Michael Wawrzycki - Blog

When Does Life Begin...And Does Your Answer Make You Sexist?

2011-10-19T18:51:00.000-05:00

Does life begin at conception, or at birth? Until recently, the question only plagued philosophers and those of existential bents, though, it has long been considered, albeit more fleetingly, by many. Does it matter? Yes. But why? Well, for starters, it affects a lot of real-life issues.

One such issue is criminal justice. If a person kills a pregnant woman, is it a double-homicide? It does seem worse than killing a non-pregnant person, but if that's murder, what is abortion? Ah. There's there's another issue. Criminalizing the former subtly outlaws the latter. In Roe v. Wade, a fetus was referred to as a "potential life." It's an apt term. A fetus can't live on its own; its sole existence is through the mother-to-be. Ending a potential life forcefully (i.e., killing a pregnant woman or conducting a D&X without consent) is reprehensible, and should be a crime in its own, but not murder. And if it's not "life" yet, there's no basis to outlaw abortion. But didn't you mention sexism? Ah yes. That.

Has it been that long since I've spoken about male hegemony, the self-inscribing apparatus that even women help enforce? I suppose so. The main issue here is representation. How do we present the ability to create life, and the role of men and women in that process? It is also about agency. Who can create life. If life starts at conception, men and women are equal partners in the creation of life, and women just happen to carry the new life into the world: like traditional housewives who buy the groceries with community property funds and carry them into the house by themselves while the men make that money.

But, if life begins at birth, only women can create life. This elevates women. This makes women capable of something no man can possibly do. This also means that women make all the choices about life and potential life, and should be the ones that establish the right of life and potential life. It means men take a back seat and listen to what women decide. The male hegemony, however, says "no" to this concept. So certain sub-stratas of society says life starts at conception, and cloak it in the authority of religion. Because, gasp, their god could not have intended for women to be above men in any capacity.

Don't believe it. Women are unique. Their ability to create life makes them superior to men. Too many make the process out to be a burden. Women in no position to complete their education or secure their financial well-being are encouraged to have children before they are ready; men argue the fetus is half theirs and demand rights. But it's all insecurity. Men cannot bring life into this world. Women should rule the world based on that principle alone. Yet too many men skirt their responsibility as fathers, burdening women as solo mothers, and use the educational and financial restraints on (particularly young) solo mothers to oppress them. Laws should stronger favor women's and mothers' rights. Women should make them stronger. For example, build in attorneys' fees and multiple damages on unpaid child support. Force the government to pay for that woman's child care and education until the father can be found; but allow the government reimbursement against the father. This is the same principle that Medicare works on: protect the injured person and allow the government to go after the liable person later. But that, of course, might be construed as socialist. For shame. On the other hand, if you realize that 100% of global democracies employ socialism in some form, maybe you'll wake up and realize that "socialism" is only as strong of an invective as you are susceptible to reverse-anachronist McCarthyism.

Regardless, women should fight harder to say when life begins, and men should be more honest about it. Because, face it fellas, it's about ego, it's about control. But the truth is, you can't bring life into this world.

Republicans Are Just Sad

2010-12-04T09:56:00.003-06:00

What's sadder is that Democrats and Independents just don't get it. Small government, slash taxes? Please. Where was the call for small government in the Bush years when the executive branch was exercising unprecedented powers? For all those that say he exercised enhanced "war powers" I ask what war he was fighting. No, seriously, point me to the declaration of war, authorized by Congress, that would give him those powers. (Part of the checks and balances built into the government by the Founders, who Republicans profess allegiance to when it is convenient, and ignore when it is not.) There wasn't one. Like in Korea (before the Vietnam War), America is fighting a "conflict" in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

So anyway, small government? Not when the Republicans are in power and control the agenda. They will legislate their religion, defy science, and diminish civil liberties through extensions of the police state. Their calls for small government only came about when Democrats took over. I.e., as a foil to the Democratic agenda, rather than adherence to any political philosophy. As for slashing taxes? Bush is the first president to slash taxes while engaged in such extensive military engagements, which is clearly fiscally irresponsible. And then, the strategy is to blame Obama for running a bloated federal government budget, and railing against him if he fails to renew the tax cuts. Again, it is a political ploy, not an exercise in political honesty.

Meanwhile, the first two years of Obama's administration, the Republicans do nothing but block his policies at every turn. Obama gets a few things passed, but not enough, considering he controls both houses of Congress, and even those bills are watered down thanks to Republican resistance. Now, with Republicans gaining seats at the midterm elections, the Republicans have avowed to block everything the Democrats attempt to pass until the next election. One can only hope that voters see this as detrimental to the functioning of the U.S. government, and a failure to cooperate a betrayal of their duties as legislators.

Sadly, the ancillary strategy of Republicans is to make intelligent voters so disgusted by the dysfunctional federal government that they disassociate from politics altogether; which, allows the so-called "grassroots", FoxNews-mob-inspired crowd to takeover. It's up to the rest of us not to let that happen.

Hornets Love

2008-04-14T12:08:00.001-05:00

For anyone who's noticed the darth of posts here, it's largely because Sarah and I have been investing all our spare time in our newfound appreciation for the NBA's New Orleans Hornets. This includes, among other things, keeping up with our new blog at HornetsHype.com.. Check us out there!

The Republicans Are Smarter Than Everyone

2008-03-10T11:37:00.004-05:00

Anyone ever play that card game "bullshit," which is based on bluffing and posturing more than the cards in your hands? Well, I call "bullshit" on the Republicans. Although, I think I'm the only one doing so. When the Republicans took control of Congress in 1996 with their hugely successful "Contract With America" pledge, they did so for the first time in decades. At a point where trust with politicians was at low ebb, they made the unusual move of promising a comprehensive plan of legislation, accompanied by the threat that if they didn't do what they said, they would expect to be elected out of office. This kind of accountability was something America ate up and won them Congress during the term of an enduringly popular President Clinton and a thriving economy. The strategy was wide-spread among the party and novel in its sweeping effect, not to mention its overwhelming success.

Well I say the Republicans are at it again, pioneering election strategy in new ways. Whatever back-room party deals were made, it was clear that the GOP machinery was behind George Bush in the 2000 election. To try and gain an edge, to differentiate himself, John McCain declared himself a maverick, an anti-establishment guy. It didn't work. Or did it? Sure, he lost the GOP nomination then. Or did he? Maybe he was never meant to win. Maybe what he did was part of a long term strategy. What I am suggesting is that the GOP is attempting multi-campaign strategems, not content to plan each election on its own.

Look at McCain's voting record. Almost every vote during Bush's two terms McCain has voted lock-step with his party. Is that the record of a maverick? The only waves he made was in fighting the torture capacities of the U.S. a year or so back. Oh sure he stood up to Bush, he made a big push in the media. But the end "compromise" with the White House was that the U.S. could do what it wanted if national security was endangered. I paraphrase, but not much. Look it up. It made me sick to read the final wording. Incidentally, Bush just vetoed a recent attempt to make waterboarding illegal. I haven't seen McCain call him out for that. Any way, so McCain "loses" the GOP election, but with just enough efficacy that he is thought to be a future contender for the spot.

Now, in 2007-08, he runs again, but everyone counts him out. But then Rudy runs his campaign into the ground. Mitt the Mormon and converted conservative never stood a chance. To either, McCain still looks the favorite, so the GOP pretends its desperate and adds Fred Thompson as they so-called "true conservative," but then throws him in too late to make a difference and had him stumble left and right. Well done, Mr. Thompson. Well acted. Against any of these, McCain still looks conservative. So what do you do? Throw in Huckabee. Note: only against a former preacher does McCain no longer look conservative. And then conservative pundits rip McCain for not being conservative when he jumps out to a lead. Because that is how he is made to look. It is a chosen representation more than any indication of truth. Why does Huckabee stay in the race when it is clear he will lose? Because he needs to point out how not conservative McCain allegedly is. (And incidentally, he lays the groundwork for a future run if he or the party so think it is advisable).

All in all, the point is this. The GOP sees that their strategy over the last eight years has alienated many people, because in reality it has benefited so few. They realized the Demos will be poised to strike at the presidency. So they need to have a maverick ready, a rebel ready, who is just liberal enough to swing some moderate viewers, while the GOP faithful vote for whomever because that is what they do, just as loyal liberals will do the same with their candidate. And so the conservative pundits continue to complain, and some moderates and liberals may even think they don't want McCain but of course they do because either Clinton or Obama are insanely liberal in their eyes. Will it work? Who knows. I hope not.

But I for one, am calling "bullshit." McCain you are no fake conservative. You are exactly what conservatives want. You will cut back taxes and regulations on big corporations. You will mire us in years more of war. Both serving to give away our country's future to foreign banks as we build the national debt. At the same time, a President McCain would almost certainly ignore millions of Americans who suffer without health insurance or good jobs, and imperil all our civil rights by appointing conservative idealogues to the Supreme Court. I for one, have had enough of that type of leadership. Bush, McCain, it's all the same.

America, vote how you will. But don't be fooled.

Democrats & Representation

2008-03-06T19:46:00.002-06:00

It has become clear to me in the last few months that biases we think we hold we don't and those we say we don't have we do. In watching Senators Clinton and Obama fight for the Democratic nomination, from both the response of popular media and general population alike, it is clear how much racism is really classism. No one's afraid of a black man in a suit, but people are threatened by a woman in charge. Having a random woman in the boardroom or Congress is an aberation, a token acquiescence. However, it is clear in how the two are treated that in today's America we still feel female agency as a threat to the status quo more than a black man in power, because after all, a black man's still a man.

How many times have you heard someone (in conversation or online, not the media) call Clinton a "bitch?" It's there. Funny. I haven't heard that Obama's a "nigger." Nor have I heard he's a "dick" or "asshole" or any of the other things you might call a black man or just a man. It's ironic. Clinton is more the stereotypical man of the two: tough, stubborn, and determined. While Obama plays it out like he is building bridges and listening, the empath: a typically feminine archetype. Yet if we look back at Clinton's history she has always been a multiculturalist, one willing to listen and hear and respect others, and make changes based on results. In fact, these traits were largely what made the Right hate her in the first place. I dare say her tougher side is to win over the moderates who might still flinch at another staunch Republican or those who try to portray Democrats at large as weak.

Yet Obama has become the darling favorite, despite no experience at the national level. He plays it as a bonus. An attribute to be lauded. He claims incorruptability. Yet even if he was--which I severely doubt--he would not make any laws as president. Congress does that. So he still has to "change" all of them too. I'd rather a president who understands how government works and understands its strengths and weaknesess and will look to better it from that standpoint. Personally, I don't care if that person is a woman. And neither should the rest of America.

Prosecutions and Immunities

2008-01-10T10:14:00.000-06:00

Who the powers that be go after in this country and how the media portrays it baffles me. Today's A-12 second headline is "Immunity is sought in CIA tapes probe." That's all we hear about, albeit quietly. Immunity for Blackwater "security guards" (a.k.a. mercenaries). Immunity for Bush for arranging illegal wiretaps. Yet the front pages are about Barry Bonds maybe or maybe not lying about steriod use. (And for those of you that think that is important, look at how many pitchers have been busted and look up when steroids actually became against the rules of professional baseball.) All I'm saying, is everytime some semi-important story like Bonds is put up, make sure you look and see what is underneath.

For example, as now the country goes apeshit on Roger Clemons and his possible steroid use, the White House is again building up its case for war on Iran. Although not quite the same, consider how many months of coverage did football superstar, Michael Vick's,dog fighting prosecution get? I'm not saying he was right (because he wasn't), but at the same time we continue to ignore calls to prosecute anyone involved in going to war with Iraq, despite the fact that our reasons for going in were erroneous and likely an outright lie. Or how come nobody has been prosecuted for leaking a CIA agent's name (Valerie Plume)? The closest thing was a conviction for lying about leaking it, and that person's sentence was commuted!

We already know that this White House administration is one of the most secretive ever. What makes things worse, is that the few things that do leak out, they cover with bullshit side stories and the media gets sucked right in.

Writing Again

2008-01-03T13:17:00.000-06:00

In the midst of a job search, I've realized the hard way that while such a thing can be time consuming, it does not involve 40 hours a week. So instead of burying myself in books, movies, and video games, I've decided to do some more writing. I recently completed one short story and submitted it; another requires one more draft (that is on hold because my computer broke...long story...). Both are urban fantasy.

I am also working on one of my abandoned novels. It is short. It is satirical. It is a madcap look at Americana and God. We'll see if it works. The first draft of one of my chapter can be found here

Language Tridaux

2007-10-07T09:48:00.000-05:00

Of course, "Tridaux" is not a real word, but it doesn't matter anymore. Language is out of control. I wanted to watch something making breakfast in the kitchen, and so turned on the news. They were talking about "torture." And how the U.S. put out a position paper saying they do "not torture" people. Then months later a memo was circulating condoning several "interrogation methods" that were "not torture," like exposing prisoners to physical violence, psychological violence, and several methods that the global community generally consider "torture." And then the news (Fox) channel proceeded to not even talk about torture but "special interrogation methods" and when which was appropriate. Was it fair if there was a "ticking time bomb" situation?

Listen: torture, is torture, is torture, is torture. It is never an accepted policy. Never. First of all, it is unreliable. All you big patriots out there consider that. People will say anything under torture. I.e. Iraq has weapons of mass destruction. Lots of our intelligence about Iraq was wrong. Why? Oh, prisoners overstated things. They had inflated egos. Or maybe they were tortured and said anything they could think of to make it stop. Listen, if you are a ground agent recognizing that impending disaster is there, might you desperately make the wrong choice for the right reasons? I can see it. I would probably even forgive it. But if people cannot see the difference between that and a blanket-pardon for any U.S. citizen doing what the rest of the world considers not just illegal, but immoral, then you need to think about it some more.

Language Redux

2007-10-03T22:16:00.000-05:00

Again, this country has been hornswaggled by the power of language. And the biggest sucker of them all? The media. In the so-called effort to maintain "detached journalism" or "objective reporting" the media has been tricked into using the language of those who are smart enough to know that language controls meaning. What recently reinvigorated my loathing of our current administration and their continual attempt to control public perception is the Blackwater affair in Iraq.

Blackwater is an "independent security contractor." What the fuck does that mean? Come on, think about it. People that are paid to fight in a war? They are not "contractors." They are not a "private security firm." They are called "mercenaries." I'm sorry people, they are mercenaries. Use the right term. But this is nothing new. When the beginning is smoke and mirrors the perpetuation is too. Listen, how many times have you heard "The War on Terror" or "The War in Afghanistan" or "The War in Iraq?" Funny. Only Congress has the power to declare war. Yet Congress has NOT declared war. They authorized the use of force. There is difference. Therefore, there is no "war" in the legal sense. And do you want to know why? If there is a war, there are prisoners of war. If there are prisoners of war, the Geneva Conventions (to which the U.S. is a party) apply and we must respect these prisoners. But we want to torture them for information. But wait, maybe they are criminals and deserve constitutional rights. No. They can't be criminals, because we have no jurisidiction to arrest people out of our country. So thus we invented the "enemy combatant" classification. Yet it was an unconstitutional declaration. The president has no such power to invent such a classification. So before he could be sued, the Republican Congress, as a parting present to the President after being voted out of power, made legal this classifcation after the fact.

But then the "war" which wasn't really a war was declared won years ago when Bush made his triumphant speech before the "Mission Accomplished" banner (and "mission accomplished" is significant because it didn't say victory because there was no war) and we were winners. But then it became obvious the fighting wasn't done and so we had to pretend again we were at war. And at that time, the White House said, we're just "keeping the peace" (a nonsensical term in itself) and if there was "civil war" we're out of there, because we don't want to interfere in such internal disputes (another ridiculous idea considering our involvement there). No, the administration said, we don't want to interfere in that that kind of mess. But then everyone said there was a civil war in fact and then it was all about "insurgency." How convenient.

Is my point not obvious yet? They just keep changing the labels to hide the truth. George Carlin got it right when he compared "shellshock" to "post-traumatic syndrome disorder." The latter lacks the brutal punch of the former. And so the words change the perception. It waters down our outrage. Wake the fuck up America. You're being lied to every day by the words your own government chooses to use because these choice words change the meaning of the message they portend to portray. And the media, right or left, is complicit because they adopt the words verbatim as spoonfed by people who know better. So don't just listen when you hear or read or see the news. Think.

Fuck the Federal Government

2007-08-15T18:10:00.000-05:00

The federal government just allocated $354 million dollars to help New York City deal with traffic congestion. Yet houses remain unbuilt here in New Orleans, entire skyscrapers stand broken and empty, we're surrounded by roads that barely deserve the name, and the levees and waterpumps that protect the city are woefully undercapable. What the fuck is wrong with our federal government.

Do we have to start an armed revolution in this country to get people to understand? This is bullshit. Oh, and President Bush just vetoed a water bill that would have allocated $22 million to levee defense down here because it "cost too much." Bull shit.

More Lies About New Orleans

2007-07-12T12:02:00.000-05:00

Don't be fooled by the difference between unfiltered science and a legal rebuttal. After the catastrophe of Hurricane Katrina and the devastation of New Orleans the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers issued a report than unequivocally placed the fault of this destruction on the failure of the levees, which was declared to be the fault of the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers. Funny how the powers that be allowed this report to become public knowledge when it was believed that the federal government was immune from litigation stemming from the damage caused by their faulty work (sad as Louisiana tort law doesn't apply to the federal government, but the cornerstone our tort law is that "Every act whatever of man that causes damage to another obliges him by whose fault it happened to repair it ... Every person is responsible for the damage he occasions, not merely by his act, but by his negligence, his imprudence, or his want of skill." La. Civ. Code arts. 2315-16). However, the federal courts have altered this blanket exemption from such ordinary liability.

Clever lawyers, finding a loophole in liability, found a way to enable persons to sue the federal government for negligence that led to the failure of the levees. Basically, it involves not the work done on flood protection (levees themselves), which remains exempt from liability, but the work done on commercial waterways (canals) constructed for other purposes, which negligently weakened the city's flood protection. And it was the finding of this loophole, which I firmly believe led to the report issued yesterday.

Nowhere is there scientific honesty, but rather a politicized retraction, claiming that the levee failures could not be traced to any one agency or group, and rather should be allocated over fifty-odd years of decisions made by a variety of agencies and persons throughout city, state, and federal governments. Listen, this is no different than when I cut my head on a quick-swinging door at a Bruins hockey game after being kicked out (as a 29-year-old) for giving Sarah (a 24-year-old) a beer -- it's a long story, but trust me, true -- and Sarah wrote a letter complaining of their treatment of us. Her focus was on their service and treatment of out of state persons (especially Katrina refugees) and the Bruins' response was mainly to deny liability for me injuring my head. It wasn't a real response but a legal form letter already written to get the average ignorant person to drop the issue.

This current denial of responsibility is the same. And it honestly boggles me. It's our federal government spitting legalese instead of doing the right thing. They're acting like the cheating man from Eddie Murphy's Raw. The joke was that you could practically be caught cheating in your woman's bed, but as long as you denied, denied, denied, it would go away and she would forgive you. True or not, joke or not, the Bush administration is the same way. There's no problems, there's no problems, there's no problems. Look at something else!

Because of such actions, it is incumbent upon each of us as American citizens to call bullshit, bullshit, bullshit. Our federal government fucked up, they admitted it, so in all fairness they should make restitution. For a government willing to spend $12 billion a month (see recent news articles) on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, for a total of over half a trillion dollars, it is mind-boggling that they refuse to spend money to save a struggling American city. Any funds they do allocate are swept up in red tape and slowed by a mind-numbing skepticism that the money will be spent properly.

If only I could convince our president that Katrina was caused by a new form of Al Queda technology and that the struggles of New Orleans are proof that the fight for freedom is a lost cause unless the city is rebuilt, maybe then he'd do something. The sad thing is, maybe that's what it would take to get our own country to fix something that was their own fault. Or maybe a republic governor.

In closing, let me be clear. No naturally occurring hurricane destroyed New Orleans. Had the levees NOT broken, the city would have been all but fine. It was the levees breaking, i.e. human failure, that led to the massive destruction of New Orleans. Fight anyone that tells you otherwise. It's the truth. Remember it.

No Justice

2007-07-04T17:57:00.001-05:00

I really don't understand how "conservatives" can be calling for Bush to grant a full pardon to Scooter Libby. He was convicted of four felonies. Aren't these the same ones that are all for "three strikes" and you're away for life? Libby is now a four-striker, so shouldn't "conservatives" be calling for him to go away for life, instead of serving no jail time? Maybe this is why they believe he needs the full pardon, because otherwise, there is no justification for his sentence to be commuted; it is illogical -- but if the underlying crimes were absolved, then there truly is no need to go to jail. The whole thing is ridiculous and brings to mind a bunch of kids playing politics instead of house, where there is no real accountability or logic. For fuck's sake, Paris Hilton served over two weeks for driving on a suspended license. It wasn't like she was helping disclose secrets of national security or covering for those that did. And if these "conservatives" feel Libby's the unfairly treated scapegoat, how come they are not calling for the Justice Department to prosecute who was actually at fault?

All this entire situation does is continue to erode the credibility of the entire Republican regime. These are people who claim no laws apply to them and they can do whatever they want to secure "freedom and democracy" and even when caught look for ways to get out of it. I'm sorry. But those in the generation above me always wonder why my generation and younger are generally thoughtless, petulant, and assume no responsibility for our actions. But the answer should be obvious. It's because we have such poor role models. People who don't see the parellels aren't opening their eyes. It only takes common sense to see that the actions of those above us are our models for behavior, especially in a culture where we deride all other societies and mores and uphold our Ameritocracy as the pinacle of human civilization, blind to the limitations of this philosophy.

It has to stop. We need new leaders who are willing to be role models. Who will accept diversity and have integrity. One can hope.

I Learned Tonight St Lawrence Kids Cannot Drink

2007-07-01T03:45:00.001-05:00

So. I'm going to a wedding with my girlfriend in a month or so. It's for one of her friends from St. Lawrence. I learned last night that kids from St. Lawrence can't drink. We went to a friend's house, that Sarah works with, and ended up at some point in the night playing card games. The game was Asshole. For those of you not in the know, it's a simple game where you just have to play cards equal to or higher than the cards the person who played before you, or else you drink. As an extra perk, there is a heirachy, such that when you get rid of your cards first, you win. Everyone that goes out after you establishes a diminishing heirarchy, such that everyone who is "below you" you can tell to drink. It's fun. Only, apparently kids from St. Lawrence don't drink when told to.

Where I went to school, you learn there are consequences for every action you take. If you damage the person above you with your card play, you can expect the logical consequence of being made to drink as punishment. However, apparently, this is a foreign concept to the St. Lawrence kids. They just "play nice." They're just "having fun." No need to punish anyone. Where I grew up it was hardcore. If you harmed those above you you paid a price. You were smart to take a pass when your card play could screw those above you, and save your cards for later, because that loyalty would be rewarded later. Although I usually reserve this blog for higher concepts, I was sufficiently offended by the precepts of another's experience that I felt compelled to share in tribute to everyone with whom I went to college, so many years ago, if only to say that we stuck it out where others did not.

One can only rage against the machine for so many hours a day. At some point you just have to kick back and have fun. To just cut loose. Only it appears different people have different tolerances to what they will or will not do for that fun. So to those from Newing Hall, Binghamton University, know you did it right.

Cockfighting

2007-06-28T17:32:00.000-05:00

Whether people out of Louisiana realize it or not, one of the yearly legislative efforts is to finally ban cockfighting, as has been done in most other states. I mean to keep blogging about this, because I feel the whole media emphasis is wrong. Most of the complaints come from animal rights groups. They say it's cruel to the cocks. The defenders say it's part of a culture that mainstream America just doesn't get. I think everyone reading these articles is completely missing the point.

The moral quandary should have nothing to do with the birds. It's about us. I think if we stopped and asked the roosters, they would probably say they'd rather train to fight and kill and die in battle rather than be bred on farms to make chicken nuggets. Think about, they die no matter what. Maybe one's more more cruel. Maybe not. At least they die with pride in the ring. No, I'm worried about us. About what it says about our culture (our as in human, because these things happen in other states too) that we want to watch animals fight each other and die.

And also, this is not just about America. The interest in various ultimate fighting and extreme fighting and mixed styles fighting is growing worldwide. Are we so cultured to promote violence that this is our best entertainment? An old friend of mine said that he had studied with a professor teaching "psychohistory" I think it was called. His whole thesis was that you could tell everything you needed to know about a culture through its popular culture as a reflection of that culture's character.

I worry for all of us.

The Nightwatchman

2007-06-20T10:12:00.000-05:00

Last night Sarah and I caught The Nightwatchman at the House of Blue's Parish Room in the French Quarter. That is, the folk-guitar solo act alter ego of Tom Morello, guitarist of Rage Against the Machine and more recently Audioslave. It was a fantastic show in many ways. The concept itself is great. Tom is not just a celebrity, but one who has used his success to benefit others, working hard to support the working class, civil liberties, and all who would be oppressed under any guise. At many of the protests and rallies he attended he realized that the songs sung were from the 60s and 70s, that there were no consciousness aware singable songs railing against the infinite varieties of social oppression that were so ubiquitous in those times. He wanted to change that. And perhaps the world a little. And so he wrote modern tales of political leftism, that dirty word in modern times, which conservatives have posed as a negative, rather than someone who is brave enough to fight for truth at any cost.

The Nightwatchman, as he calls himself now, was not only a great act musically, but the kind of person that inspires us all to be acts of change. And now I have one more album that I can listen to periodically and remind myself of my duty to make the world a better place. If not for myself, than for all those who are less fortunate than me. He reminds us that none of us have a right to complain about anything to which we have not actively struggled against.

What are the Real Morals and Questions in the Abortion Debate?

2007-05-13T17:37:00.000-05:00

Abortion rights activists are in trouble. Their terminology is failing. While they have successfully fended off the "anti-life" labels from their enemies, their own "pro-choice" label is becoming increasingly limited. First, there is the counter-attack on conservative forces, attempting to label "pro-lifers" as "anti-choice." This is a mistake. It exposes the weakness of the word choice. "Anti-choice" and "pro-choice" are bland. While the "right to choose" sounds nice, it does not link to a moral. The opposing side, for example, has a powerful tool in "pro-life." They have linked their political stand to a moral: saving a life. Now, who doesn't want to save lives? Too simple you say? In the end, yes. But most people don't get that far. For a world ruled by headlines, they have the advantage. The right to make choices in the end must be limited by the right to life. For example, we should all agree that murder is wrong. So, when can you rationalize taking a life? Do you see how the contextualization weakens the pro-abortion side?

There we go again. Word choice. "Pro-choicers" don't like the term "pro-abortion," as many may or may not be actually for it, but just for the right to choose: something often linked to the woman's right to make choices about her own body. This entire discourse is becoming increasingly complicated as we try to define those "choices" and link them to morality. Incest, rape? Most agree that the metnal trauma of the events are enough without daily reminders of that violence, and so allow abortion in those circumstances. Perhaps the potential mother is too young, too irresponsible, and wants to wait until she is ready. Many concur with that logic. And what if the child is shown through testing to be mentally retarded or deaf, or if it would suffer from some other genetic abnormaility? Some would say of course. Others, perhaps might feel that is too much power. Too much choice.

But it is exactly at this point that both labels become problematic. Some might feel one is "playing god" not only if they have the right to choose when they want a baby, but which one. Some feel as if that is perhaps "genetic selection" or "eugenics": both dirty words. But here also is where the "pro-life" label fails. Morals are never absolute-there are always gradations. The promise of life is not enough. For example, if a higher power came down to you and said, your child will suffer horrible physical deformities all his life, and be depressed every day, struggling to find a way to be happy, but fail: only to die by his own hand after decades of torment for him and his family who had to helplessly watch him suffer. Can you really say he would be better off alive than dead under the mere supposition that life is a value that is precious by its mere existance, irregardless of the quality of that life? Conversely, should a 12-year old mother want to abort her incest caused pregnancy, but was told that the child would be happy always, and make the mother the more happy, and would do something great someday, don't you think the "right to choose" would be modified by the quality of the life? Of course the facts make both situations different.

So what "pro-choicers" must do is two-fold. They must A) tie their beliefs to a moral framework; and B) expose the short-comings of the absolute value placed on life. If they do not: they risk the quality of life for us all. Natural selection has been short-circuited by modern medicine and affluence. We can heal some and keep others alive when they provide no value to their society. It is for these reasons it is imperative that selective abortion is not only allowed but exercised. We have no natural way of weeding out flawed genetics and no capacity to fix such extant defects: therefore, we must as a species find the value in strong genetics and be willing to allow parents the right to ensure their children have every opportunity to live their lives in health and happiness. To do any less, would be inhuman .

Hate is Hate is Hate is Hate and Why are the Preachers the Last to Get It?

2007-05-04T08:12:00.000-05:00

The House of Representatives yesterday passed legislation extending federal hate-crime legislation to include attacks resulting from bias against gender, sexual orientation, gender identity and disability. This would expand the reach of a law that has existed since 1968, but has until now focused on race, color, religion, and national origin. In a political era fraught with scandals, and fixated on ill-conceived wars, it is fantastic to see a commitment by some politicians to protecting the ideals that this country was founded on. As House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said, "Hate crimes have no place in America, no place in a nation where we pledge every morning 'with liberty and justice for all.' We must act to end hate crimes and save lives." Bravo. Bravo.

But not everyone feels the same way. According to the Washington Post, "the House's staunchest conservatives wrote to Bush, saying the legislation federalizes crime enforcement and 'segregates people into different groups...then seeks to either reward or punish these different groups using different standards." This is absolutely non-sensical dribble. First of all, this law does no more to "federalize" law enforcement. Hate crimes have been illegal to some extent since the late 1960s. Also, note that they do not use any legal terms, such as "constitutional" in their complaint. This is because they full well know that section 5 of the 14th Amendment gave Congress sweeping powers to legislate just this kind of thing. Just who do these hypocrites think they are? Are not these the same politicians voting for the Patriot Act and its extension, the most sweeping form of federal law enforcement legislation this country has ever seen? Or in favor of President Bush being able to set up wiretaps on anyone, without even a warrant? Second, they think that this law "segregates" people into groups? I'm sorry, but this law does not tell whites and blacks to be separate groups or force gays and straights apart. America segregates itself just fine, thank you. Sadly, American culture has long identified itself by such distinctions. All this law does is stipulate that if a person hurts another person with a motivation based on these distinctions, the act is more heinous than otherwise, and should be punished accordingly. Thirdly, this extension of an already existing law does not treat groups by different standards. All it says is if you hate a gay person and hit them or kill them because of that bias, you will be subject to punishment above and beyond the penalty for hitting or killing someone. The same would apply to a gay person who hits or kills a straight person because they hate straights. The law applies equally to any person in any group, majority or minority, who acts in hatred to hurt a member of another group. These politicians, and their statements, make no sense once examined under a microscope.

But the story doesn't end there, as you knew it wouldn't. Conservative religious groups are also concerned, reports the Washington Post. They're afraid "the bill would make criminals of clergymen who speak out against homosexuality, then inadvertently inspire violence from misguided followers." Listen, laypeople of America: no priest wrote that statement. Not one. It was written by lawyers or public relations specialists with knowledge of the law. First, they are aware that inducing another to commit a crime can be a crime. Second, they use the word "inadvertent" to avoid any imputed intent to the priest. Lastly, they note that not only does the priest not intend harm to anyone, but if harm did actually result, the acting person was clearly "misguided." Bullshit. I can't say it enough times. Bullshit. What does anyone expect when they counsel that an entire segment of society is wrong? They know, and they're covering their ass. I don't know why they cling to this crap, but I can explain why they should know better.

Here's the simple logic. It's all heirarchical. Religious persons have long been concerned about war. If "thou shall not kill" is a key commandment from one's god, what does that mean for the soul of those drafted into wars? Thus Catholic Catechisms, among other sources, responded that as long as the war was just, and one was faithfully obeying one's duty to one's country, it was essentially all good. So, killing is okay if there's a good reason. I.e., millions of dead to stop a great evil like Adolf Hitler is acceptable. By analogy, abortion is murder. Thus some people believed they could attack or even kill abortion doctors to prevent thousands of murders. Seemed a fair trade-off. And now, you say gays are sinners by virtue of their "choice" to be gay. (As if with all the prejudice and difficulties that come with being gay, it's somehow a "choice." They're called genes. Some people are just born that way. As one character says in the movie, "Chasing Amy," "it just feels right." Whether straight or gay, or somewhere in between, people just do what their own biology dictates. For the same reason that humans are attracted to other humans, rather than say, dogs, we are each attracted to certain sexes, man or woman, despite what our own sex is.) But the use of the term "choice" is just a way to get around knowing that people would not hate gays if they were born that way. I recommend segments of George Lakoff's, a Berkeley cognitive linguist, book Moral Politics for more on this choice of words used by religious groups. Yet when these religious groups indicate to their congregation that an entire segment of society doesn't have a right to exist, they cannot honestly expect some not to act on those words-especially with the weight given to words of the clergy by the faithful. They have to know. Especially after the issues with abortion doctors, these religious groups have to know. So in the end, this resistance to hate-crime legislation is no different that the priestly sexual abuse scandals. Sweep up culpability under the rug, cover your own ass, and most importantly, protect your money. But they of all people, should know that hate is hate is hate. But money changes quite a lot.

One of the most successful anti-hate groups in America is the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC). They not only fight for civil rights, but pursue aggressors in civil lawsuits. For example, when the Ku Klux Klan killed a black man, the SPLC helped the man's family file a wrongful death suit not only against the men convicted in criminal court of his murder, but of the Klan itself. They ended up confiscating the group's regional headquarters as part of the settlement. This is how to fight hate today. Bankrupt the haters. Because if a person is convicted "beyond a reasonable doubt" in criminal court, it is an almost automatic civil suit victory for wrongful death, where the burden of proof is the lesser "preponderance of the evidence." So if someone's church tells them that gays are evil, and that person kills a gay person, I say attach a civil suit not only to the person, but the church. While society may have a special respect for the clergy in this country that might deem this improper, I say the hell with that. No one feels sorry when the Catholic Church forks over millions because they hid the fact that some dozens of priests molested hundreds of kids. Same thing here. If you preach hate, you SHOULD be held liable, no matter who you are. And certainly, plenty of hard working Americans, who barely scrape by, might be surprised to learn that the churches who solicit their donations every week from the pew, have invested that money to make billions. Not each individual church, of course, but when sectarian groups put together their funds, it's a dirty little secret of money economics. Any major religious group has significant bankrolls. And they don't even have to pay taxes on it like you and I.

But even beyond the money, who are these preachers anyway, and what Bible do they read? Even if you were ignorant enough to believe gayness a sin, wouldn't Jesus be living with them, not hurling stones at them? Didn't he hang out with thieves and prostitutes and counsel mercy for all? And guess what, those are professions: things about which people have choices. There can be nothing wrong with-and indeed can only be called alignment with one's nature (as opposed to foolish claims of the opposite)-being who you were born to be. Gay people forced to pretend they're not who they are suffer a hell on earth as it is. Let's just let them be who they are and find happiness. Aren't they promised at least the pursuit of that? Oh yeah, and they deserve life and liberty too. So let's punish those who would take away any of those rights: life, liberty, or the pursuit of happiness. What else could be more American?

So the moral of this post is that hate has no place in America. Call your senator and convince them to pass this bill in the Senate. And then write the White House and tell them that a lame duck president with twenty-some percent approval has no right to stand in the way of a Congress with the mandate of the people in general, let alone stand in the way of making hate-crimes illegal.

Too Smart?

2007-05-02T09:10:00.000-05:00

Plenty of people are upset at the current state of this country. In one sense, that's no surprise. People always complain. But in another sense, it seems heightened now. The Bush administration's approval rating has dropped into the high-twenties, an all time low. A lot of smart people I know constantly ask how so many people could be "so stupid" to fall for the tactics of this administration.

However, more and more, I feel the opposite is the problem. It's not that there are a lot of dumb people out there, too dim to notice the perspicuous manipulations of a devious regime. No. I'm starting more and more to think that there are too many smart people out there, controlling perception, managing spin, and manipulating representations in order to establish what the rest of us call reality. Our country is built on laws. But inherent to American culture is that whatever you can get away with to succeed is okay. Therefore, even moreso, whatever you can get away with legally to succeed is okay.

Just because something is not illegal does not make it right. Maybe insurance lawyers can find a loophole to tell someone that the insurance policy they've paid for twenty years doesn't cover their damage; maybe pharmaceutical companies can pay for pretty ads to make people ask their doctors for drugs they don't need; and maybe selling guns to Third World countries fills the coffers of this and other countries: but maybe none of those things are right.

No. We definitely have too many people keeping us busy with a surfeit of information, anesthetizing television, and sense numbing video games: while I have no objection to the content of any of these things, the problem that is it all functions to keep our attention off the things that matter. No matter one's education, every person has an instinct for what is right and wrong. But we only can care about it if we know about it. So no. Education is not the problem. How we use our educations is the problem. It's a moral problem. A matter of ethics. Choose the word you like. But something in our culture fosters those that can live without it. And that's a problem with which we all are being force to live.

Carhart and Abortion

2007-04-20T12:13:00.000-05:00

In the just handed down U.S. Supreme Court case of Carhart, the court upheld the ban on the so-called "partial-birth abortions" (see my earlier posts for refutation of that very label). This is a not-so-subtle battle in the outright war on the right of abortion. Do not be fooled that this only about one procedure. It's just one more step for these people to eradicate this right altogether.

Sadly, this is one more result that falls directly at the feet of each pro-Bush voter in 2004. I tried to warn people that the presidential nominees were irrelevant to the long-term civil rights of this country, but the ability to name Supreme Court justices would last for decades. Bush's two right-wing appointees, Roberts and Alito, both voted with the 5-4 majority (and based on her voting record, the departed O'Connor likely would have sided with the minority). A majority, who according to Justice Ginsburg's dissenting opinion, offered "flimsy and transparent justifications" for upholding the ban. This is not the first 5-4 decision that these Roberts and Alito have swung.

While I understand the viewpoint of religious conservatives, who believe abortion is murder, and thus must be stopped at all costs, they need to understand the viewpoint of persons with different religious beliefs. What is obvious to them is just spin to me. "Partial-birth abortion" was and is called "DX." What some see as a "baby" others see as a "fetus," and yet others see as a mere collection of cells: what the Roe court called a "potential life." Those that have the ability to think for themselves have the right NOT to see this as murder, but as the control of possibilities.

That is, there is the problem that abortion isn't just abortion, it's about fitting women into historical gender roles. That they should be mothers, life-givers, servants. Right. That thinking should be dead. Women have proved more than capable to do anything men can. As such, they should be given the right to choose how to use that possibility by controlling what happens to their bodies. It's impossible not to see abortion as a piece of that male-dominated cultural hegemony.

Moreover, this attitude is emblematic of male attempts not only to control women, but to control women's sexuality. There is the concept that women themselves are at fault for having sex. Right. I've yet to see any serious attack on men at that level. Several years back, there was a big outrage against "teen premarital sex." A major magazine inquired to many of these conservative figures (Republican and Democrat) to comment on "adult premarital sex." None would. So if you don't want to ban all sex, what are you doing? Trying to use it as a method of control, as an apparatus of power.

Sex is what it is. Use it as you will. Don't let anyone judge you for it. And don't let it dictate your possibility. Man or woman. And be wary of any sideways attack on the right to have an abortion, no matter how inconsequential or tangental to that right it may seem.

Short Stories Updates

2007-03-29T16:07:00.000-05:00

A large component of my fiction writing is playing with "what ifs." I find creating an event or alternate existence that pushes the boundaries of accepted science gives me a unique opportunity it explore different morals. This is what has always drawn me to fantasy, horror, and science fiction. I like asking "what if" you were a vampire? What moral code would you subscribe to? Wouldn't it have to be different than those of humans.? And if so, doesn't that prove morals are relative? It must. It is that conclusion and its effects that I want to explore; I think doing so forces us to re-examine our own surroundings.

In my writing, I've played with time travel, what the modern-day return of Christ would be like, and various takes on myths (from voodoo to lycantropy to druidism to magic). I feel that when you go to these places and look at these people's lives, they force you to ask strange questions that hopefully result in arriving at answers that can translate to our lives in the "real world."

Maybe it's all window dressing. People are certainly more fascinated by a modern magician asking what his purpose is on earth rather than a construction worker doing the same. But maybe also that's our fault as bad writers. Yet it's not just that; it's about wonder, too. About the dreaming we had as children when we believed that anything was possible. Today, we only say such things are impossible. I for one think that's sad. At the very least, I want to wonder what if.

Which brings me to the actual updates. I have three stories currently in production. I just finished a new story about a lycanthrope (very raw, but my first authentically set in New Orleans story). I also have a story about a wizard in modern times that I adapted from a past story in a universe not my own (once fan fiction-and no, not Harry Potter, it's much darker). That one I feel might be the most polished already, but I'm waiting for Sarah's feedback. The third story I've spent the most time on recently, is about what I call an Immortal. In many ways, they are vampires, but I have modified the myths enough that they certainly disdain that term. However, those readers needing some set of classification would find that's the closest match. It's not that I'm pretending to have created something truly original, I'm just playing with myths and picking and choosing and changing what I will. It's the characters who'd be offended, not me.

Unfortunately, I feel as if I'm struggling with the story, tentatively titled "Immortal Twilight" (which is about my fifth dumb title-I'm not so worried about nailing that right now, though). It takes a new Immortal from one of my unpublished novels and picks up where the novel left off. He has only recently come into his Immortality, he is unexpectedly flush with power, and is struggling to find out who he is. It deals with the consequences of one of his worst actions in the novel, and explores his inability to control his raw emotions, all over a cynical view that human existence is a series of fabrications to soothe the weak mind. I like the concepts, but the writing is giving me trouble. I've given it several heavy edits, and it doesn't feel good yet.

I hope the fact that I continue on is a good sign. However, I fear that maybe if I was a better writer, I would have nailed it out of the gate more. It's not that I mind editing. As a former editor in chief of a journal, I'm used to it, and actually am cool with it. It's just hard to have three stories at the beginning of the work. I wish I had something great at the end of the process so I could see where I'm heading. ~~Ah well, time will tell.~~ [Sorry, that was so cliche, damn my foolish brain...]

New Orleans Traffic Laws

2007-03-13T11:16:00.000-05:00

There's no way around it. New Orleans drivers are horrible. By contrast, Rochester Drivers are generally skilled and knowledgeable; Pennsylvania drivers are slow; San Francisco drivers are cautious; and Boston drivers, while usually fast and borderline reckless, are at the same time very skilled. I love living in New Orleans, but it's drivers are ridiculous. I speculate this is why my insurance rates were jacked once I moved here (and apparently it is mostly Orleans Parish [counties for the other 49 states], because Jefferson Parish apparently has much lower rates). So I thought for years perhaps this was a result of some bizarre traffic laws here in Louisiana, as if the Napoleonic Code had somehow influenced driving, like horse carriage traffic law was more bizarre in France than in England.

Not so. In researching traffic laws in preparation of defending my girlfriend in court, I realized New Orleans has pretty much the same rules as anywhere. Use a turn signal within 100 feet of an upcoming turn. When turning left, stay close to the median line; when turning right stay close to the right lane line. These are the big ones. No one here uses a turning signal and people routinely swing the opposite direction before making their turns, as if they were about to cut down on an inclined Indy track or were trying to clear the rig of an eighteen-wheeler. Right

New Orleans, I love you. New Orleans drivers, you have no clue what the traffic rules are and you suck. Maybe they don't have a written test here to get a license. Maybe they just put you in a car with an instructor and tell you not to hit anything. And based on my insurance rates and the amount of times they keep replacing traffic light poles and control boxes, I'd say many can't even do that.

The Buck Stops Where?

2007-03-12T12:30:00.000-05:00

For almost as long as the Iraq Civil War raged post-invasion, critics have called for (now former-) Defense Secretary of State's resignation. Ultimately, it came. "Scooter" Libby was just convicted for lying about the revelation of a CIA operative's identity. The White House blamed the CIA for "intelligence failures" regarding the status of Iraq pre-invasion, yet when one puts together all the information available it is quite clear that they knew this going into the matter. The NSA has got into trouble over its warrantless wiretapping, and now, FBI surveillance has been found to have transgressed the already broad powers provided by the Patriot Act. Then, of course, there is the flap over the federal prosecutors fired for not persecuting democrats. (And don't get me started on how this affected my Congressperson, William Jefferson.)

So when is America going to ask who's responsible? Are all these high-level secretaries and chiefs of staff just rogue agents, acting alone? Or is it an orchestrated theater of deception and misuse of power? Personally, I see a pattern, and it doesn't take a genius to see it. When Democrats stormed back to control of both houses of Congress, Republicans first response was well, you better not use this as a bogus political haymaker to impeach Bush. Why not? Clinton lied about where he put his penis-an act that physically hurt no one and emotionally hurt only a few-and his credibility was so under attack that he was impeached and almost forced from office. Bush's lies (yes multiple) put this country into an unnecessary war, killing thousands of Americans and tens of thousands of Iraqis, created civil war in a country where order had once ruled (albeit not the best kind of order, but most likely more importantly here an order that was opposed to American goals). Now the whole Middle East is destabilized while the U.S. reels from a series of high level political scandals, and economic fraternizing that led to commercial favoritism over results, which left America with problems like substandard construction in military projects overseas (to aid companies friendly to the White House) and amazingly poor health care for those men and women who have sacrificed in those same places (e.g., the Walter Read situation).

So when do we ask where the Buck stops? And when do we decide that where a man or woman puts their private parts and who they decide to share such experiences with, are much less important than waging wars on other countries and affecting the outcomes of real people's lives just to make a few bucks on the side, to make a friend happy (so he can make the money), or even through misguided good intentions? Even if wholeheartedly done to better America and the world, when do the rest of us get to say, you've gone to far and betrayed everything you were trying to protect?

I say now.

Short Story Restart

2007-03-07T15:32:00.000-06:00

My first legal employer, Joe, looked at my resume the day he hired me and noted that I was an English major. Somehow he knew I wanted to be a writer. Just like maybe he wanted to be a rock star. He said if I wanted to do this law gig that I'd have to give up that dream. It was easy for me to agree. I'd already come to that realization when I made the decision to go to law school.

Yet now I'm not sure he or I were right. Most published authors become who they are while doing something else. And though creative purists may cringe, I have become a better writer through my law school experience. When I was younger, I eschewed all rules in the name of unbridled creativity; I bristled at any semblance of order or structure as conformity. Yet I needed some of those rules and structures to clean up my writing. Also, I am now looking forward to my third non-fiction article publication. That will help. Moreover, I now am dating a terrifically talented writer who is well ahead of me in the getting published endeavors.

So turning my back on my all or nothing strategy of trying to get my novels published (as it was "nothing"), I'm looking back at short stories and trying to figure out how to make them work. It is the "traditional" way to go, and sometimes that's just how you have to do it. So far I've made good progress on two stories and am now working on a third. I'm waiting for Sarah to look over the first two for an outside perspective.

More to follow.

Post-Katrina Update

2007-02-23T14:27:00.000-06:00

I was going to give a post-Katrina update for all those of you not in New Orleans right now, but it just so happens, Sarah beat me to the punch. She nailed it. See her Still Life With Soup Can blog.

Rote Wonder

2007-01-26T10:50:00.000-06:00

A problem in our country is that we feel rote education is the only model that works until college, which unfortunately is not even mandatory. This results in two very different problems: the lack of critical thinking capacity and the loss of wonder.

Under the first, we have too many people who aren't trained to critically think. Not enough people think about what they hear, read, or see and instead just accept it as truth, when more often than not it's just a version of the truth, and in some instances, an outright lie. The differences which may seem like minutia might actually foster end results miles away. Not enough people stop and ask "really?" Or more importantly "why?" Because sometimes, when we ask why, the answers we're originally given just don't make sense.

Second, children are the only ones left that have wonder in today's society. They're the only ones that believe in the unbelievable. Part of this is the emphasis on science. I don't think science is bad, only finite. It emphasis on understanding everything is laudable, but at the same time limiting. Who's not to say that faith healing doesn't work, that magic doesn't exist, or that there might even be those who can change back and forth between human and animal form? If there were ways to quantify and understand these things, there would probably be scientific models that would explain them. And maybe that in itself would kill the wonder. But I think what I'm trying to say is that science seems to foreclose the possibility of all it can't explain. And so as a society we build walls around ourselves, saying that isn't possible, or that can't be true. But shouldn't we all wonder?

Why Some Laws Are Wrong

2007-01-25T10:34:00.000-06:00

Personal lives of people should be just that. Personal. The state has no business regulating sex in any way other than to prevent forced encounters and to protect children from adults who know better. The reason why this country will eventually fester and explode, like Rome before it, is because America refuses to evolve. Its people stagnate with an apalling apathy. No one is innocent. Politicians and public alike don't care.

We want to win wars, as long as our lives aren't impacted and all our sons and daughters return. We want everyone to be "normal," and we vigorously fight to keep America this way, pretending no one gets hurt in the process. And we never stop to question why people are in jail, instead content to put them away for years at a time, simply because then we don't have to deal with that person, all the while ignoring that the same causes that put that person in that situation will put another person in that same situation, leading to the same result.

And so it is, because our courts refuse to strike down laws that are not actively enforced, that we still have laws governing who can do what with their personal lives. What, in particular, has raised my ire, is the fact that the state of Georgia feels justified in mercilessly prosecuting a promising young man, aged 17, for having oral sex with a 15-year-old, in a situation where everyone agrees she was the instigator. Read the full story here.
This young man, who was a 3.2 gpa student, an athletic success, and homecoming king, was put away for 10 years without a possibility of parole. We say today that girl was too young to consent. Bullshit. Girls were married before then in those "good ole days" that laws like these are meant to preserve. It's an illusion of morality wrapped in righteousness that is grating on this country.

But that' s right. We have a war going on. We have gays getting married y'all. And, gasp, illegal immigrants. As if we don't have enough people to get concerned about anything else. It's all smoke and mirrors and people make deals out of a lot of things, because at the end of the day people just want to feel okay about themselves and they don't care at what expense it costs others. It's depressing.

New Orleans

2006-12-28T14:40:00.000-06:00

It's hard to go through the holidays and explain to people how New Orleans is. We want the tourists and conventioneers back. So we want to say "great!" And indeed, this infrastructure is sound; the French Quarter, Marigny, Garden District, and Uptown are all thriving. But so much of the city is still a devastatated wasteland and there is a responsibility to say so. There is nothing in some places. It's like block after block after block after block of Ground Zero in New York City. How do these people endure? Where are they?

It makes me so sad to think about. There are so many people without homes or jobs. And it makes me feel so powerless because our governement is doing nothing about it. And then people have the nerve to ask why New Orleans should be rebuilt. It's like asking why your mother should get a pacemaker when her heart fails. Because you love her and you'd do anything to protect her.

Why Bad Things Matter

2006-12-14T14:52:00.000-06:00

I have a strong memory. Although it is nowhere near as powerful as someone who has a "photographic memory," it is visual, and I can replay moments in my head from events past, or sometimes even remember facts not because I remember the fact but the image of seeing the text in the book. This comes in useful. Although, on occasions, it is painful. When the appropriate mental triggers arise, I replay bad moments as much as the good, and with compulsive tendencies to repeat the images once recalled, this can be an unpleasant experience. Nonetheless, it matters to me because those bad decisions and stupid mistakes I've made are those that haunt me and make me want to be a better person. I'd like to thing those bad things are what actually do make me a better person, a better human.

This is why it always baffles me when others try to lie about the past. The recent "summit" in Iran is a horrible, but apt example, where once again people have tried to deny the Holocaust occurred. I don't care that it happened in the Middle East, or that this event was hosted by Muslims. Europeans and Americans were there, as were Christians and even Jews. Nor is it really relevant that the most common depiction of Holocaust victims were of the Jews, because many others suffered as well, including gypsies, communists, gays, and others. The point is not that one or another group was targeted, but that they could be targeted. The point is this: the Holocaust is the absolute low point in human existence; it should strive as that one darkest moment never to be forgotten by any human, lest we revert to the same tendencies that made that moment possible.

World War I was supposed to be "The War to End All Wars." It wasn't. World War II should have been. Instead, it turned out only to be the War to End Overt World Wars. Little, localized wars were still okay. This still means people don't get it. Trying to forget the Holocaust, though, is like saying Hiroshima was pro-Japanese propaganda, and that if India and Pakistan want to have a nuclear war over Kashmir, it won't be that big of a deal. That, of course, is ludicrous. History is important. The truth is important. World War II was that by-gone era when the Holocaust occurred. Those alive at that time, those who saw or lived through the Nazi death camps cannot forget; but they will soon be gone.

With their absence, it becomes incumbent upon all successive generations to outright condemn any attempts to claim this historical fact was anything but true. Freedom of Speech is one thing. Freedom to deny humanity's darkest moment is another. We none of us must forget how quickly evil can spread, how pervasive its reach can be, and how easy it disappears waiting to arise again in a new guise.

The Reality of New Orleans

2006-12-08T13:13:00.000-06:00

To those of you that continue not to understand the situation in New Orleans, I encourage you to read Bob Marshall's editorial in the 12-08-2006 edition of the Times Picayune, viewable at http://www.nola.com/. But even if you don't take the time to read the whole thing, check out this excerpt:

Here's an example that is typical. I have a friend who owned a $200,000 home in Lakeview. He had $14,000 left on his mortgage, and only $40,000 of flood insurance because it had never flooded. He might end up with $100,000 from Road Home. So he pays off his old mortgage and spends another $15,000 having his home torn down.

But the builder says it will cost $325,000 to rebuild the same size house. So, at 55, he will have a $250,000, 30-year mortgage. He may never be able to retire.

He's left in this situation after the richest nation in the world admitted it destroyed his home [referring to the U.S. Corps of Engineers, who have admitted the levee failures in New Orleans were not a result of the natural disaster itself, but for their negligence in building the levees] but refuses to pay for the damage. And he's lucky. There are many retired people who can't get the $300,000 mortgage to rebuild their homes destroyed by an agency of the government. They'll spend their remaining days in small FEMA trailers.

I wish more people knew stories like these. America spends more money rebuilding Afghanistan and Iraq than it does to fix one of its own cities. The reason Americans put up with this Administration's excessive privacy and civil rights violations and spendthrift spending is so that they can feel safe. Americans wants to be protected. But when given the opportunity to make things right because of its own failings, it has repeatedly failed to step up to the plate and do the right thing and help the people of New Orleans: inexplicably refusing to spend on this one project.

Consider this, if the U.S. Corps of Engineers were a private company, they would be subject to a 500,000-1,000,000 person class action lawsuit for approximately 100 billion dollars. Yet, they are not a private company. As a governemental entity, they are completely shielded from all liability. And when the people ask if the 10 billion thrown at New Orleans isn't enough, instead of nodding your head, ask if it is fair that the people of New Orleans pick up the slack on the other 90 billion of damage that was caused by the failure of the federal government.

Free Speech is Free Speech is Free Speech

2006-12-05T09:38:00.000-06:00

Free speech is free speech. Should I say it again? I read an article today about how us "free" Westerners are mad that Iran is censoring the internet to prevent against "Western Immorality." We hear similar goings-on in China, although we usually just label that as "Communist repression." I call bullshit.

Before Americans get too judgmental, let's remember that the general powers of American states are to look after the general welfare and the morals of the people. Indeed, the FCC is looking to fine CBS mega-bucks for its Super Bowl gaffe where Janet Jackson's breast was exposed for a milli-second. Sponsors dropped out and conservative advocates called for an immediate cancelling of The Shield, a show where a cop shot and killed another cop in the pilot. And most major networks on television and radio are legally prevented from using words like "shit," "fuck," or "cock." And even pay channels like Cinemax will only show "soft core" adult films.

Am I advocating that any of the above should be done? No. But neither am I advocating against them. All I'm saying is that our culture draws moral lines and tells others it cannot cross them. So what gives us the right to be indignant for other cultures doing the same thing just because they draw their lines in different places? It smacks of hypocrisy.

To be honest, I think disclosure is the answer. Take movies. They are given an age-appropriate rating and an explanation of why. That said, you can do whatever you want in a movie. Why not do the same with other venues? Restrict speech less and just put advance publication on the content level, so families can take it onto their own to enforce their chosen brand of morality, rather than have the state force one on us.

Rubric of the Righteous is a Recital of Fear-Spawned Vitriol

2006-12-02T11:09:00.000-06:00

The recently trounced before the American electorate Conservatives have hit an all-time low. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.) is set to become the first Muslim member of Congress next month. He has stated that he intends to be sworn in on the Quran, not the Bible. These same critics, led by the idiots at Townhall.com, took offense, writing that this "undermines American civilization," and that "America, Not Keith Ellison, decide[] what book a congressman takes his oath on." These critics also added that "If you are incapable of taking an oath on that book, don't serve in Congress."

What is it about diversity that threatens such Christians? Guess what, most of the world is NOT Christian. It is a fact of life. Therefore, it is just common sense that Christians have to respect other religions and other faiths, or even those that choose no faith. Otherwise, the only other road is that of the Nazis in World War II: isolation, hatred, and ultimately, extermination. Could it be the specific faith in question here? is it the association of Muslims with terrorists in contemporary times that terrifies some people? Those that understand Islam know it is not by nature a violent faith. Nor is Christianity. Yet horrible violence has been done over the millennia in the names of both. Thus, that is not a logical conclusion.

This fear is the same thing that makes some cling to the scientific farce known as "Intelligent Design," or insist that the 10 Commandments have more to do with the legal history of this country than the philosophy and law school educations of our Founding Fathers. And for all those who think those Founding Fathers were all Christian, well most were. But some, notably Jefferson, were outright hostile to organized religion. Nonetheless, they all knew full well of Jews and Muslims, and even the Hindus. And it was with all this in mind that they crafted the 1st Amendment to the Constitution, an integral part of the U.S. Bill of Rights, which guarantees the freedom of religion and that the state will be separated from religion, such that it endorses no one faith or even faith over non-faith. This is the basic principle of America's religious roots: freedom to pursue the dictates of each individual person's conscience, not a forced rote recitation of faith dictated from above.

Truth be told, the kind of blind obedience that some in the Religious Right would demand would more resemble the "Papist" mandates of the Catholic Church over which the Protestant Revolution was fought. The Founders of America engaged in an intellectual revolution, as well as a physical one, and were those that believed in an individual's right to choose one's one path in life. To insist otherwise, for example that an incoming congressperson must swear an allegiance to any religion, let alone a specific brand of faith, is just plain unamerican.

War or Occupation?

2006-11-12T14:38:00.000-06:00

Some people say words are only words. They couldn't be more wrong. Words imply meaning, which dictate the discourse, which by a basis of focusing the attention of the certain facts and not on others, controls both perception and analysis. I think the seeds for learning the truth about America's current "wars" were spoken by John Kerry, unwittingly, when in attempting to unseat President Bush in the 2004 election, referred to the situation in Iraq as needing to "win the peace." It seemed off and everyone knew it. But no one asked why it felt so wrong.

There is no such thing, in terms of military objectives, as "winning the peace." Peace indicates an end of war and the beginning of diplomacy. Yet diplomacy is not what is happening in Iraq, no, the U.S. has not gotten to that stage yet. The same could be said in Afghanistan. In both locations, Americans wonder, why can't we win these wars? Why haven't we won these wars? Wait a minute. Didn't we? Weren't both wars won within months of engaging thesse nations?

Yes. They were. President Bush declared the "Mission Accomplished" in both cases, and he was right. But then, of course, the fight against the "terrorists" had to continue. Or call them "insurgents," if you will. Both are disingenuous in this context. Listen. There is no war being fought in either location. In both Iraq and Afghanistan the war was won, but the occupations are failing.

What the United States should have learned in Vietnam, but failed to, was to recognize that there was no war being fought, but an occupation. And there lies the fundamental problem. The American public does not want to be party to supporting an occupational, imperial military regime. Also, the military objectives of "occupation" are in direct opposition to "bringing freedom and democracy" to a people. If we allow them freedom, they have the freedom to fight us; they have the freedom to move about and barter in weapons and bombs and to spread hate speech. WWII is often compared to this war. Yet, if this was WWI, we would be putting people in prison camps (where they would NOT be tortured), and bombing villages who resisted American rule. You cannot possibly hope to win the "hearts and minds" of people as an occupational power, you can only break their will to fight back.

This leaves us with two options: 1) the U.S. military is inept and in their arrogance fails to realize this truth; or 2) they full well know it and are trying to experiment with ways to actually win an occupation as "the nice guy." With the collective memories of Vietnam fading, they try again what failed so miserably then. In fact, they may be trying it twice at once, in two different countries. One with NATO power, one mostly with U.S. forces (perhaps one as a control group?.

I certainly do not know what the truth of U.S. military intentions are in either Afghanistan or Iraq. However, what I do know is that our media needs to wake up and stop eating the line they are being fed; the American people likewise need to think for themselves, instead of being l placated by the wrong words. And in this case, the words mean everything. Think about it. Is America really in two wars? Or is it bogged down trying to occupy two foreign nations, without using the resources or methods that are required to actually occupy a nation safely?

Is Our President For Real?

2006-10-20T20:52:00.000-05:00

Seriously. Is George W. Bush a real president? As part of America's new space policy, Bush has claimed the right of the U.S. to deny access to space to those who are hostile to U.S. interests. What? Are you serious? Does anyone think sometimes that the ridiculous Chapelle Show skit with Chapelle as "Black Bush" was maybe not even an exageration? I can hear it now. "Space bitches! That's right, you heard me. Space. It's not even the United States of America. It's the United States of Space." Wait was that the skit? What the hell? Who thinks anyone owns space?

There will always be conflict in this world if we persist in thinking of human existence in an us or them proposition. Why can't we just realize that we all have more in common than we do different? It's not the United States versus the terrorists. It's the world against the terrorists. No civilzed state endorses that kind of behavior. But that's not enough. Not for America. Here's global politics in a snapshot: asking the U.S. to share its sovereignty with the world is like asking the Yankees to decide whether there should be a salary cap in baseball. Don't hold your breath. Well, sorry, but here's your clue America: you will NEVER be 100% safe. It is impossible.

Space. Fuck. I've run out of words. "Space bitches! Space!"

Oil

2006-08-30T10:47:00.000-05:00

The Netherlands has built a complex system of dams and levees to withstand the entire North Sea. These waters have inundated the country in the past, and the people there built to reclaim their land. 60% of them live below sea level. Yet they have never given up. Today, they feel safe. U.S. leaders went to study these dams and levees, to investigate how perhaps New Orleans could be better protected. And then there was nothing. Why?

These Dutch protections extend 19 miles into the sea. Oil drilling off the Louisiana coast typically starts past the 3 mile barrier, and the central unloading and distribution port for all incoming supertankers to the Gulf region, the Louisiana Offshore Oil Port (LOOP-built by a group of major oil and pipeline companies-is less than 20 miles offshore. The Dutch built their system starting in 1927. You are going to tell me that the richest, most technologically advanced country in the world couldn't figure out this technology to protect a city which is typically among the three most vulnerable in the country? (San Francisco from earthquakes and New York from terrorism are the other two.)

If the oil lobby is in any way responsible for blocking such defenses off the coast of Louisiana, each and every one of the business people and politicians responsible for this should be tried and executed for treason. I happen not to believe in the death penalty personally, but I have also come to respect the laws of the United States of America. Louisiana is such a jurisdiction that promulgates the death penalty. Over a thousand people died in Katrina because New Orleans wasn't protected like it should have been. Hundreds of thousands more were affected. Billions of dollars were lost. Most everyone affected was an American citizen. And if this happened all to make a few big cats rich, they should be cursed to see the dead bodies floating in the water every night they try to fitfully sleep; they should smell desperation and panic each time they reach into their wallet to pay for something.

Is this crazy talk? Maybe. But who knows, this might be my Pelican Brief moment. So just watch for my sudden death. I have no reason to take my own life and no enemies who would wish that. Let me just record that now. I'd be more confident I was wrong if most of the Bush White House and its cabinet weren't oil people. I'd be more confident if the two countries the United States recently invaded had not 1) been oil rich (Iraq) and 2) a key nation through which we wanted to run an oil pipeline (Afghanistan). I'd be more convinced if the one country with which America refuse to interact cost companies like Standard Oil millions (Cuba).

Katrina Day

2006-08-30T10:37:00.000-05:00

President Bush and the federal government refuse to name it, but August 29th will always be Katrina Day. A day to remember and mourn the catastrophic destruction that was unleashed upon the Louisiana and Mississippi Gulf Coast on August 29, 2005. It changed the lives of millions of people forever.

We have Pearl Harbor Day. We have Valentine's Day. We have a fucking Secretary's Day. Listen, Katrina Day should be a paid holiday, a federal holiday. I say this not in the spirit of getting something for nothing. Quite the opposite. This holiday should exist to give back to our communities. Certainly, there is no way to enforce this. But maybe this is the spirit that John F. Kennedy tried to foster when he said "ask not what you can do for your country, but what you can do for your country." Well, this day of rememberance should not be about our country, but our communities.

August 29th should be a day that people can promise to give something back to their community, to acknowledge that they are each fortunate to be alive and living in America. The suffering that this natural disaster exposed millions of people to is a daily experience in some countries. If we can't give one day back to help our communities, then what is the point at all?

I'm Sorry to Who It Offends, But This Is No Hole in the Ground

2006-08-29T09:49:00.000-05:00

Once again, New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin has caught the national spotlight for snapping at reporters after being questioned on the pace of rebuilding in New Orleans. He derided NYC's efforts to rebuild the "Freedom Tower" over the old WTC site after 9/11. Of this situation, he said: "You guys in New York can’t get a hole in the ground fixed, and it’s five years later. So let’s be fair." This caught flak nationwide.

Why? Is it a brutal truth? Yes. But is it truth? Yes. NYC lost not just two towers, but several surrounding buildings. True. But I have been there. August 2003. Did a set of important buildings get lost? Yes. Was the loss of life tragic? Of course. But was 99% of the city doing just fine? Yes. That horrible night, did most people go home? Yes. Business was bustling, and once the shock of the initial attack was over, most people could go back to their normal, every day lives.

The destruction wraught by Hurricane Katrina on New Orleans is not even comparable. Entire neighborhoods were destroyed. Even the buildings still standing, most of their first floors had to be completely gutted. To this day, people are still gutting everything. Businesses have left the area. And at times, even those people remaining in the area, presuming they can find work, have nowhere to live. Meanwhile, landlords have jacked up rents in the places still livable. Yet, I have faith that the people of New Orleans will ultimately prevail. It is in our nature to endure.

Five years later there is still a hole in the ground of NYC. A year later, entire neighborhoods are still destroyed here. How can the two compare? Yes, polls show people remember and care. But do they understand? Go to Sarah's blog, she's posted a video of images put to song. It shows destroyed homes, people swimming through major streets. It reminds us that this wasn't just a natural disaster, it was the greatest tragedy in American history. Never has an American city been subject to such widespread destruction. It is why we need to do more to make sure this never happens again.

Share Stem Cells, Just Not Share Alike

2006-08-24T09:20:00.000-05:00

Despite the benefits already shown to stem cell research, and the further promise that they hold, Christian lobbyists still fight stem cell research every step of the way. I propose a compromise. Take a nationwide referendum. Let's say 60% of people are in favor of such tax expenditures to support this type of research. Then give researchers 60% of the funding they request. This way, people that have moral objections do not have to subsidize it.

Moreover, once the benefits are tangible, and life-saving or threat prevention techniques are devised, we withold all such treatments from that 40% who refused to support this research. After all, it must have been God's will that their loved ones die when they die--any tampering with medical science would only deviate from that plan.

The Siren Call of Cassandra: Communism, Drugs, and Terror

2006-08-20T20:06:00.000-05:00

Oft times, it can be hard to see the big picture when you're in the thick of things. But when you step back, sometimes you're amazed. The following passage is from a paper I wrote in spring of 1997:

"'Global communist expansion' has historically been the most important part of the mythology that has legitimated U.S. expansionism . . . Narco-terrorism is now being presented in the same way, that is, as a grave external threat that the United States has a moral imperitive to fight, a moral imperative that legitimates intervening in some Latin American countries and propping up puppet or reactionary governments in others. If it is not the Soviet 'evil empire,' it is the 'evil empire' of herion, or of drugs in general (or whatever threat eventually eclipses the war on drugs)" (quotes and citations omitted). (Click here for the full text).

Puts the "war on terrorism" in a new light, doesn't it?

Those Who Do Not Learn From History . . .

2006-08-19T10:51:00.000-05:00

. . . are doomed to repeat it. I dare anyone out there, set aside all of your work for the weekend. Just once. Go to your local video rental store. Rent Troy, Alexander, Kingdom of Heaven, Braveheart, Last of the Mohicans, The Thin Red Line, Platoon, and Black Hawk Down. Watch them all that weekend. Force yourself to watch each one in consecutive fashion. And when you are done try not to cry for humanity that we have learned nothing in four thousand years.

Stop asking if we should or should not be in Afghanistan or Iraq or wherever. Ask why violence is the only thing that drives humanity. Or should I say mankind? How many of these wars were waged by women? I don't know the answers, maybe no one does, and maybe no one needs to. But does anyone need "the answers" to know that war is horrible?

Yes, one always brings up stopping Hitler. Sure, that was a necessary evil. But why only focus on American intervention in that war? Why did it have to begin? Why could one man convince an entire country that their woes could be solved through violence?

And we have the nerve as a society to wonder why there are shootings in our streets and parents starting fights at soccer games. Come on now.

Nuclear Winter

2006-07-29T13:31:00.000-05:00

Well, it's over. I have officially taken the Louisiana bar exam. I am a free man. And the first thing I am compelled to write about? The weather. Actually, I've been wanting to post this since I read it in the paper. One commentator actually called New Orleans' weather this summer akin to a "nuclear winter." I thought that was terrifyingly apt. Almost every day it has been overcast and rainy, accompanied by flashes of lighting and crashes of thunder. Even those days with sun where you lay out at a friend's 6th story rooftop pool, you find yourself sprinting through the warehouse district streets to your car down the street in the kind of instantly-drenched downpour. I don't know if it has something to do with global warming or repurcussions of hurricanes in the gulf, but it sucks. And now that I actually have time to "enjoy" the weather, it really sucks. Heh. Even now the sun pokes its head out of the clouds, as if daring me to take a book outside and read.

A Personal Aside

2006-07-19T09:44:00.000-05:00

My social commentary must be placed on hold the the next week and half. It will be that long until I'm done with the bar exam, and hopefully on my last stage to becoming a lawyer, the only remaining bit of which will be waiting for confirmation that I am in fact qualified to so act. The sheer amount of knowledge we are being asked to know and apply over a nine-test, three-day gauntlet of endurance and wit is daunting. But at the same time, the waiting is almost over and I'm ready simply to tackle it straight up and move on to the rest of my life.

Why aren't you sickened?

2006-07-14T18:04:00.000-05:00

Has anyone ever known a gay person while they were "in the closet?" Were you friends with them? Did you work with them? Did they make you laugh or cry or do anything else that may be considered human? So at what point did you turn on those people and say you disgust me. I do not believe you have a right to exist as God made you. Yes, I may have worked with you, breathed the same air as you, and ate the same food as you, but those days are over. Now I know who you really are. You do not deserve to share in this country's fundamental freedoms such as the right to marriage, the right to be a parent, or the right to have intimate relations. You do not deserve hospital benefit rights to see your sick partner, nor the right to handle his or her affairs when he/she dies, let alone deserve the right to inherit their property. Nor do you deserve to share insurance benefits, tax benefits, or the 295-some other benefits that have been cataloged in New York State alone.

What hatred can possibly justify these feelings? And how can so many of you feel such feelings? And if you think you do not hate gays, stop and ask yourself if they deserve all the rights of straight people. Ask yourself much in the same way you might ask if blacks deserver the same civil rights guaranteed by the state. Can we pass laws preventing blacks from having these rights? No more. And know this. 70-some% of people are against gay marriage today. 96% of people were against interracial marriage when the U.S. Supreme Court found that unconstitutional.

Nor is it relevant if your religion tells you that gays are against God's will. It is not relevant because that is how your conscience answers the question. Yet one of the very most fundamental tenets that this great nation was founded on was the protestant right to follow the dictate of God's word according to your individual conscience. Back then, protestants revolted from the Catholic Church force-feeding them dogma. This was a right any given colonist would have died for-even if it meant protecting those who held a different conscience. My conscience says gays are not immoral. It says it is their natural state of being. Many other people in this country believe the same. Nor do I or any other person have to be gay to believe that. I'm not gay. But it makes me sick to see the continued bigotry this country espouses toward the entire gay population.

In the generations to come this era will look no different than we now look back on the Jim Crow laws of the previous generation. And just like now, they will sweep our hatred under the carpet and pretend it never really happened. The thing that was important in the black civil rights movement is the same thing that is important now. Gay people are people. If they are pricked will they not bleed? They are people. Just like any straight person. To pretend they are some kind of sub-human thing should make every American sick.

North Korea?!?

2006-07-05T10:36:00.000-05:00

If any of you think North Korea (or Iraq) for that matter are dangerous, you are out of your mind. Does anyone remember the Cold War anymore? How about M.A.D.? (Mutually Assured Destruction.) Who the fuck cares if North Korea or Iraq has a few nukes or chemical weapons. Why under any god's green earth would they do so? One nuclear weapon launched at us, okay, blows out NYC. And guess what, we then drop 10 nukes on them and turn their country into glass. Conflict over.

At the height of the Cold War, The Soviet Union (let alone China, who still has them) had enough nukes to lay waste to the entire world. How are today's "Axis of Evil" remotely dangerous in comparison? Oh, right, these guys are scary, they're crazy! They might actually use them! Right. North Korea's leader directly quoted realized the futility in such a conflict. His response was not to threaten the U.S., but to say if we attacked him, he'd lay waste to South Korea.

The media. The Administration. Take your pick. Someone's trying to create a politic of fear to manipulate you all. Wake up.

Through the Looking Glass

2006-07-04T10:13:00.000-05:00

Monday, the day before we all celebrate the independence of our country, the Associated Press put out a story entitlted "Supreme Court decision needs reining in, GOP senators say." This, a reaction to the Court's telling the President that he has overstepped his bounds in creating "enemy combatant" classifications and holding these men subject to special trials,subject to no law. The Court found this a violation of the U.S. Constitution and the Geneva Accords. This is not a new gripe. For some reason, we Americans are terrified of being subject to foreign treaties. If this is truly the case, then our Presidents should never sign international treaties and the Senate should never ratify them. But they do. And it is a fundamental tenet of our legal system that these treaties have a binding effect on our country.

What is really disturbing is what scares these GOP Senators. Article 3 of the Geneva Accords prohibits outrages upon personal dignity, "In particular humiliating and degrading treatement," and bars violance, including murder, mutilation, and torture. Mitch McConnel, R-Ky, said "I don't think we're going to pass something that's going to have our miltary servicemen subject to some kind of international rules," McConnel said. Why not? Do we really object to these rules? Don't we wish that our servicemen and women captured in Iraq were shown these kindnesses? They should be. But these terrorists are all about an eye for an eye, and so if we torture their prisoners, they'll torture ours. Other Congresspersons say that "detainees in the war on terror should not have the same legal protections as those in the military." (That because the Court ordered they receive at least the same justice as through military courts--which, mind you, is far less than our domestic criminal courts.) If any of you out there really think that the United States has the right to commit these international crimes on prisoners of war, then I guess you should keep electing these people. But maybe you've also forgot what it means to be human. To have compassion. To turn the other cheek.

I'm not going to go on some kind of post-hippie rant about love, but there is something to those arguments. Look, how many stories, plays, books, and legends have we passed on to each other over the last several millennia that relate the story of "live by the sword, die by the sword," or "violence only begets violence?" How can we stop hatred with guns blazing? We can't. And you cannot shove peace and democracy down people's throats. It doesn't work like that. The U.S. needs to stop meddling in other countries' business and stop nation-building, a promise that George Bush made on his initial campaign trail. We have so many problems in the country, from high crime rates, drug trade, poor education, poverty, and more. Yet we spend how many billions fighting wars that never needed happen? We could have launched enough missiles to wipe out every terrorist camp in Afghanistan and called it a day. And gone on to rebuild our country. To put those billions into our people.

Instead we're out trying to articificially craft others' independence days. Good luck.

A Near Miss, Your Freedom, and the Ball They Hide

2006-06-27T18:52:00.000-05:00

Politicians are dangerous. Let us not forget that Hitler, Mussolini, and Stalin were all once favorites of their people. It was their consolidation of federal powers and a concomitant withdrawal of civil liberties that made those societies the totalitarian states they were. For years after World War II, Westerners asked themselves what they would have done had they lived in these states? Would they have stood up to these regimes? Or worse yet, would they have even seen them coming?

Today it appears that the Senate has shot down a constitutional amendment to ban flag burning. To most Americans, they hear only that a patriotic symbol they believe in was not protected. However, the issue is actually larger than most politicians would lead us to believe. The Supreme Court, whose job it is to protect minority interests and rights guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution must balance the desires of the majority as expressed through Congress. The Court has ruled that flag burning is "symbolic speech" and thus protected by the First Amendment. This amendment is an attempt by Congress to tell the Court they were wrong. Certain congresspersons have not hid this fact. You might say to yourself, flag burning? Who cares about that speech? Or who cares about the hate-speech of the KKK? Or pornography maybe? Why keep any of it? Because once we start limiting ourselves, we cease to be a land of the free. Moreover, as the infamous pornography publisher, Larry Flint, said, (and I paraphrase) if the law will protect a scumbag like me, it'll protect you. These "rights" are not just the rights of hatemongers and criminals--they are your rights too.

Consider also this amendment in conjunction with the proposed amendment prohibiting homosexuals from marrying. This would implicitly, in part, repeal the 14th Amendment's promise of equal protections of the law. Once the homosexuals can be legally discriminated against, who's next? Atheists? Jews? Blacks? There is a reason that we have so rarely amended the Constitution in this country. It is the bedrock of all the ideals of this nation. It stands for and enumerates the freedoms and liberties so many have fought and died for in this country. To give it away for such a trivial reason as setting fire to a piece of cloth, even if that piece of cloth is an important symbol, because we don't like the message this sends, leads inexorably away from freedom, and down a path of intolerance and thought-control.

Americans accept the notion that there is no tyranny by the majority in this country. We are after all, a free society. That is, all persons are protected by the Constitution. Who would have thought it would come down to the day when the America we love could be governed by tyranny? Turns out, it just takes a 2/3 majority.

Hypocrite

2006-06-27T09:56:00.000-05:00

President Bush promised to hold his White House to a higher ethical standard after the "scandals" invovling President Clinton. I'll mostly let that one go for now. When a CIA operative's identity was leaked, he promised to punish the leaker. That is, until that person turned out to be Vice-President Cheney's Chief of Staff. That is, until his top advisor, Karl Rove, was implicated. Now from the Washington Times, "A clearly incensed President Bush yesterday called the public disclosure of a secret terrorist-tracking program 'disgraceful.'" This relates to tracking of bank records. There are even hints that he wants to go after newspapers that published these reports. I'm sure he would, unless it turned out to be one of his staff.

I'm sure President Nixon felt the same way when Daniel Elsberg leaked the Pentagon Papers during the Vietnam War. I'm sure Reagan felt the same way about whoever leaked details of the Iran-Contra scandal. This is why we have Freedom of Speech and Freedom of the Press in this country. To expose what a corrupt government would not want us to see. They are a private check on unmitigated state power. This is not even to say that this particular operation was illegal, but the culture of secrecy which this president would breed is one that is arranged to preclude a disclosure of such wrongs.

So not only are you a continuing hypocrite, Mr. Bush, you just do not understand the constitutional guarantees that our forefathers established and so many men and women have fought and continue to fight to protect.

The Little War That Wasn't

2006-06-24T17:05:00.000-05:00

Ok. Quick facts. Article I of the U.S. Constitution gives the Congress the ability to declare war. Article II appoints the president the commander in chief of the armed forces. Now stop. Take a deep breath. And understand this very clear premise: the United States is not at war. Congress has never authorized a "war" against either Afghanistan or Iraq. Have they passed "resolutions" that enable the president to so use the armed forces? Sure. But they have not declared war. Why am I nitpicking this point? Because I am one of those damn lawyers? Well, don't forget that most politicians and policymakers are too. The end result of this representation is twofold: domestic and international.

Domestically, we traditionally allow the president to assume greater power during war, and this can even include the suspension of certain civil liberties. Okay. But he cannot do this during non-war time. Let me reiterate. There has been no declaration of war. If anything that is attacked under the "rubric" of war allows greater federal powers and less individual freedom, what are we fighting for? And moreover, then what is a "war" in the court of public opinion? Well, the battles raging in Afghanistan and Iraq seem like good examples. For that matter, it seems the government has sold most of the country on a "War on Terrorism." What is that? Where is it fought? There are no boundaries to the answer. What about "War on Drugs" or the "War on Crime?" Both present bad guys. Seem good? Who cares if criminals get their rights stomped? What about the "War on Illegal Parking" or "War on Anti-capitalists?" Where do you draw the line? My point is this, if Americans do not realize what rights they are even giving away, how can they protest them? Oh, and let's not forget the current administration's "War on Dissenters." If you can gain real power by just changing your language, hasn't the government played us all for fools?

Now, internationally, the deal becomes even sweeter. The United Nations and its members (which, yes, includes the United States) have all signed multilateral treaties which create rules of war. Ah, but the United States has never declared war. Oh, and of course there are rules for prisoners of war. Whoops, we're not at war. Instead, we have "enemy combantants" (a term which the president invented to dodge this very issue-and no, I am not making this up, it is absolutely a fact). So no, no prisoners of war, which means no rules for how we treat these persons. It means we don't have to even proove they did anything like we would with someone who only picked your pocket. Three of the persons kept in Cuba have already committed suicide in despair. Europe has found evidence of secret CIA prisons in those countries. Rumors have long circulated about outsourcing interrogations so they can use whatever methods necessary. Is this what we're fighting for?

All said, this is a very real joke that has been played on all Americans, the punchline of which is that you are anti-American if you question any of this, and any judge/court which has the bravery to actually interpret the Constitution as it was written is branded an "activist judges/court." Would a congressperson be an "activist" for passing legislation that someone else didn't like? Would the president be an "activist president" for signing a bill someone didn't like? No. They would both be fulfilling their constitutional duties. as for the judiciary, courts interpret the constitutionality of laws. That is their job. They cannot be faulted for merely holding that a legislative body or the executive office has overstepped its constitutional limits. If doing that is some form of invalid "activism" then we shouldn't even have a court system. And before that sounds too good, let's remember that we might still have segregation if it wasn't for the courts; we might still sanction other forms of discrimination and bias just because a majority approved of it. Legislatures look out for the wishes of the majority, and the courts make sure the minorities' rights are not extinguished in the process. This is called balance of power, something we all learn about in middle school. So how is it that a few inflammatory politicians can make a big deal of it?

Wake up people. Stop just believing what you have been told by people who have done nothing but earn your distrust. How many misrepresentations does it take for the American people to get it? Is it just that some of us don't understand the law? Well I'm telling you. I'm not even telling you my opinion in this post, just the law. I'll leave it to you to decide what to feel about that information.

Publication Cornocopia

2006-06-24T10:58:00.000-05:00

I've wanted to be a writer for so long, it's probably concomitantly not surprising that I am finally published and surprising that I'm now a legal writer. My first time to hit print was a foreword I wrote for Volume 14, Issue 1 of the Tulane Journal of International and Comparative Law, entitled On the Visibility of Contemporary International Issues, cited as 14 Tul. J. Int'l & Comp. L. 1 (2005). But I was much more proud to have published a larger piece on the legality of the international use of force, The Waning Power of Shared Sovereignty in International Law: The Evolving Effect of U.S. Hegemony, published in Volume 14, Issue 2 of the Tulane Journal of International and Comparative Law, cited as 14 Tul. J. Int'l & Comp. L. 579 (2006).

Now, I'm proud to find out that I will be having another article published. The Cardozo Journal of Conflict Resolution has agreed to publish my article, Language, Morals, and Conceptual Frameworks in Dispute Resolution: Establishing, Employing, and Managing the Logos. This will appear in Volume 8, Issue 1, but the full cite is not yet available, thus for now, will be referenced as 8 Cardozo J. Conflict Resol. (2007) (forthcoming). You can also find abstracts of these works on my website here.

I'm really excited about being to take my academic endeavors and analysis and to be able to share them with a wider legal audience. I've started off with quite a diverse set of papers, and I hope to continue to pursue those thoughts that engage me, rather than focusing on any one topic.

MORE THAN ONE ISSUE!

2006-06-16T18:54:00.001-05:00

Let me make one more thing clear. The War Against Iraq is a complicated matter. Any of us would be fools to say otherwise. And so the question of whether we should support troops over there or pull them out shouldn't be the only question we fixate on. Yes, that is important and, hey, they are there. It's a fact. America needs to support its troops. But that doesn't mean as Americans, we shouldn't ask why they are there.

Some people want to pretend that because we're there already, it doesn't matter why we went there in the first place. They just want us to deal with it. That doesn't make sense. Let me offer an analogy that will highlight what they are asking you. Imagine your girlfriend, wife, sister, or mother was raped. Now imagine the authorities just said to you not to worry about who did it or why it happened, but that the rape just happened, so you only need to figure out how to deal with your girlfriend, wife, sister, or mother as a victim. Would that satisfy you? Or would you be angry? Wouldn't you want to know who did it and see them punished? Of course you would. That's common sense. They committed a crime, and so they should be punished. It's a standard we hold to rapists, drug dealers, murderers, etc. So why are politicians exempt from this? Is that common sense?

Now, we don't know if there was a crime committed under the laws of the United States. But shouldn't we be concerned about whether there was some sort of misfeasance? This country was ready to impeach Bill Clinton for lying about where his penis had been. Yet no one was hurt in that affair. Even the most wronged person in that affair, his wife, forgave him and is still married to him. But over 2500 Americans are now dead in Iraq, and dare we even ask how many Iraqis have died since March? So why are we fighting so hard not to know why we went there? Are maybe we all afraid that we will be collectively ashamed of the answer?

Where are your tax dollars going, or, no one was spared . . .

2006-06-16T17:13:00.000-05:00

Seriously, why are we paying congresspersons hundreds of thousands of dollars a year? Both Democrats and Republicans are more worried about jousting for the next election, than actually solving the problems plaguing each state, such as crime, education standards, and disaster prevention. No, instead these men and women who should certainly know better are voting on USELESS items, such as:

The Senate same-sex Marriage Amendment: regardless of whether you think this is necessary or legislating hate crime, it was a measure that lost badly, falling well short of the votes necessary--a fact they knew going into the vote.

The House resolution to preclude a timetable on pulling out of Iraq: listen, reasonable people dispute why we are there in the first place--notably many House democrats--but few actually advocate an immediate, unequivocal pull-out. So why vote on such an essentially meaningless measure when the contrary result would never have been authorized anyway?
LA Rep. Jefferson is ousted from a key House panel: by his own party, and then the House, for a crime of which he was not only presumed innocent until proven guilty for, but which he has not even been charged for!

I'm sorry, each of the above is about a partisan framing of facts, not representative democracy. It's about looking good for voters, or making others look bad to voters. It is a disgrace. We all elect these leaders to solve society's problems, to make our communities better places to live. It makes me sick. All of it. All of them. Is this really what thousands of years of "civilization" amounts to?

Iraqi In-security

2006-06-14T11:00:00.000-05:00

So in case anyone is wondering what the "real" situation in Iraq is, and whether the media is inflating the sense of danger and chaos there, or if our government is hyping it up to maintain its "war" rhetoric, consider each visit of high-ranking U.S. officials, as exemplified by President Bush's recent trip. It's always a "surprise" visit. If you don't believe me keep your eyes open for the next vist. Why is this so? Because this gives "insurgents" no time to plan an attack. That shows you you much confidence the United States has in Iraqi security.

Moreover, Bush stayed in Iraq for five hours. Think about that. Five hours. Who believes that this was because of his busy schedule? Right. To anti-U.S. forces in Iraq, it would be the equivalent of CNN reporting Osama in Baghdad. Can you imagine the intensity of the U.S. response? Yeah. He would be a walking target who could not be protected. It only highlights the bizarre hybrid situation of violence going on. It's not war, but it is war. Can you imagine FDR traveling to France days after D-Day? No way. Yet, admittedly, there is enough war to get him the hell out of there once stopping in.

It's also this juxtaposition of war and un-war that keeps critics and supporters off-balance alike. By breaking all the rules, no one knows what to do or say about this situation. And apparently, that means no one can propose any better alternative than the current administration.

Religious Acceptance

2006-06-10T10:52:00.000-05:00

Sarah and I were talking about something the other day, which the news reported all kinds of Christian groups had a problem with. She was upset, like why don't they just let people live their lives? It occurred to me the problem with Christian disapproval is not inherent. That is, Christians should be allowed to exercise their First Amendment rights the same as anyone, and be justified in encouraging its members to approve or disapprove of certain things. That is because the people who are Christians choose that form of belief. Moreover, the first amendment is meant to allow such speech, no matter who agrees or disagrees with it.

The problem comes from the hegemonic influence that Christianity as a whole, and arguably even Abraham-descendant monotheism (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam), exert. That is, what certain church leaders approve or disapprove of something, it in essence becomes a standard bearer of all morals. The related problem that in this country in particular, we subscribe to "universal truths and freedoms" to which all persons are entitled, and yet concurrently presume those are the same truths and freedoms given by religion. Maybe yes, maybe no. Humanity has existed long before these religions, and will likely exist thereafter. Maybe that's right and maybe that's wrong. But the bottom line is, that there are plenty of people out there, be they Hindus, Buddhists, Wiccans, or any other sphere of belief, who have different morals. Yes, before anyone gets huffy, there are certain morals we pretty much all agree with. Killing is wrong. Stealing is wrong. But it did not take the 10 Commandments to make these things law; certainly Romans and Greeks had such prohibitions, let alone the many societies that existed before them. More importantly, there are things we disagree with. Must we follow dogma to a T? When is sex allowed? How do we view abortion or use of stem cells? These are complex questions to which different faiths have different answers.

The resultant problem is that Christianity and Islam, in particular, are not so good at playing with others. I would have a much easier time accepting the dictates of priests on matters of conscience, if I didn't feel their mandates were restricting all of society. Let's remember separation of Church and State people. Ironically, when the colonies were founded, it was the religous zealots who demanded this, for they feared state encroachment on their religion. Yet now that Christianity has largely blended into a melting pot of similar beliefs, it is they who push relgion on the state, claiming the birthright of a Christian nation. I hate to be the one to break it, but there were Jewish settlements in the original colonies, and the founding fathers were certainly aware of Islam and Hindu, even if they were not in the Americas. All said, these founding fathers pointedly chose to make no reference to God in the Constitution, and refused to make any law favoring Christians over other religions.

So the bottom line is, I don't care what Christian leaders tell their followers. That is between them and their congregations. But to impart one's individual beliefs as the one and true center of the universe and force it on others is another thing. The thing that people forget with religion is that it is okay to believe in one's faith. But you have to remember that there will always be others who believe just as strongly that their faith is the truth. Yet the two are incompatible. Either one is "wrong" or both are. Based on the probabilities, doesn't it just make sense to believe what you believe, cherish your own faith, and to respect the other person as having the right to follow their own individual consscience?

The other problem with religious fervor is that sometimes people only look at the surface and not the meaning. Ironic for a relgion based largely on parables and metaphors. Regardless, Kevin Smith said it best in his much-maligned movie Dogma. (Which only proves this point.) People never kill each other over ideas. But they will over beliefs. The point that God has tried to impart on us all is just to have good ideas about how to live a moral life.

So next time your religious leaders tell you to lash out at someone else for believing something contrary to your faith, just think to yourself not that you believe what they are saying, but that whatever the substance of his argument is, that it is a good idea. And that others are entitled to their ideas. Maybe, just maybe, at the end of the day this will lead people to getting along better. Maybe instead of being willing to strap bombs to his chest, a young Palestinian will say to the American Christian tourist. "I disagree with your Jesus, but I no longer believe you are the great Satan." And maybe that Christian American tourist will say, "I don't believe your Mohammed spoke the word of God, but he seemed like a good person." And maybe instead of getting violent, they'll look each other in the eye, laugh, slap each other on the back.

Maybe then each will go their separate ways, thinking, I disagree, but their faith is a nice idea.

What does America really care about?

2006-06-07T10:27:00.000-05:00

Sometimes one needs to admit when someone addresses a subject better than you possibly could. As participants in a representative government, we all have a duty to ourselves, our family, and if applicable, certainly our children to make our country a better place. America is great not for its deeds, but for the ideals to which it adheres. Therefore, it is encumbent upon each of us to bring it closer to those ideals, if with our vote if through no other means.

To that end, please read or skim this CNN article which is about more than the title might lead you to believe.

The Official Dillard's Boycott

2006-05-26T19:17:00.000-05:00

I tried to return a shirt I received as a gift today. Dillard's carries the same shirt. The gift had the tag. Apparently it didn't match. Thus, store policy dictated they couldn't accept it in exchange. The sales lady said no. Then I convinced a manager to say yes. Then another manager came to process it and said no again. Okay. First, I'll skip right by the part where no reasonable store does that, just out of general princple. Remember, "the customer is always right?" Apparently Dilliard's doesn't.

Now here's why no store normally turns away such an exchange. This shirt retails for $50. That means it probably cost no more than $35 to the store. So, instead of putting it back on the shelf and actually reselling it, let's say they gave me a $50 gift card and threw away the shirt I was trying to return. I would have turned around and probably bought at least $100 dollars worth of goods, not to mention future purchases. Let's see, they give $50 but really only lose $35, but then make back an extra $65, which is probably $20 profit. That's may be a $15 loss, but what if I had bought $150, or taking into account future purchases? So why would they do this? Because they are short-minded fools.

Instead I walked out of Dillard's without buying anything and will never go back.

Great New Music

2006-05-25T14:39:00.000-05:00

A lot of people I know are always looking for good new music. Many are not impressed by new stuff and instead retreat to the comfortability of what they know and like. Nonetheless, sometimes there is some band, or some one, that comes along and is just so talented that they transcend social boundaries. A good example is John Mayer. People that dig so many types of music just dig his stuff. It goes down easy, kind of like expensive Vodka. Now, I'm not really a promotional kind of guy, but there is a new album out by a guy that is even more talented, and 100% less commercial, because each of his past two CDs have been self-financed. He does it because he loves the music. His name is Brian Vander Ark, and he's more like an 18-year-old single malt Scotch.

His website is www.brianvanderark.com Also, you can check out some of his music on Myspace.This former frontman and songwriter for the Verve Pipe is even more amazing in his solo career. His first album, Resurrection, put out independently, and available on his own website, was soon snapped up by Brash Records. It can now be found at most major retail music locations, including the iTunes music store. Not only a great melodic post-Beatles, post-grunge journey of music, this album offers searing lyrics of a relationship gone wrong and the stinging pain and hurt. Far from depressing, it is exactly that kind of record that says "I get your pain, because I've been there." It's completely brutal in its honesty and ability to tug at the heart. You can definiely hear that he put his soul into each song. Even if you don't listen to the words, the songs will still resonate in a way that makes each one stand above the rest out there.

Doing the near-impossible, Brian's follow-up studio album is even better than the first. Written in happier times (dedicated to his wife), Angel, put your face on is an amazing collection of pop songs that will please almost any listener. I find myself listening to the album over and over, even since I got it. Right now, it's only available at www.brianvanderark.com, but it is sure enough to get picked up by major labels soon. Although I have never seen him live, the songs I have downloaded of his live performances are amazing. (As was his album released last year, "Within Reach," that features just him and his guitar.) Brian Vander Ark is one of the unique talents in the music world. I really hope that this album brings him back under the spotlight for the music world. Even though he has been disenfranchised by "the industry," Brian deserves to reap enough profits from these albums so that he can keep playing as long as he feels the music. He's that good.

The bottom line is, if you like music. You need Angel, put your face on.

Directions?

2006-05-24T19:25:00.000-05:00

It's funny. I started this blog because I thought I'd have all kinds of stories to share. I thought I had a crazy enough now and then to justify this experiment. But then, as a prospective lawyer, I realized that that was really more likely to just create a tidy collection of self-incriminating statements that may or may not be used against me in either the court of law.

Lame, hunh? Oh well. Over time, it seems that this blog has become much more intellectual. Kind of my own personal rant zone. I'm not sure if that will keep up now or not. I guess some of the rant-based stuff comes from doubts. Questions. For better or worse, I seem to have a lack of preconceptions in a variety of ways. This can be bad, because sometimes I don't get the things that others get instinctively or nurturedly (whichever). But it also gives me a unique Decartesian freedom to ask why and not be biased by what others presume to be the answer. This quite often leads me to offend people. Sometimes I just do it to play "devil's advocate." But I don't do it to pester, but rather to test the theory. I guess something of Socrates rubbed off on me. I just want to interrogate all wisdom. If the thing is truly representative of wisdom it will stand up to the questions. If not, then it was never that special -- but as Socrates found out, people don't like conventional wisdom being questioned, even if it is wrong.

As a youth, when I was an avid comic book collector, I always loved the character Wolverine (now played by Hugh Jackman in the X-Men movies). He had this devil-may-care attitude and when asked if he wasn't more curious, would just respond that there was too much to know in one lifetime, so he was content with what he did know. I think I loved him in part because he embodied everything simple that I knew I could never be. Life is complex. And when you see the infinite shards splintered across your consciousness, you sometimes want to let everything be black and white, simple and clear. But few things really are that way. If everything was "clear," "obvious," or even "black and white," I don't think we would disagree on things. We would all just agree on everything. I guess the trick is making things work anyway, by relying upon the differences between others and being willing to bridge the gaps between views. At our law school graduation, Bill Clinton called this "interdependence." That works for me.

I don't feel bad when I offend people when I ask why. All I'm doing is searching for truth. Sometimes you find it in weird places.

New Beginnings

2006-05-24T18:05:00.000-05:00

Spring is in full bloom, law school is over, and life goes on. Sarah and I are happy to say I now have a little time to breathe each day, which makes us both happier. Louisiana bar review classes have begun, and all I have to do now is remember everything I learned in the last three years, cram it into six weeks, and then learn to memorize it all for three blistering days of testing (three tests per day). Good times.

Until then, I'm eagerly awaiting the publication of my first article, due out in a few weeks, looking for places to publish a new paper, and then maybe taking a look again at short fiction. Surprisingly, my law studies have been a tremendous help to my overall writing. Anyway, it's nice to be able to breathe.

Day in the Life

2006-05-19T01:57:00.000-05:00

As hard as I was worked this past semester, it was full of several rewarding experiences. For example, yes, I have had correspondence with all 9 Supreme Court Justices. Consider this example.

Not bad, eh?

Finally . . .

2006-05-03T19:46:00.000-05:00

I'm done. It's over. It was only appropriate to end with a grueling 24-hour, excruciating final. Fuck law school. The worst three years of my life just to get somewhere I want to be. I wouldn't change it, but I can't put it behind me fast enough.

Dumbfounded

2006-04-28T07:19:00.000-05:00

I don't know how else to put it. Honestly, anyone who reads this blog should take it for what it is, and not presume anything. It is criticism. As such, my criticism of faith, religion, or even the portrayal of god does not make me antireligious or antigod. Quite the contrary. Am I not using the very brain that God gave me? The brain is the most underrated of God's gifts. My problem thus is with people who refuse to use it. Faith has its place, as does spirituality, but they do not supplement intelligence, instead they complement it. For example, one cannot simply work out at a gym, one needs to go to school to become a complete person. In other words, you cannot just work out your body, but your mind also. So it is with faith. The trick for the faithful then is learning to reconcile their faith with their other human attributes.

Nothing distrubs me so much as people who refuse to accept that we are people. We live in a world of people. And no matter your belief in God, I think even the most faithful recognize limits to what God is willing to do. Now arguably, the Christian god (or Jewish or Muslim for that matter) is all powerful, but clearly this deity does not choose to use its power at many points. God does not meddle overtly in the affairs of humanity. God does not prevent wars, give money to the needy, or simply eradicate all disease. These are tasks God leaves to humanity to solve. If you don't agree with me go to bed tonight and pray for a million dollars or no more cancer. See what happens.

With all this in mind, I finally come to what has sparked me to write. My girlfriend is researching child literacy for her graduate program. Part of this has focused on what can interest a child to read. Unsurprisingly, this brings her across the popular Harry Potter books. Sadly, these books that tell of magic, are often seen as threatening to Christianity, who continue to link all supernatural to the devil. The point that these critics miss is that Harry leads a profoundly moral life, and despite his poor upbringings, always seems to do what is right, and instinctively makes ethical choices. There should be a very positive message there for all religions. Yet, even some that look past the mysticism are totally blinded by other aspects of their faith. Consider this quote:

"It bothers me that so much emphasis is on Harry's inner strength, his own abilities," says [a] mother of three. "I want my kids to realize that our power comes from God, not ourselves. We read these books together and talked about how Harry might have behaved differently if he was a Christian. I think it was a good talk."

This woman's children will henceforth live with the disability of doubt. They will forever doubt their own abilities, and simply pray for God to make things right. This is not how the world works. They say everyone is entitled to their own opinion. But they also say that the right to swing your fist ends where someone else's face begins. Make no mistake, this woman has abused her children much deeper than had she actually hit them. The bruises would heal and fade. A single statement from a parent like this might last a lifetime.

Even from a Christian perspective, people must realize, that God will not hit the home run for you; God will give you the pitch to hit. God might open the door, but you have to walk through it. And people will not ante up and have the gumption to take these steps if they do not have faith in their own inner strength and own abilities in addition to their faith in God. I guarantee you, no CEO, no professional athelete, no doctor, lawyer, or professor thinks this way. Of course, I can hear the snappy retort already, "such material ends are not necessary." Of course. Be happy with being a nobody because you have faith. The good old Puritan work ethic that still drives this country. Work hard, be content, and get to Heaven.

These attitudes are the product of centuries of population control. Not everyone can be successful and powerful, so selectively breed that acceptance into people. Live good, quiet, happy lives and don't bother other people. It's a great recipe for order. All in all, a very Roman recipe. Let me repeat: population control. There is a reason it became known as the Roman Catholic church, after all. Protestants should not fool yourselves. All your faith derives from that instance of faith: Catholism. Do you know how your ancestors became Protestants?

They used their brains. The bundled their inner strength and abilities and defied a monolithic Church to fight for their right to not only worship God in their own way, but to interpret the scriptures their own way: deeming these things to be fundamental individual rights, not something a class of priests should dictate to them. Of course, that breeds a bit more chaos that way, less order. So where does this leave us?

Where it always has. On Earth. Surrounded by humans. Regardless of your faith in God or lack thereof, you all need to learn to think for yourselves. To fight for yourselves. I live in a city destroyed by natural disaster. Some had the gall to say God did it. I live in a city that has a high crime rate. Does God do that too? Does God sell drugs strapped, blasting competitors? No. They say Louisiana is corrupt also. But these are not things we should blame on God. They are all done by people. Nor are these things we should read about in the paper and wait for God to take care of. As people, we need to raise our expectations in ourselves and in each other. I'm sick of crime. I want to feel safe. So at the very least, I refuse to shake my head at the morning paper and say oh well, another murder, another rape. i'm going to be sickened every time I read it. I'm going to be active in politics and vote for who I think can make a change. And I will do everything I can to contribute to the rebuilding of New Orleans, because it's one of the greatest cities in the world, populated by mostly honest people, who know how to have a good time. And that's important too. What good is faith, reason, and health, if you can't enjoy it?

I can say only that as I get older, I start to see that Socrates really was right. We will never know all the answers. How could we? There's simply too much to know. But we do start to see our own wisdom in others' ignorance. The more life you experience, the quicker you come to such realizations. We need to let our children have these experiences. And we need to teach them to be strong, to stand up for themselves and others, and to fight for what they want in life. The only strength that matters comes from within because it is the only one that does not falter. If a man's faith comes from his love for his wife, what happens when he finds her cheating on him? If a mother finds her strength in God, what happens when her child is killed and someone tells her it is God's plan? I am not saying that we should think only of ourselves, quite the contrary. But on a consistent basis, we have only ourselves on which to rely. Therefore, it is encumbant on each of us to carry that strength and confidence within ourselves and to be proud of it. Only then, will we have the capacity to make our surroundings a better place.

Sheep Go to Heaven

2006-04-27T16:03:00.000-05:00

There is a song by the pop-rock band Cake, Sheep Go to Heaven. It seems like kind of an odd name for a song. Especially when you consider the full chorus: "Sheep go to Heaven / Goats go to Hell." But then again, it's not the kind of thing people think about; the song is catchy, they sing along, and then they forget.

But what is the moral? Sheep go to Heaven. The overbearing metaphor of Christianity is Jesus Christ and God the father as shepards tending to flock. Personally, I've always that it an odd metaphor, considering that typically when we people call "sheep," it is derogatory: a way to denigrate people who don't think for themselves and blindly follow others--whether wisely or foolishly. To me, the moral was you don't question, you're rewarded.

But that criticism is all the more poignant in the contrast this Cake song creates. Goats go to Hell. What is the figure of the goat in Christian mythology? The goat represents the evil; the beast; Satan. Yet the story still doesn't make sense. What is the contrast? Is this about mythology? No. Rather, what else does the goat mean in history? Or more precisely, what would early Christianians have sought to distance themselves from?

Consider the later Cake verse: "The carpenter can take you out to lunch / I just want to play my Pan pipes." Pan was a god to the Greeks and Romans who watched over shepards and flocks and known to have the torso of a man and the hindquarters of a goat; he was associated with the satyrs (similar goat persons) and was known for his alluring charm, as well as playing music, drinking wine, and inspiring sexuality. The pre-Christian version of its modern demons: sex, drugs, and rock & roll.

So the question then is, was Christianity for its own reasons endeavoring to cast down such values. Or was it posing itself in binary opposition to these values, demonizing them in reaction to what it would later deem false gods? Remember, the Old Testament indicated that this God was a jealous god, and thus commanded persons to have no other gods but him. This command would be nonsensical if there were no other gods. Today, with the hegemony of monotheism, we simply call all other gods, false gods, but such a term is really historically inaccurate. In either respect, Cake nails it again when they say, "As soon as you're born you start dying / So you might as well have a good time."

I'll tell you want. When I finish law school, I'll thank Pan.

Reading Beyond the Lines

2006-04-04T16:08:00.000-05:00

So, the media wildstorm over an Afghan citizen's Islam-to-Christianity convert is over. Shame on all of us. America made this big deal because another man under another country's laws was in danger of being sentenced to death for something that we don't believe in. Putting aside that much of the world considers the death penalty itself uncivilized and that America loves it as its chosen method of state-sanctioned revenge, and assuming that the U.S. has a right to influence laws it doesn't like, we should still be ashamed because we don't care anymore.

Last important headline read "Case dismissed." As if that meant anything. U.S. Christians hail it as a victory for morality. It's not. It's a measure in superficial lip service to pretending to care. Did anyone catch what that dismissal actually meant? Nothing. Why does no one read beyond the headlines? Afghanistan did not change its laws. The man was released because there were questions of whether the man was either (1) no longer an Afghan citizen (and therefore the law of that state did not apply to him), or (2) insane (and thus exculpated). Therefore, if a sane Afghan citizen were to convert to Christianity, that person would be put to death and there is nothing the U.S. could do about it short of sending in troops. Further, did anyone catch what that person is doing now? He is in hiding for fear that vigilante mobs will kill him. And you know what, they probably will find and kill him. And maybe, just maybe, that story will make page B12 in the paper, in the bottom left hand corner. Or maybe it won't at all. Maybe that's just not a good story.

To be responsible citizens, we need to think beyond the headlines. This issue, no matter how one reasons it, has not been resolved, and like most legal quandries, will come up again. Should either reason or faith settle for good headlines? Or should they seek for results that actually mean something?

Moreover, this documents how democracy can run amuck. If 90% of the people of Afghanistan are in favor of this law, should they be allowed to enforce it? Or should Afghan rights be protected by some kind of Bill of Rights? This is a question that is relevant to any democracy, new or old. And the opposite rule holds true. If U.S. citizens will argue that the small percentage of Christians in Afghanistan deserve the right to live, practice, and exercise minority religious rights, without interference by the Muslims, those same U.S. citizens must also admit that the minority of non-Christians in America deserve the right to live, practice, and exercise their rights, without being forced into the moral worldview of Christians.

Think about it.

Absolute Barbarism

2006-03-27T04:11:00.000-06:00

This from Jonathan Finer, of the Washington Post:

In the western city of Ramadi. Armed insurgents burst into teacher Khidhir al-Milhallawi's classroom at Sajariyah High School on Wednesday, accused him of being an agent for the CIA and Israeli intelligence, and beheaded the English instructor in front of his students, according to sudents, fellow teachers and a doctor at a local hospital...in a statement distributed in several Ramadi mosques . . . [this was] God's punishment."

I have made no secret, I was against the American War on Iraq. This, however, has nothing to do with any of those reasons. This is a culture that has embraced absolute barbarism. These people aren't ready for "freedom" or "democracy." Maybe this kind of religious fervor is fundamentally incapatable with Western democracy.

Look at the situation in Afghanistan, a key U.S. "ally" in the so-called War on the Terrorists. They wanted to put a man to death for converting to Christianity. Of course, outrage across the West! It seems an obvious wrong, doesn't it? But why? Religious freedom is one of our values. We cannot force it on people who don't want it. If they choose to put a man to death for these reasons, isn't that their democratic prerogative? Leaves the Western conscience in a quandry doesn't it. This is also a history lesson. Flash back to Vietnam circa early 1960s.

Quite to the contrary of Iraq, Vietnam wanted democracy. Ho Chi Minh had received a Western education. He was ready to build democracy in Vietnam, but the West would not help him while the French colonists kept control over Indochina. So for freedom, he turned to the Chinese communists. Then once they had their freedom from France, they were ready for a kind of democracy, but it wasn't they kind of democracy America wanted. So we went to war with them. The point is, what does America do when it tries to instill "freedom" elsewhere, and that Other takes that freedom and chooses to do things America doesn't like, or are even anti-American? And so it is once again in Iraq.

So I say pull our troops. Now. Not because I opposed the war initially or even yesterday. But because not one more American needs to die to enforce something that may never work. If we want them to be a democracy, they must learn to rule themselves. I know, I know. The counter-argument is that U.S. troops are there to save people like this teacher from the "terrorists" or "insurgents." That sounds noble, but is not realistic We cannot possibly put a security detail on every single Iraqi. Instead, our troops walk around a "conquered" country, dreading each car that turns the corner, lest it be the next suicide car bomb.

Again, shadows of Vietnam. We have not learned anything. We still use the same phrases: "shock and awe" and "hearts and minds." We still tally daily body counts as if that meant progress, and then hide the final numbers because our people don't want to know how many we lost, and the casualties on the other side must nearly border atrocity. Not to mention the report the other day of firing on and killing civilians in revenge. True? Who knows, in this case. But it is that same sign of frustration of fighting a specter, of one who could strike from anywhere, anytime. Just llike in Vietnam.

Will the United States make the same mistakes as a country, only thirty years later? Will it bear out for no good reason other than to "stay the course?" Or will we do what we allegedly went there to do? To instill democracy. To allow people to make choices. Regardless of what they think of us.

I think we should. So let's send our troops home. What about the Iraqis you ask? I truly feel for them. I cannot possibly understand the chaos of their lives. But only they can decide their destiny. Be that "freedom," "oppression," peace, or even civil war. That must be their choice.

But as for America and its role in that country? I say end the war. Say it quietly to yourself. Doesn't it sound good? End the war. And if it doesn't sound good. Ask yourself, why the hell does ending a war not sound good? And then ask who has taught you to think that way. End the war.

End in Sight

2006-03-25T11:34:00.000-06:00

I can almost hear Jim Morrison's deep voice . . . "This is the end ..." I have one more week of heavy editing, and then just final edits, and attention to school, finals, and all the other things that will consume far less time than the journal,which has sucked 100 hours a week out of my life for far too long.

Some day I'll look back and be glad I did this. There will be great satisfaction at what I and others have accomplished.

It's just not that day.

New Look All Around

2006-03-12T03:15:00.000-06:00

So, Sarah found all kinds of templates for Blog layouts and I got ensnared. I had to find my own way to personalize what is basically the online representation of my personal thoughts. This happens to also coincide with the going live of my new website. Not all new content, but a brand new look. The links to the right actually work now, as they were months ago updated to reflect the website I never uploaded until tonight. This morning, actually.

I should also have the cool icons next to the web address now, both here and there. One caveat to my new website, however. It is best viewed with Safari or Firefox, or barring that, if the text is too big on Internet Explorer, you need to go to "View" and then "Text Size" and choose "Small" or "Smallest." This snafu is what delayed me going live with this version, because I didn't know what was wrong. Now I do and I just don't have time to care. It is what it is. It looks great from the other browsers or IE with the right settings.

What are you going to do? Peace out.

From Bad to Worse (and perfection)

2006-03-08T23:41:00.000-06:00

From not having the spirit to blog, to not having the time...totally lame. For a while, I was really getting into the blog thing. At least I was trying to...trying to find my own comfortability, my own style....to discern what it was that I wanted to share (expose?) to the world.

Now, being Editor in Chief of the Tulane Journal of International and Comparative Law is kicking my ass. Probably putting close to 100 hours a week into that, school, and work. It's devastating. The only thing keeping me even is a more-than-understanding girlfriend who is very patient, very independent, and very loving.

She's perfect.

Hmmmm.....

2005-11-21T08:22:00.000-06:00

Once upon a time, this blog was supposed to be here because some parts of my life were interesting, comical, and out of control-but all in good ways-the stuff of good stories. But it seems as if all I've done here is go off on random tangents and bitch about this or that. Faced most recently with the ghosts of Puritans present, I don't have the energy to write any more. Or to do much of anything. See Sarah's blog for more info. Link on the sidebar.

What do we really know about "In God We Trust" and not throwing stones?

2005-11-14T17:10:00.000-06:00

Most people think that the reference to "In God We Trust" is a very innocent, innocuous phrase, emblazened on our U.S. money as a tribute to the past, others as a tribute to God. What most don't know is that in the legal world, the only reason it is allowed--that is, it does not violate the Constitution, which mandates no state establishment of religion--is because it is considered a "ceremonial deism." That is, the phrase which is so commonplace on U.S. money has now become trite: a historical reference, which celebrates only the traditional ties of the founders of this nation to a belief in god. Thus, despite the great importance this phrase has to many people across the world, it only is permitted to be printed on U.S. money for its intrinsically non-religious significance.

I think this knowledge offends people of religion, just as much as much as its very presence offends people of non-monotheisitic religions or of non-religion. Unfortunately, too many short-sighted proponents of religion, see only a court victory, not the reasons behind the victory. So when you are disappointed that students at your local school cannot sing Christmas carols any more, and such a result just seems silly or you ask what is the harm? Instead rejoice. You now have the right to celebrate the individual mandates of your conscience with your family and chosen religious community. You do not have to suffer the degredation of your beliefs as something merely "historical." They mean something.

But of course, the above is only so relevant as it is true, that is, that such a phrase placed on money is indeed innocuous. Consider the following passage from page 25 of William V. Spanos' recent book, America's Shadow, An Anatomy of Empire:

[O]ne also finds this central and concentering panoptic eye figured in the Great Seal of the United States, which also appears on the American one-dollar bill: a pyramid enclosed by a circle, at the apex of which is an all-seeing and all-encompaassing eye (and its bright rays) and at the base of which, the Roman numerals MDCCLXXVI (the entire temporal history of the Christian world over which its providentially ordained commanding gaze presides). This resonant image bears the Virgilian mottoes ANNUIT COEPTIS (God has favored our beginnings) at the top and, especially pertinent for the purposes of this study, NOVUS ORDO SECLORUM (New World Order) at the bottom...This [all-encompassing eye] was, of course, the "diagram of power," according to Foucault, that became the structural model of the modern disciplinary society.

This seems to leave a discrepency between the words of some founders, such as Thomas Jefferson, who argued vigorously for a "wall of separation" between religion and state, and others, who would have the Christian empire extend its roots into the fibers of this country. The idea that is America is a truly great idea: that all are created equal, and that all may live their lives as they choose, so long as they hurt no other in doing so.

Religion can be a great strength to many people. But this can only be true when one follows one's own heart or conscience to whole-heartedly embrace that religion. What faithful congregation wants people forced to follow them? Hopefully none. If that is so, then those of true faith must remember that when they turn to their legislators to ask him or her to outlaw things that go against their faith, regarding topics of prayer in school, public religious displays, abortion, and teaching creationism in a science class: we must remember to respect those with different beliefs. It is not fair for the state to practice a tyranny of the majority. For as the Supreme Court of the United States has emphatically declared on more than one occasion, most recently in 2000: "fundamental rights may not be submitted to vote; they depend on the outcome of no election.” See Santa Fe Independent School District v. Doe .

Doesn't it make more sense to simply love your neighbor, even though he or she may have different beliefs than you? Do we really believe as citizens in a free American society that some of us, even a majority of us, have the right to tell people what to believe, and what moral code they can live by, beyond simply the secular norms that define a civilized society? Because what comes next? Shall we ban pork as a sinful food? Will we outlaw all work on Sundays? Will we reinstate prohibition? America is no theocracy. The Founding Fathers could have set up this country as such. Yet, with Protestantism fresh in their blood, they knew well the corrupting potential of a Theocratic Empire. Indeed, most Protestants railed against the first Catholic president of this nation, John F. Kennedy, believing he would turn this country over to the pope.

Have we come full circle? Will we deliver our nation straight to god and cut out the middle man of this equation by cutting out the singular political figurehead? Does the formless mass of Christian bodies accomplish what a Pope or Holy Emperor could not? But is it any different?

Perhaps instead of such nonsense, the Christian majority should dedicate their lives to goodness, rather than screaming out to others how one should live one's life. Remember the words of Jesus, "He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone." John 8:7. Because those that believe in this god, must surely believe that he knows the difference between living your life according to Christ, and in others not doing so. As Jesus also said, "when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full." Matt. 6:5.

Let the state worry about the multiplicity of beliefs inhering to its citizens, and to legislate accordingly, taking into account all of the nation's beliefs. You and yours take care of your beliefs. Because only by working together, living together, and accepting each other, will we all find peace and harmony.

Otherwise we'll have more blood and death, harbinged by brimstone: modern Crusades, people that preposterously invite and justify natural disasters to "hotbeds of sin" like New Orleans, and suicide bombers looking for the next "Great Satan" lurking in shopping malls and wedding parties. But if that's what your faith dictates, then I'm sure you'll get it.

Consumer fraud, Entergy, and other pre-bankruptcy skullduggery

2005-11-10T11:13:00.000-06:00

Anyone out there frustrated with your gas & electric monopoly? Anyone feel cheated or robbed by the one company that you likely cannot select around in our supposedly free market? How about victims of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita? Haven't you already felt violated enough without your energy company screwing you?

Here are some facts.

My recent "estimate" for ten days of usage was $51.62. Let's assume that a 30-day month is a full month. That would make a full month's bill $154.86. Yes, this would have been for the end of August. However, my previous two full-month bills (of actual usage) were $121.22 and $131.57. It was $106.90 the month prior to that. That makes Entergy's "estimate" pretty damn generous.

Let's take another example. Sarah's estimate was worse. When you extrapolated a full month's payment from her partial month bill, it would end up as $244.97. Consider two things: first, that this four-person apartment never eked out a bill over $155 because they all are so conscious about watching their bills (and that bill was only so high because their roof was ripped off in Tropical Storm Cindy, and was leaking cold air while that room was repaired, and was high to pay for the tools used to fix it-their next highest bill was like $125); second, that they have individual AC units in their rooms, not central AC, and only two of the four girls were there in the summer.

So with these facts in mind, I encourage anyone who is a Louisiana resident and subject to Entergy's monopoly, to scrutinize your bills. If you find something that does not appear accurate, I encourage you to call Entergy first, but likely you will get nowhere as Sarah and I did. If that happens, you may choose to file complaints with both the Federal Energy Regulatory Commision at http://www.ferc.gov/cust-protect/complaints.asp and the Louisiana Public Service Commission at http://www.lpsc.org/complaints.asp

I am no lawyer, so I cannot say whether you are better off not paying your bill and risking a mark against your credit rating (thus implying a dispute over the bill), or paying, protecting your credit rating, and protesting nonetheless (but risking that your payment indicates an acceptance of the bill). Personally, I think I will pay the bill, but will also send a written letter of protest. Regardless of what you do, it is clear that for Entergy-a company who is about to go into bankruptcy to reduce the amount of their debt they actually have to pay-to extort funds out of the real victims of these horrible situations, is just WRONG.

As people in a social multicultural democracy, we need to stop talking, to stop complaining. We need to start acting. It doesn't take that long to send an email or write a letter. But you'd be amazed at the power enough letters and emails can invoke in the form of the state or federal government, and subsequently bring down upon any actor who thinks the people of this country are beneath them, and that their company is above the law.

So yes. You will hear from me Entergy.

Are you F*@#ing Kidding Me?!?

2005-11-08T13:54:00.000-06:00

Okay. About two weeks ago the big ugly stupid black Lincoln Towncar parked next to me in our assigned parking spots at my temporary Boston apartment building backed out and ripped into the side of my car. He doesn't live in my building, rather he rents the spot from someone who does. Apparently, he was of the belief that I would not call my insurance company and the police and the managment of the building and track him down, or that I would create a comprehensive photographic record (including pictures of matching tape measured marks) of the damage. It is my first new car. I love it. I am proud to have gotten to where I am in life that I can afford it. And this person thought I wouldn't care?

Okay. This morning I went outside only to find a scratch alongside the other side of my car. Are you f*@#king kidding me? For a thorough discussion of my frustration, see the above paragraph. Of course, the only thing more incredible then my disbelief in general is my lack of disbelief in specific. Let me backtrack.

When I was looking for the car that damaged my driver side, I looked at the car on my passenger side, a white something with NY plates. Every single corner and side of the car was dinged, scratched, or dented. I almost gave up right then. Then again, what jury wouldn't believe he/she did it? I can just seethis person at the Massachusetts DMV right now.

"Excuse me sir, can you drive?"
"Yes"
"Can you park?"
"Maybe."
"Well, that's good enough for me. Here's your license and registration."

And yes. This is the person who hit my car the second time. At least in New Orleans they have the common courtesy to total your car. At least then you get compensation for pain and suffering.

Rain, Rain, Rain

2005-10-10T16:06:00.000-05:00

Okay, in New Orleans I am used to flash rain storms. There is periodic flooding, but then sunshine. Then blue sky. Even a hurricane blows over. (It was sunny and hot picking through the ruins...) But this damn Northeastern weather?! It was 80 Friday. Good right? Not when you plan on doing fun things over the weekend. Ever since it has been cold, gloomy, and rainy. It just keeps raining. What the hell were those Pilgrims thinking? This is a hospitable climate? Seriously. This is ridiculous.

Raising Boston

2005-10-09T19:16:00.000-05:00

On one hand, I am a master of controlled denial; "out of sight, out of mind" works wonders for me. So when tragedy strikes, I'm often adept at moving on by simply adapting to the new reality that fate has assigned for me. Yet it is hard to "move on" past an event like Hurricane Katrina when you are living somewhere that is not your home. There is always the specter of the return, of the second movement: that once you are settled and happy you must start all over again.

Yet I cannot find too much fault in my new life. All things considered, it is quite good. It is a scary prospect to move in with the woman you are dating when you are essentially forced to do so by circumstance and not allowed the breathing space of choice. However, this has been one of the strongest and brightest points of my exile. Sarah and I have only gotten closer too each other, and the experience has brought us closer together, rather than dividing us, or playing on our nerves. Also, we've been lucky enough to have a lot of furniture and clothes donated, as well as given monetary gifts to make up much of the remaining slack. The apartment really does feel like home now. Plus, I'm attending a great school, and have finally gotten my journal back on track -- and without having to stress about doing that and having to maintain my grades (because only the credits will transfer back to Tulane). Not worrying about grades is a wonderful freedom. I can focus more on learning, rather than trying to second guess what a professor will or will not test us on. Also, I've had time to do extensive research on the article I'm supposed to have published on that Journal. I think that will really turn out well. To top it all off, Sarah is preparing to write a novel, and it's fun to be here for her to bounce ideas back and forth off of. (Yes, I did end a sentence with a preposition, and yes, I am leaving it there!)

I'm not sure that life is "back to normal," but it is good.

Hermetic Blessing

2005-09-28T08:03:00.000-05:00

Poseidon may have tried to drown us, but with Hermes' blessing, Sarah and I made it to New Orleans last weekend. As it happened, we were on our way back to New Orleans, encouraged by the reopening of the city, when Hurricane Rita descended on the Crescent City. Our flight was interrupted in Memphis and Mayor Nagin, under pressure from federal officials, re-closed the city. Sarah and I were left reeling, pacing the corridors of Memphis International Airport, wondering which god had conspired against us now. We had already taken a risk in getting on the flight out of Boston to Newark to Memphis in the first place. What were we to do now? We were stuck half way across the country. So close, yet so far from our final and necessary destination.

But as all mortals must do when the Fates pull an unexpected string on the tapestry of reality, ever weaving unexpected lines of destiny, throwing a monkeywrench into one's best laid plans: we made a choice. We knew we could wait out the storm and fly down when the storm cleared. But how long would that be? 24 hours? 48? Our entire trip was only supposed to last 48. We could fly to a nearby city. We could rent a car right there. Had we been warned away? Were we on the wrong side of soon-to-be-history? All these obstacles in our path. My father would have said common sense dictated not even flying in the first place, let alone doing anything rash at that point. There was still this other hurricane approaching. Yet in the end, we did the only thing we could: a choice as inevitable as the rise and fall of hurricanes in the gulf from june to october. For the first time in weeks, we took matters into our own hands. We made a choice. We decided not to be passive victims of mother nature, fate, or the gods. We rented a car and drove south toward New Orleans.

Now, we were heading for the home of my parents' friends, near Houma, west of New Orleans. That gave us a base of operations. That was the good news. However, this hurricane was supposed to hit west of Nola (New Orleans, LA). That was the bad news. Because my car is a standard, and Sarah can't drive a standard, I drove up the country on our original refugee flight. So I made her start out the trip driving. Then, after a few hours, when the weather started to get bad, I took over. The clouds darkened the sky, and although we left at around 12:30 PM, we had little sun to guide our way. Our ultimate goal was to get there before nightfall; that was the true mission. Any less would leave us horribly vulnerable to getting lost or missing a sudden curve in the road. Intermitten squalls pounded us, making the road barely visible. I had to follow the impossibly straight road, and hope that it stayed that way and that no one stopped in front of me, because at that speed, I wouldn't have been able to stop. But we didn't have time to crawl forward at 30 mph: the storm was coming.

We made it. We beat the storm worst lashes. Although it sounded like our friend's home was going to blow away overnight, we made it, fitfully sleeping. Nervous about our prospects the next day. So we drove to Nola in the morning, full of trepidation. After all, Nola was closed. Emergency personnel and repair crews only. I don't want to get anyone in trouble, so I won't say where, but the first checkpoint denied us entry. We were upset. We had come all this way for what? To have the city closed out from under us? Sarah was determined, though. She said head for another checkpoint; I don't care if we have to try them all. And whether it was luck, fate, or maybe a bit of trickery from Hermes himself, the next checkpoint guard let us through. And there we were. In New Orleans.

Our home. Empty. Freaky. Creepy. Tree branches were down everywhere. I can only imagine the mess they must have made before they were pushed aside to let vehicles through. I heard they bulldozed the streets to push them all away. None of the stop lights were working. There was no traffic on what once was the busiest of streets. And freakiest of all, there were no people. The city was dead. Or dormant, I hope. Comatose. Because I know the people of Nola will be back and as vibrant as ever before long. But at that point, it was like a ghost town. Broken doors and windows and shutters banged intermittenly in the light wind. But other than that, nothing.

We were fairly lucky. My place was fine other than a ruined fridge and water damage in the basement. Sarah's place was not so lucky. It was eerie pulling up to it. Roof tiles were on the ground around the house, and her house had that creepy spray paint all over it, marking it as a place Guardsmen had been. (The back door had been broken in by would-be rescuers, looking for stragglers or abandoned pets.) Her place did not fare as well. Half of the building was collapsed, the roof giving under the weight of the storm. For a full pictography, visit my snapfish page. And for a richer detail of the exact operations, visit Sarah's blog at http://jedisluzer.blogspot.com. (It may be a few entries down now.) However, the roof over her room, which had been damaged during Tropical Storm Cindy, was about the only one to hold now. Most of her things were okay. The only bad news was, her walk-in closet, safe during that storm, and where she had placed many valuables, and all of her clothes, was collapsed. By some miracle, all of the disgustingly wet clothes were salvagable after a wash or two. Further, many of her larger picture frames, saved those under it. Eight hours in 90+ degree heat with no AC, a pair of workgloves, and two airmasks later, we had saved almost all of her stuff. Because we were lucky enough to get into the city.

Maybe we should feel luckier to have gotten out. As creepy as it was during the day, it was devastatingly so during the night. Were looters around the corner? Were trigger-happy Guardsmen going to take you out thinking you were a looter? And again with the creaking noises of a dead city. Flashlights and candles only invited trouble in a city bereft of light. And driving out? No city lights, no stoplights? I almost got lossed, so used to them as visual landmarks. (Thanks Sarah.) We stayed past the curfew, but we got everything done we came to do. In that sense, we were blessed.

Of course, we had to go to a laundromat. Have you ever tried to wash everything you own at once? It takes quite a while. True story. We did so in Raceland, LA. Half of the washers were broken. I think we lost at least $8 that way. Luckily, the people at Roush's Supermarket were kind enough to keep making us change. And get this, every single dryer at the laundromat was broken or out of service. It only took another $4 or so to figure that out. But my parent's friends, Ed and Jackie Gilbert, saving graces that they are, not only let us use their dryer all day, but called each of their neighbors and asked to use their dryers. These are all wonderful people, and we thank them all: Chad, Monique, and Tim/April. (I'm sorry if I can't remember all your names, but I can see all your faces and you are all in my hearts.) Not to mention the fact that we technically didn't stay at Ed and Jackie's house, but Ed's mother's house, which is on the same property. She is equally saintly, offering us a warm bed and food at any time of the day.

Did we spend a miserable two days in Louisiana moving every single thing Sarah owned from her ruined apartment to my intact apartment? Yes. Was it creepy driving back and forth on ruined and empty streets? Yes. Did we spend a frustrating day doing wash and little but? Yes. Did we have to delay our flight on the way home and then change it like 5 times on the way back north? Yes. Have we both broken out all over our bodies because of the horribly polluted air and water in Nola? Yes. But was it worth it? Yes. Have we achieved peace of mind? Yes. Are we ready to move on with our lives? Yes.

Did I raise a glass to Hermes or any other identifiable shard of divinity which may have aided our travels? Yes.

Life Goes On

2005-09-22T14:36:00.000-05:00

Boston has been a good experience. Sarah and I finally got an apartment just down the B Green line of the T from school or downtown, so that means my car can finally rest. School helps to distract from everything else, as does watching lots of DVDs and drinking.

Honestly, all things considered, life is good. I'm happy living with Sarah, attending a great law school, am able to work out, and now live in a tremendous city. As long as my student loans come through, I can squeak through on that account too. Plus, so many people have been generous already, sending clothes or money to help us through this difficult time. I am very thankful for all of that.

Nonetheless, many things are just difficult. Starting all over has sucked, as has leaving behind everything you own. As soon as Mayor Nagin said we could return to New Orleans, Sarah and I booked tickets back to salvage her damaged apartment and hopefully to store things in mine, which we hoped at the very least would secure our peace of mind. And allow us to return with some winter clothes. But now this new hurricane is creating problems, and wouldn't you know it, we're supposed to fly through Houston.

Way back before even Hurricane Katrina, I was convinced we needed to make a sacrifice to Poseidon. Maybe we should have. The gods are still angry.

Wicked Retahded

2005-09-13T18:44:00.000-05:00

Life is a battle of denial. Boston is a great city. BU is a great school. There's always plenty to do here, and sometimes it's really easy just to kick back have a few drinks and forget everything. But other times, even as lucky as Sarah and I are, and as well as we've managed to keep our heads above the water, it can be a bit overwhelming. Getting an apartment was supposed to be a high mark, but it only seems to highlight how much we don't have.

Luckily, people around us have been fantastic. The spirit of generosity that has sprung up around the country has certainly turned its attention toward us. Our friends and family have been super supportive and we owe them all a lot. And that's just focusing on the here and now. It's hard not to constantly wonder if your possessions are all destroyed. Yes, they are only things. But they are also physical manifestations of a reality that we all live in. People acquire things. These things can make us happy. Maybe we should be all pursuing some kind of zen nirvana, but maybe getting the new Coldplay cd is just easier and sometimes just as satisfying, albeit more briefly.

Nonetheless, I'm committed to getting back to New Orleans shortly after this semester. It's my home now. It has an infectuous spirit that is unique and vibrant and I would rather let my own spirit wither and die before I would give up on it. I plan on working and living there the rest of my life. And I don't believe that anyone who truly calls Nola home would say any different.

Time for more Glen Livet. Laissez Le Bon Temps Roulez.

Yankee Bound

2005-09-02T15:59:00.000-05:00

So it appears that Sarah and I are headed up to Boston. For at least the semester, I will be at Boston University Law School. At first, we'll be staying with my boy Matt and his wife, Meghan. Hopefully we'll find our own place soon thereafter. I will still be able to be contacted on my mobile phone at 504.376.3651, or by email at michael@verve.name.

Surviving Katrina

2005-09-01T17:21:00.000-05:00

I never really had a chance to get comfortable with this whole blog thing before a little something called Hurricane Katrina decided to destroy my city. It makes for a less than exciting story, really. It's more sad. Especially with the worst of human nature being brought out in those remaining behind. It makes all other inhabitants of New Orleans embarrased. The whole thing is really beyond human fathom, the wholesale destruction that has overtaken this unique and beautiful city. And with everyone you know scattered to the winds, transient and alone, you try desperately to discover where your life is supposed to go.

You don't know when things will return to normal in New Orleans, or when you'll be able to go home. I guess I'm one of the lucky ones. My girlfriend and I escaped Nashville and are staying at her aunt's house. We're looking for law schools to attend temporarily. It's all so sudden as students rush to get the few openings at choice schools. It's chaos. I gotta go, this is bumming me out.

What the Blog!?

2005-08-04T21:50:00.000-05:00

Hmmmmm....honestly, I never thought I''d be doing this. Blogs just seemed to trendy, to handy to have and live and breathe by. To be sure, I''m not even sure why I have one. Oh well. Sometimes life is interesting, and damn if my life doesn''t have plenty of moments worth sharing.

I''ll keep you posted.