Photo Update by Allison, at Don't Let's Start 11:51 pm / 30 September 2006
I may never blog again. But here are some pictures anyway.
September 2006
This Week In Politics by Rachel S., at Alas, a blog 11:19 pm / 30 September 2006
This has really been crazy week in politics. The American political system was in turmoil all week and, of course, the saga that leads up to the election played out like an episode of Dallas. Well, maybe not Dallas. I guess we need a new prime time soap opera called “DC.” I just thought I’d summarize a few choice headlines from the week.
1. Bill Clinton Goes Off on Fox News: I’m sure most of you have seen this by now. It was rather remarkable; last time I saw him that ticked he was saying, “I did not have sexual relations with that woman…Ms. Lewinsky.” Conservatives tried to spin the interview as an “angry Clinton is out of control” moment and liberals were just happy that a Democrat finally showed some backbone and didn’t kowtow to Bush. My favorite headline about this story is this one–”Angry white man meets the smirk“. I’m not necessarily thrilled with the content of the article, but I had to laugh at how the “smirk” has taken such a prominent role in contemporary politics. President Bush has perfected it. While some debated the smirk, others asked whether or not the “blow-up” was orchestrated.
2. Virginia Senate Race–Racist vs. Misogynist: Jim Webb, the Democrat, has a nice history of assailing women in the military. I watched the debate between him and George Allen on Meet the Press. You can watch the debate in its entirety here. The gender question comes up 30 minutes into the discussion. Webb refuses to denounce his 1979 statements, but he did admit that he regrets, saying the Naval Academy is a “horny woman’s dream.” However, it’s not just 1979, as recently as 1997 he made similar comments. He very half heartedly backs down (ever so slightly), from his earlier position. Of course, Allen is no better. He opposed gender integration at VMI, but he admits in the Meet the Press interview that he was wrong. While Webb has a “women problem,” Allen has a racism problem. He called an Indian American man macaca, and said “welcome to America.” Apparently, macaca is a racial slur (one I was not familiar with), but I think the “welcome to America” comment leaves no doubt about his views. But it isn’t just the macaca issue that brings out his bigotry. Allen also revealed his anti-Semitism when he was caught by surprise and was apparently offended that someone “discovered” his Jewish roots. In the process, he declared his love for ham sandwhiches, to prove that he is not Jewish. The most recent racist gaffe for Allen includes the revelation that Allen used the N-word in college. It’s not like Jim Webb is much better. He has called affirmative action state sponsored racism (check the Meet the Press interview) and goes on to revise his position ever so slightly to say that only African Americans should benefit from affirmative action and that poor white “cultures” should also be included. So I guess poor white people and Blacks should get affirmative action, but Latinos, Asians, and American Indians should not. It looks like the people of VA have a great choice.
3. Woodward Releases Book on Bush Denial–Bush Denies Denial: Ok, I couldn’t really find an article of Bush directly denying anything about the book, but his press secretary did call the book cotton candy. Apparently, the book also lays out the internal conflict in the administration, making the White House look like an episode of Survivor with alliances and backstabbing.
4. New York Attorney General Candidate Tries to Wiretap Husband: This New York Attorney General Candidate has a big problem–her husband. Seems that she thought he was cheating on her, so she decided to enlist former New York City Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik to wiretap her husband’s boat. The feds intercepted the conversation and have launched an investigation into the legality of this. I didn’t know that it was illegal to eavesdrop on your spouse, and I have heard conflicting reports about whether or not this would have been legal to do. Personally, I would not think this was a big deal if it was an isolated event, but legal woes, including jail time, have followed the husband for years. When you read this time line provided by the local newspaper, Jeanine Pirro doesn’t exactly come out smelling like roses either.
5. Florida Congressman Resigns After Sending Sexually Suggestive Emails to Underage Page: Yes, just when you though the Dateline catch a predator series was over……OK, I’m just joking. Dateline didn’t catch this guy online, but somebody did, and his email reads just like one of those “Dateline Catch A Predator” chatlogs. What makes this case even more absurd is that this guy served on the Congressional Missing and Exploited Children’s Caucus. He even proposed legislation that would crack down on child sex offenders.
I’m sure there are some other great political stories out there this week that I missed. Please do share them in the comments section. I thought these rather salacious stories read more like National Enquirer headlines. What if anything do you think this crazy week in government says about the state of the American political landscape?
Unless you are free by Rad Geek, at Geekery Today 9:25 pm / 30 September 2006
Chris Clarke’s post on yesterday’s political developments is very good and very important. Something I hope to have something intelligent to say about later. For right now, though, I wanted to thank Chris for leading me to something I’ve been hoping to find for for a while now. Specifically, an online recording of Mario Savio’s speech on the steps of Sproul Hall, during his time in the Berkeley Free Speech Movement. After the speech, Savio joined about 800 people from the assembled crowd to face arrest in a nonviolent sit-in against the arbitrary arrest of their fellow student Jack Weinberg:
We were told the following. If President Kerr actually tried to get something more liberal out of the Regents in his telephone conversation, why didn’t he make some public statement to that effect. And the answer we received—from a well-meaning liberal—was the following. He said: would you ever imagine the manager of a firm making a statement publicly in opposition his Board of Directors? That’s the answer. Well I ask you to consider: if this is a firm and if the Board of Regents are the Board of Directors, and if President Kerr is in fact the manager, then I’ll tell you something: the faculty are a bunch fo employees, and we’re the raw materials! But we’re a bunch of raw materials who don’t mean to have any process upon us, don’t mean to be made into any product. don’t mean to end up being bought by some clients of the University—be they government—be they industry—be they organized labor—be they anyone. We’re human beings!
There’s a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart, that you can’t take part—you can’t even passively take part. And you’ve got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus, and you’ve got to make it stop. And you’ve got to indicate to the people who run it and the people who own it that unless you are free, the machine will be prevented from working at all.
Nice, Normal, Poor People What Could Be A More Subversive Concept? by olvlzl, at ECHIDNE OF THE SNAKES 7:43 pm / 30 September 2006
Posted By olvlzl
P ostcards From Buster, the PBS children’s show, is most famous for the suppressed episode in which he visited a two-mother family in Vermont during maple sugaring time. I saw the episode when it finally aired. After the big buildup Margaret Spellings and other mouth pieces of the radical-Republican right gave it I was expecting something like a daughter in Future Longshoremen of America or a son who aspired to be a Radical Faerie. But no, the most controversial thing about the episode was the promotion of tooth decay and that was due to Buster’s sugar addiction, not anything to do with the non-animated people. Being a kid’s show, the parents were almost invisible.
There is another episode of Postcards which did a lot more to undermine the corporate state than that perfectly nice, though typical, middle-class family in Vermont. The show which presented the unremarkable lives of clearly poor children who live in a trailer park was far more subversive. I loved it. The lives of poor children not as young thugs, not as problems to be jailed in a few years but as entirely likeable, normal children with normal, non-pathological, fantasy lives. That is something that is just not seen much on TV.
Nor were they presented as tragic figures. The children were presented as having normal problems, some due to their financial condition but not as hapless victims of their circumstances or as an implied threat to the slightly more fortunate. Happy, nice, poor kids.
The idea that an oligarchy needs to have poor people and their financial condition as a threat to keep the working class in line is an idea that I’ve never seen much to contradict. That certainly is the most common use the oligarches’ kept media puts them too. As a number of people have pointed out, it’s the major theme of “COPS” and where else do you see poor people on TV these days? Jerry Springer?
If there was no destitution then the demands of the working class for a better deal would be a lot stronger. The threat of poverty drives wages down for the near poor. In order to make maximal use of this resource for social management the poor have to be despised. The never far away condition that they could fall to if they get too aggressive has to be shown to be a living hell with little chance for escape. Working stiff is better than the other roles assigned to the poor, criminals, junkies, prostitutes, violent psychopaths, drunks, etc. And that most despised role of all, victim, don’t forget victim. Some of this hatred of our untouchables even bleeds through to the left, “trailer trash” is a term that is sometimes even used on the most leftist blogs.
All of this hurts poor people, they suffer from the attitude of other people and from the damage it does to their opinion of themselves. It would be useful to know how much of the inertia of ingrained poverty is caused by people being convinced that it is hopeless to try to achieve a better life. It might give insights into other problems poor people sometimes have.
If poor people were depicted on TV as good people the social order could truly be endangered. The class system could really fall. If the United States really acted as if it believed the children of poor parents were the equal of the richest of the rich it would have to feed, take care of and educate them as if they were something other than a threat to distract the middle classes with. The neo-Malthusian view of them as surplus population would become unfashionable again.
What would happen if Postcards and other TV programs presented a lot more positive images of poor people*. Could America handle it? Would it be allowed to handle it? If poverty in itself wasn’t seen as a despicable thing a good part of the fear factor in middle class politics would lessen and with it the downward mobility pressures on wages and services. The assumption, built so rigorously by the corporate state and its organs of media, that all of the destitute were lazy, degenerate, “undeserving poor” could give way to the more idealistic American response of the New Deal era. The truly American way as opposed to the class snob way. What would happen to an oligarchy whose children were discouraged from being class snobs? Heavens, the young of the ruling class, itself, might someday fall in love and marry them! How would they feel if their daughter wanted to marry some nice, poor boy? Or girl?
* Running this by my nieces they tell me that there was an episode showing positive images of families in the barrios of LA. If their account is accurate all I can say is keep those kind of postcards coming, Buster.
Note: digby at Hullabaloo has this link to look at what is respectable among the best people. I'll take the trailer park residents, thank you. They have a lower crime rate.
P ostcards From Buster, the PBS children’s show, is most famous for the suppressed episode in which he visited a two-mother family in Vermont during maple sugaring time. I saw the episode when it finally aired. After the big buildup Margaret Spellings and other mouth pieces of the radical-Republican right gave it I was expecting something like a daughter in Future Longshoremen of America or a son who aspired to be a Radical Faerie. But no, the most controversial thing about the episode was the promotion of tooth decay and that was due to Buster’s sugar addiction, not anything to do with the non-animated people. Being a kid’s show, the parents were almost invisible.
There is another episode of Postcards which did a lot more to undermine the corporate state than that perfectly nice, though typical, middle-class family in Vermont. The show which presented the unremarkable lives of clearly poor children who live in a trailer park was far more subversive. I loved it. The lives of poor children not as young thugs, not as problems to be jailed in a few years but as entirely likeable, normal children with normal, non-pathological, fantasy lives. That is something that is just not seen much on TV.
Nor were they presented as tragic figures. The children were presented as having normal problems, some due to their financial condition but not as hapless victims of their circumstances or as an implied threat to the slightly more fortunate. Happy, nice, poor kids.
The idea that an oligarchy needs to have poor people and their financial condition as a threat to keep the working class in line is an idea that I’ve never seen much to contradict. That certainly is the most common use the oligarches’ kept media puts them too. As a number of people have pointed out, it’s the major theme of “COPS” and where else do you see poor people on TV these days? Jerry Springer?
If there was no destitution then the demands of the working class for a better deal would be a lot stronger. The threat of poverty drives wages down for the near poor. In order to make maximal use of this resource for social management the poor have to be despised. The never far away condition that they could fall to if they get too aggressive has to be shown to be a living hell with little chance for escape. Working stiff is better than the other roles assigned to the poor, criminals, junkies, prostitutes, violent psychopaths, drunks, etc. And that most despised role of all, victim, don’t forget victim. Some of this hatred of our untouchables even bleeds through to the left, “trailer trash” is a term that is sometimes even used on the most leftist blogs.
All of this hurts poor people, they suffer from the attitude of other people and from the damage it does to their opinion of themselves. It would be useful to know how much of the inertia of ingrained poverty is caused by people being convinced that it is hopeless to try to achieve a better life. It might give insights into other problems poor people sometimes have.
If poor people were depicted on TV as good people the social order could truly be endangered. The class system could really fall. If the United States really acted as if it believed the children of poor parents were the equal of the richest of the rich it would have to feed, take care of and educate them as if they were something other than a threat to distract the middle classes with. The neo-Malthusian view of them as surplus population would become unfashionable again.
What would happen if Postcards and other TV programs presented a lot more positive images of poor people*. Could America handle it? Would it be allowed to handle it? If poverty in itself wasn’t seen as a despicable thing a good part of the fear factor in middle class politics would lessen and with it the downward mobility pressures on wages and services. The assumption, built so rigorously by the corporate state and its organs of media, that all of the destitute were lazy, degenerate, “undeserving poor” could give way to the more idealistic American response of the New Deal era. The truly American way as opposed to the class snob way. What would happen to an oligarchy whose children were discouraged from being class snobs? Heavens, the young of the ruling class, itself, might someday fall in love and marry them! How would they feel if their daughter wanted to marry some nice, poor boy? Or girl?
* Running this by my nieces they tell me that there was an episode showing positive images of families in the barrios of LA. If their account is accurate all I can say is keep those kind of postcards coming, Buster.
Note: digby at Hullabaloo has this link to look at what is respectable among the best people. I'll take the trailer park residents, thank you. They have a lower crime rate.
Fifth Big Fat Carnival – Final Call For Submissions! by Ampersand, at Alas, a blog 7:17 pm / 30 September 2006
The end of the day on Sunday is the deadline for the Fifth Big Fat Carnival, to be hosted by I Hate People. Please use this form to submit favorite fat-positive and anti-sizism posts, either that you have written yourself, or that you’ve come across in your browsings. Soopermouse’s suggested theme is “Daily living with fat, in dignity,” but as usual off-theme submissions are also welcome.
Also, we need a host for the sixth big fat carnival (to appear the first week of December), so please leave a comment or drop me an email if you’d like to do that. (Or any future BFC, for that matter).
Republicans covered up Mark Foley’s sex scandal for almost a year by Media Girl, at media girl (mediagirl.org) - progressive, feminist, empowered 6:21 pm / 30 September 2006
So much for family values. GOP leaders in Congress knew of Mark Foley's sexual cruising of minors and covered it up, all while keeping Foley in charge of the chairman of the Missing and Exploited Children's Caucus.
That's right.
Republicans kept a man in his 50s, who they knew was exploiting minors online, in charge of protecting children from exploitation by adults over the Internet. Talk about the fox guarding the henhouse! (Actually, the "hens" were boys, which only adds to the hypocrisy of the homophobic GOP.)
Among the Republican explanations during the night:_The congressional sponsor of the page, Rep. Rodney Alexander, R-La., said he was asked by the youth's parents not to pursue the matter, so he dropped it.
_Alexander said that before deciding to end his involvement, he passed on what he knew to the chairman of the House Republican campaign organization, Rep. Thomas Reynolds, R-N.Y. Reynolds' spokesman, Carl Forti, said the campaign chairman also took no action in deference to the parents' wishes.
_Rep. John Shimkus, R-Ill., chairman of the Page Board that oversees the congressional work-study program for high schoolers, said he did investigate but Foley falsely assured him he was only mentoring the boy. Pages are high school students who attend classes under congressional supervision and work as messengers.
_The spokesman for Speaker Dennis Hastert, Ron Bonjean, said the top House Republican had not known about the allegations. Shimkus said he learned about them in late 2005.
Late 2005??
Rep. Rodney Alexander also notified majority leader John Boehner:
Alexander said he also notified majority leader John Boehner of Ohio.
“I don’t know what action (the House leadership) took,” Alexander said.
Alexander said he believed the e-mails were inappropriate.
“It certainly wasn’t something I would say to a young man or woman,” Alexander said. “Obviously (the teenager) thought there was something wrong with it.“I can tell you that I’d be disturbed if I was a parent or grandparent of a young person and a grown man sent him these e-mails.”
He was disturbed, but not enough to do anything about it except pass it on.
The Washington Post reports that Boehner passed it the matter on to Hastert.
Hastert has wasted no time spinning himself into the protector of children. What timing.
Meanwhile, the Republican majority leader, Representative John Boehner, R-Ohio, has blocked investigation into this matter. Instead, he's passing it on to the ethics committee.
Just a little late for that, isn't it? If Foley had not been caught, it's clear the Republicans would have done nothing.
Big hat tip to Crooks and Liars.
That’s all folks! by blue, at Alas, a blog 5:35 pm / 30 September 2006
My month of Alas blogging seems to have expired already. Many thanks to Amp for the invitation, and to everyone else for welcoming me and engaging in conversation with me. It wasn’t all pretty, but they were all discussions I wanted to have and learn from. Which I did. I am.
Remember to check out that first ever Disability Blog Carnival at Penny’s on October 12. Or submit something yourself by October 9.
And stop by my site sometime, will ya? Thanks again.
Just in case you had in any questions about what “purposefully and materially” meant by Violet, at Reclusive Leftist 5:31 pm / 30 September 2006
Thursday night Congress passed a bill rescinding the Constitution* and giving the President unilateral power to kidnap, imprison, torture, and murder anyone in the world just ’cause he feels like it. All he has to do — though really, do you suppose anyone will hold him to even this minimal standard? — is decide that the individual has “purposefully and materially supported hostilities against the United States.”
Not coincidentally, Friday morning the President remarked that people who criticize the war in Iraq are embracing “the enemy’s propaganda.” There’s your purposeful; running a blog or donating to MoveOn or even just volunteering your time and labor, and you got your material.
*I note that this item is already off the front page of the newspapers and the Google news feed. Tyranny, like the fog, comes on little cat feet.
Saturday Slumgullion #13 by blue, at Alas, a blog 5:25 pm / 30 September 2006
I love doing these slumgullions, but with the first Disability Blog Carnival coming up at Disability Studies, Temple U. I may focus here more on non-blog slumgullionish stuff. Or maybe there will be so much disability blogging I can gather the leftovers here. We’ll see how it goes.
- Mark Boatman at Nodakwheeler had planned to escape the South Dakota nursing home he was stuck in (because of the state’s lack of funding for in-home care) last May, but it didn’t go as planned. Happily, he has recently made a successful break and is enjoying his freedom in Montana.
- In “Born that way,” Third Culture Kid(s) makes a connection between racial outsiderness and being born with a disability.
- Neonatal Doc writes about the reasons prospective parents give (or tell themselves) when they decide to abort a fetus with birth defects. The comments are long and varied, as well. Via Grand Rounds 3.1
- Suzuki unveils prototype fuel cell electric wheelchair. Um, I think it looks like a uncomfortable tinker toy, but it is interesting.
- The online poetry journal Slope presents an American Sign Language Poetry Special Edition. Be sure to watch the video of “Flying Words.” The poetry is pretty cool too.
- Lisa Ferris at A Letter to My Children tells the long and winding tale of making friends at a church when everyone seems uncomfortable with her disability:
People just wouldn’t talk to me. It is one of those things that is hard to put your finger on. Like there are a thousand little ways that people disregard you. And if you looked at each one, you may not think it is a big deal, and some individuals may have even had a very legitimate excuse that has nothing to do with you, but when you put them all together over time…you can only conclude that a large number of people really don’t have any interest in getting to know you. I asked people out for coffee and I got turned down every time. I would go up to people and talk and they would make a hasty exit. Once this woman came up and talked to me and I was fiddling around with my hearing aid from having been using the FM system. I said, “I’m sorry, my hearing aid wasn’t working and I didn’t get all that you said.” She said, “So you just let me go on talking when you couldn’t hear me?” I said I got the gist of what she said but I might have missed some things. She made a hasty exit and has never talked to me again. I have even said hi to her by name and she doesn’t even say hi back. I used to go home from church after this stuff would happen again and again and just feel like crap. Part of it was just asking myself what I was doing wrong or that was so awful? If the Unitarian Universalist can’t deal with me, who can?
- I’m eager to hear all kinds of opinions on this: “Right-wing disability” video.
- Pambazuka News covers the problems of sexual violence for disabled women in Kenya.
Crossposted at The Gimp Parade
Check there for more comments
Gardening Weirdness by Roxanne -, at Rox Populi 4:37 pm / 30 September 2006
I just found truffles growing in my front yard. And my spring bulbs are already sprouting.
