Ain’t it funny how those who yarp the loudest about freedom and justice can’t actually stand it when it occurs?

We have one party who has run on nothing but More Freedom! Less Government! for thirty years. They never meant a word of it.

We have another party who claims to support the lessor against the stronger, but sells them out every time.

Together -as Lewis Black wisely stated, – one side has a bad idea and the other goes “Wait! I can make it shittier!”

And what about the man in charge?

For all the cruelty and hardship of our world, we are not mere prisoners of fate. Our actions matter, and can bend history in the direction of justice.

BARACK OBAMA, Nobel Lecture, Dec. 10, 2009

Well, there are about 2 million Egyptians in a plaza with tanks aimed at their heads who would like you to bend some damn history into the direction of justice. And if not justice, then at least direct Mubarak to the airport. Because those 2 million- and the rest of Egypt behind them- are right. If you are willing to stand for freedom with a tank pointed at your head, you are right. Even if you’re wrong, and end up with some ooga booga Islamic whatever, you’re still right. Because you are willing to die for your freedom. In America we’re willing to die under the heels of an unemployed mother of 3 for a $39 dvd player at Wal-Mart on Black Friday.

Here in America we prattle on about “Bringing democracy to the Middle East”, and then piss ourselves when it actually occurs. And now, with signs of hope in Tunisa, Yemen, and now Egypt, all the staunch defenders of freedom are running for the exits:

This virus is spreading throughout the Middle East.
John McCain

“Mob riots like this,” she warned, “have never led to something good.”
Ann Coulter

Be it gay marriage, or drug laws, or revolution, those that spray the most spit about freedom can’t see to actually, you know, allow it. Because they fear freedom, because freedom means they aren’t in control. And they crave control. Left to our own devices, we might not elect them again. Or bail them out. Or fight in their wars. Or grow their crops for shit wages. And that is simply unacceptable. So when two million people crowd a city square in Cario, they think Times Square and shudder. But they need not worry. Despite the lunatic ramblings of Glenn Beck, this nation doesn’t have what it takes to revolt.

It is said that Chinese prison camps are remarkably easy to control. See, they put a thousand or so inmates in a yard, watch who the men gather around- and kill them. Without leaders, the rest are easily manageable. We are a nation without leaders. We have cheerleaders, and thieves, and despots, but we have no leaders. Not someone to control us, but to inspire us, and the rest of the world toward a more just future. Someone who doesn’t accept the Nobel Prize with empty platitudes about freedom while sending drones over Pakistan.

We need the strength of will, and commitment to freedom exercised by those two million in a square in Cario. That a nation that is as potentially great as ours cannot seem to find it within in self to be as exceptional as some trumpet it to be, well, that ain’t funny at all.

On 1.19.2011 Stephen Colbert gave a Shout Out to Preston Pysh and his men serving in Afghanistan, mainly for sending him a flag flown in combat. Grotesque cheerleading, but hey, it gets better. A few minutes later (at around 2:15) he revealed another gift from the fellas, his name on a Hellfire missile.

So, Stephen, how many innocent Afghanis you figure your nifty present wiped out? A wedding party perhaps?

I was stunned when I watched it for the first time, and every time I’ve watched it again. But more stunning to me, is that no one else, far as I can tell, has made mention of liberal icon Stephen Colbert getting wood over a device designed to massacre, aimed at a people that have done him no wrong. No irate DU rants, no ironic Huff Po, not a word. Does it not bother you even a little bit, or make you say “huh”?

Or have we become so benumbed to this endless horror that it no longer registers as the epic event and soul-killing shame it is? Is it just another topic, another fact of life, another punch line to a “Support Our Troops” pep rally? If so, count me out. In 2002 I wrote a letter to Bowflex about the disgust that grew in me watching their ad featuring returning troops praising the benefits of a Bowflex machine while over there. I said this then:

In closing, I ask that you reconsider this ad campaign. I hope that you will remember the lives ended and families ruined by our actions in Afghanistan. They did not die for you to sell exercise machines and increase your bottom line. The Nautilus Group and its Bowflex product have been in the past at best an annoyance; now they are an obscenity.

I say the same to you, Stephen Colbert. The innocent people in Afghanistan, as well as our own who have been ground up in the “Land Where Empires Go to Die” didn’t do so to provide you with material, a “bit”. I can understand not wanting to offend the troops, but surely something could have been worked out behind the scenes. That it wasn’t shows a level of callousness to tragedy that I don’t find funny at all.

I hope you are better than this incident makes you appear.

First, we have this:

Province targets alleged sex offender’s home

IT’S a lawsuit that’s the first of its kind in Manitoba.

“What we’re saying generally to the public is that if you’re using property to assist in a criminal activity, don’t expect to keep that property,” said Gord Schumacher, provincial director of the criminal property forfeiture unit.

And we also have this:

Irish abuse victims ‘disgusted’ at Vatican letter

Irish victims of sexual abuse are “disgusted” by a newly revealed letter in which a Vatican official expresses “serious reservations” about requiring bishops to report suspected abuse by priests to police, they said Wednesday.

The envoy expresses “serious reservations” about requiring that such cases be reported to the police.

The Catholic Church has “had an issue” with child abuse nearly as long as their history has been recorded. No need to waste anyone’s time rehashing the facts, its all easily available to find. Too easy to find. Too much evidence. Too many lies by power. No, the question is not do they condone the sexual abuse of children. That answer is yes. The question is, what should be done about it? The church is clearly more interested in deflecting the issue than dealing with it, so we can no longer take anything they claim into account. This is neither an isolated, nor recent issue. If a day care center down the road faced these allegations, they would be investigated, and if proven, the center would cease to exist, and no one would question it at all. So why does the world allow a criminal organization with massive assets, focused to a certain extent on the protection of those who would harm children- why has nothing been done? Is it because of unfocused legalities and jurisdictions? Is it because of Vatican influence? Whatever the reasons, the solution to them all is quite simple. Simple to state, but improbable to imagine.

The Catholic Church must cease to exist.

The church has estimated assets at roughly 52 billion dollars. That figure sounds impossibly low to me, but its large enough. Child abuse costs the United States over 100 billion a year, and that sounds rather high, and its probably inflated as are most social cause statistics, but its still amazingly expensive to contemplate. There is absolutely no reason the victims, their families, or the rest of society should bear the burden of the staggering costs of Church-condoned sexual abuse. It is horror enough the mental and emotional trauma it causes, of which there is no way to say the cost. So the assets of the Catholic Church should be seized, just like the house of the kiddie diddling soccer coach. Sell them for whatever you can get, and spend every last dime on the children. Shut down every church and school, and treat them as the criminals they are- and you don’t allow criminals around your children.

Not if you’re worthy parents, anyway. Some of you continue to put your children into this environment, and I say as a parent, I consider that a dereliction of your duty. And if the only way to get those people away from your children is to dissolve them to the four winds, then I guess your children are worth it. I have Catholic friends that I’m sure this will offend. I am not attacking your faith. That is your own business. I am attacking the criminal organization that has used it to stalk and harm your children. There is no way to explain any difference between the two items I’ve cited. A man placed in a trust position with your children abused that trust and those children, and lost his liberty and his home because of it.

The Catholic Church was placed in exactly the same position with your children, and behaved in exactly the same way- times thousands. Can someone explain to me why they are allowed to continue to do so?

The Catholic Church must cease to exist. Whatever good they have done can be done by other people, with other names. Their good will never outweigh their bad.

Democracy cannot succeed unless those who express their choice are prepared to choose wisely. The real safeguard of democracy, therefore, is education.
-Franklin D. Roosevelt

Dunno how it is in your neck of the woods, but whenever I see a headline that starts with “Georgia Representative…” I flinch. Being a native of the southland I’ve become sadly accustomed to the follies of our elected “leaders”. Georgia was recently under the siege of Governor Sonny Perdue, a theocratic asshat who had so little respect for his subjects that we weren’t even allowed the chance to vote on Sunday alcohol sales, much less go out and actually purchase a six pack in a grocery store on THE LORDS DAY. So when I read about Bobby Franklin introducing legislation that would force taxpayers to only use gold and silver for all transactions in the state, I sadly wasn’t surprised.

Franklin represents a rather well off area of Cobb County, and I have to wonder- how has this buffoon managed to keep getting reelected since 1997? This year alone he’s wanted to return Georgia to the gold standard, to institute his version of Sharia, change the word “victim” to “accuser” in cases of rape, stalking etc, and abolish the state income tax. Of course none of this idiocy becomes law- he generally is only able to get passed meaningless proclamations of “Psychology Day” and such. His bio states the following:

Representative Franklin has been called “the conscience of the Republican Caucus” because he believes that civil government should return to its biblically and constitutionally defined role.

So year after year, Cobb County residents cast their votes to return this pious pinhead to the legislature, despite his inability to actually do anything but mouth meaningless platitudes. And they aren’t alone- John Boehner vows to open each House session with a reading of the Constitution, among other Tea Party demands- all feel good gibberish meant to quiet the rabble without actually doing anything about anything. Our media is filled with story after story about an economy in the ditch, two endless wars swallow resources and bodies, and Wall Street continues to suck the very marrow from our bones, but apparently, things are actually pretty ok. Because societies in decline don’t have the time or energy to be this silly, do they?

Nonsense is a luxury. For all the horror stories, the residents of Rep. Franklin most likely still have jobs, their bridges haven’t crumbled below the tires of their minivans, and the hospitals in District 43 are probably well-staffed and have all the resources they need. So, they really aren’t suffering too much, at least not enough to actually elect someone to face reality and lead. No, they are fat and happy enough to elect a cheerleader- no more, no less. Now cheerleaders don’t block tackles, or throw the ball- in fact, they do nothing meaningful at all, truth be told, but my, they are pleasant to watch and they swell the soul with pride. They aren’t essential to the actual functioning of a team- and neither are the likes of Bobby Franklin, or Rand Paul, or any of the Tea Party sign wavers who managed to get elected this time around. They’ll introduce legislation to repeal the Health Care bill, or defund NPR, knowing full well that Obama will veto all of it, just so they can return home to make speeches and fleece the rabble for yet another round of fundraising with the rallying cry of “we’ll get ‘em next time” and “we’re holding them accountable!” all the while the rich get richer, people continue to lose their homes and jobs- but apparently not enough of them to actually get anything done.

So instead of taking to the streets demanding change, they march to see Obama’s birth certificate. Instead of devoting coverage to veterans chained to the White House fence to bring an end to our folly in Afghanistan, we get another round of Sarah Palin babble, as if she actually means anything at all in the big scheme of things. No, nonsense is a luxury only the well off can afford. So, until the reality of our dire situation actually lands in the pews of upscale Cobb County churches, or the government stops paying for Medicare scooters, our country will continue to wallow in the comforting balm of silly slogans and useless cheerleaders.

Our nation has lost its educational and technical edge to countries such as China and India in large part because we’re obsessed by short term profits over long term stability, amusement over education, and meaningless flag waving over substantial change. And as long as non-stories such as the Ground Zero Mosque or the fevered insanity that is Glenn Beck continue to dominate our national discourse, things will never change. We’ll just get dumber, and more broke, until finally, one day, we won’t be rich and idle enough to enjoy the warm fuzzies of nonsense. And we’ll awaken to a nation too stupid to elect real leaders, and too obsessed with trivia to even understand the issues we face.

But we kept the heathens from buying beer on Sunday, that counts for something, don’t it?

It’s been our national myth since approximately 10:30am on September 11th.

9/11 changed everything, and anyone who disagrees hates America.

Afghanistan. Iraq. Thousands of bodies, billions of dollars.

9/11 changed everything, and anyone who disagrees hates America.

NSA wiretapping. American citizens held without charges. Patriot Act. Abu Ghraib.

9/11 changed everything, and anyone who disagrees hates America.

It has literally been our national blood. The only growth industry in this nation for nearly a decade has been the myth of 9/11. The myth that a religion of 1.5 billion people hates us, attacked us, and will attack us again unless we all give up our money, our security, our lives, and large bottles of water on a plane. Our national myth made a Churchill out of a dunghill, transformed xenophobic demagoguery into our national voice, and strips us naked in public. Everyone had to sacrifice.

9/11 changed everything, and anyone who disagrees hates America.

Until Thursday the 9th, that is. That was the day the whores of the GOP decided to strip off the yellow-ribboned garb of war to show their true colors, as bagmen for foreign corporations. $7.4 billion dollars- about a pallets worth, you might say- taken from the first responders on 9/11 because it might “damage U.S. relationships with major trading partners”. So, with all the lingering respect and interest a john has for a used condom the myth that “changed everything” was pulled off and tossed in the trash, its job done.

So, my question is this. Can we now stop with the piety of bullshit that has turned our world inside out since 9/11? Can we dispense with the sanctimonious hand-wringing masking our latent racism? How about we swap all the tattered “USA Pride” bumper stickers with something more relevant…such as this?

Because the myth has never been true- but it was profitable. Now, apparently, it is not. So to everyone who has been sacrificed on the altar of our national myth, thanks and fuck off.

We’re just not that into you anymore.

Oh, so much hand-wringing on either side over the fate of the Obama presidency. First, from Time:

While he negotiates his way through the lame-duck session of Congress, prepares for his State of the Union address and budget, and braces for the new normals of 2011, the President had better figure out how to react when the moment comes. Without that moment — whatever it is — and strong leadership in its wake, Obama may find his luck has run out.

Or, from the short bus wing:

No, Obama won’t run in 2012, although he’ll be coy about it for at least a year. He has no taste for compromise and his over-weaning narcissism won’t allow him to be the head of a devolving minority party. Besides, I think his handlers are not pleased with the thwacking he took in the midterms, and will be looking hard for another puppet. In fact, George Soros, Obama’s premier benefactor and perhaps even the puppet master pulling his strings, just told a group of Progressives: “We have just lost this Election, we need to draw a line. And if this president can’t do what we need, it is time to start looking somewhere else.”

So many people, expending so much effort on nothing. People are considering Obama a weak president, based on what, exactly? Let’s see what he’s accomplished in two years:

Removed actual health care reform from discussion for our lifetimes by giving the very people who ruined it to begin with a signing bonus, and an entire nation of new premium payers- at the point of a gun.

Escalated the illegal and unnecessary wars into Pakistan and Africa, effectively making them his, not Bush’s wars.

Cut off all domestic and international attempts at holding the Bush regime to any sort of rule of law, making torture and rendition an actual debatable point.

Stage-managed the entire financial crisis to put his backers on track to having the largest year of corporate profits ever seen, only a few years past bringing the world to the edge of economic collapse.

Tap-danced on the “third rail” of American politics, on route to tossing your social security payments into the 3 card monte scheme that is Wall Street.

Anyone who thinks Obama is weak is a fool. Or he may be, but it really doesn’t matter. Because Obama no more runs this country than my dog. Obama was elected by Goldman Sachs and the shadowy “military-industrial” complex that Ike warned us about a generation ago. His few feints in the direction of actual liberal ideas are nothing more than bread and circuses meant to keep the Volvo crowd in line. If he wanted to end DADT, he could do it with the stroke of a pen. If he wanted Net Neutrality, it would get done. But in nearly every case, you can accurately predict how Obama will react simply by determining who will benefit from any given action. If he has the ability to fuck the majority and enrich the minority, that will be the side he picks.

And if his handlers decide that he’s given a sufficient return on investment, he’ll be our next President. And if the little people get antsy, then the national media will simply give Palin another show, or Newt will write another book of gibberish, and “just this time” the left will rally to save us from faux, unelectable celebrities masquerading as candidates. And the glib Barry O will just smile that sickening smile, put his feet up on the desk, and wait for the phone to ring.

And it sure as shit ain’t gonna be democracy calling.

Jon Stewart and the Daily Show, along with Colbert, are a required nightly ritual in our house. During the Bush years it was the only way I could stand to hear Dubya’s voice- without Jon’s “heh heh heh” following it, it all seemed too real and ugly. Of course, it was- and is- too real and ugly for sane people to tolerate. Stewart and Colbert are masters at skewering the pompous, mocking the endless propaganda of the right and the madness that is 24/7 TerrorVision cable news.

But when it comes to actual things that matter, TDS are nothing more than master gatekeepers- to the point you almost wonder if they have an Obama (or Bush) appointee on their writing staff. The notion of government involvement in 9/11 is mentioned only to deride “crazy” conspiracy theorists, the concept of Bush and Obama being war criminals (as they surely are) is mocked as “extremist” talk that they devoted an entire rally to quashing.

So I wasn’t too surprised when Stewart blasted Julian Assange and Wikileaks the other night:

“If this is the diplomatic 9/11, sack up,” Stewart said. “I’ll give you it’s diplomatic mischief night … maybe. But most of the shit in there is non-policy chit chat and things we already knew.”

Really, Jon? You read all 250,000 cables and came to that conclusion? Imploring our diplomats to get DNA from UN members is “mischief”? Obama in league with GOP higher ups, quashing the Spanish investigation into the Bush admin for torture, that’s “chit chat”?

Fuck you, Jon. You’re wrong. And worse than wrong, you’re dangerous. Anyone who can gather hundreds of thousands of people on the National Mall for what was essentially nothing, that is a powerful person. And when that person declares a false equivalence between liberal activists such as Code Pink and the Murdoch promoted goon squads, the astroturfing Tea Party, basically calling attempts to end the illegal wars and investigate torturers to be silly, you do a grave disservice to those who give a damn.

There is a nation of people who sat and watched in horror as the Bush, and now the Obama regimes discarded the rule of law on a whim, unaccountable to anyone. Wikileaks, and whistleblowers everywhere, are one of the few means of leverage available to common people. People who can’t get their faces on cable TV, or put a Congressman in their pocket. It is said history is written by the victors. And in the days of Gutenberg, that was true. But we don’t live in those times. We live surrounded by information, an entire internet of data, most of it crap to be sure, but amid all the tweets and Farmvilles sits a mechanism to fight back. To learn. To get angry. To get involved. To give a damn. We should be using it to get louder, not quieter. Angrier, not calmer. We should use this information to hound the guilty until there isn’t a place on earth a George Bush or Hillary Clinton can step without the threat of arrest.

So Jon, we still love ya. Keep sticking it to idiot pols from South Carolina, and Colbert, keep up the truthiness. But when it comes to real issues- and the dreams and passions of people who demand justice anyway they can- either lead, follow, or get the fuck out of the way.

The beginning of wisdom is to call things by their right names
Chinese proverb

Everybody has one, at least. The bellicose friend who is the personification of Moynihan’s Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts dictum. You can attempt a discussion, but it’s an exercise in frustration as they rebut anything you say with a pithy St. Ronnie quote. If you’re lucky you can salvage the friendship by sticking to discussions of something trivial such as football, but in today’s hyper-connected, social networked world, generally you end up with their ignorance billboarded in your face every time you log on, until finally you snap and delete them from your life.

fool don’t see…Tryin’ hard to recreate
What had yet to be created

The greatest accomplishment of the conservative movement is the creation of an alternate reality. It is what drives everything else they do. In this world tax cuts raise revenue, god-less heathens are fighting a war on Christmas, and homos want to bugger their kids. They listen to the skillfully presented propaganda of Wall Street and the military and steadfastly defend borrowing money to pay to millionaires while their own kids don’t have health care coverage, they champion the intelligence of Palin and the honor of Bush. And they watch crap like this, and take it seriously:

Fox News hosts pretend birther author’s novel is non-fiction

So opaque are their blinders that they gobble up anything that supports their paranoiac vision of the world- even if its from the Onion. Even when its been debunked around the globe.

But what a fool believes he sees
No wise man has the power to reason away

Religion was created as an attempt by a terrified people to make order of a world they couldn’t understand or control. If a flood washed away the village, then it was the wrath of an angry god. When the crops don’t come in as expected, then next year we’ll kill a goat as an offering. Completely illogical, and utterly indefensible.

And you’d no more save that goat by reasoned debate than you will win an argument with a true believer- because deep down, they know what you’re saying is true, and they hate you for it.

Honesty is the first chapter in the book of wisdom.
Thomas Jefferson

I recently lost a friend under these very circumstances. He was a “hoo-ah!” yarping supporter of our illegal wars – but had marched against Vietnam when it was his time to serve. He hasn’t earned enough money since I’ve known him to pay taxes (that’s his wife’s job, I guess), but he’ll argue the Laffer curve until you want to slap him. He sat on his hands during the reign of Bush the Tyrant, but elect a democrat and suddenly he cares about bailouts and civil liberties, when Obama is simply Bush on steroids. He lives in a Wonderland of lies without the incredulity of Alice. He lives literally on the ruined shores of the Gulf of Mexico, but its “crazed environmentalists who hate capitalism” that dumped all that oil in the water, not a greedy multinational corporation. He lives in a state gutted by big money Ponzi schemes but our current economic disaster can be traced to riff-raff getting home loans from ACORN. He considers the treasonous outing of Valerie Plame to be a “non issue” but wants the Wikileaks guy to hang.

What seems to be
Is always better than nothing

Deep down my former friend knows that what he believes is nonsense. But to admit it would mean facing truths about a world that scares and frustrates him- a world that operates not on mythology but on facts, not on the faith of Fox but the voice of millions who live with their eyes- and minds- open. And every time I would argue with him, I stepped foot into Wonderland.

It would be so nice if something made sense for a change.
Alice in Wonderland

Embrace reality. Foist off fantasy. Be here now, as the Buddhists say. I’ll miss my friend. I hope his delusions can sustain him.

Because they are killing the rest of us.

I’m appalled by our growing wealth gaps because in my travels I see what happens in dysfunctional countries where the rich just don’t care about those below the decks. The result is nations without a social fabric or sense of national unity. Huge concentrations of wealth corrode the soul of any nation.

And then I see members of Congress in my own country who argue that it would be financially reckless to extend unemployment benefits during a terrible recession, yet they insist on granting $370,000 tax breaks to the richest Americans. I don’t know if that makes us a banana republic or a hedge fund republic, but it’s not healthy in any republic.

No ‘enhanced’ pat-downs for kids, TSA says

Children going through airport security will no longer be subject to the aggressive pat-downs that have riled some passengers and will instead face less-intrusive hand searches from screeners, the Transportation Security Administration said Tuesday.

The TSA decision to ease screening for children came as the agency was sued Tuesday by two airline pilots seeking to block the use of body scanners and enhanced pat-downs. The suit was filed in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., by Michael Roberts, an ExpressJet Airlines pilot who created a minor stir last month when he refused to undergo a body scan and a pat-down at Memphis International Airport, where he was trying to board a flight to his base in Houston. The other plaintiff is Continental Airlines first officer Ann Poe.

The larger issue behind this notion that we must submit to “unreasonable search and seizure” in order to fly home to see Grandma at Thanksgiving is not what the TSA is doing, but rather, what they are NOT doing. Which is examining cargo. Now, I’m inclined to think the entire Yemen episode was bullshit, but the notion that something could be brought into the country hidden in freight destined for your local Wal Mart is certainly plausible.

But folks like Wal Mart don’t give a shit. Enhanced security costs money, takes time, and reduces the profits of any company receiving goods from abroad, which is of course nearly all of them, since our “free market” took the short cash and sold our manufacturing base for pennies on the dollar.

Same folks who collapsed the world economy, and got the US taxpayers to pay for the experience. Same folks who imported millions of tons of poisoned products from China because they were cheaper to sell at the Dollar Store. Same folks who spent nearly 90 million dollars assuring that health care reform would never happen. Same folks who get fatter while millions sit idle. Same folks who are going to steal your money from Social Security while stopping the income cap from being removed.

There is no free market in this country. There is only socialism for the rich. And because capitalism has sucked the very marrow from our bones, unimpeded, we all suffer. And pretty soon somebody is gonna die while we fret about TSA goons diddling children and saving scans of hot chicks. Our national security and our outdated notions of a free market are simply two acts in the ultimately fatal kabuki that is our nation.