnormality. condition of optimal wellness. community. similar character; agreement; identity. sharing, participation, and fellowship.



life. the general or universal condition of human existence; a particular aspect of existence.


existence. continued state of being.


liberty. freedom from control, interference, obligation, restriction, hampering conditions, etc.; power or right of doing, thinking, speaking, etc., according to choice.

happiness. contentment. contentment. satisfaction; ease of mind. satisfaction. fulfillment; gratification. the state of being satisfied; contentment.

what chance have i of a miracle?

i only want one day
one lousy day, that's all
of every day that's been before
since time began

i know my prayer's in vain,
but for a second i'll pretend
that i could start today again.

today in american politics.

amendments were made. civil liberties were depleted.

in the new bill on credit card regulations, oklahoma senator coburn's provision to lift ninety-four year old ban on ability to bring loaded firearms into national parks has been adapted.

bill to allow loaded guns into national parks. on credit card bill. true story.



and, not to be outdone,
virginia lawmakers passed new legislation that will allow employers to discriminate against employees and job applicants who are LGBT because of their LGBT status.

passed new legislation to remove the right to equal opportunity that all virginians had yesterday...because apparently current virginia legislators aren't big on civil rights.

my favorite.

they tali bans
and censor art for sport. they
snuck into our law schools and
hijacked the supreme court. their
money makes missiles, their labs created anthrax
osama was their pawn, and
evil is their axis, they're
skilled at killing innocent civilians,
because they've had lotsof practice from
hanoi to nicaragua from
vieqes to damascus, for
agua and oil,
gold, zinc and soil
they spread their views on cable news,


they call each other
george and dick and rudy
so next time you see a terrorist,
kick 'em in his booty.
it's not only your right as an american,
it's your patriotic duty.

brilliance.

"real eyes realize real lies"

why?

because i have an affinity for quotations, especially particularly good ones, and this book is so incredibly quotable.

from EL&IC by J.S. Foer.

"we could imagine all sorts of universes unlike this one, but this is the one that happened."


"just because you're an athiest, that doesn't mean you wouldn't love for things to have reasons for why they are."


"in the end, everyone loses everyone. there was no invention to get around that one. and so i felt, that night, like turtle that everything else in the universe is on top of."


"humans are the only animal that blushes, laughs, has religion, wages war, and kisses with the lips. so in a way, the more you kiss with lips, the more human you are."


"the books had been buried, so i hid this time behind a group of trees, i imagined their roots wrapped around the books, pulling nourishment from the pages, i imagined rings of letters in their trunks..."

here's to a grain of sand.

"What would happen if a plane dropped you in the middle of the Sahara Desert and you picked up a grain of sand and moved it on milimeter?"

I said "I'd probably die of dehydration."

He said "I just mean right then, when you moved that single grain of sand. What would that mean?"

I said, "I dunno, what?"

He said, "Think about it."

I thought about it. "I guess I would have moved a grain of sand."

"Which would mean?"

"Which would mean I moved a grain of sand?"

"Which would mean you changed the Sahara."

"So?"

"So? So the Sahara is a vast desert that's existed for millions of years and you changed it."

"That's true!" I said, sitting up. "I changed the Sahara!"

"Which means?"

...

"I changed the course of human history."

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close
page 86, J.S. Foer

i'm making lilith 2010 a priority.

you strut your rasta wear
and your suicide poem,
and a cross from a faith that died
before jesus came.

you're building a mystery.

i don't understand why

no one seems to want to ask
"how the fuck did we let this happen?"

we should be asking this of ourselves every day.

as we focus all of our attention for a few minutes on Haiti, before the next disaster strikes, we are apparently blind to the fact that we've been wholly ignorant to the state of a nation so close to our shores. ignorant to the fact that it represents a tiny per cent of the rest of the developing world that we've steeped in poverty as a result of our seemingly infinite greed.

climate change is undoubtedly the cause for the number of natural disasters that have hit world-wide over the last decade, disasters that are off the charts in comparison to those prior in our recorded meterological history which, even before the new millenium, were seen to be of increasing intensity.


and apparently no one saw this coming.
and apparently no one will ask "why?"

still, i don't quite understand
what's so threatening.
what it is that's so easily identified,
some
red flag i'm ignorant to.
because all i know is what i know
and
that's not much of anything at all.


we are buried

in a time when at once
our television sets blare bad news
and terror is a word in the vocabularies of our children
with eyes wide open to a world that is trapped in a
haze of chaos.

and i've got a room full of memories
i'd pay to forget.
walls built of regret. and guilt.
doors with hinges that refuse to give
with handles that stick
rooms filled with misunderstandings.

so it pays to have a perspective you haven't bought.
and i'm short on insight
but i'm pushing for change
while i push through walls of
quiet.

because they've got nothing to say to me.

earthquake in Haiti

an earthquake moved through Haiti tonight, just before 5 PM eastern standard time, about 10 miles west of the capital city of Port-au-Prince, one of the poorest cities in the world.

the people who are without power, hospitals, ambulences, rescue teams, food, water, shelter, and even communication need help ASAP.


TEXT "Haiti" to (90999) for an automatic $10 donation. Keep Port-au-Prince and the Haitian people in thoughts and hearts tonight...



how to help:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34834553/ns/msnbc_tv-rachel_maddow_show

no on H8

the trial began today.