The old axiom was wrong

There was a great quote I don't remember where I read it, but it was relaed to the old US/USSR cold war rivalry, and some KGB officer was making the rounds and he commented to his CIA counterpart about how much respect he had for American 'propoganda', which to him was what our system of commercial advertising was. To paraphrase, he said the difference between the US and the USSR was that the US believed their own propoganda, where as the Russians didn't believe their own.

And I can so see that in America, just not today, but throughout our history. We've only recently entered the cynical stage of nationality, where as Russia has experienced it almost from the begining, heh. The more they knew someone the more the distrusted them almost, where as we trust people explicitly that we've never even met.

I mean, why do people trust Bush? Or Clinton, or any president for that matter. The vast, vast majority of people have never met them, never seen them in person, never saw how they acted in social settings, knew nothing about them except what they were spoon fed by the media.

The American media is not liberal, nor conservative, nor of any specific ideology, other than consumerism. They sell what we'll pay for. We don't buy it, they don't offer it. It's brutaly efficient, sadly.

The old axiom was wrong; you don't get the government you deserve. You get the media you deserve, and by proxy the government they sell you.

The bitch of it is, though, is that they aren't even trying to do it. If there was some nuderlying ideology, some nefarious plot to weaken our spines and loose the ar for the Allies, at least then it would be explainable.

Lacking that, I can only conclude that man is a selfish piece of shit at heart, and that's jsut a drag to have to admit your species sucks nads.

Is being a 'Nam vet a political liability?

I've said before here and there, that I've come to believe that having served in Vietnam, and worse, being decorated for that service, is a liability in todays political climate.

By serving, they only illustrate they were too stupid or not connected well enough to get out of serving, and any decorations earned were nothing more than the pursuit of political gain later on.

How many Republican Vietnam veterans are there in Congress today? I'm honestly asking, I don't know of any, though of course that doesn't mean there aren't any. Conversly I can name off a handfull off the top of my head that are Democrats that have subsequently had their patriotism very publicly and savagly questioned.

Oops, I do forget McCain in this, but again, he was savaged by those that were smart enough or connected enough to get out of serving their country when she called.

Murtha only escaped the phenomenon as long as he did because he's also a Korean War vet.

I can't help but view this as a form of contempt for those that served in the only war we lost. Is there some risidual blame trickling down? Is it resentment to being reminded of the loss, or is it actual contempt for service as beneath them?

I blame the WW II generation for part of this, though by no means all of it. George H.W. Bush was a true hero in WW II. He served his country proudly and deserves respect and thanks for that service. And yet, he did everything he could to get his own son out of serving in the same capacity. Was it because he knew the true horrors of war and naturaly wanted to spare his son as any father would? Or was it because he knew the war wasn't worth dying for?

So many of the WW II generation did the same for their sons as Bush Sr. did, there has to be some connection, or disconnection, as it were, between the two causes.

And now, of course, we have the 'all volunteer' army, so no one has to worry about a sense of shame in not serving. Others will do it for me, it makes it all nice and neat and manageable. I can support the war and never have my own patriotism questioned because others volunteered to fight it for me. In fact, I don't even have to sacrifice, I get tax cuts during war time.

No one likes to be reminded they lost. How many Iraq War vets are running for office as Republicans? Again, there could be some, but I follow national news pretty good, and with the amount of party line trash on boths sides posted here, if there were some I probably would have read of them by now. And certainly the Republicans would want to be making a big deal out of it, what with their naturaly puffy chests and such.

Actualy, a quick Google of 'iraq war vet running office republican' turns up a story in the Boston Globe of one Iraq War vet running as a Republican. Of course, of the nine vets running, eight of them are running as Democrats, heh. And even the Republican is running against the prevailing leadership in Washington.

Said the lone Republican candidate profiled;
"Both parties have pursued policies of division, and there is this gaping whole in the middle where I think most Americans reside, Those people need to be represented," he said. "I don't know how we go from a country as united as it was on Sept. 12, 2001, to one as divided as we are today. That is what is propelling me in this race."

Good call, my man.

Deathwatch, day 15,558

It's been 15,558 days since I began dying. From the moment I breathed, I started to die. Lucky is the animal man that knows his mortaltiy, blessed and cursed by equal measure.

I used to write a lot, back when I was younger and had a few more catalysts happening in my life. Mostly when I was drinking. But I was also dating, having relationships, confrontations, interactions, catalysts, things that pushed my feelings. I haven't had that for some time. I've been alive, but the spark is gone. I don't drink anymore either.

For a long time I drank the old axiom; write drunk, edit sober. But that was just a filter for my feelings. Still, it was like a valve that opened and let my thoughts roam. Now I feel restricted, not empty, more like idling in neutral.

Oh I still have my recreations, but nothing so raw s drinking. Drinking was primal, from the pit. Not good or bad, just was. Now it's more cerebral, but unfortunately I'm a bit less capable in that department. I can still talk a good game, but I can't put it down in the way as I used to.

And it's not the same for me anymore. For me it was personal, I was connected to my writing. I held the pen and paper, with my own actions I formed the words on the paper. It all goes back to putting pen to paper, the ideal, the freedom, the speaking of one to many, the liberation from the confines of my mind as it passed physicaly through my arm to my hand to the pen to the paper.

I've never been able to quite capture that depth of feeling with a computer. But then it never clicked for me with a typerwriter or word processor either. It's not just the keyboard as agent of medium, it's the whole historical ideal of speaking to the masses. The liberation of the printed word.

I don't view fire as an invention. It was just a matter of time before lightening struck a tree and caught it on fire and some knob ofa caveman figured out he could light a stick with it and carry it back to the cave. Discovering it was chance circumstance, not deliberate design. Now the guy that figured out you could chip some flint, that I could give some props to.

But the first real invention to me was the wheel. And it was the literaly the mother of all inventions. So much sprang from the wheel, it wasn't jsut the wheel that impacted us but what it begat. For one, the pully or the block and tackle, ball bearings, gears, axles. Mostly the pully I guess. Pulley?

Anyway, the next truely significant invention for me was movable type, my little love of words. Liberated from the confines of a repressive religious state, for good and ill, and there's been plenty of ill, disimination of information to the masses was unleashed like a hellish Pandoric, uh, Pandora, I guess.

The next invention to spawn more parts then it's sum is the Internet. I put it no less than in the ranks of the wheel and movable type in it's significance in the advancement of the human race. But even so, I find it distant in so many ways.

I talk to people in other countries on a daily basis more than I talk to people in the next room. Ok, that's allegorical, but still apt. And I actually do converse, at least in type on forums every day with people in a dozen different countries. Which is really freaking cool, all in all. But the expanded freedom and knowledge has come at the cost of lessening my interaction with those more immediatly around me. Why should I go out into the cold, cruel world and risk embarrasment when I can get online and talk to people worlds away with no fear of personal risk?

The temptation is alluring.

China really sucks

I can't believe we buy so much cheap crap from China when they suck so fucking bad on human rights. Fucking bottom God damn dollar is that that matters. And no, it wasn't always this bad. And no, I don't blame Bush, though him and his ilk certainly push it to their profit. Capitalism works fine for an economic structure, not a fucking social one though. We'll be down 3,000 lives in Iraq and a half a billion fucking dollars in the hole by the time we're done there, and for what, to liberate the Iraqi people? To push fucking freedom and democracy? We give China MFN status, Wal-Mart is China's thrid fucking largest export market behind Germany. Of course the US is first by far. No one touches us on buying cheap Chinese crap. Get that folksy white trash vibe going in Wal-Mart, no need to bother with a social conscience or anything, better to get that cheap price instead, that's all that matters. You're as likely, or even more so, to see fucking SUV's and new Buicks and Caddy's in the local fucking Goodwill parking lot as you are rust buckets and winter beaters. Are people hurting that bad? Or are they just cheap bastards? My parents businss will probably close in the next year because we don't lie and cheat our customers like our local competition does and we can't compete when they're better at lying then we are at being simply honest. But we don't push bottom line price, even though that's what they want. Very few people care about quality anymore, all that matters is it's cheap. China buying up all our debt has kept our inflation artificaly low. That and tying their fucking currency to ours has done nothing but hurt the US and enrich a repressive Communist fucking regime that arbitrailty kills and imprisons it's people for their political and religious beliefes, ostensibly in the name of national security. Hm, sounds familiar, doesn't it? China fucks us and we just spread our cheeks wider, we can't get enough of it. If iflation was were it was supposed to be, and China wasn't such a piece of shit, we wouldn't be on this crap spree to the extent we are. Our fucking trade dificit is a fucking joke, poeple! Our countries being sold out. At least the fucking Japanese were our allies, the Chinese hate us! They want to supplant us as both the dominatn military and fucking economic superpower of the world, you shit for fucking brains! But hey, those plastic food dishes are just so damn cheap at Wal-Mart.

Witnesses: Chinese protesters shot, village sealed