Author's posts
Jan 28 2009
Discretion is the better part of valor
We built yellow into our traffic lights because if they went right from red to green with no warning it would be too late to stop in time. Strangely, in matters of personal behavior, people seem to treat yellow lights like they do when they’re driving, they hit the gas.
This is a blog. We sit behind our keyboards and “converse” (you could say banter, or joust, or bitch) with other people who are similarly distant and anonymous. And lately it’s fascinating how much the anger back and forth has become so perverted; the people who claim they are the level-headed intellectuals have found some malicious form of enjoyment in carrying on disagreements to the point they seem to hope the other party has either smashed the computer, shot themselves through the temple, or blown up the building to take as many others with them as possible.
More evidence of unabomber anger below.
This is a long diary. Don’t read it if you’re in a hurry.
Dec 28 2008
On prosecuting Bush/Cheney et al. for war crimes
If you wish to repost this essay you can download a .txt file of the html here (right click and save). Permission granted.
Here's a comment that was sent to the petition that I liked:
About two years ago I found a quote by Abraham Joshua Heschel that has haunted me ever since:
When considering cruelties committed in the name of a free society, some may be guilty, but all are responsible.
As much as Gerald Ford might still be lauded by some for “sparing the country the long national nightmare” of whatever proceedings might have been the fate of Richard Nixon, what happened in the Nixon administration was an in-house problem. What has been done in the name of the United States by President Bush and Vice President Cheney has worldwide consequences to our reputation and our future credibility.
When we went to war in contravention of world opinion in 2003, we became the rogue nation that the UN was created (with our co-operation) to deal with. We all know the only reason no one has dealt with us is not because our cause was just or because we were proven right, but only because we're the biggest dog on the block with all the teeth. Who is left that could challenge us?
Now the only chance we have to regain that credibility is to use the freedoms as a citizenry to be honest about what our leaders have done in our name. In my opinion it will haunt us for generations to come how we were so proud of our form of democracy -particularly of our Constitution – that we felt we were the one country qualified (if not obligated in the minds of President Bush and Vice President Cheney) to use the largest military force ever assembled to force it on Iraq – whether they asked for it or not.
It therefore seems perversely tragic that there are plausible allegations that our Constitution – the one we were so proud of – was betrayed in the effort. more below…
Nov 23 2008
The father is “appalled”. Well, so am I.
Here's a sign of the times that I am sure will become far more common than we can ever get comfortable with (but nonetheless surely will, no doubt to either of us):
Father appalled by virtual audience to son's death
I may come back and expand on this later tonight.
Then again, I may not.
I remember how I felt the night of the Columbine massacre, and how everyone but the rocks and stones was sure they knew exactly all there was to know about the inside of the two kids that drove so far off into the evil.