WHAT IS WRONG WITH US?
The Supreme Court of The United States noted in "Rasul vs. Bush" that:

Petitioners' allegations--that, although they have engaged neither in combat nor in acts of terrorism against the United States, they have been held in Executive detention for more than two years in territory subject to the long-term, exclusive jurisdiction and control of the United States, without access to counsel and without being charged with any wrongdoing--unquestionably describe "custody in violation of the Constitution or laws or treaties of the United States. (footnote 15)

Link to the case at: http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/cgi-bin/getcase.pl?court=US&navby=case&vol=000&invol=03-334

www.globalsecurity.com reports that there are still at least 500 people being held at Guantanamo, ranging in age from 13 years to 98 years.

What is wrong with us? Where is the outrage? If a single US citizen was being held in this way by a foriegn country, without due process or hope of release, the reason would not matter. We would declare it a human rights violation and do whatever was necessary to effect that person's release. We would go to war if necessary to secure that person's freedom.

The jingoistic, racist way we can ignore wrongs perpetrated on foriegners that would greatly anger us if perpetrated on an American is shaming, and it is wrong. Anyone who can ignore that can never again use the rhetoric of freedom to justify anything.

OGW

CANDOR ALSO IS APPARENTLY ONLY SKIN DEEP

In a recent slate.com story at:

http://www.slate.com/id/2132705/

the slate writer talks about how Bush is trying to appear more candid in his latest speeches and interviews. The article takes pains to point out that Bush's off-the-record comments and views still do not match his public rhetoric. But, using different camera angles, talking points, etc., Bush is at least trying to present himself as more open and forthright. Hoping, I assume, to save the final shred of his credibility from destruction.

There is only one problem with this strategy that I can see. Isn't the phrase "appearance of candor" an oxymoron? I mean, the word candor means "appearing as you really are", so there is no such thing as the appearance of candor. Either one is candid or one is not. In fact, 'trying' to give the appearance of candor automatically disqualifies you from being candid. So all Bush is doing in trying to present the appearance of candor is being less candid than when he was just a liar. After all, if everyone knows he is a liar, then he is candidly a liar. But now he is trying to be a liar who doesn't look like a liar, which is the least candid state possible.

OGW

ARMY VIDEO GAME IS EITHER FIFTH OR SIXTH SIGN OF THE APOCALYPSE

I just saw a commercial for a video game created and endorsed by the U.S. Army. I have already posted on several occasions about the strange nature of having created media (movies, games, as opposed to news) that deals with current events as if they are history. However, the destructive power of such media when it is created by the private sector is nothing compared to such media created by the government.
When the private sector creates games like this, the motive is clear. Profit. As sickening as it is to make a profit off the backs of people who are currently fighting and dying, at least it is a known and understood motive.
Although the government may have similar profit motives in the creation of their game, it is all too easy to assign them, in addition, far more nefarious reasons. It seems to me like clear propaganda, trying to create and intensify the perception of soldiers as warriors instead of killers. This perception is not only false, it is dangerous. The reasons I have discussed before, but I felt it was necessary to post this further example of the creation of propaganda by our government.

OGW

ANDERSON COOPER IS A TOOL

I just saw a commercial for Anderson Cooper, an anchor with his own show on CNN. He said, in his commercial, "We're at our best when we are showing you different points ov view, showing you sides you never even knew existed." WHAT? Aren't you at your best when you are uncovering FACTS that we never knew existed? When did we replace the word "fact" with the word "perspective" in so much of this country's journalism? Isn't that basically a backhanded way of telling people that they can't make up their own mind about anything? I personally am offended at the idea that it is not enough to show me facts, that my "perspective" on those facts has to be spoon-fed to me by idiots like Anderson Cooper.

OGW

JOKES LESS FUNNY, STILL IMPORTANT

Last week, two Carolina Panther cheerleaders were caught having sex in a bar bathroom stall. Here is a link to the story:

http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/archives/12595

On Saturday, Saturday Night Live's "Weekend Update" did a fake news reenactment of that incident, which turned into the most insightful, flat-out ballziest piece of reporting I have seen in the last five years. I don't have the exact quote, so I'm not going to post the whole thing. I mention this because there is a trend emerging here that I would like to point out.

This fake report, along with "The Daily Show", represent the most honest and complete criticism of the current political scene available in the media. AND THEY ARE BOTH FAKE NEWS SHOWS. I have noted this before, but now I want to make a further point about what I believe this means.

What is it that comedians do? Make jokes, of course, but how do they do that? They do it by violating taboos. In a public forum, the violation of taboos is considered funny.

So then, why are the joke news shows the only ones doing completely honest journalism? Because honest journalism has become a taboo in this country. Speaking the plain truth, without regard to party or ideal, has never been the province of politicians in this country, but recently it has ceased to be the domain of the media. Now, our assumption of "partisanship" with regard to any political or social news has turned into reality, and no media is able to resist the pull of one side or the other. A journalistic slant is a precursor to journalism itself. Except on the fake news shows.

Let me be careful to point out that I am not suggesting any intentional bias in the part of our newspeople. Indeed, what makes it taboo is that it is an unspoken but fundamental change in the way that our system works.

Shows like "Crossfire" and others of its type encourage the taking of sides instead of the debate of issues. The moderators of these shows create a liberal or conservative 'persona' so that the audience can know what they are getting before they get it. The problem is that doing the news becomes a rhetorical effort to fit facts into personas instead of an honest and open evaluation of the facts. The sum of politics does not fit into only two categories, so why should the coverage of it fit into only two categories?

The result of all this is that news' goal of creating informed and honest political opinions is lost, replaced with the goal of entertainment. And, in an ironic twist, the shows that entertain us have started doing the real news.

--OGW

THE GLORY OF COMBAT

I was watching a commercial for the US Army on TV tonight, and they were really playing up the whole "glory of combat" angle. You know, things like "only a select few are tough enough..." and it made me start to think about the validity of that premise on today's army. I mean, I understand that in days of yore the glory of combat was a very real thing. Great soldiers trained for years with swords and other weapons, and single soldiers often did turn the tide of a battle, or even a war. That is simply no longer the case today.
As with so many things, our technology has outpaced our humanity, and it is now primarily weapons and equipment that matter in deciding the outcome of combat. What glory is there in mowing down a hundred enemy troops with a machine gun when they are a hundred yards away from you? How can it be glorious to push a button that wipes out an entire village while you are miles above it in an airplane? And, if there really is no glory to be had, isn't it incredibly irresponsible to advertise as if there was?
In the modern army, it is possible to kill everything you can see, using superior weapons and equipment, until the one person you don't see kills you instead. What glory is there is that?

OGW

THE POWER OF OPPOSITION

Recently a student at Duquesne University was sanctioned for creating and posting anti-gay propaganda on the web site called "The Facebook", which connects college students throughout the country. For an article describing his posts and the resulting fallout see

http://www.digitalduke.duq.edu/article.asp?id=128

My intention here is not to debate the content of his posting, which seems to me obviously misguided and ignorant, nor to discuss what seem to me to be clear violations of the first amendment committed by the school in sanctioning him for his post. (See the article for details)
Instead, I want to point out that it is not in the best interests of the gay rights advocates to make such a big deal when these sorts of things happen. I also want to make clear here that the comments made on the web site were not threatening n nature. That is, he did not say gays should die, or anything of that nature. Comments that directly threaten need to be treated as such.
However, comments such as those made on The Facebook should be treated in a very different way, one that minimizes their impact instead of maximizing it. Let me explain what I mean.
People who read comments such as that can be divided into two basic groups. First are people who read them and are outraged. There is no need to explain to such people that anti-gay comments are inappropriate and hurtful; they already know. Second, there are people who read such comments and agree. There is ALSO no need to explain the facts about anti-gay comments to people such as this, but for a very different reason. That they can ignore the obvious bigotry and inappropriateness of such comments proves that they are either incapable of understanding or unwilling to understand, so explanation does no good.
Given this, all such strong responses to this bogitry do is legitimize it as part of our national discourse. I have a message for all the Gay Rights Advocates out there: YOU HAVE ALREADY WON! Although I understand that the Gay Marriage Ban would not suggest this, this post does not concern official policies. In that arena, I agree there is a ways to go. We are talking here about personal bigotry which, while it exists, is no longer acceptable in the public arena. This is a very important distinction to be able to make, because, while we can exorcise official bigotry from our society, the first amendment makes it impossible to eliminate private racism through legislative or punitive means. Where I say that Gay Rights has already won is in making it socially unacceptable to bring private bigotry into the public forum. This has happened through no political means, but through the resocialization of an entire generation.
When such bigotry rears its ugly head, it is somewhat akin to a dog pissing in the middle of the kitchen floor. It is inconvenient, and sometimes a little embarassing if you have friends over, but you must recognize that the dog can't help being a dog. What you don't do is walk through the neighborhood with a loudspeaker and demand that your neighbors acknowledge that your dog has no right to pee on your floor. And you always remember that is that dog bites someone, you will have to put it down.
My point is this. There is no reason to get up in arms about bigotous idiots, because they do not know or care that you are up in arms. Instead, exclusion is the order of the day. All of us who recognize that bigots are less than human should simply refuse to publicize and legitimize individual bigotry, while working to eliminate all traces of that bigotry from the public political arena. If we do that, we will be much farther on the way to creating a bigot-free place to live.

OGW

I CAN'T EVEN TELL ANYMORE

I was reading the headlines this morning, and I thought that the papers were actually doing a pretty good job of coverage. Then I realized something: I am so suspicious of the media now (and for good reason) that my sense of how they are doing is skewed almost beyond recognition. They have done so little for me over the last 5 years that I cannot read a headline without wondering what the political motive and backstory has done to the coverage. It is sad in a way, and perhaps partially my fault, but I feel almost like a jilted lover who cannot stop think that his now faithful wife is cheating on him.
I guess that means that this process is not one that can be simply reversed. The transformation of our media into a political tool is not complete, but neither is it something we can simply walk away from. Although this is something of a tired analogy, and in this case perhaps overwrought, i see it as a line of dominoes already beginning to fall. And the last domino is the democratic process.

OGW

THE APATHY OF THE MEDIA

I have been checking the news quite regularly for the last couple of weeks, and I am struck and horrified by a trend I am only beginning to understand. It seems that the mainstream media is being led around by the nose by the Bush administration. I know, I know, this is an old tune, but this time it has resurfaced with a new twist. Usually, I am angry at the Media for blandly accepting what they are told by the administration and reporting it as fact without any further investigation. I have sort of become numb to this kind of journalistic irresponsibility.
What kills me now is how easily, and how completely, the truly important stories have been thrust aside to make way for coverage of things that may matter, but may very well not. Yesterday, I was somewhat angry that EVERY major internet news site covered the judicial nomination instead of the indictments comcerning the Valerie Plume leak. That said, I do recognize that the nomination of a supreme court justice, particularly one as controversial as Alito, is a big story. The administration OBVIOUSLY timed that nomination to counteract news of the indictments, but I can't be mad at that. The democrats would do that just as fast in a reversed position, anyone would with an ounce of political sense.
This morning, I opened the front page of cnn.com, wondering whether they would lead with Alito or the Plume case. Instead, to my wondering eyes appeared our beloved doofus of a President, asking Congress for still more money we don't have to "prepare for a possible flu pandemic." A flu pandemic? Better yet, a flu pandemic that has not yet even happened in this country? Is this some sort of sick joke? Or have the news media really become such partisan hacks, such overwrought, self-important nabob's that they really can't make up their own minds about what is an important story anymore? If we are going to read words directly from the mouth of the President's writers, let's dispense with the middle man and have little speakers in our homes that broadcast his words, like in 1984. I do not need to hear those words cloaked in a veneer of authority and nonpartisanship simply because they were reread by some rich, makeuped clown with a permanent smile sewn on to his face. The news media in this country seems to have confused the idea of objectivity, of reporting the facts, with the idea of repeating whatever you are told. I expect nonsensical, self-serving BS from politicians. I just never thought that the media, once the bastion of honesty and toughness in our country, could fall so far as to become mouthpieces for the propaganda and manipulation that is ruining our country.

OGW

FUNDAMENTAL DIFFERENCES

I heard something that truly startled me the other day. I heard that soldiers in the Iraqi army, including those on our side, routinely have homosexual sex with each other, and that the practice is accepted and common. They even have a saying, "Women are for children but men are for pleasure." I do not write this for shock value, if that even has shock value, I am not really sure. I write it because it seems to me a poignant way to illustrate what I believe may be a fundamental misconception inherent in the American presence and plan in Iraq.
My point is this: Iraqis are DIFFERENT from Americans. Can you imagine something like this being allowed in our country? If you can, I think we may have been living in different Americas these last few years. If these differences run to things as basic as sexual behavior and the morality surrounding it, what other fundamental differences exist that separate us from them?
We seem to be laboring under the absurd fantasy in this country that underneath every person on earth there is a liberal democratic statesman waiting to get out. It is one thing to hold that as an ideal. It is morally irresponsible to fight a war based on that assumption, when every historical analysis shows the opposite. In the way that Karl Marx thought a communist revolution must begin with the people, any attempt to "impose" democracy is doomed to failure.
A democratic government is the people, ideally representative of the will of the people. So, when the people are as fractured as the people as Iraq, the division and instability will inevitably follow in the government. They are divided by race, divided by religion, and divided by a history of hundreds of years of warfare. How arrogant of us to think that we can end that by enforcing a system of government that, by its very nature, allows people to do what they want. Indeed, it offers them the means of legitimizing their violent behavior by attaching it to an official government.
The only way to avoid these problems in the new government is for us to maintain an armed presence in Iraq for a long-term period. That we will not leave Iraq quickly has been obvious for years. I am disgusted by what we, as a people, have allowed. I am truly shamed at this moment to be a part of it.

OGW

THE PROBLEM IS THE PROCESS!!! -----

I was watching "The Daily Show" last night and they had a segment where they went through and highlighted the many inconsistnecies and hypocricies the Bush administration has perpetrated since 2000. I was struck in particular by a number of pairings of news segments in which Bush said, direct from his own mouth, totally incompatible statements. For example, they had a clip of him in 2001 saying "Finding Osama Bin Laden is my number one priority", then of his in 2005 saying "I don't care where he is. That is not a concern of mine at all." There were an unbelievably large number of these sorts of statements.
Just when I was starting to feel that familiar anger at the Bush camp that has sustained me through much of the last five years, I was struck by the fact that I was watching the most insightful, best designed piece of news I had seen in that same period -- AND IT WAS ON A FAKE NEWS SHOW! These pieces of tape are not secret! It is not some incredible investigative journalism by the Daily show that uncovered this footage. These statements were all made on national news programs, and the footage is available for anyone who cares to put it together. Why have the "legitimate" news shows not done so?
My only conclusion is that everyone in power, including the major news networks, has a vested interest in maintaining the status quo. What that interest is, I cannot really figure. But, there is simply no other explanation for the manner in which the Bush administration's blatant disregard for facts has been consistently ignored by the mainstream media. More reflections on this in a future update.

--OGW

THE PRICE OF WAR!

I have been thinking on many of the things that have happened since the start of this war, and I have come to one conclusion that I am fairly certain of. The conclusion is that there are certain necessary costs that must be paid in waging war, such as the human rights violations that have occurred in the last two years in Iraq. Pillage, Abuse, and even Torture will inevitably result from the waging of war. Period. Countless historical examples have proven and reproven this fact. However, instead of acknowledging this fact in the modern era, we persist in promoting an impossible and ambivalent attitude in our soldiers and our people. They are taught to treat with human dignity those same people they are sent to kill.
The truth is that that message, that unmanageable duality, is intended more for the people at home than the people abroad. It matters very much how war is perceived by the People, but very little how it is waged by the soldiers in the field. They cannot be decieved, but their opinions and their suffering count for almost nothing in the political arena. Fortunately for those in power, those who vote need not understand those who fight.
So Abuse and Suffering is the natural and inevitable consequence of waging war. If that is true, then the question of whetner to wage war is no longer so simple. We must ask whether the expected gain outweighs the cost. After al the careful consideration I can hope to give it, I must protest that our current war is not worth it. Not at all.

OGW

I was sitting in the car yesterday listening to what I am sure is my ten thousandth plus commercial that is trying to raise money for hurricaine relief. My first thought was pride at how well we are able to come together in times of crisis. But then I thought two things.
First I thought of the number of places in the world that have experienced the level of destruction that the gulf coast has. There are a fair number of such places that spring to mind. The areas in South East Asia, for example, whose fundraising commercials I remembered being all over the radio a few months before. Then I thought of some other areas that did not have any fund-raising commercials. Iraq. Afghanistan. The level of destruction wrought on these places is almost as severe as the aftermath of a hurricaine, the death toll far higher.
This lack of active compassion for places torn by war instead of by a natural disaster is the second thing I thought of in the car yesterday. It seems to me that the opposite should be true. After all, it is no secret that hurricaines, even very destructive hurricaines, are not all too uncommon on the Gulf Coast. That is, there may be some implied risk in a decision to live there. And while I recognize that many New Orleans residents had no means to live elsewhere, many did. And our aid and our empathy are given to both equally.
In war-torn countries, however, no natural disaster caused the destruction. Instead, we simply allowed our behavior to degrade it so thoroughly that it became uninhabitable! And yet we dig deeper into our pockets to help people hurt through no fault of our own!