"Most mistakes with our children, with our spouses, with all family members are not the result of bad intent. It's just that we really don't understand. We don't see clearly enough into one another's hearts.
If we did - if an entire family could develop the kind of openness we're talking about - over 90% of the difficulties and problems could be solved."
- Stephen Covey, speaking of humankind, not just the humankind we are related to
It's so refreshing and beautiful to have someone write about politics like people really matter to them.
A Christmas wish
"My sister’s rental place was littered with signs of a more complicated truth than the one obscured by the easy headline. She had 24-hour Alcoholics Anonymous coins lying all over her house, on tables and in dishes. These coins are given out at meetings to mark a day of sobriety, and she attended meetings all the time. She had weights in the living room for her workouts. She always wanted to stay in shape. Religious, spiritual, and poetry books were scattered about with freshly underlined passages on faith, hope, and love. The food in the refrigerator was still fresh, and notes were posted on the door to remind her of the things she needed to do, amid pictures her kids had drawn for her. The movie The Bucket List was near her DVD player. She had either just watched it or was about to. It’s a wonderful film about preparing for death and enjoying life in the meantime.
And, of course, the Christmas list in her pocket. A piece of paper that reflected her love of her kids and the hope and joy that comes with giving.
No, President Obama isn’t a socialist. He isn’t trying to ruin the country, and he doesn’t hate America. Sarah Palin isn’t a dimwit without anything valuable to say or contribute to the country. Republicans aren’t all greedy and corporate stooges. Democrats aren’t all Big Government liberals and against capitalism. The news media (generally) aren’t a tool of the Left or the Right. And my sister wasn’t an uncaring addict who overdosed on a cold day in Michigan.
As we walk through life and deal with one another, we need to keep in mind that truth is not in the headline or the pithy sound bite but deeper in the hearts and souls of each of us—and in the good intentions that most of us carry with us every day, whether we’re bagging groceries, cleaning offices, defending our country, or negotiating a tax compromise.
Diving down to those depths, rather than just snorkeling in the shallows, might give us the bends. But it also might tell us a little more about each other and ourselves.
And maybe it would be good to consider the possibility that each of us, even on our bad days, is walking around with a Christmas list in our pocket."
Perhaps this should be the only way to write about anything that really matters.
Studying politics, like working with the meanest kids, has a tendency to sit heavy on the heart.
They're both similar activities. Both celebrating their meaner instincts. Politics, especially, in the last 10 years. Both pretending like their meaner instincts are their better instincts. Because it's easier than facing shortcomings, in both cases. And listening. And being decent. And having faith in people. And being better, generally.
All of the things we take for granted with nicer people. Loving people. The same people that the meanspirited scapegoat for the failures of their meaner impulses.
Because it's easier than having the courage to take responsibility for them, is the truth.
All of this has made the the world an enormous mess in the last 10 years.
And all of it weighs on the heart. Which is exactly what meaner folks count on to get their way when they want to do that. So it's not terribly surprising.
And the saddest consequence of all this for me and for the country, right now, I was realizing, tonight, is just how much it underestimates just how great each of us and all of us can be.
Given the one thing people have been desperately trying to avoid and more explicitly undermine than I have ever seen.
Our sense of common and higher purpose.
It's been a strange odyssey to watch a country and a world give up on its sense of common purpose. And to pretend like its baser impulses can somehow compensate for more genuine higher purpose.
And the saddest fact of all, in all of this, is how much this fails to appreciate just how great each of us and all of us can be. Given a commitment towards that end.
We may choose not to be great. Not to be good and decent to one another. Not to be generous and decent. To be courageous and humble. To be compassionate and thoughtful. To be forgiving and trustworthy. To be all of the values that we know, deep in our hearts, are humanity's and America's strongest legacy.
We can choose that.
And we can live with its fruits.
And we are, currently, living with those fruits.
And the craziness of it all is that it really does not have to be that way.
Because we can also support one another to aspire for our own greatness. And for greatness as a nation. And greatness in our commitment to the purposes of all humanity.
People really can be better. To let those who refuse to do so refuse. And to lead them in better directions. And to let those those take up the mantle of greatness lead us. And to aspire in the direction of greatness. Because it serves us better. Even when we fall short.
The rub is that it means humbling ourselves. And facing how we fall short. To take up greatness in whatever pursuit once again.
Especially in the pursuit of being a great human being. Great children and parents. Great spouses and loved ones. Great people making great contributions to our families and communities and world and the lives of others.
If there is anything I regret at this point in my life it is losing track of this commitment in my own life, too often. And losing track of my commitment and need to aspire in this direction no matter what anyone else is doing. To let them lead their lives as they see fit. For good and for bad.
To take greatness seriously in my own life. To see greatness in others. To encourage them and myself in more loving and constructive directions.And to let people choose otherwise if they so choose. Except when they are dangerous to others.
Because the truth is that greatness is within our reach. Mine. Yours. All of us. One day at a time. One choice at a time. One moment at a time.
And the rest of my life is committed to seeing and encouraging that in myself and others. To knowing the limits of doing so for anyone other than myself. And to love and appreciate deeply people in my life no matter how this pans out for any of us.
Just how great can we be?
As great as we can imagine. And make real what it conceivable and able to be actualized.
That is just how great I aspire to be.
And doing so does not need me to bemoan the ways that the world falls short somewhat and perhaps substantially less than I am encouraging myself and the world in the direction of its biggest, greatest horizons.
Many will choose to forgo those horizons.
Until their pride gives way to a humble appreciation for what is possible.
For me. For others. For the world.
And that is the only way forward that really offers anything real to satisfy the deepest sense of purpose and satisfaction in life, I am convinced.
Just how great can I be?
Just how great can you be?
Now's as good as time as any to enlighten the rest of us.
Poll: Support Drops for Afghanistan War
Something is amiss, these days, in America and the world.
And America's discussion about the war in Afghanistan should be the big red flag for everyone that this is so.
The Afghanistan war, for those who were never fully convinced - I include myself, here, when the war was initially declared - really was and is the war of self-defense. This is in contrast to the Iraq war, which was a worthy war of choice, I believe, with a far-less-than-worthy effort to persuade others of that fact.
After Al Queda attacked on September 11th, the means of capturing or killing remaining fighters, likely to strike again if not contained or killed, was limited by the their ability to find save haven. They had one in the mountains of eastern Afghanistan (and western Pakistan) with no recourse to capture or kill them given a Taliban government that was sympathetic to the cause of Al Queda and not likely willing, in any uncertain terms, to cooperate with the United States.
Absent a U.S. invasion, Afghanistan not only had one of the more brutal and oppressive regimes, over its own people whom had no say over the matter, and towards Muslim people, for those concerned about the fate of Islam under liberal or illiberal governents, in the world. More immediately threatening to U.S. interests, it was a safe haven for Al Queda fighters operating and planning future attacks on the United States and other targets with impunity.
In other words, without invading Afghanistan, the likelihood of Al Queda remaining on the offensive and attacking the United States again was very high. By invading, Al Queda played mouse to our cat and laid low in hiding (and we had a better chance of capturing Bin Laden and the lot) and a terribly ugly and brutal regime gets taken out, in the process, and Afghanis could elect a government of their choosing democratically. Just as we take for granted in the good ol' U.S. of A. as we debate the very issue.
Now, that is the argument that should have been made and debated in 2001, and was, in part, when America first invaded Afghanistan.
And the fact that we didn't discuss and debate this invasion or the invasion in Iraq nearly thoroughly, respectfully, open-heartedly, and open-mindedly enough - and with more focus on doing good than looking good - has everything to do with why the domestic politics is such a mess, on both this war and the war in Iraq and most issues America faces, right now.
So lots of fucking up in this war, the war in Iraq, and all around. And mostly, contrary to popular opinion, not around the military strategy - where America has always had overwhelming force - but around the political matters - in how we understand and engage the people issues, more honestly - and our failure to have an honest and respectful enough discussion and debate about all the people matters that matter.
And in a way where everyone did exactly what everyone is so loathe to do today.
To admit the only and most important honest thing they could possibly admit about anything of any import.
That they may not have all the answers. That they could be wrong. And that, thus, there was plenty to explore, with a genuinely open mind and heart, to arrive at better decisions.
All of this is true. And all of this has created an enormous clusterfuck in Afghanistan. And Iraq. And on most issues that America faces right now. Largely because we've all be acting like assholes and acting like acting like assholes has no consequences when it so clearly has.
So, now, that's where we're at, today.
Now, 9 years later, with nearly 10 years of emotional and upsetting debates about both these wars and any number of issues that matter to people, and with a long war with lots of Americans dying, people have grown war weary.
Understandable. Especially when a lot of folks are not completely clear on the stakes in this war. And many of them may just disagree with me, no matter how clear I am that the stakes are too high to just pull out and supposedly cut our losses.
What's not understandable is all of that meaning that America pulls out of the one situation where self-defense was and still is (as far as I know, Osama Bin Laden is still at large) the real legitimate reason to go to war. And to do so knowing that doing so will leave Afghanis to the devices of those brutal thugs who used to rule their country, in league with the very brutal thugs who killed our people and were the reason for us being there, in the first place, and will do so, again, as soon as they have the inkling they can get away with it.
What's not understandable, in other words, is quitting. Because it's hard.
All the while, pretending what tough little badasses we are to the rest of the world.
It's fuckin' weak, is what it is.
It's fuckin' pathetic.
And it is exactly what America has become in the early 21st century the more we march down this dark path we've been on.
America wants to prove how tough she is.
Stick it out and do the right thing.
And stop making excuses for why we don't wanna.
Or why the fact that we don't wanna somehow means that the people who do want to stick it out need to follow suit. All to suit your ego. And pride. And whatever damn fool impulse drives you, these days.
In other words, perhaps Afghanistan can be a genuine restart.
An opportunity for America to do what she has been failing to do for the last 10 years.
To lead.
And leadership meaning building commitment to doing the right thing.
Patiently. Honestly. The way real, sustainable commitment of any kind is built.
Even when all the popular winds point otherwise.
I don't care how weary we feel.
We went here for the right reasons. And we're fighting there, now, for the right reasons.
And if we leave, Afghanis go back to a brutal, barbaric existence.
All so we could pretend how tough we were.
But not really be tough when it counted.
Meaning, resigning ourselves to being a nation of whining little pussies.
All the while crowing about how fuckin' tough we are.
And then bailing, when the going gets tough.
Leadership is calling out that bullshit for what it is.
And building commitment to something genuinely better.
And we are all welcome to follow anything else that we please.
But pretending like doing so is really our best, or toughest, or most thoughtful selves is really just bullshit. No matter how you try to spin that one.
And if America leaves Afghanistan. They deserve to be known for the fuckin' whiny, tough-talkin' little pussies they turned out to be.
And no amount of talking our way out of that one will make anything different from what it really is.
America is not a country of whiny, tough-talkin' little pussies.
Not for long, that is.
Because we have what it takes to be better than all that bullshit.
And we're gonna stick it out in Afghanistan and demonstrate that's true. And not just talk it.
Doubt that? Watch, motherfucker.
And you know why, captain?
Because nothing else would be worthy of the name American.
And, in my book, at least. That still means something.
I am convinced, at this point, the more I watch politics, and the utter failure of any political partisan to ever acknowledge any real failure, at all, that most progress in politics happens largely despite ourselves.
Despite our egos. And our stupid pride. And our failure to ever admit failure. Because we think by doing so we make it go away. Or, at least, not our problem.
Which explains most of the problems of liberal democratic politics, right now.
And, for that, we have only ourselves to blame.
What I know today that I did not realize more than 20 years ago, when I first started following American and international politics, is that political leaders are often the farthest thing from an example or role model for life that one could want. For one's children. And for anyone, for that matter.
Because political leaders so consistently fail to do the one thing that anyone would want out of a role model.
To admit their mistakes.
To themselves, at the very least. And to others, when they feel comfortable. A fact we make far less likely by making anyone, nevertheless those in politics, afraid of doing, for fear of the repercussions, even though it is the surest route to facilitating willingness to giving our mistakes up. So that we can move on and stop making them. The failure to do so being about the most damn fool way to live life possible. Because failing to admit your mistakes, of course, by any objective criteria of judgment, does not, in fact, mean that you are not making them. It just means you are repeating them. For as long as it takes for you to admit them.
Says the man to his mistakes.
There is no one in politics, these days - no one, not even one - person I look up to for this purpose. Which is how it should be, I suppose. Since the man I should be looking to for that purpose is myself, of course.
And if there is anything I have learned from politics in 20 years it is that there is so much to be learned, of any substance, from those in politics is of the variety of negative example. Sadly. And, these days, that is a more serious problem than I have ever witnessed it in my lifetime.
If you are looking for anyone to save you, outside of yourself, you are damned fool, is the bottom line, if you look to these people. They can barely take care of themselves, nevertheless you or your loved ones. And, after a time, if you are still looking to them to be a better judge of your life and what is best for you more than for yourself, you not only are a fool - because they can't do so, no matter how much you might wish differently, and, typically, are barely able to sufficiently do so in their own lives - but you really have no one else to blame but yourself for that foolishness.
Because there is no politician who is ever going to come down from on high and tell you:
"Most of the time, we're just doing our best to think of something and get elected. The truth is, we haven't thought nearly enough about this stuff, either. We have strong opinions. Just like so many of you. But just like so many of you, that really doesn't mean jack shit, in the real world, is the truth. Opinions are like assholes. And there's an awful lot of those, too, doing their damage in this tiny little world, now aren't there?"
It's the most profound thing I have to say on the matter, these days. Because I am so fully convinced that these idiots will never say so themselves. So someone has to say it.
The most important thing I have for my kids, for any kids, and for anyone in life, at this point, I'm convinced, is my example.
And the most important example I have to offer, right now, I'm convinced, is that if you want to be an idiot in life, it is all yours. Enjoy it. Because it's going to hard to enjoy anything else, given the mess you're likely to make of your life.
Says the man to his mess.
But I don't want to make a mess of life. And I know, without reservation, at this point, that the surest way to a tidier, self-respecting life I might love is to be the best man I know how to be. The best father. And husband. And son and brother. The best man I know. And to let the idiots have their idiocy. And to live a life I'm genuinely proud of.
Like opinions, anybody can be an asshole. Doesn't take much, frankly.
And anybody can have the damn fool life that comes with it.
I'll take something with more real love, myself.
And I just won't be settling for anything else, at this point.
No matter what gets laid on the table.
And that's the only kind of progress that could ever be worth anything even approaching anything real in my too short a lifetime.
In any lifetime, for that matter.
I'm weary of the lie.
The lie that my lying and cynicism is exactly what make me worthy of overpowering you.
Obama's Cynical Maneuvering on the Health-Care Mandate
"On page 25 of his decision, Judge Hudson writes, “Despite pre-enactment representations to the contrary by the Executive and Legislative branches, the Secretary now argues that the Minimum Essential Coverage Provision is, in essence, a ‘tax penalty.’
If you slow down, enough, to hear it, as I've been, here, recently.
This guy is unbelievable.
Who I'd want my daughter to marry, at least.
Thanks, Jack. Thanks for everything
At some point, in every person's life, we are faced with the choice.
Am I going to follow that herd? Even when they have stampeded down that dark path.
Or am I going to have courage to croon that ballad I sing quietly in my own soul?
The road less taken, says Frost.
To your own heart be true, sings the Bard.
And Jack. He thinks the answers could be found. We could learn from digging down. But no one ever seems to be digging.
And you. I'm curious. What verse might you have to share with the heartfelt world?
What secrets are whispered in your tell-tale heart.
What dreams hunger expression.
What love needs your heart to breathe.
Now that's a tune, if you ask nicely, I just might just be willing to give a listen. Or two, if you listen to the sad, lonely melody in mine.
How awesome is it to basically tell everyone else in your business:
I am the smartest, sweetest, most beautiful motherfucker up in this joint.
What the fuck are you gonna do about it?
Jack Johnson. Loving the fuck out of everyone. And that means you, too, bitch.
If we opt for life to become like prison - where the most aggressive can bully to get what they want - are we willing to live with prison conditions?
Where everyone becomes more and more aggressive to ward off potential retaliation and where aggression and retaliation make everyone feel unsafe, and too insecure to give it all up?
Or, to put it a bit more simply:
Do you really want life to be like prison?
Or should we save prison for the truly dangerous?
And the rest of us just learn to behave better? And stop acting like prisonyard bullies?
Something to chew on.
Outside the gruel they serve around here.
Maybe the world really doesn't have anything better to offer.
Maybe tragedy is the only language we will ever speak.
Or maybe.
ZenHabits - What's Wrong With the World? Not a Damn Thing.
This is your moment of Zen.
Nobel head: Liu's prize based on universal values
"The Nobel Peace Prize panel on Thursday defended its award to jailed dissident Liu Xiabaobo as based on 'universal values,' rejecting Beijing's accusation that it is trying force Western ideas on China.
Dear American partisans (Left and Right, and whichever rock you hide under),
Thank you, from the bottom of my heart.
For shitting all over my country.
Thank you for what an insane mess you've made of America.
Though how terribly strange and sad and small of you that you behave like this and call it anything even resembling good or decent or honest or anything of the sort.
How thoroughly mindless and weaselly that you shut down all reasonable discussion and understanding, and lately, our short term economic fortunes, and take no responsibility for the consequences of any of it. All while you destroy others for their own failures. And for your own purposes.
Whether you admit it or not, Mr. and Mrs. Left or Right Wingnut, you are responsible for the mess this country is in.
And no one cares what your excuses are anymore.
I certainly don't.
The Wiemar Republic quickly became the Third Reich when left-wing and right-wing partisans did the same to the German government and economy in the 1930's.
Thankfully, in America, we take our right to think and speak for ourselves more seriously than all that bullshit.
But thank you, just the same, for fucking up my country and acting like no big whoop.
And thank you for continuing the legacy that has killed, oppressed, and made miserable the lives of more human beings than any other legacy that our species has to offer.
And telling the world, "What the fuck are you gonna do about it?" while you shit all over it.
In other words:
Fuck you. You mindless bullies.
And get used to that refrain. That will be my response to anything you ask for. At all. Ever. Anymore. For as long as we know one another.
You don't like that. Humble thyself.
If not, enjoy the consequences.
I don't care about your causes, anymore. Not until you stop being shitheads.
My patience is finally worn.
Sincerely,
You Know Who
Quick question.
Doesn't progress mean things get better?
Talk amongst yourselves.
After a weekend of some honest reflection on my life, I'm wanting to take a slightly different turn with my life, from here on out, I think.
I've been too angry for too long with a world too stubborn and foolish to give up the unnecessary tragedy. A world of homo sapiens, especially, who bully and kill and oppress and hurt one another for no real useful purpose. A species that, too the contrary, creates most of its own tragedy. And gives ammunition to the excuses of all its friends and especially its enemies. All in the name of avoiding that same tragedy. Or so it says.
I'm tired of the theatrics and tired drama of the Hominidae. The liberal and the illiberal variations. Their politics and their money. Their violence and their power envy. Their popular and their higher culture. Or so they say. And all the rest of the world that all the rest of the world is focussed on.
I want to make a difference, is the truth. I want to contribute what might make the world a better place to live.
Some honest and loving understanding on all of it might offer something along those lines, I hope. Can't do worse than all the alternatives, I reckon.
I just appreciate this sort of contribution better, is the truth. Jack's quiet reflections on life. On a world consumed with itself, to be sure. A world consumed with one another. A world consumed and consumed with consuming.
And a life reflecting on life, with my own heart, with friends and family, with a wife and kids, with everyone we love, without the theatrics and tired drama we so often choose. In lieu of something more loving and understanding. A little life more full of love and understanding.
Be a damn shame, wouldn't it?
A world more loving and understanding. Lives more thoughtful and full of love. Respecting each others' limits and learning and consciences.
Be a goddamn shame, wouldn't it?
Not possible, say cynics. Because of cynics like us, say the same. Or at least those other cynics on the other side of this godforsaken garden.
Maybe not tomorrow, says yours truly. But maybe not impossible, either, says the same. If we stop making all the excuses, that is. For us. And our failures. And all the rest.
For my children's sakes. And for their children. And for their children. And all the rest.
For all the children that are bigger than us and our opinions. About ourselves and one another. Even if we won't be.
For my children, in the meantime. And for all the rest, while I'm at it.
The one thing that the left and right agree on, these days.
Whether it's business, government, the press, or whomever gettin' their macho on, these days.
They sure as hell aren't responsible for any of the messes America finds itself in, today.
America: As lame as we wanna be. As long as someone else is doing the real heavy lifting.
A kind-hearted yiddish response to Charles Krauthammer's sweet-natured musings.
From our own Linda Richmond:
Da Wikileaps dumps, like leaks to mainstream media, aw good fah freedom and demaw-cracy. And America. Talk amongst ya-selves.
Freedom and democracy: It's like da bread and da butta.
Happy Hanukah, bubbellahs.
A serious sign of just how bad things have gotten in America. This guy, I mean.
When an FCC commissioner starts talking about regulating the content of news and journalism, you know respect for the spirit and the letter of the First Amendment face serious threats.
Liberal my ass, Michael. You need to spend some more time figuring out what that word means, Commissioner.
In the meantime, go fuck yourself, Mr. FCC.
The grownups in this country will sort this out just fine without your oversight.
Exactly what it means to be a grownup in the free world.
Thomas P. Barnett has the strongest reflections on the WikiLeaks mess and the lessons it offers for American foreign policy that I've seen.
Wikileaks and Obama's False Utopia
"So the Obama administration says America's relations with our allies around the world can survive the latest WikiLeaks dump of U.S. diplomatic cables, and I'm inclined to agree. Truth is, the whole thing reads like a booze-addled Thanksgiving argument spun out of control, and nothing more. So the Middle East's corrupt autocrats hate each other and constantly goad the White House into taking out their garbage — big deal! God only knows the same good ol' boys will be the first to condemn us once things get tough and we choose to act. (To say nothing of Julian Assange's impending lawsuit.) In the meantime, sell the bad guys a few anti-missile defense systems and tell 'em to shut the hell up, because President Obama has one helluva lot more on his plate right now than just Iran, or North Korea, or Pakistan, or... you get the point.
But here's the bigger point: What really screams out from all these very much undiplomatic cables is how little Obama ever really broke from the Bush doctrine. I mean, in a certain way, he never really broke from it at all. Yes, there's been a laudable break from Cheney's Toughonics in terms of rhetoric, but in spirit, Obama still hasn't gotten realistic with his foreign-policy ambitions all that much. The president is constantly lecturing us about how America can't do it all, and yet consider how many plates he's trying to spin around the world. He keeps talking about how we need to accept this new world and how we can't solve any big problems on our own, but he hasn't acted like that's the case — not enough, anyway. And, quite frankly, Obama's lack of adjustment to his own articulation of a global future is starting to make America look weaker than we really are.
If I might be so bold as to warn of a strategic trilemma here: America can't simultaneously be about stopping the spread of nuclear weapons and promoting democratic regime change and unwinding our wars in a responsible fashion. Something's got to give, on multiple fronts...
...It's high time, then, for Obama to put his Nobel in the closet, get his inner Nixon on, and get to work in the one arena where John Boehner and Mitch McConnell don't share his bed. If we really want to move the ball forward instead of just keeping a bunch in the air, compromise had better start sooner than the hunt for some Australian "journalist" with a fancy Web site."
I highly recommend reading his entire thought process.
He's right.
The weakness of the Administration is not that it is too soft. Or compassionate. Or any other damn fool notion of weakness.
It is too much hubris. And ambition. As with his domestic policy. And American policy, domestic and international, writ large.
The weakness of American international and domestic policy is not too little muscle.
It is too little humility.
What weakness looks like in any serious human endeavor. For those for whom strength has meaning beyond their own egos.
And ignoring that fact just entails more failure.
Have at it, boys. I say. I'm sure it will make all that failure go away.
Just like North Korea. Or Iran. Or Cuba. Or Zimbabwe.
Or any government organized primarily around power rather than around freedom.
Failure is nothing new to the cynics who manipulate for power.
What is new is the notion that no one should be listening to their excuses.
No how matter how many ways they spin it. Or try to talk their way around the failure.
Strength is humility in the face of failure.
And a commitment to real success. When making excuses is easier.
Says the man to his excuses.
Perhaps something stronger is in order.
Love thy neighbor would be a good start. To understand him or her.
Respect for freedom of conscience would help us learn and comprehend the world better.
And the liberty and democratic self-determination that flow from those principles, for peoples as much as for individuals, would center all of our efforts more effectively.
And the proof is in the rotten pudding made of its alternatives.
Enjoy that pudding, folks
Myself. I'll just be expecting something better.
A reminder of where my heart is centered.
In a world with too many, too often, hostile to any center at all.
Miley. Forgive Andrew for being such an asshole. Someone has to.
Else the world will be full of assholes like Andrew.
And what a fucked up world that would be.
I just won't do what dicks say so just because they say so, anymore. No matter who they are. I'm sorry if that disappoints dicks who would prefer otherwise. I don't feel beholden to their inclinations any longer.
Homo sapien. Latin translation for "wise man". "Clever man". "All-too-clever man." And the most ridiculous mess of stubborn foolishness that humankind, so called, has ever known.
Quick question: If you bully Galileo into recanting a heliocentric solar system, or any other fact of the known or unknown universe, does that, in fact, mean that the known universe revolves around the earth? Or the pope? Or your bank account? Or your powerful perch? Or whatever selfish impulse suits you, that afternoon?
If homo sapiens bully those other homo sapiens who tell you that bullying homo sapiens to solve their problems, generally, makes those problems and those homo sapiens worse, does that, in fact, make those homo sapiens and those problems and the state of the species better? If you bully those who tell you that bullying, punishing, and otherwise aggressively leveraging problems from our midst does not, in fact, resolve them, often makes them more difficult and painful, and often makes life quite needlessly destructive and tragic, does that, in fact, resolve those problems by pretending them from their midst?
If you are a member of the only remaining species from the animal family Hominidae, circa its entire known existence, perhaps you might be so foolish to pay cash money for that bullshit.
Homo sapiens sapiens. The only species on earth that can contemplate the depth of such questions of their existence and, simultaneously, dramatically and destructively, fail such questions and all the real and meaningful matters they touch by failing to seriously contemplate them at all.
Until the rest of the human species figures out what just how stupid and stubborn the rest of the human species really is.
The best guarantor of a free press is a government that shuts it the fuck down.
Progress is killing this little bitch called freedom once and for all.
There are days when something so simple makes all the difference. And makes you remember why you teach. This was one of those days.
I've been feeling seriously burned out on the job, frankly. All the various legal requirements and outside bureaucracy that persistently get in the way of me - and most of my colleagues, honestly, if you ask them and, perhaps, care or give some thought what they might think on the matter - bringing a commitment of excellence in education and not just the mandated "free and adequate public education" that so often encourages and enforces diminishing expectations in public education - "a rising tide of mediocrity," as one man spoke of it - in my field have really been weighing heavy on me, this semester.
So much time that could be spent preparing really meaningful lessons eaten up by requirements, many of which are dedicated to explaining away failure with kids who have failed far more than most, rather than committing ourselves to their success. And the ways it distorts more honest understandings of what is going on with kids and adults and schools and ways to create the best opportunities for all of them.
A class I have at the local university, in particular, has been eating at me, given the professor's more conventional commitment to making excuses for failure rather than facing it honestly, learning about its honest sources and committing kids and adults to success and more meaningful understandings of the world around them.
The strongest liberal education, in other words. The kind that matters. To those who believe that it matters. People like me, at least.
The prospect of resigning myself to this nonsense and all of the ways that its mandated variations are out of my control was getting too much, as of late. Given opportunities to leave the field and mark a path for greatness, or at least an independent working existence, elsewhere.
And, last night, in my mental and emotional exhaustion and my lack of inspiration for original lesson ideas for the week, I decided to do something very simple that made all the difference, today.
I decided to have a conversation with the kids.
The question that got the ball rolling was very straightforward and at the heart of all of my anguishing about the distance between why I became a teacher and what education had devolved into, in an age when government fiat too often trumps the commitment of liberal education to develop conscience, freely and honestly. What that liberal in "liberal education" stands for. Liberty, namely. And the commitment to the development of a free and independent conscience that it implies.
The question I asked the kids was, "Does it matter to learn something, to know something, about this world?"
Outside of the assessments - the DBQ's, or Document-Based Questions, as the kids, with half-hearted inspiration and dread, simultaneously, know them - outside of the requirement to take history classes, outside even of the legal compulsion to be at school. Outside of parents and teachers and other adults and all the people who tell them that they should get an education and that education is their future and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
And out of that question, the kids and I had really remarkably profound conversations, today. About the nature of learning and knowing and education. Every class had lively and, at times, passionate opinions on the matter (except for a few in 2nd hour, where a couple of kids opted for napping, all efforts to engage them to the contrary). Even the one girl who argued in 6th hour that education did not matter did so thoughtfully and thoroughly immersed in the discussion (the most involved in that class, ironically).
So many interesting directions with this conversation. The nature of success and education's role in that journey and destination. The nature of education and learning and all those places it shows up. The relationship between street smarts and book smarts and which mattered most in life. Whether learning mattered independent of whether it advances our ambitions or wealth or opportunities.
And my favorite insight from Noah in 4th hour. That so much of school and life gets bogged down in ways peoples' various insecurities - smart people and not-so-smart people, good folks and not-so-good folks, good-looking and the not-terribly-pretty, the more and less talented, the petty-minded and the bigger-minded folks of the world, and down the line - how all of this is constantly getting in the way of people being able to keep focus on this much more fundamental question.
Does it matter to learn, to grow, to develop, to mature, for it's own sake? No matter from where in life we come from. And no matter what stations in life we aspire to.
It was really extraordinary, actually. A bunch of fairly terribly behaved teenage kids, almost all of whom have been in more serious trouble with the law or with school, in one form or another. Many of whose ability to read and reason have been, otherwise, cast in more serious doubt. Many of whom adults have variously given up on. All having a very serious and well-reasoned and, often enough, passionate conversation about whether education matters for its own sake. Completely independent of what it does for each of us tangibly.
It was really insightful for me because it got me much more square with my own insecurities. The same insecurities I work with the kids on. Whether I'm smart enough. Or good enough. Or successful enough. Or whatever enough to warrant peoples' love and respect. And the ways that my own insecurities play out in the classroom, as much as my relationships, or my life, or anywhere else.
We talked about Jack Johnson, of course. Since he's my musical hero, and all.
What was so profound about it, for me, was that in a world that is consumed in those insecurities - in its politics, in the world of high finance and average everyday work-a-day business, in its sports and entertainment industries, especially the world of popular music, and most certainly in its press and media and in its universities and think tanks, in almost every facet of life in America and in the world - these kids, generally thought of as intellectually incapable, even by many of their own teachers, and often thought beyond the pale, even by many of their own parents and family members, were getting underneath some of the more profound truths of human nature and life on this third planet from the sun. And I was learning with them, too. About the world and people. About myself, as much as anything else.
And, to boot, they were enjoying it. I don't know if I had ever seen them appreciate a abstract classroom conversation nearly as well before. And I don't know if I've ever learned so much from kids in one day, from the whole experience. I don't know if I've learned so much from anyone in one day, nevertheless these kids.
It was all really pretty profound for me. A fundamental conversation about the nature of education. And a reminder of why I got into this work, in the first place.
The only and best therapy for my eduction blues.
If this becomes a regular feature of my life as a teacher, I don't know how I can quit, is the truth. It almost felt like I was getting through, today. I'm sure that will fade, tomorrow. But, maybe, like the tide, it will return and perhaps, with it, bring the promise of something else over that moonlit horizon.
I don't want kids who will settle for good or smart after being thought delinquent or retarded and otherwise incapable.
I expect greatness. And genius.
And today we got a little closer to constellations never conceived before on these kids' sky maps.
And that, if you're wondering, is why I do this work.
Myanmar democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi released
And waits patiently for the world to catch up.
All you ever needed to know about the cold, cold world.
Warm words for the bitter chill that chafes at a broken heart.
In a world that celebrates its cowardice and pettiness and dark impulses, say those who carry candlesticks, we can either offer our own portion, or we can envision a brighter horizon. Dark can give way to light. If we take time to notice just how dark it has gotten.
Perhaps ugly is not the only impulse that can find a home in our hearts. Perhaps there is no home, at all, in our hearts, as long as it does.
Amidst the celebration - mine, yours, all of us, when we are honest - of the small and base in our natures, perhaps we might consider what kind of world we have made for ourselves and our children in consequence.
And, then, perhaps, there might be hope for something more beautiful for the ones we love, after all.
The Democrats hold on the House didn't last. Their landmark legislation will.
Hubris, the Greeks whisper.
Instant karma's gonna getcha, says the Brit.
Humble self-discipline beats bitter medicine.
And stinky tofu make for stinky adventure.
Ancient Chi-nese se-cret.
Where this is all going?
I definitely do. More often than I let on, honestly. More often than not, these days, really. I preach love and patience. And I practice, far too much, anger and despair. Lack of faith, I suppose. A lack I experience so often, I can't keep up with it. I don't know why, really. Other than everyone - family, friends, students, everyone I know and all the rest I do not know - trying to impress upon me that assholes finish first and that nice guys - my kind of people, meaning - finish last. Nice to know you're loved, huh?
It's a more than a little overwhelming for the heart, truth be told. No matter how strong we think we are.
But then I read exchanges like this. And I'm reminded why humanity just has a way of working these things out.
"JUSTICE GINSBURG: Is there — you’ve been asked questions about the vagueness of this and the problem for the seller to know what’s good and what’s bad. California — does California have any kind of an advisory opinion, an office that will view these videos and say, yes, this belongs in this, what did you call it, deviant violence, and this one is just violent but not deviant? Is there — is there any kind of opinion that the — that the seller can get to know which games can be sold to minors and which ones can’t?
MR. MORAZZINI: Not that I’m aware of, Justice Ginsburg.
JUSTICE SCALIA: You should consider creating such a one. You might call it the California office of censorship. It would judge each of these videos one by one. That would be very nice."
Honestly, do we really have any doubt where we are headed, long term?
More or less freedom? More or less love? Honest progress or not?
We shouldn't, I don't think. We doubt, I think, because doing the right thing does not always bring instant gratification. And doing the wrong thing often does.
But we also do really know how these things work out in the end. When we're not deceiving ourselves.
Doubt is among the choices while building faith, I suppose. And faith is a function of our efforts. Our successes and our failures.
I'm tired and feeling a bit cynical today. A function of bad choices, I assume. And a heavy and weary heart, these days.
Perhaps wiser heads should speak on this matter, today.
Perhaps one day I might be more like one of them.
Happy Meals banned in San Fransisco
Progress. Means never having to admit that you're wrong.
And no Happy Meals, to boot.
Unhappy meal. Happy, happy day.
This is not a Sandwich. This is Progress.
I do not understand French. I am sorry. But I want to love you.
- Jack Johnson
And the say of those who say different generally does not. Not really. When all is said and done.
There's good reason the masses are revolting
It is so funny and sad watching politics, this season. Every season. This season. Every season.
What none of the largely good faith and still too often bad faith major players in this tired, tragic great game of power can quite fathom, the American President included, almost identical to his predecessor, is that a politics that beats the life out of each another encourages all sorts of self-and-that-other-guy-deception. And ignores the bountiful unintended consequences of serious policy decisions. It is the very thing that Democrats and the American left keep engaging in up to the bitter end, and the very thing that lost their right-wing predecessors the U.S. Presidency and both houses of Congress, and is exactly what independents and citizens in my fair country, more broadly, are voting at odds with.
It is the most seriously disheartening fact of 21st century humankind. The most seriously disheartening fact of every century humankind. The will to overpower. The endless feuding. The impulse to dominance. The fear of a world without such obsession. The pride that animates it all. And the imitation it inspires among more repressive members of the species. And the countless dead and oppressed and too-terribly-frightened it leaves in its wake.
The great irony of the viciously partisan, and hence much more seriously self-enamoured and self-deluding, political and media wars of the early 21st century liberal democracies (not to mention the regularly pious political, cultural, and media manipulations of the illiberal world) is that it is average folks, or at least independents, in America, at least, who are deciding elections, these days, by and large, who have the least distorted outlook on questions of governance, in my all-too-distorted estimation, and the all-too-learned-and-self-important political intelligencia who are feverishly defending their very serious mistakes of policy, to anyone not defending them and their mistakes.
And the saddest fact of all, right now, is that various partisans, left and right and of every flavor and variety, have become so self-consumed that they would rather the other guy fail and their side and its policy positions be defended, right or wrong, without serious reservation - that they would rather watch American governance fail, in the broadest strokes - than to humble themselves and get honest about their failures.
All the while strong-arming the rest of us to become more responsible for the world.
It's all kind of mind-numbingly, still yet forgivably, and terribly, abundantly self-centered, after awhile.
And there is no amount of words that will ever talk us out of the wreckage.
The very impulse that drives partisanship - a failure to seriously consider that you and your side just might be wrong about any serious policy matter - is exactly what is sinking both American political parties, their ideological wings, and all-around confidence in government and the culture of politics as professional wrestling, at this moment. And for good reason. And will the next round. And the round after that. And the round after that. And the round after that. And the round after that, too.
The British Empire, similarly thought, after World War I, that it could coax and bully its way out of disgruntlement with the grabbing of British spoils following the First Great War.
They, too, thought that might would make right indefinitely. They, too, believed, cynically, that no new ideas about the world - self-determination and liberal democracy and freedom, more broadly, namely - could trump the force of military arms.
And they, too, were terribly, pitifully, tragically wrong. And failed miserably to maintain their overwhelming might. And much of the politics of the world, today, is a function of that very cynicism both during the height of empire and its various democratic corollaries, internationally and domestically, that were practiced following World War I and World War II.
And those democratic fellow-travelling power calculations are now falling apart, as well. And people begin to see the lie for what it is. And grow disillusioned with the ugly consequences.
Lord Acton knew what he was talking about. Power corrupts. And it does not matter if it is your side and you are convinced of the rightness of your cause. You are not original, in that thought. That thought has animated power and its wielding since the dawn of homo sapien as a social, political animal. And, by and large, though intentions have often been good, in limited ways, they have also been bad, in vastly more corrupting ways, long term.
Hence the skepticism of power in modern liberal democratic societies. The strongest societies in the world and the history of the world, in case you are keeping score. For good reason. Because power is used, more often, to hinder progress than to encourage it. So says honest observation.
And the early 21st century is but one additional iteration of that foolish, failed, perpetually self-unraveling notion.
It does not matter how much governments fight this reality. The impulse and need for freedom and self-determination for people to self-govern their lives is more basic and fundamental than any government could ever be. All governments can ever do is frustrate this need. They can never meet it. And hence why people perpetually find ways around masters and governments that frustrate their own real learning, growth, and development.
The Chinese government must liberalize, as the only means to face a failed and stagnating economy. There is no doubt that it was the freedom of the Chinese people, granted a bit more daylight when a Chinese government begrudgingly lifted its repression, that ultimately grew the Chinese economy and lifted 500 million people out of poverty. Mao's government had killed between 40 and 70 million people to establish its power and, in consequence, stagnate Chinese political, economic, and cultural development. Just as it is the repression of the North Korean communist government that is responsible for the starvation of its people. And the power machinations of the theocratic Iranian regime that has strangled its economy and halted its serious cultural development. And the opportunistic dictatorships in Zimbabwe and Myanmar that shut its people away from the light of the free world. It is liberalization, not Chinese totalitarianism, that created the strong growth we see in China, today. And it is liberalization that will be the genuine march of progress in China, North Korea, Iran, Zimbabwe, Myanmar and in America, the land of the free, from here until the end of human history.
Because liberalization is the only and single possible direction for honest progress. Nothing else actually produces or leads to real progress. And every ounce of evidence in free and unfree countries points in this direction.
It is not the evidence that is the problem. The evidence is in exponential abundance. It is the agendas of those who seek to defend their favored policies and ideological commitments, left and right and otherwise, that is the most serious obstacle to real progress in America, in China, in North Korea, in Iran, in Zimbabwe, in Myanmar, in Europe, in Africa, in Asia, in North and South America, and in the rest of the known world.
Thankfully, our progress does not depend on any person in power, no matter how educated or not. Our progress has always and always will depend on our own self-determined efforts. No matter what anyone who happens to be in charge of the government at any particular moment has to say about the matter.
That has always been the case in America and the world.
That is just on stark and fast-forward display right now.
And no amount of talk will make it go away.
And thanks go to the Americans and people all around the world who are making that fact plain enough to their governments and governors, today.
No matter how much they might deceive themselves otherwise.
This is the most fundamental strength of liberal democracy.
What we are witnessing, right now - a country turning over its government as many times as necessary and as it takes to get us in the direction of more honest and liberalizing progress - is what living in a free country is all about.
You might thank Baron de Montesquieu and James Madison for that, when you get a chance. They are quite dead. But they still deserve your thanks.
Real progress does not need permission. What it needs is freedom. And and love for one's neighbor. And a more honest appreciation for the fact that the one goes quite naturally with the other.
If you are still not quite sure of that notion, you might take a moment to consider something. You might consider your daughter, for a moment. And just how, exactly, you want her to be treated. By the man, or any man, she falls in love with.
You might ask yourself. Do you want that man to be one who will bully and control and attempt to scare her into submission? Do you want a man who will intimidate and hurt and cower her in fear? Or do you want a man who treats her with love and respect for her, her life, her choices, and her heart.
Because if its good enough for your daughters, then, perhaps, you might consider that it might be good enough for the rest of us, too.
And if you are the type of parent or man who would bully or control or cower your wife or children into fearful submission, perhaps they should be doing exactly what they, generally, will end up doing, most of the time, anyway, regrettably. Sometimes not-so-regrettably.
Looking for someone else to love them. As soon as the opportunity arises.
What each and every single one of us should be doing in all of our relationships in life, if we cannot find the courage to turn back from that dark path.
Matters of power and governing being just one more minor variation on that eternal and eternally human theme.
I am looking for someone who loves and respects and cares about me, my life, my choices and my heart. I'll be looking for the same for my daughters, one day, I hope. And I just as surely will be looking for the same from my government. And choosing as many times as necessary until I find one that will.
That sort of choosing is what real progress looks like.
My daughters, I will hope, should expect no less.
There really is literally no end to this circus.
4-Year-Old Can Be Sued, Judge Rules in Bike Case
Presidents are not responsible for their policy failures. Ever. In any administration.
But 4-year-olds are perfectly and legally culpable.
How in the world could young people come to the conclusion that they cannot trust their elders, I wonder?
Perhaps because they can't.
And perhaps we have no plans to ever earn back that trust.
Perhaps.
I think, at this point, watching the stupidity of aggression and arm-twisting, how it inevitably fucks things up, and how little anyone takes any responsibility for it.
Perhaps this really is the world we want.
We seem dissatisfied. But when you talk to anyone about how it got this fucked up, they all defend all the bullshit that got us here. Against everyone else, of course. They hate how their own arms get twisted. But they love twisting someone else's arm.
Perhaps our entire lives are just one long unhappy marriage. And if we all pretend like this is the way things are supposed to be, we can all, maybe, pretend, as well, just how happy we are with life as it is.
Perhaps a world that is fucked up and unhappy and with no potential for anything better, as long as we continue down this same road, is just too comfortable to ever give up.
All I know is that all this pride costs us something.
A life we love, namely. And one that's safer, freer, more decent, more full of opportunities, and where more people more genuinely get their needs taken care of.
That's the choice, I suppose. The same unhappy mess. Or something better.
Difficult choice, I know.
And it's not a political party that offers us a path out.
It's not anything that any politician can offer us at all (other than getting out of our way).
It is whether we are going to give up the pride that if I could only step on the neck of that other motherfucker, then and only then, the world will finally be made right.
The long, dark nightmare that is human history, that is.
Perhaps one day we might wake up from that grim reality.
For now, it is our own little plot of mutually assured misery.
Yay us.
Pride. It's a helluva drug.
As I read the coverage of the Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Keep Fear Alive, I am reminded of a deeper truth of people and politics and all the rest, today.
'Rally to Restore Sanity' Unite to Offer Pretensious Whining
I find the criticisms of these rallies as whiny and self-involved and disingenuously serious as I did the criticisms of Stephen Colbert's brilliant performance for Congress on matters of immigration.
The truth is these assholes hate the fact that these guys are clowning them. And, worse. That they are dead on in much of their satire. It bothers them that John and Stephen have their number. And even when I disagree with these guys, which is often enough, they get taken more seriously exactly because they don't take themselves so seriously. And bring some needed humility to political discussions, right now.
I love these guys. I disagree with them often. But I love the much needed humbling and levity that they bring to a political world all-too-seriously-committed to its various worldviews and policy positions.
What I love about Stewart and Colbert - Stephen a bit more, just for the record, because he's goddamn brilliant as all shit and has some of the more thoughtful conversations taking place anywhere that anyone else can see, right now - is exactly that they do not take themselves so seriously.
This world would be a far better place if more people - Jesus and Buddha and Mill and Twain and King and Ghandi and all the rest included - did not take themselves and their random opinions so goddamn seriously. It is mindboggling, sometimes, just how ugly and foolish we all behave, this strange, self-involved, solipsistic species, in the name of our all-too-certain opinions about this and that and whatever tickles our momentary fancy.
The goddamn tragedy of the world is that people are so unrepentantly and self-centeredly serious about All Matters That Make Them Look More Important Than They Or Anyone Deserves.
And that so many people are killed or imprisoned or variously bullied and treated in ugly fashion because of this perpetually irrational attachment that the whole goddamn species has to its various thought processes.
It's a goddamn tragedy. And you can either cry about it. On end.
Or you can laugh. Big and hearty, if you can.
At what a sad, stupid, lame, oft-self-centered and mean-spirited, always bumbling and foolish, species we so often choose to be.
All in the name of pretending to be smarter and better and whatever else that any of us could possibly ever be.
All of which only further demonstrates just how stupid and petty and small-minded and everything else that we all really are.
And, the sad, comic irony of the whole thing is that it's still all OK. We just have to pick up from there.
Because what the fuck else are any of us going to do, for God's sakes?
Other than maintain this mindless, mean, damn fool mess of an existence.
An existence that would be far better, for everyone involved, tragically and ironically, the more love and freedom - the very virtues that our fears persistently betray - we make available in the world.
About goddamn time we finally faced up to that little tidbit of life as we know it.
A little sanity never hurt anyone.
Least of all any of us.
Democrats are the unbeloved, if pitiful, heroes of their own Greek tragedy, this year.
And David Brooks knows hubris is just another way of saying:
"Noone likes me because I am so much undoubtedly better and smarter than you."
No Second Thoughts
"When times get tough, it’s really important to believe in yourself. This is something the Democrats have done splendidly this year. The polls have been terrible, and the party may be heading for a historic defeat, but Democrats have done a magnificent job of maintaining their own self-esteem. This is vital, because even if the public doesn’t approve of you, it is important to approve of yourself...
Democrats are lagging this year because the country appears incapable of appreciating the grandeur of their accomplishments. That’s because, as several commentators have argued over the past few weeks, many Americans are nearsighted and ill-informed. Or, as President Obama himself noted last week, they get scared, and when Americans get scared they stop listening to facts and reason. They get all these crazy ideas in their heads, like not wanting to re-elect Blanche Lincoln.
The Democrats’ problem, as some senior officials have mentioned, is that they are so darn captivated by substance, it never occurs to them to look out for their own political self-interest. By they way, here’s a fun party game: Get a bottle of vodka and read Peter Baker’s article 'The Education of President Obama' from The New York Times Magazine a few weeks ago. Take a shot every time a White House official is quoted blaming Republicans for the Democrats’ political plight. You’ll be unconscious by page three...
As Nancy Pelosi put it at a $50,000-a-couple fund-raiser, 'Everything was going great and all of a sudden secret money from God knows where — because they won’t disclose it — is pouring in.'
Even allowing the menace of secret money, embracing this Paradise Lost epic means obscuring a few inconvenient facts: that Democrats were happy to benefit from millions of anonymous dollars in 2006, 2008 and today; that the spending by Rove’s group amounts to less than 1 percent of the total money spent on campaigns this year; that Democrats retain an overall spending advantage.
But legend rises above mere facticity, and this Lancelots-of-the-Left tale underlines a self-affirming message — that Democrats are engaged in a righteous crusade against the dark villain who tricked Americans into voting against John Kerry.
In short, it’s hard not to be impressed by the spirit of self-approval that Democrats have managed to maintain this election. I say that knowing it may end as soon as next Wednesday, when, as is their wont, Democrats will flip from complete self-worship to complete self-laceration in the blink of an eye."
Poor pitiable progressives. Does no one in America realize that all of this is for them?
Such an ungrateful lot, these American suckers. We offer up our best sales pitch. And all they can bitch about is how everything has gone to hell.
How can they know how much smarter we are when noone will listen anymore to just how much smarter we are?
It's enough to make a grown man cry.
Perhaps a little love is in order, even for the loveless, after all.
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