This picture always cheers me up.
English Camp, Song District, Phrae, 2004
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
Winning Ohio
“No Republican has ever been elected without carrying Ohio.” Check.
Virginia for Obama; West Virginia for McCain: an inversion of the sides taken in the Civil War. Alabama; Georgia; Texas; Mississippi; for McCain. Bill Bennett referred to the “Confederate States” vs. the “Union States.” At first I thought he meant it as in “union states” vs. “right-to-work” (i.e., anti labor union) states. Either way, he was right, and his friends will give him shit for this comment.
The McCain “party” in Phoenix had their news connection cut early. Too depressing.
John Bolton was on BBC with an American psephologist, a poll chaser; an English professor-duffus historian; and some guy who was never spoken to and who never said anything. A pretty blond commentator in another location suggested that Sarah Palin hurt McCain with independents, without whom he could not win. Bolton sprung forward, with his index finger outstretched in total attack mode, sharpened teeth mercifully hidden beneath his walrus mustache. “He needed her to solidify his base! And she has! Do you think he could have won without his base!” (Ergo: John McCain had no base. Does Bolton know what a “voter base” is? It’s the voters who would vote for a yellow dog if you nominated him. To Bolton, evidently, the Republican base would only vote for a yellow dog if Sarah Palin was holding the leash.)
McCain has Lindsey Graham with him to keep him upbeat . . . that’s my idea of depressing. He is awaiting the results in the Barry Goldwater Suite of the Phoenix Biltmore Hotel. That’s just pre-Freudian and sad.
CNN had these screens that they could touch and colors would flip and numbers would flash, all of this without drugs. It was all “hypotheticals,” and one guy was way into it, it was like his screens, John King I think. I’m sure that this was very confusing to lots of people who were having trouble just keeping up with the reality of the situation. I believe that this showed admirable confidence in the generally literal-minded American people. Unfounded, probably.
I love Barney Frank, but he’s really more of a bass player, he’s not a lead singer. That non-descript man in the Senate, is it Harry something? He shouldn’t even be on stage, put him in charge of the fan club or something. Nancy Pelosi is like Grace Slick: she looks ok, and she’s a pretty good singer, but no one likes her anyway. This team needs a tough-love clean-sweep with a wire brush.
Joe Lieberman’s fate: life at the limits of the patience of the Democratic Party, and proof that people in Connecticut aren’t as smart as they think.
“Republicans will be looking to re-create 1994,” as a step to re-creating 1900, no doubt.
“We’re going to win in Pennsylvania! We’re going to win the election on Tuesday!” Throwing air-punches like an ill-constructed animatronic device of a mean spirited, fading old tough guy.
Bolton is making a list of things over which “we’ll see them in court.” Number one is: Virginia doesn’t count absentee ballots unless they could affect the race.
Let’s count the states that can be relied upon to follow macho flag waving supported by outright lies. This is the dream world: no issues; no fact-checking; no memory, what? me worry?
The Colorado GOP chief, rubbing his hands together gleefully, says that the worst thing that could happen to the Democrats would be the presidency and large majorities of both houses of congress. He promises perpetual, total war based upon the Democrats’ impending “failure to deliver.” This is the logic of criminals and the insane. Having destroyed the country, many Republicans are secretly relieved to see the Democrats in a position where in only two or four years they can be blamed for the entire thing.
McCain’s concession speech has been well received, and to be fair he kept it on a surprisingly gracious note with only some little digs like, “he’s my president, and I’ll support him, but we’re Americans! We never quit!” On the whole, however, McCain’s concession speech was self aggrandizing and maudlin. His audience was decidedly not gracious. They heartily booed Joe Biden, and repeatedly chanted “John-Mac-Cain!” and “U-S-A!”
The remains of the so-called right wing conservative branch of the Republican Party should be banished so far out into the political wilderness that their horses die of thirst. I say this for the good of America, and for the good of the Republican Party, out of love.
Virginia for Obama; West Virginia for McCain: an inversion of the sides taken in the Civil War. Alabama; Georgia; Texas; Mississippi; for McCain. Bill Bennett referred to the “Confederate States” vs. the “Union States.” At first I thought he meant it as in “union states” vs. “right-to-work” (i.e., anti labor union) states. Either way, he was right, and his friends will give him shit for this comment.
The McCain “party” in Phoenix had their news connection cut early. Too depressing.
John Bolton was on BBC with an American psephologist, a poll chaser; an English professor-duffus historian; and some guy who was never spoken to and who never said anything. A pretty blond commentator in another location suggested that Sarah Palin hurt McCain with independents, without whom he could not win. Bolton sprung forward, with his index finger outstretched in total attack mode, sharpened teeth mercifully hidden beneath his walrus mustache. “He needed her to solidify his base! And she has! Do you think he could have won without his base!” (Ergo: John McCain had no base. Does Bolton know what a “voter base” is? It’s the voters who would vote for a yellow dog if you nominated him. To Bolton, evidently, the Republican base would only vote for a yellow dog if Sarah Palin was holding the leash.)
McCain has Lindsey Graham with him to keep him upbeat . . . that’s my idea of depressing. He is awaiting the results in the Barry Goldwater Suite of the Phoenix Biltmore Hotel. That’s just pre-Freudian and sad.
CNN had these screens that they could touch and colors would flip and numbers would flash, all of this without drugs. It was all “hypotheticals,” and one guy was way into it, it was like his screens, John King I think. I’m sure that this was very confusing to lots of people who were having trouble just keeping up with the reality of the situation. I believe that this showed admirable confidence in the generally literal-minded American people. Unfounded, probably.
I love Barney Frank, but he’s really more of a bass player, he’s not a lead singer. That non-descript man in the Senate, is it Harry something? He shouldn’t even be on stage, put him in charge of the fan club or something. Nancy Pelosi is like Grace Slick: she looks ok, and she’s a pretty good singer, but no one likes her anyway. This team needs a tough-love clean-sweep with a wire brush.
Joe Lieberman’s fate: life at the limits of the patience of the Democratic Party, and proof that people in Connecticut aren’t as smart as they think.
“Republicans will be looking to re-create 1994,” as a step to re-creating 1900, no doubt.
“We’re going to win in Pennsylvania! We’re going to win the election on Tuesday!” Throwing air-punches like an ill-constructed animatronic device of a mean spirited, fading old tough guy.
Bolton is making a list of things over which “we’ll see them in court.” Number one is: Virginia doesn’t count absentee ballots unless they could affect the race.
Let’s count the states that can be relied upon to follow macho flag waving supported by outright lies. This is the dream world: no issues; no fact-checking; no memory, what? me worry?
The Colorado GOP chief, rubbing his hands together gleefully, says that the worst thing that could happen to the Democrats would be the presidency and large majorities of both houses of congress. He promises perpetual, total war based upon the Democrats’ impending “failure to deliver.” This is the logic of criminals and the insane. Having destroyed the country, many Republicans are secretly relieved to see the Democrats in a position where in only two or four years they can be blamed for the entire thing.
McCain’s concession speech has been well received, and to be fair he kept it on a surprisingly gracious note with only some little digs like, “he’s my president, and I’ll support him, but we’re Americans! We never quit!” On the whole, however, McCain’s concession speech was self aggrandizing and maudlin. His audience was decidedly not gracious. They heartily booed Joe Biden, and repeatedly chanted “John-Mac-Cain!” and “U-S-A!”
The remains of the so-called right wing conservative branch of the Republican Party should be banished so far out into the political wilderness that their horses die of thirst. I say this for the good of America, and for the good of the Republican Party, out of love.
My Guitars
I made a fundamental mistake when I was “learning” how to play guitars: I learned with my ears and my hands, and I never used my brain to figure out what was actually happening. For me it was all ear-training and muscle memory.
Go ahead, ask me, what are the chords to “Looking for the Heart of Saturday Night.” How the fuck to I know? I think I play it in “D.” Whenever I wanted to play it, I’d take twenty or thirty seconds to figure it out all over again, or, remember it, if you will. Then I’d turn it over to my fingers, and it was music, and it came out fine. I could play fifty songs, no problem. I couldn’t tell you shit about them, especially the ones with 6th’s and 9th’s and major 7th’s and like that, but I could play them.
So after I stupidly cut the business end of my left middle finger off, cleaning out an ice chest in preparation for a party, my life is all about the love, bringing happiness to other people, after I had so mutilated myself I couldn’t play shit. How could I play the songs? I never knew shit about the songs! My fingers could play the songs, and now the most important one was gone!
When I pick up a guitar now it’s almost like starting all over again. Worse than that, I must un-learn over forty years of muscle memory. There are worse fates in the scheme of things, but it’s certainly annoying.
Go ahead, ask me, what are the chords to “Looking for the Heart of Saturday Night.” How the fuck to I know? I think I play it in “D.” Whenever I wanted to play it, I’d take twenty or thirty seconds to figure it out all over again, or, remember it, if you will. Then I’d turn it over to my fingers, and it was music, and it came out fine. I could play fifty songs, no problem. I couldn’t tell you shit about them, especially the ones with 6th’s and 9th’s and major 7th’s and like that, but I could play them.
So after I stupidly cut the business end of my left middle finger off, cleaning out an ice chest in preparation for a party, my life is all about the love, bringing happiness to other people, after I had so mutilated myself I couldn’t play shit. How could I play the songs? I never knew shit about the songs! My fingers could play the songs, and now the most important one was gone!
When I pick up a guitar now it’s almost like starting all over again. Worse than that, I must un-learn over forty years of muscle memory. There are worse fates in the scheme of things, but it’s certainly annoying.
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
Very Cool Comment on Spin Easy Time!
. . . on “Sadly the Case,” see below. I doubt if any of the books mentioned in the comment contain places or deeds that interest me much.
My most amazing meal in Thailand was up around Kachanaburi, on my way back “home” from the WWII bridge thing. I got out of a van and had to figure out how to get to the train station, and since it was lunch time I pulled up a chair in a wall-less noodle shack. There was the usual shock at seeing a Farang off the beaten path, and the usual relief when it became apparent that I could speak a little Thai. I ordered a bowl of noodle soup, and was disagreeably surprised to find that in this small city lots and lots of pig blood was a key ingredient. I never say anything when this kind of thing happens, I try to be a good guest. It was ok anyway, it tasted good if you didn’t think about the probably uncooked blood too much. Lots of people wanted to talk, I mean in some places when a Farang speaks Thai, however poorly, it’s like a talking dog just ordered a drink in a bar. One guy was fully dressed up as an American cowboy, boots, jeans, pearl-buttoned cowboy shirt, American Indian turquoise jewelry and belt buckle. He spoke twenty words of English, but we had some fun. He had a nice little cowpoke with him, also with the cowboy clothes. He got done before I did, and when he left he paid for my lunch too. Nice fellow.
My favorite golf course is Penmar in West Los Angeles. It’s the most used golf course in the world, no lie. It’s a nine hole “goat path,” that’s the term of endearment in L.A., straight, flat and easy. From first light until lights out they sent out groups of five players so close together that someone is blasting into you for the entire round. Here’s the good part: you almost always play with strangers, and the strangers can be very, very interesting. I played with a ninety-something guy who made cracking sounds and cries of pain every time he took a shot. He had a good straight game, but short. He was playing with a beautiful forty-something blond. I knew a guy there who played everyday and who was a very good golfer. He carried three clubs in a shitty little bag, he bought the entire kit for five dollars or less when he retired. He had a two-wood, a five-iron, and a sand-wedge, he putted with the five, and boy were the young athletic, competitive guys pissed when he beat them. I played with Len Sheridan one time. He came on as a single and just introduced himself as “Len.” He was a goofy sort of guy, very friendly, about seventy years old. After a few holes during which I noticed that he had a huge leather tour bag that said “TOYOTA” in letters that could be read from space I blurted out, Oh! you’re Len Sheridan! (Len Sheridan Toyota, one of the biggest Toyota dealers in California.) He about swallowed his gum, he was very impressed with my powers of deduction.
No, I am an unusual tourist. I stay away from the big temples, I like to go to the small markets outside of town, the ones where poor people shop for their daily bread, often in the form of bugs, or rubbery little, bitter as hell sea urchins from the rice paddies, or frogs, some of which can be of very impressive size, crucified on these split bamboo crosses and grilled. They don’t have those at the hotel restaurant.
Here’s a poem for you, I know you all love my poems:
Death and Venice
Now I lay me down to sleep,
Venice, before it sinks,
Would top the short list, I’d say,
Better hurry now,
Time being what it is, like money:
Once spent, gone like a summer’s breeze.
I pray the Lord my soul to keep,
The no-go list is long,
The couldn’t-give-a-shit list is
Vast and unwieldy, but then,
Who gives a shit?
So, Venice then, but expensive now,
Euros, I’ve never even seen one!
And so many time zones!
Think of the jet lag!
Six weeks anyway, to make it worthwhile,
See the Berninis.
And if I die before I wake,
Too old now to look for work as a sex-toy,
And not inclined to submit to the tremors of actual work.
But I’ve seen the Alps,
And Greenland, from a plane, it’s white,
Some kind of joke, I guess,
And I saw the Ramones, and Jimi,
And way too many rude All-Stars to name,
Or even count, in clubs as small as your apartment,
And who needs more museums?
Once you’ve been to the Met?
And the Modern?
One hundred times? Each? At least?
And the Frick for good luck?
I pray the Lord my soul to take.
And I’ve seen things,
And done things,
That if you’ve seen them too,
And done them,
Then we should have a secret handshake!
The elite! The lucky few!
I salute you!
I’ve seen the sun, our sun, shine
On waters far and wide, and battlefields,
And a concentration camp!
The real kind, no ersatz bullshit where no one died,
Saw the showers, stood in them!
And the industrial crematorium, and the dissecting tables,
Wow! This dumb fuck swallowed a wedding ring!
What an impressive pile of ashes they had!
And a room, a big room, filled with children’s shoes,
Filled to a height of five feet,
The cute-beyond-cute of horrors.
But Venice,
Venice haunts me,
Who’ll die first?
Me or Venice?
Time is our enemy,
Passing inexorably,
Leaving only
History in its wake.
April 20, 2008
My most amazing meal in Thailand was up around Kachanaburi, on my way back “home” from the WWII bridge thing. I got out of a van and had to figure out how to get to the train station, and since it was lunch time I pulled up a chair in a wall-less noodle shack. There was the usual shock at seeing a Farang off the beaten path, and the usual relief when it became apparent that I could speak a little Thai. I ordered a bowl of noodle soup, and was disagreeably surprised to find that in this small city lots and lots of pig blood was a key ingredient. I never say anything when this kind of thing happens, I try to be a good guest. It was ok anyway, it tasted good if you didn’t think about the probably uncooked blood too much. Lots of people wanted to talk, I mean in some places when a Farang speaks Thai, however poorly, it’s like a talking dog just ordered a drink in a bar. One guy was fully dressed up as an American cowboy, boots, jeans, pearl-buttoned cowboy shirt, American Indian turquoise jewelry and belt buckle. He spoke twenty words of English, but we had some fun. He had a nice little cowpoke with him, also with the cowboy clothes. He got done before I did, and when he left he paid for my lunch too. Nice fellow.
My favorite golf course is Penmar in West Los Angeles. It’s the most used golf course in the world, no lie. It’s a nine hole “goat path,” that’s the term of endearment in L.A., straight, flat and easy. From first light until lights out they sent out groups of five players so close together that someone is blasting into you for the entire round. Here’s the good part: you almost always play with strangers, and the strangers can be very, very interesting. I played with a ninety-something guy who made cracking sounds and cries of pain every time he took a shot. He had a good straight game, but short. He was playing with a beautiful forty-something blond. I knew a guy there who played everyday and who was a very good golfer. He carried three clubs in a shitty little bag, he bought the entire kit for five dollars or less when he retired. He had a two-wood, a five-iron, and a sand-wedge, he putted with the five, and boy were the young athletic, competitive guys pissed when he beat them. I played with Len Sheridan one time. He came on as a single and just introduced himself as “Len.” He was a goofy sort of guy, very friendly, about seventy years old. After a few holes during which I noticed that he had a huge leather tour bag that said “TOYOTA” in letters that could be read from space I blurted out, Oh! you’re Len Sheridan! (Len Sheridan Toyota, one of the biggest Toyota dealers in California.) He about swallowed his gum, he was very impressed with my powers of deduction.
No, I am an unusual tourist. I stay away from the big temples, I like to go to the small markets outside of town, the ones where poor people shop for their daily bread, often in the form of bugs, or rubbery little, bitter as hell sea urchins from the rice paddies, or frogs, some of which can be of very impressive size, crucified on these split bamboo crosses and grilled. They don’t have those at the hotel restaurant.
Here’s a poem for you, I know you all love my poems:
Death and Venice
Now I lay me down to sleep,
Venice, before it sinks,
Would top the short list, I’d say,
Better hurry now,
Time being what it is, like money:
Once spent, gone like a summer’s breeze.
I pray the Lord my soul to keep,
The no-go list is long,
The couldn’t-give-a-shit list is
Vast and unwieldy, but then,
Who gives a shit?
So, Venice then, but expensive now,
Euros, I’ve never even seen one!
And so many time zones!
Think of the jet lag!
Six weeks anyway, to make it worthwhile,
See the Berninis.
And if I die before I wake,
Too old now to look for work as a sex-toy,
And not inclined to submit to the tremors of actual work.
But I’ve seen the Alps,
And Greenland, from a plane, it’s white,
Some kind of joke, I guess,
And I saw the Ramones, and Jimi,
And way too many rude All-Stars to name,
Or even count, in clubs as small as your apartment,
And who needs more museums?
Once you’ve been to the Met?
And the Modern?
One hundred times? Each? At least?
And the Frick for good luck?
I pray the Lord my soul to take.
And I’ve seen things,
And done things,
That if you’ve seen them too,
And done them,
Then we should have a secret handshake!
The elite! The lucky few!
I salute you!
I’ve seen the sun, our sun, shine
On waters far and wide, and battlefields,
And a concentration camp!
The real kind, no ersatz bullshit where no one died,
Saw the showers, stood in them!
And the industrial crematorium, and the dissecting tables,
Wow! This dumb fuck swallowed a wedding ring!
What an impressive pile of ashes they had!
And a room, a big room, filled with children’s shoes,
Filled to a height of five feet,
The cute-beyond-cute of horrors.
But Venice,
Venice haunts me,
Who’ll die first?
Me or Venice?
Time is our enemy,
Passing inexorably,
Leaving only
History in its wake.
April 20, 2008
Congratulations Are in Order!
Let's hear it for Mr. Radical-Terrorist-Abortionist-America-Hating-Friend-Of-Criminals! Chicago, a city to which I could not be more indifferent, is obviously a good place to learn politics.
I know a good tailor in Columbia who makes beautiful bulletproof clothing, even t-shirts!
I know a good tailor in Columbia who makes beautiful bulletproof clothing, even t-shirts!
Monday, November 3, 2008
The Unitary Executive Theory
After the election we can look forward to a proper airing of issues that were considered too difficult for voters to grasp. The most important of these is the Unitary Executive Theory.
This boondoggle was first formulated by the Reagan Justice Department under Edwin Meese. It was an expansion of the power of the Executive Branch of government to control policy through its authority over Administrative Agencies.
Under the W. Bush administration the theory was expanded to put the president as far as possible beyond the control of Congress or the Constitution. Dark Lord Cheney, and his minion, the activist and deeply reactionary Professor Yoo, posited an almost imperial presidency. Their importance may diminish soon, but they leave in their wake four Supreme Court Justices who support their new version of the Unitary Executive.
One of the first formulators in the Meese office, Federalist Society founder Steven Calabresi, now writes:
“The cost of the bad legal advice that he received is that Bush has discredited the theory of the unitary executive by associating it not with presidential authority to remove and direct subordinate executive officials but with implied, inherent foreign policy powers, some of which, at least, the president simply does not possess.”
Which is to say that the president, with the backing of one short of an unbeatable majority on the Supreme Court, has been wielding unconstitutional power for several years now.
Tomorrow, there will either be a president elect who wishes to continue the expansion of the Unitary Executive and will veto any effort to investigate abuses by the Bush administration, or a president elect who (it is to be hoped) wishes to return to constitutional equilibrium and oversea the aforementioned investigations. And America will within a year or two have a President and a Supreme Court that believes that Congress is just a powerless showpiece, or a President and a Supreme Court that believes in the Constitutional balance of power that had been in effect for two hundred years until the Bush administration got a hold of it.
This sure has my intestines in a twist, and I don’t think that I’m the only one.
This boondoggle was first formulated by the Reagan Justice Department under Edwin Meese. It was an expansion of the power of the Executive Branch of government to control policy through its authority over Administrative Agencies.
Under the W. Bush administration the theory was expanded to put the president as far as possible beyond the control of Congress or the Constitution. Dark Lord Cheney, and his minion, the activist and deeply reactionary Professor Yoo, posited an almost imperial presidency. Their importance may diminish soon, but they leave in their wake four Supreme Court Justices who support their new version of the Unitary Executive.
One of the first formulators in the Meese office, Federalist Society founder Steven Calabresi, now writes:
“The cost of the bad legal advice that he received is that Bush has discredited the theory of the unitary executive by associating it not with presidential authority to remove and direct subordinate executive officials but with implied, inherent foreign policy powers, some of which, at least, the president simply does not possess.”
Which is to say that the president, with the backing of one short of an unbeatable majority on the Supreme Court, has been wielding unconstitutional power for several years now.
Tomorrow, there will either be a president elect who wishes to continue the expansion of the Unitary Executive and will veto any effort to investigate abuses by the Bush administration, or a president elect who (it is to be hoped) wishes to return to constitutional equilibrium and oversea the aforementioned investigations. And America will within a year or two have a President and a Supreme Court that believes that Congress is just a powerless showpiece, or a President and a Supreme Court that believes in the Constitutional balance of power that had been in effect for two hundred years until the Bush administration got a hold of it.
This sure has my intestines in a twist, and I don’t think that I’m the only one.
Sunday, November 2, 2008
The Wives' Neighborhood
Yesterday I took a trip with my buddy Choophong and his family to visit the recreational palace, the out of town get away mini-Versaille, of the great king, Rama Five. It was all very impressive, but my favorite part was this large collection of nondescript but nice houses tucked over in a wooded corner of the large, park like property. It was the wives' neighborhood.
It was house after modest house, each bearing signage naming the occupant. They had titles which had meanings like, "Main Wife," "Wife with Children," even "(Mere) Concubine but with fully accepted Royal Children." One slightly bigger house listed five wives names, the "bull-pen" I suppose.
Rama Five was a busy guy on the wife scene. He had lots of them, and lots of children, no less than seventy four sons alone. That was in the second half of the Nineteenth Century.
This kind of thing is the rationale that Thai men offer even in these late days for having more than one wife. In Thailand, if you can support a second wife, you know, put her in her own house and pay the bills, most people think it's ok. The women don't like it, no surprise, but for men with money it's a way of showing off.
How do you feel about that, said the doctor?
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