Obama’s cynical strategy of playing the middle and standing for nothing finally blew up in his face last night. His performance was an insult to any of us who have supported him, because he didn’t debate. He didn’t even know his positions. He had no specifics, no facts, no interest – and sadder still – no ability, to actually respond to what his opponent was saying. And because he stands for nothing, there was nothing left. It was real garbage, and it actually made me sick to watch. If he ever had me, he lost me.
Obama’s cynical strategy of playing the middle and standing for nothing finally blew up in his face last night. His performance was an insult to any of us who’ve supported him, because not only did he clearly not prep for debate, he didn’t debate. He didn’t even know his positions. He had no specifics, no facts, no interest – and sadder still – no ability to actually respond to what his opponent was saying. And because he stands for nothing, there was nothing left.
I am not cynical for seeing Obama as cynical. I love him as a person, such as I can tell, and disparage him as a President. Why? We are in way worse trouble than he is willing to say, and his unwillingness to say it, which has been his policy, left Romney enough room to drive a truck through. Obama is not an angel, and Romney is not a slick lying bastard. This is not good vs. evil; we aren’t children. They are both politicians who have far less difference between them than the range of options that ought to be before us should ever warrant. But mainly it was just sad to see how unable the modern world is to generate a leader that can speak the truth, which is that we have to change course in a big way.
My friend George described Romney like this: “I believe that Romney is pro- whatever will transfer and consolidate wealth and power at the top. If there is substantial profit in war, then he is pro-war. If there is substantial profit in Oil/Coal -then he is pro-Oil/Coal. If only there was profit in peace, aspiration, being a big yellow bird and for each person to live their life with dignity -then he’d be pro- all that. But there’s no money there.” And now I’m sitting wondering how much difference there is between these two guys.
When a very hawkish Elliot Abrams says that “we need to wait over time and hope the situation abates,” I start to wonder if liberals are allowed to take up the mantle of national defense. A large and growing group of extremists attack our embassies, kill our people: We should be the ones rioting in the streets. Don’t people understand that our whole country was built on being allowed to show this video?
We need to send a message: “You can’t hide from this, what you are doing, all because some jerkoff in our country made a shitty little video making fun of Muhammad. America exists so idiots like that can make crappy videos. That’s why we are who we are. You can’t have a higher council saying this video is OK, this is not. We know this, so we say, as Americans, we let the videos happen in our country. We just don’t watch if we don’t like it. Now, while we do not gratuitously censor, it’s also true that there are guidelines: not on prime time, not in your face, not real hate speech, not porn or cursing, etc. But we won’t hunt you down and kill you if you say Go to Hell Obama! You can say that. You can say of anybody and anything: He’s an idiot! It’s absolutely ok! God is a whore! That’s A-OK in the USA. Christians are weirdoes! Fine. We can do all this here. Even kids. Even women. Dick Cheney is a thief with a stolen heart! All fine. So, there’s no question now these may sound like silly liberties to defend, but in fact they are no different than their more serious brother and sister liberties.”
So what do we say to an appropriately outraged Muslim world? We say: “We hear you.
It must be infuriating, humiliating even, to have to watch this blasphemy. Except guess what? You don’t have to watch it. But that’s different than saying somebody can’t say it. We agree: It’s a lie. Its not funny. But here’s what I now need to tell you, and need to reiterate to the world:
We are not you. We are us. We’re THE US. And our purpose on this planet, and we are not saying you have to be like this, is to be a place where people are free to express themselves. That’s why we exist. We got formed specifically in order to let people do that very thing that you hate. That’s why we came over on the Mayflower. That’s why we fought the civil war. That’s why we fought in World War I, World War II, the Korean War, even Vietnam. Go look it up.
So we can’t back off on that. We can’t stop videos like this from coming from the US. We could no more easily stop being the US. Which is what would happen if we acceded to your demands. Yes, that video is probably the worst of all possibilities that we have to abide to protect our democracy, but it falls within the general idea. For time and again we have heard across our great land, and may it be forever thus: the rules have to be the same for all, human judgment is fallible, and we must be a gov’t of laws, and not of men. There is no United States of America without this sensibility, and we cannot compromise to satisfy your need to not have that video in the world.
Actually, we don’t like it any more than you do. Indeed, as we have said, it’s offensive, wrong, and dumb. But the loser that made it gets to do that. Because if you stop him, on what grounds? The grounds of bad art? Well, it is pretty bad. Bad acting. Bad lighting. Bad costumes, not funny. Not serious. Just lame. But we can’t censor him for that. America exists to allow for bad art. Haven’t you noticed? That should not come as news.
So I, if the President of this country won’t say it, Uncle Sam will: I am standing for these values in front of the entire world right now, not later, and saying: No. We will not take this down. The cartoons will continue. The video will remain available. You want to bomb us with suicide bombs? Don’t try it. You will lose a war you could already have won. Because we will not stop We can’t hide from this. We can’t pretend we don’t believe in this. We do.
At the same time, we will fight just as hard so that you can live in a world where you do get to have a society where the rule of God is supreme. We respect that. We only want to go to war with you if you insist on going to war with us. We can live in a world where you get your way, and we get ours. If you don’t even want us to get our way, then we’re forced to neutralize that threat, and we will. We always have. From the Battle of Concord to Gettysburg, from Verdun to the beaches of Normandy, from the 49th Parallel of Korea to, yes, Vietnam, we always turn the odds around. By the way, I would like to take advantage of this opportunity to rewrite a little bit of world history, for having recently visited Vietnam and seeing capitalism in such full swing, I am not very convinced that in the end we actually lost that war.
I should also mention that we here in the West we have learned a thing or two about human psychology, and your reaction to this blasphemy is very defensive. It’s not gonna work for you. Thank you for letting me try to articulate what our country is.”
So that’s it. We need to speak for our country’s truth, and actually we need to have it done from the bully pulpit of the Presidency. But somehow the sentence: “America is…” must be in there. And I actually think it would benefit Obama if between now and Nov. 6 he were to say: “Look we’re not going to stop this, and we would prefer you don’t try to kill us for it. This is the type of society we want, a free society.”
“This is our vision long term: A USA about civil society, the rule of law, transparency, a level playing field, equal justice for all, might does not make right, with great power comes great responsibility, everybody has a shot that we as a group work to make as same as possible, and we declare these values for all to see. You say of us, society is above God and it is the convoluted nature of your antithetical arrangement that is the cause of the world’s suffering. You say that until God as being above man is built into the structures of society there can be no peace, and to wage war to bring about such a heaven on earth is a holy mission. You say that we have lost our way, that we are blind to the suffering of humanity, that we only care about power, and that we aim to destroy you. You need to think this or your mission makes no sense. But let’s look at the facts. Blind to the suffering of humanity? No way. We’ve given more per capita, per GNP, per GDP, total cash, total credit, total contributions of technology, innovation and invention, however you want to slice it, the USA does a lot. We have also made many mistakes, but we always return to our core mission. We may need to purge a Huey Long on the left or a Richard Nixon on the right, but then we enact Social Security or the Freedom of Information Act. If we relinquish the moral high ground we can still beat you in basketball. But we recognize now that the rest of the planet is just as awesome. And America, you need to come with me to give the world the credit that is due. We are great, OK, but so is the Khmer Rouge and the building of the culture in Cambodia, wait no that that, I mean the Aga Khan, whatever, Angora Watt, whatever it’s called, all of it’s just pomp and circumstance. Hold on, I think I lost my mind. I digress.
We recognize and in fact welcome that the dominance of Europe over the world for the last 2000 years is at a close. For people who strongly identify or feel they benefit from this arrangement, I feel your pain. Yes, this transition is gonna hurt at first. But let’s face it like proud Americans. I want to reach out to you, my Tea Party comrades, and tell you this: If I win, I will hold a meeting at the White House, televised live, where all your issues and grievances are aired. And Occupy, if you can get it together you can come too. And we’ll pick 8 themes and do one a week, two hour TV specials, rotate thru the top 8 networks, have interactive web stuff, show the world how America has a discussion. Nobody’s blowing each other up. Not on my watch.
Thank you. God bless America. God bless the whole blessed world. Good night.”
Xinhua is China’s official and largest press agency. Yesterday it wrote of our country: “The United States should stop its role as a sneaky troublemaker sitting behind some nations in the region and pulling strings.” That’s not nice. And the facts don’t bear it out. Yes, we’re obviously more focused on Asia, and yes, we’re advocating a multilateral approach to territorial disputes in the region, and not China’s preferred divide and conquer strategy. But that doesn’t warrant getting nasty and fomenting discord. The Global Times, China’s second biggest news organization, wrote yesterday: “Many Chinese people do not like Secretary Clinton. The antipathy and vigilance that she personally has brought to the Chinese public are not necessarily in the United States’ diplomatic interest.” It might as well have added, “Perhaps she should sleep with one eye open.” Isn’t it obvious what’s going on? Why don’t we realize that China’s insults are sincere? Despite the fact that Uncle Sam has been known to get his gander up, I am not saying we should trade insult for insult, but why in the world would we not call them out on being insulting? And if not now, when?
The Diaoyutai, or Senkaku islands, are what’s got China riled up at the moment. Japan controls them; China wants them. Huge energy deposits lie beneath them. And next to them run some of the most popular shipping lanes in the world. But if China thinks that they can bully their way into getting them, we ought not continue to appease them. The US ought to insist on a public and transparent framework for this kind of dispute resolution, ought to reject the tone China likes to take while at the same time not lowering ourselves to it, and ought to stand up to these threats by saying quite publicly that threats of this kind and mean spirited communication have no place in the world of mutual inter-dependence and cooperation we are creating. If we don’t respond now with some plain speaking, it’s going to be a lot worse later. Trust me; I’ve been there.
China is gearing up for huge land grabs in all directions. To the east, China claims the entire continental shelf right up to Okinawa. The US and Japan are never going to put up with that, so why not say so now? China wants the Chunxiao gas field, known as Shirikaba in Japanese, despite the fact that it is much closer to Japan than China. To the south, China claims territory much much farther south than even the southernmost tip of Vietnam, well into the southernmost parts of (and only a few kilometers from) Indonesia. All the waters from the shores of Vietnam to the shores of the Philipines to the shores of Indonesia belong to China, according to China. If you look at it on a map, it just looks crazy. And it goes beyond that. Indeed, all the major countries in Asia have territorial disputes with China. For example, the Paracel Islands, right next to Vietnam, which also have energy deposits, are coveted by China, despite the fact that looking at a map reveals these claims to be unjustifiable on geographical grounds.
To the west of course is Tibet and India. China has already annexed what it now calls the Tibet Autonomous Region. Our government refuses to intervene, or even speak up for human rights or democracy there. The genocide and culturicide now occuring in Tibet is an affront to everything I, Uncle Sam, and our country has stood for. It is a global tragedy we will be ashamed we allowed to happen. Regarding India, while actual fighting along the border wars has cooled off, the two countries – both nuclear powers with very thin skins – have fought bloody wars over these borders, with few issues resolved. And China has occupied Aksai Chin in the far west against India’s wishes. And finally, there’s Taiwan, China’s Ruby Slippers, which it threatens with missile tests from time to time, as if to drum into our heads its Wicked Witch like mantra: “One day my little pretty!” It’s obvious that if China thought it could get away with taking any of these places it wants by force that it would. Our job is to push back enough to keep China from getting that confident.
8/12/12
So now that Obama’s going to win again, let’s take a fresh look at black people in America. Let’s consider a couple amazing facts, which is one that the USA created, bought, sold, and then freed more slaves than any country in the history of humanity. More than the Greeks. More than the Egyptians. have you ever noticed that bla
Only the Nazi’s had more POWs, and that really is different: there was a war going on. But in terms of peacetime subjugation of other people on an ongoing basis that society sort of accepts, that’s us, or rather US. And it went on for a long time, and though it ended formally in 1865, Jim Crow kicked in in 1873 and lasted until 1955 and in some ways until 1965. In 1963 you would see all over the southern part of this country two different drinking fountains, White and Colored, and you could go to jail or get your head cracked in for drinking from the wrong fountain (that would be black from white, nobody gave a shit the other way around). So that’s part of my lifetime. IF I was a kid down there’ I’d remember it. And kids my age do. So while it’s not quite slavery per se, it’s close, and considering that it’s a full 100 years since slavery was formally shut down in this country, that shows it too k a helluva long time to make any headway whatsoever. And if you are black, it’s a sad story. The statistics don’t lie and they show us that black families sare 40$ poorer than white, x percent less education, x more likely to sbe a victim of violent crime, grow up in a broken home, not learn how to read and write, or die of a drug overdoses. These are sad numbers.
But meanwhile, at the same time, we have a brown president, and even ore importantly, because this happened well before Obama took office, our culture in a very real and general way, ahs been Africanized. What I mean by this is that while we certainly have been influenced by Asian culture, and Hispanic culture, and all forms of white culture, if you look at the Facebook pictures of the kids, they are striking “black” poses. Money shots, the hands in the ghetto position. Every Asian kid poses like a pimp, and it is not the other way around. You don’t see black kids trying to look like Asians. The kids today, and not just the kids but the pop culture overall, is more than anything else, black. African American. We’ve been Africanized. Just as much as we make them slaves, we now are culturally indentured to this form of servitude. It’s more than ironic. It’s causal. What i want to say is a little radical, but I think it makes sense. Somehow, because they were slaves, we’re now living in their world. Not that it’s guild, but it’s something din hernet as a lw of the universe, it’s more than cosmic payback it’s deeper than that/
Once cannot argue that black people somehow are the coolest people. If you’ve hung out with them, you know, socially they have it down in a way that is just, well, they invented it, cool. And now cool is the most important thing in America, and so the world, so that’s black people running the world again. At least as far as how we talk, gesture, etc. Two generations ago, it was not valued the way it is now to be cool. But cool won. Black people one.
So part of it is this insane irony. Part of it is the crazy coolness of the source culture. And part of it is of course the music and the sports and the sheer superiority of the black man in these pursuits, and how much these pursuits are based on identification, idealization, sthe hive mind, etc.
They are just better, dammit. And that leads into Africanized, and how we don’t want them mating, shy not. Bigger dicks. Tougher. More resistant. Hones, evolutionarily superior. Blend the black and the white, get mostly black. No wonder the insecure, small dicked white people are white supremacists. They can dance. They can fuck. They can blow your mind. They’re real live black people from African now running our country! And not just as president, but as president of rock and roll, or fashion, of cool, of lingo, of sports they wown sports! Music! What would American music be like wo black people. It would suck, that’s what. Now again nothing against the other people, we love you all. But it’s amazing when you see how important African Americans are to Americans. How impoverished we would be without their contricutions. Sdss§ and then when you realize that these are the people we enslaved, that we now worship the people we made slaves, whipped beat killed treated like dogs, that they now are aspirational to the culture, that’s pretty intense. And it even goes deeper than that. The black traffic lady story. Tell it! Here…man courtin gher. Back and forth, you got rights this sense of entitlement is amazing. It’s fucking American! The way she got in his face…you lining up…they owe us! So this is really an amazing culture.
Now meanwhile they are blowing each other away, abandoning each other, crime and shit, but still…
Now to expand it out, the Asians got us in a different way. Cool as the black man is, be ca n kt make a cell phone. So the black man and the Asian man acting like the black man, do it all on Asian hone. So we’re their slaves that way…next issue…