The Economist Challenge...again...

The Economist runs another excellent commentary on the Iranian nuclear situation that I highly recommend...

No appetite for carrots, no fear of sticks...the Economist...

The opening lines of this article freaked me out, a little, to be honest...

"Iran has carried out its threat to restart its nuclear programme, removing the seals on part of its uranium-conversion plant at Isfahan. European offers of political and economic incentives, designed to dissuade the theocratic Middle Eastern state from building atomic bombs, have not proved enticing enough. Is a more aggressive approach called for?"

Now...

My first thoughts were, "Is the Economist seriously considering an invasion of Iran to tackle a nuclear program?"...

A pretty scary thought, as the Economist already argued well in a previous column that I posted, here, about the dangers of a militaristic diplomacy with Iran and North Korea over nuclear issues...

Thankfully...the Economist makes clearer, later in the article, just what kind of aggressive actions they are talking about...

"In response to the latest crisis, the 35-member board of the IAEA is due to hold an emergency meeting on Tuesday, called by the Europeans once it became clear that the talks were grinding to a halt. This is likely to lead to an entirely different type of diplomatic process: one that sees Iran referred to the UN Security Council, with a view to sanctions being imposed."

Now...

I have no confidence that sanctions will work with Iran...

The Iranians clearly view the development of their nuclear program as a matter of national sovereignty and autonomy...and, even with the dangers that come with an ultraconservative Iranian government hostile to the more modernized and democratic world having nuclear weapons -- which uranium and plutonium development likely signal -- it does seem very unlikely that Iran will respond to international pressure on this matter in this way...

As the next lines of the Economist article observe...

"Nevertheless, the Iranians are putting on an unconcerned face: “Even if they issue a resolution tomorrow, since it would have no legal basis…we won’t accept it and will carry on with our work,” Mr Saeedi told reporters on Monday."

And as the article's title -- No appetite for carrots, no fear of sticks -- sums up nicely...

Several issues, here...

First...the aggressive actions that the Economist, the world's premier conservative periodical -- is exploring should illustrate just how beyond the pale the aggressive approach that American conservatives, like Victor Davis Hanson and others, have openly explored -- invasion of countries like Syria, Iran, and North Korea -- are...

Invasion is not an acceptable way to resolve difficult diplomatic issues, at all...it increases fears among these countries...and leads -- as it already has -- to more ambitious efforts from nations fearful of invasion to protect themselves, as it clearly has, as the Economist argues well in an earlier article, Iran and North Korea...Return of the Axis of Evil...

Iran and North Korea...Return of the Axis of Evil...the Economist...

You'll want to read the article to get the full flavor of their argument...

But the essence of the article was an acknowledgement that the invastion of Iraq had seriously complicated and made counterproductive the efforts to limit or remove the threats of nuclear programs in Iran and North Korea...and a challenge to America's critics to develop alternative proposals...a challenge that I accepted and met, and then some, in the pages of my Blogspot blog...

The Economist Challenge...What to do with Iran and North Korea?...at Building a Better World...Return of the Jedi...http://benfrankln.blogspot.com/...

Now...

Having said that...the Economist is arguing for exploring more aggressive means of dealing with Iran...namely sanctions...as it did in that original article...

I seriously doubt that Iran will respond to such measures, for reasons illustrated, above...rational or not...although...as George Will argued during an earlier period of focus on Iran...when a President has invaded a neighboring country and when his Administration and many of his ideological cohorts have made plain that you might be next...efforts to defend yourself become rational...even if you are one dangerous regime to be waving such weapons of mass destruction around for everyone to see...

But, beyond that...as I argued earlier...the kind of psychology that we are dealing with...

"...insular, paranoid, seriously-controlling and repressive, militaristic, and seriously manipulative leadership in both Tehran and Pyongyang...Iran is democratic and, thus and on its own merits, less dangerous, I think, than the megalomania of Kim Jong Il...and has fewer capabilities to threaten democratic countries than does the North Korean leadership, according to this Economist article..."

So...

The question, again, is what should we do?...

First...as I argued in that earlier post...

"I want us to take a deep breath...exhale...

And remember that we are all on the same team, here...

And we ALL have an interest in a more peaceful, less threatening world...especially from the likes of leftist dictators like Kim Jong Il and Iranian theocrats who control parliament next door to Israel, Iraq, and other places that we need be concerned about...

Which is EXACTLY the point of the Economist editorial, if a bit shrill in its alarm at the situation..."

Second...as I argued, earlier...vis a vis the comparisons between Iran and North Korea (or Iran and Iraq, for that matter)...

"Iran is a very different case, I believe, that should be treated, differently, I believe...the most important difference, being, of course, not only that Europeans were briefly persuasive in getting Iran to hold back on its nuclear plans for about 6 months (an important success to build on...

But MUCH MORE IMPORTANTLY...Iran is a DEMOCRACY...and one that recent dealt with a MILLION PLUS protest in its capital against the current leadership...a theocratic leadership that has proved itself to be TERRIBLY manipulative in its pursuit of power in Iran, including a slightly ramped up version of Pope Benedict's somewhat similar moves at power in the Catholic Church, purging moderates who veer from the leadership's view of Iran...in the Pope's case, his power is -- LUCKILY -- limited to the archaic institutions of the Catholic Church....in Iran's case, the conservative leadership purged moderate candidates who might have unseated them in periodic elections:(...

But Iran is a democracy, nonetheless...allowing for more openness to change and shock and adaption to circumstances and ability of the electorate to have influence --as it recently did in a MUCH, MUCH LESS democratic Lebanon -- that a more straightforward autocratic dictatorship like North Korea does not share with its autocratic democratic world neighbor...Islamic theocrats look more like their Christian theocratic brethren here in the States, in many ways, than they do the ugly and parasitic dictatorship of North Korea...

My friend, Kenny, has a REALLY WONDERFUL suggestion, I think...

In the case of North Korea and Iran, the President could start by de-linkinng the two countries, which are very different...

He could then pursue non-threatening bi-lateral and multi-lateral talks with them that don't take already paranoid actors and have them ambitiously pursue nuclear materials because they are afraid that you might invade and they clearly want to keep you out, making them MORE DANGEROUS, as the Economist points out, rather than LESS DANGEROUS,
which, if you take a moment away from just defending the President and his actions and just look at what they are doing in response to the President's actions...which is REALLY THE GOAL, isn't it?...I'd also -- in this case and with Iran, specifically -- build on MANY, MANY STRENGTHS in this Administration...including:

1) A SERIOUS respect for Islamic religion, cultures, and institutions...is EVERYONE losing their minds on this story TOTALLY forgetting how much effort the Administration and the military went to avoid hitting Islamic mosques in Iraq and rebuilding ones that got caught in crossfire or where fighting couldn't be avoided?...I would add a serious respect for the constructive priorities of leaders in
Iran and North Korea, including a vague desire to care for the needs of their peoples...given...it's a STRETCH of a compliment...but I think this is a better start than just criticism alone...which gets us to the SECOND important strength of this Administration, I think...

2) President Bush's forthright criticism of autocracies and rogue regimes...this is where I and many of the President's critics in the media SERIOUSLY DISAGREE...I DO agreee with many folks -- and the bulk of the international policy scholarly community...conservatives -- like Henry Kissinger and Robert Kagan -- AND liberals -- like Joe Nye and
Thomas Friedman...that the President should stop trying to bully the world and should work WITH multilateral institutions, like the United Nations and NATO, and with democratic and non-democratic partners to engage such issues...with open and honest disagreement, to be sure...but not trying to win the upper hand, politically, and not expect consequences that none of us want, on the back end...

And I think that trying to SCARE North Korea and Iran into giving up their pursuit of weapons is CLEARLY NOT WORKING BY ANY OBJECTIVE MEASURE of the situation, which is EXACTLY why the Economist is so
RIGHTLY critical...

I think we should focus on bilateral and multilateral talks...and in doing what the President and John Bolton have SAID, recently, that they want to do with the U.N...which I think would be encouraging if they are being sincere...which is to ENGAGE it...to recognize and acknowledge it's value...as the President does so well with, say, American businesses...but which he needs to do better, I think, with the U.N...AND to criticize it...especially its record of allowing serious human rights abusers tell the rest of the world what constitutes a human rights abuse...I am ALL ABOUT INCLUSION as a means of engaging aggressors in a democratic context -- as has CLEARLY been a success in Great Britain with the IRA and the Ulster Unionists -- but there also needs to be voices of reason who say that Syria is not the best country to tell ANYONE what is constituted in a human rights
abuse...and out of that democratic engagement, I think, we give autocrats experience with the BENEFITS and HONESTY and good for their countries and for the world that come with democratic engagement, which is EXACTLY why Gerry Adams -- a spokesman for a former terrorist group now-turned-political-party -- worked so hard in the last couple of years to keep the peace in Ireland on track...a remarkable development, to say the least, from a time when Gerry Adams and Sinn Fein RATIONALIZED murder for political ends...

So...there is MUCH PRECEDENT to believe that such a strategy could besuccessful...as well as the Europeans BRIEF success in squelching the Iranians' pursuit of nuclear weapons which was SADLY COMPOUNDED by a boisterous U.S. threatening war with it...what a foolish mistake....

And...it's just a mistake...and...like
Newsweek...the quicker the President recognizes that...the quicker we get to BETTER solutions...

3) The President's and the Administration's GENUINE concern for America's interests in global affairs...and their hopefully moving past the illusion that somehow their just going to be
able to BEAT world opinion in their direction...a foolish bet, that's for damned sure...and the Administration's willingness to point out the shortcomings in international institutions like the U.N. (though I somehow doubt going after Kofi Annon will do very much more, at all, than increase the shrill of Bush sitting for war-crimes talk amongts liberals (which is a pretty serious risk for the President who DID violate international law over the course of this war...I don't think it will go this way...but going after Kofi Annon will surely INCREASE that likelihood, rather than decrease it...and likely do NOTHING to promote the welfare of those hurt by the mistakes in the oil-for-food program -- except bring general awareness of the issue -- and do MUCH to undermine conservative credibility on the issue, as it already has with me...

4) Making the case that though America's willingness to lead military efforts when they are needed might, at times, make them a bit TOO EXCITED to take on such missions...that the resistance to sharing the burden equitably on such missions by the Japanese and Germans and French, etc., undermine THEIR CREDIBILITY AS WELL...a truism that gets MUCH DISCUSSION in the U.S...especially amongst conservatives...but less and needed discussion in places like the U.N....

...and saving the talk of militarism for when it is more useful...like
in the case of a REAL IMMINENT THREAT from the North or Iran on Seoul or Israel...like if North Korea or Iran is overtly threatening to rain nuclear on Seoul or Tel Aviv...or to otherwise attack, with missile technology or ground troops, their more democratic neighbors...

5) Sanctions will almost inevitably beconsidered...and the Administration will almost inevitably support them (though they have PLEASANTLY SURPRISED me at times...as with their pleading with Ariel Sharon to back off more aggressive moves in Palestine)...so I have to include them...I don't have much hope that they will work, given what we know about the psychology of the insular, paranoid, seriously-controlling and repressive, militaristic, and seriously manipulative leadership in both Tehran and Pyongyang...Iran is democratic and, thus and on its own merits, less dangerous, I think, than the megalomania of Kim Jong Il...and has fewer capabilities to threaten democratic countries than does the North Korean leadership, according to this Economist article...

Though the Economist suggests them...they will likely have a similar, less serious consequence as the current policy, I'm afraid (I would love for them or war or ANY POLICY to work, frankly...but they just aren't likely to, I'm afraid, given who we are dealing with...and with human nature's tendency to DEFEND itself from perceived attacks, for good or for ill...

I think bilateral and multilateral talks and inclusion of these countries into institutions like the United Nations are MUCH MORE LIKELY to create changes in their leaderships' behavior (with a VIGOROUS AND ENGAGED debate and discussion about the direction and purposes of the United Nations and other international institutions by conservatives, liberals, and even rogue regimes...this doesn't mean that Kim Jong Il's philosophy of democracy is equally as valid as that of democratic countries like the U.S. OBVIOUSLY...it just means that, like Gerry Adams...the more he's TALKING AND THINKING about democracy...the more he absorbs its values...and the better for ALL OF US, as a consequence...as the truism of contemporary political science that the President has been repeating to President Putin and his neighbors, recently...the more democratic countries are...the more likely that they DON'T go to war with one another...and that they act less aggressively with one another...which, at its root, is the FUNDAMENTAL PURPOSE of our policies towards Iraq, Iran, and North Korea...not declaring war...or imposing sanctions...these are only tools...that either get us CLOSER to that goal...or, as is the unfortunate case today, get us FARTHER AWAY from that goal...

6) The very savvy and important work and suggestions of the brains behind much of the work in Iraq, right now, that I'm ashamed that I forgot about when I posted very similar versions of this writing on
Ala's blog...

Paul Wolfowitz...

Very soon after the commencement of the Iraq war...As Paul was -- far ahead of the pack of the very reflective re-thinking of the war going on inside the Administration...ahead Condi's very poignant rethinking...and Don Rumsfeld's second thoughts...and Colin Powell's and Tom Ridge's and Richard Clarke's post-cabinet re-thinking that would have been far more effectively engaged if it would have had an audience while they were still working for the President...

Very soon after the war started, Paul suggested that Americans support more open, democratic, and liberal -- "small l" classical, free-thinking, free-expressing liberal, in this sense -- values by financially and otherwise supporting schools in Islamic countries like Afghanistan and Iraq to support the nurturing of these kinds of very important values in Islamic cultures...

And that suggestion is not only a brilliant one -- which the Administration, generally, and Paul, specifically, deserve much credit for...

But it is one that should be extended, as much as possible to autocracies and dictatorships like Iran and North Korea...

This would make an immense difference, if it were possible to implant these institutions in places like North Korea and Iran...But they will only be possible if these states and cultures do not feel threatened by the Administration and the Western and civilized and democratic world...

A very, very, very good reason to not engage in a policy that makes threats as a way of resolving difficult issues...for goodness sakes...But that is ok...because mistakes get made...and that is the nature of international and domestic policy...

It is not only OK that mistakes get made over the course of these very difficult policy choices...it is common and on-going in the neverending learning curve of international (and domestic) policy...and acknowledging that instead of assuming bad faith is much more constructive, I believe, to preventing similar mistakes in the future than trying to get folks' heads...

For the President...and for Newsweek...and, this time, the President needs to follow this media organization's lead, I think...

That would be the most important suggestion I would have for the President...it's not his strength, unfortunately...and, as I've written earlier, it is very difficult to do, publicly...so I totally feel for George in this respect...but I'd do it anyway...

Apologize...

Apologize to the world for trying to make it do your bidding just because you say so...and because you're arrogant enough to believe that you know what's best for the world without consulting it...Apologize to Iraqis and American soldiers and international relief workers and other service-people, Iraqi law-enforcement, non-profit workers, commercial workers, and to the families of those whose lives were lost over the course of this world...whose lives were all put in far too much unnecessary risk, as a consequence of the President's arrogance to believe that forming substantial international coalitions
and consensus did not/do not matter...for disregarding international institutions, like the United Nations General Assembly and Security Council...as well as important NATO allies, like France and Germany...

Apologize to the North Koreans -- the leadership and the population -- as well as the Iranian leadership and people for persistently threatening them, militarily, to get our way on a whole host of matters
-- specifically, the renunciation of nuclear programs -- that has clearly been counterproductive to anyone honestly concerned with dealing with this threat...and not just defending the President and his mistakes...a policy of threats that leads those cultures, populations, and states to close down, dig in, and prepare for battle...not the state that you need so same folks in to learn and
support and nurture the values of free and open and liberal ("small l" classical liberal ) and democratic cultures...

And apologize to the American people...for both giving deceptive reasons for going into Iraq...and for not being more thoughtful about how such a war might be engaged to ensure that many, many, many fewer American, Iraqi and other lives would be lost over its course...and to American liberals, in particular, for treating them like opponents, at worst, and less than equitable partners, at best, when developing international and domestic policy...

I would then work with international relief organizations, fundraising, and other groups to fund emergency food relief for North Koreans, specifically, during bilateral and multilateral talks...to make clear that such talks and efforts in the region are authentically about how much Americans care about the North Koreans -- and about themselves -- and not about how they want to scare or repress them further than they are already repressed (learning the lessons from the very serious problems we've encountered in Iraq...

I would also continue to offer up as much free and paid for and otherwise supported access to both Iranians and North Koreans (there is more precedent for Iranians enjoying American culture...but if there's a way to get it to North Koreans, then I am all for it to products and media of American culture...the pink fashions and rap music that Iranians have, reportedly, been indulging in...and rebelling against their parents and their parents' generation with...the access to American, British, South Korean, Egyptian, Iraqi, Japanese, French, German, Spanish, Scandanavian, Swiss, Italian, Nigerian, Kyrgyz, Russian, Christian and other missionary (my South Korean friends tell me that Christian missionaries have been very important ambassadors to South Korean culture from America...and might have similar influence in the North, though, as with China, with significantly more risk, I'm sure, in a Communist dictatorship...and other more democratic media, movies, music, books, scholarship, and more open culture...

As Joe Nye -- the Dean of the Harvard School of Government and my favorite international policy scholar -- makes clearer in his most recent works...

While hard power -- in the form of military and economic force and sanctions -- can be useful in international diplomacy (and I would add...for some purposes...that have important tradeoffs with other purposes...meaning they are discreet tools for certain efforts -- like limiting regimes' access to weapons of mass destruction -- while distorting relationships needed for other efforts -- for democratization, for instance...or for extradition of or for reducing or removing support for terrorists....or for trade...or for improving openess and linkages for American and Western and democratic and non-democratic media, music, books, scholarship, internet, etc...or for solving a whole host of serious international problems...that require
strong overall relationships, first and foremost, to tackle so many important and necessary issues, simultaneously, without trading off issues of importance with one another...rather than discreet and often counterproductive efforts at forcing regimes' hands on issues that are not of immediate and truly imminent threat, as I see no evidence, thusfar, including from this Economist article, that Iran or North Korea really are...

As Joe makes clear...

Soft power -- or more direct diplomacy, study abroad programs -- especially programs that allow young folks from these countries to study in America in as big of numbers as possible and that sharing and genuine exchange of our more open culture and even others' more closed cultures -- are far undervalued in the current context...and need to be revisited by American and world leaders, generally...but definitely in situations of the most serious risk of escalation, as Iran and North Korea and Iraq are proving to be...

And soft efforts to encourage, teach, share, and otherwise nurture democratic values in these countries...through schools -- as Paul Wolfowitz, the current World Bank chairman and one of President Bush's most important intellectual advisors over the course of this war in Iraq suggested very, very, very wisely in Islamic countries...like Iran, say...through open and as freely accessed as possible...internet...press...and other news media (the Economist making its premium content freely accessable is a welcome and wonderful move in this direction...I've been waiting to brag on them about this ever since I encountered it...music...movies...television...advertising (as much as this just pisses off like hell traditionalists in developing and autocratic and repressive cultures...fuck 'em, I say...I don't have any fuckin' problem in the fuckin' world with Islamists and Communists and various autocrats and dictatorships and closed and more traditional cultures being pissed off with Americans and others using and celebrating their First Amendment Rights...I also happen to think that Afghanis can learn to tolerate desecration of the Koran, as well, by the way...even as Americans also learn to respect, preserve, and appreciate the Koran, Islamic tradition and culture, and Arab and South Central Asian cultures, generally...but that's for another post...

And if we need to use weapons and sanctions...We can still do so when we might think we might need to...but not lead with such a policy, thus playing trump cards that we cannot quickly replace or get back and, in doing so, at each turn, reversing a very important game called, "How to facilitate all of humanity adopting the highest values of all humanity..."

I would also add, at this point...that we should also consider acknowledging the legitimacy of Iran pursuing a peaceful program, as a part of those talks...meaning...that it is hardly fair for the Administration to argue, as they have, that peaceful nuclear development in America for energy purposes is needed...but that it must be halted in Iran...the President and the Administration and all those involved need to acknowledge that Iran's pursuit of a non-weapons-grade nuclear program is wholly legitimate for an emerging economy seeking non-oil-dependendent energy sources...

But one of the main purposes of bilateral and multilateral talks -- as is being used, more successfully, with North Korea, with the wise leadership of the South Koreans bringing Washington on board for a much more constructive resolution to such matters, there -- is to guarantee is -- whether Iran gets the bomb or not -- that they do what most democracies do, better, these days...

Which is not go to war with one another...

Meaning...

That we should work on better relations, generally, with the Iranians -- at least for the long run...even when there is, periodically, bad blood in the short run -- to better guarantee that any nuclear weapons that might be developed or acquired...

Are not used...

Which is our real concern...

The world is slowly beginning to come to terms, I think, with the fact that it cannot control hostilities...

At best they can combat them when they are aggressive...and then, only as a temporary solution to such conflict...

And build better relationships...even with those nations we don't trust...

And to follow the example that Franklin Roosevelt and George Marshall set for the country more than 50 years ago...

To build up our enemies...into stronger and better versions of themselves...

And to continue to expand on our own legacy of freedom and democracy...domestically...as well as abroad...

To build on what is good...to leave behind what is wrong and destructive...to forgive ours' and others' past transgressions...as we want others to forgive our and their own...

Melissa is home...I'll have more suggestions, later:):):)...have a great day, everyone:):):)...

Love,
Ben

I wasn't going to share this...but I'll share it, anyway...

I've noticed since I've worked at Amarr...I'm not sharing as much, as honestly...a defense, I think...in an environment not always hospitable to be totally authentic in...

But tonight...I was reminded what it was like to be around people who accepted me more completely...just as me...

I ushered, tonight, for the EMU Theater/Running Joke production of the rock musical, Johnny Butts...my very good friend, Andy Stowers, wrote Johnny...with his friend and drummer for the show, Nick Wells...

It was really good...I told Andy and everyone that I think that this show could be picked up by other theater groups...and major playwriting publishers, if he would be interesting in submitting it...

But the nicest thing, tonight...honestly...

Was hanging out with a bunch of friends that I didn't have to defend myself to...

It was so nice, I can't tell you...

After too many nights defending myself and who I am to my friends at Amarr...

It was nice to be with people who really appreciate/d me just for who I am...and the things that so many folks at Amarr just don't understand...are the same things that I and my friends at EMU really love about me...and that I really love about me...when I'm around folks who remind me that they aren't anything to defend...and are great without the approval or acceptance of folks who likely don't really approve or accept anyone...for too many of the guys I work with...probably not even themselves, too often...sadly...

And I realized...while I was sitting in the audience just enjoying this really great musical that my friend had just written and produced...

That I really need to get a teaching job...

And get out of this rut at Amarr...

I haven't really thought of it as a rut...

I've thought of it as working with friends that I really cared about...

But it's becoming all too clear to me that with too many of the guys...this feeling is not reciprocated...

And that I need to stop being such a fool...

And to move onto a healthier work environment...

Where I can be appreciated, more, for what I have to contribution...

And not always torn down...

For no reason, in particular, really...

But just because too many of the guys at Amarr don't know how to do much better...than to tear me down...and I'm sure themselves...

So sad...

And I need to stop being a part of this pitiful spectacle...

And move onto somewhere where my contributions will be appreciated and respected...

Because that is definitely not happening most nights, now, at Amarr...

No matter how much I'm a glutton for punishment...and appreciate many folks who do not appreciate me, comparably, at all...

Tonight I realized what a sad, unhealthy situation that I was in...and had lost track of just how bad it had gotten...until I spent like about 10 minutes with my friend, Joel...explaining the situation...and getting his reality check...that this was really kind of fucked up situation to work in...

How many people work in environments where they get bossed around by most everyone they work with?...

When was the last time that you got threatened to fight at work...nevertheless 5 or 6 times, since you've worked there?...

And what environment do people work in where such bullying is not only common...but almost encouraged, really, so much is changing it resisted...by virtually everyone...with notable exceptions...

...particularly my friend, Kenny, who has actually been a really great guy to work for/with:)...and who'll be a really great lead on second shift:):)...

Tomorrow I do more work on teacher applications...

Because I got to get out of this situation...

And into a situation more like EMU...

Where I can be me...

And not have to defend it all the time...

Because so many folks feel so bad about being them...

One more thing...

The title of this post actually referred to something else that I wasn't going to share but I'll share, anyway...

At risk of sounding like a total puss of an ex-boyfriend...

Is it possible that you can love someone completely...think it's reciprocated...and find out...only after you don't even have an active friendship with that person anymore...

That they didn't ever have those same feelings for you...

That it was far more unilateral a complete and unconditional love than what was felt for me?...

Is that really possible?...

Because my life sure feels like the Twilight Zone, right now...

Maybe it is...though I haven't wanted to believe that...even four years -- almost to the day, actually...Brandi and I broke up around August 5th...a little more than a month before 9/11 -- after we've broken up...

But having someone not even talk with you will make you see things that you either didn't see...or didn't want to see...or at least consider them...

Is it possible that my life has turned to February?...how totally and senselessly tragic...

I better get some sleep...I have applications to fill out:)...

Have a great night/day, everyone:):):):):)...

Love,
Ben

What the fuck?...

I had this brilliant little post on why I embrace and yet qualify thinking of myself as a liberal, these days...much as I embrace but qualify my identification as white trash, these days...

And then I lost much of it...I'm working on recreating it...

In the meantime...

NCAA Bans Native American Mascots in Postseason...

What the fuck?...

I hope the Florida State President fights this and wins this in court...

This is insulting to Florida State and all such teams in the extreme...

That certain Native American groups think that they can/do speak for all Native Americans...and that a school that has worked with Florida Seminole tribes around this issue...

For all of that to be nullified...and for them to be tarred as racists because they use a term that racist Native Americans don't like is...well...

RACIST...

And it's bullshit...

Interestingly, enough...

A professor that I worked with on race issues when I conducted race dialogues on campus as a part of my grad school experience, Cornell Pewewardy, presented the historical analysis that led the committee to make its decision...

Response of The Honor the Chief Society webpage at the University of Illinois to the NCAA ruling on team mascots...

I worked with Cornell in race dialogues...and I have to admit that I was struck, too, that Cornell's perspectives on race were biased against whites and in favor of the idea that the relationship between whites and Natives was consistently one of oppression...which is not the case...

The Honor the Chief Society, by the way, is the University of Illinois' effort to preempt such criticisms and to put their own Chief Illiniwek mascot in historical perspective...

The Honor the Chief Society at the University of Illinois...

As the Honor the Chief Society points out...it's not just Chief Illiniwek who is a part of Illinois heritage...it is the name of their state, Illinois, itself, which is named after the loose confederation of Native tribes in the region -- the Cahokia, Tamaroa, Kaskaskia, Michigamea, and Peoria -- through 1818, when Illinois became the nation's 21st state IN HONOR of the Native tribes that inhabited this region...

Why would a group of people name their state after a group that they are supposed to disdain?...they wouldn't...Whites and Americans did much to treat Natives badly over the course of the 17th, 18th, and 19th Centuries...but they did much to honor and treat them well, as well...and naming their state and their team mascots after their tribes was one of those ways of honoring those same tribes...

If these folks were mocking Natives...that would be one thing...

But they're not...

They're celebrating them...

And they have the right to celebrate the Seminole Indians if they want...

All forces of political correctness to the contrary...

The NCAA is WAY OUT OF LINE to demand anything different...

As Dennis Dodd writes brilliantly on the CBS College Sports website...

NCAA takes a stand that isn't much of one...

Teams like Illinois and Kansas, where Dr. Pewewardy works, are in big trouble if we start banning all Native references in team names...because both of their states', universities', and teams' names are based on names of Native tribes...

And what about roughneck Texans who might be offended by the Texas A&M Aggies?...or people of Irish descent who might be offended by the Notre Dame Fighting Irish?...or Cajuns who might be offended by the Ragin' Cajuns of Louisiana Layfayette?...

And then the NCAA decides it's going to step up penalties for schools with student-athletes with low grades...

I have a modest proposal...

How about death for all students who don't get above a C...

That sounds about right to me...

All those lazy, stupid athletes will surely be motivated by the threat of death to get better grades, don't you think?...

Have we all just gone COMPLETELY FUCKING INSANE...

Grades aren't designed, as they are currently given, for everyone to get A's...I want athletes to do better work...but this is about the most back-asswards, foolish, dumbass way to get there that I have ever seen...

And do you know what is so COMPLETELY IRONIC about this proposal?...

What IN THE FUCK would members of some NCAA grades commmittee know about getting good grades?...

You think these morons get on the rules committee by making good grades?...

Fat chance...

Because the folks who make the best grades and do the best work go on to be people like professors and teachers and those who make the most outstanding contributions to their field...

And...more importantly...

The people who do THE BEST in school DON'T necessarily get the best grades...

Many of them...like Joseph Campbell...the greatest cultural theorist of the twentieth century...or Roald Dahl...the eminent writer of works like Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and James and the Giant Peach...drop out of school...

Still others...like Albert Einstein...get told that their work is "irrelevant and insignificant"...the same work that went on the revolutionize the world of physics...

I made pretty good grades in both undergrad and grad school...and I imagine I am far smarter than many of those folks on the NCAA grades committee in matters that count...

And I know for damned sure that this is about the most goddamned foolish way that I've ever heard of supporting students to make better grades...

The sad part is that many student athletes do try to make better grades...and are often very discouraged that their efforts are not recognized...because they are often just not as smart as other students...at least they are not at the same intellectual level, in that moment...and so they are behind the curve of smarter students and trying to catch up...having everyone expect that they both catch up AND win national championships, never satisfied with athletes, when they don't do either...or, in the case of many of the stronger teams on the NCAA list, when they only do one of the two...

Do people really expect that all athletes can both get the best grades and all win national championships?...a few, like Bill Bradley, do (not in college, where his Princeton Tigers were 3rd at the NCAA tournament in 1965, his senior year, rather than champions...but he did win two championships in the NBA with the New York Knicks...a rarity for a person who is a Rhodes' scholar to be sure)...

...and yet everyone and their momma incessantly moan and bitch when ALL college atheletes don't do what Bill Bradley was only able to do twice in his college and professional entire career, but never in college...fans and others constantly bitch and moan and bitch and moan when they athletes don't do either...win championships...or get the best grades and do the best intellectual work...and when they don't comply with every other arbitrary bitch and moan that they have about college athletics...

Like what kind of mascot they have...

This is power run amok...all of it...

Love,
Ben

Maybe dancing?:):):)...

I don't know what I need to cheer up this weekend:):):)...

Had a run-in with a lead last night who just a month ago was avoiding work and distracting me from mine when we were staging together and who I had to remind to get back to work...

And now this guy is my "boss"...or one of them:)...

It's amazing how high mediocrity can rise in the world...

I have to say that it was kind of satisfying to tell a boss who was being an asshole that he was being an asshole to his face, last night:):):)...

He totally deserved it...

He's a new lead...he's understandably behind the other leads in productivity for his team, right now, because he's learning quite a bit all at once, right now...but it was clearly getting to him last night...especially as one of our trainers jokingly made reference to the need to kick his ass in gear (I just love how for some people the answer to every problem is seeing how far you can piss and how hard you can beat your chest...its very evolved of us, I must say)...

So...anyway...he fucked up and forgot a door on a tier...I very nicely pointed it out and asked if he wanted to complete the order...

And this asshole starting yelling at me about why I hadn't already gotten the door...his mistake...he's too chicken-shit to take responsibility for it...and he yells at me for it...

I get the door...

But not until I have an opportunity to tell him that he's being an asshole...which he is...

And I get in trouble...

Ah...the pleasures of working on a shipping dock...sometimes it's so goddamn jarhead, I can hardly stand it...

And I've been understandably upset about the situation ever since...

But not before I realized just how cool it was that I had just called an "boss" who was being an asshole that he was an asshole to his face:):):)...

It was kind of spontaneous...and the context is that this guy has been a co-worker for most of the time that I've worked with him...and not the most proactive co-worker, shall we say, of those I've worked with (he's kind of lazy, too much of the time:):):):)...

And he went on some hopefully temporary power trip last night...

And now I have to figure out how I learn to just let him abuse me next time, so that I don't get in trouble with the bigger boss...

Ahhhh...I just can't do it...

People will just have to stop being assholes with me...this is just garage doors...this job isn't worth it...

Yet one more incentive to find a better teaching job -- where my intelligence will be taken just a little bit more seriously...though I'm sure this will be a problem for me no matter where I work, from now on...no good deed goes unpunished, in this respect, I'm quickly learning:):):) -- ASAP:):):)...

Now there's incentive to get these applications done this weekend:):):):):)...

Have a great weekend, everyone:):):)...

Love,
Ben

James Carville is an asshole...and this whole situation is bullshit...

CNN Suspends Robert Novak After 'Inexcusable' Outburst...

You know what I think about Robert Novak saying that the line delivered by James Carville on CNN's Inside Edition, yesterday...

"He's got to show these right wingers that he's got a backbone, you know. It's why the Wall Street Journal editorial page is watching you. Show 'em that you're tough."

It was bullshit...

And it was right on for Robert Novak to say so...

James Carville is a slinking, slithering, nasty, hateful, vengeful polluting force in American politics...

And Robert Novak called him on that, yesterday...

And James TOTALLY DESERVED IT...

And good for Robert...

And you know what I'm most disappointed about in the whole deal...

That Robert apologized...for something he had nothing to apologize for...

This game of political recrimination that liberals and Democrats have been playing with the President, the Administration, Karl Rove, and now Robert Novak...is...as Robert so famously put it, now...

BULLSHIT...

And good for Robert to say so...

I finally finished all three stories that Time Magazine did in its cover story of the Karl Rove/Valerie Plame drama...including a disclosure by Time reporter, Matt Cooper, about his interview with Karl Rove and his grand jury testimony...

I've gone into this whole thing with a presumption of innocence for Karl Rove...and have grown increasingly concerned, after discussing this issue with several liberals, that this was becoming a smear campaign to get back at Karl Rove and the Administration for what they are really upset about...

Maneuvering a 2000 election win, declaring a war in Iraq that they disagreed with, and winning a second time in 2004...all of which were perfectly legal...

The first was a travesty of democracy, I think...though legal and reasonable...and far in the past...the second was a serious political miscalculation on the President's part, with noble intentions to free the people of Iraq, I think...and the third was a perfectly reasonable way for an American electorate to decide who leads them politically, even as I voted for the other guy...

And those Time Magazine articles and everything I've seen on this drama, thusfar...

Say nothing new...

And the trend which has increasingly concerned me...

Is the tone of liberal articles that seem to be less concerned, now, with the truth of these claims...

Than with getting Karl Rove...and the President...and now James Carville encouraging others, in yesterday's remarks, to get Robert Novak...

And the whole thing is EVERYTHING THAT IS WRONG WITH AMERICAN POLITICS...

It is the Clinton impeachment trial re-lived all over again...

It is ugly...it is partisan...

And a Robert Novak angrily opined yesterday on Inside Edition...

It is bullshit...

And good for Robert Novak for calling James Carville on his bullshit...

James has long been a corrosive force in American politics...

And thought Robert Novak is a cynical son-of-a-bitch, much of the time...he's an honest and independent reporter...a conservative journalist who was critical of the war in Iraq very early on...and who wrote his story out of that same even-handed skepticism that characterizes much of his journalism...and this most recent effort to smear a conservative over this whole drama is...

Bullshit...

James Carville should be ashamed of himself...

And liberals should too...

If they're various particular realities, which cannot possibly be understood by anyone else but themselves, allow them to feel bad about any of their behavior...

If they might be able to acknowledge that maybe it is wrong to do some things...like trying to smear conservatives you don't like because you don't like them...because you disagree with them...because one helped a President you don't like win an election...and because another is just a conservative, even if he is an independent and critically-minded one...

And if they can even possibly acknowledge that they aren't even close to living up to the decent, compassionate, and innocence-presuming ideals that characterize so much about what is great about being liberal...as someone who has been a life-long liberal...

Liberals, it seems, can put themselves in anyone else's shoes...

Except conservatives...

And this particular episode in the drama that is the on-going cycles of political recrimination in Washington, D.C., and in the most overbearing halls of power...

Is bullshit...

And good for Robert Novak to call someone on it...especially James Carville...who has deserved to have his particular brand of political discourse bullshit for quite some time, now...

I used to be charmed by James Carville...after he had just finished helping Harold Wofford succeed in upsetting Dick Thornburgh in the 1991 special election for his Pennsylvania Senate seat...and helped President Bill Clinton (the Governor of Arkansas who I voted against in the 1992 election, my first election that I could legally vote in...one of the biggest mistakes of my voting career:):):)...win election to the American Presidency...

James has/had a Louisiana backyard barbeque charm about him, that I appreciated and still appreciate...he had a way of taking complex political issues and making them very simple for average folks...average folks willing to read his arguments, that is:):):)...

Too simple, I think...

So simple...that the world becomes a battle between the good guys and the bad guys...

He's one of the good guys...

And Robert Novak is one of the bad guys...

And anytime that someone splits up the world into those who are "with us or against us"...

It's a sure sign that they've stopped thinking enough...

And it's bullshit...

No matter who it comes from...

No apologies, necessary, Robert...

You're right on the money, on this one, I think, thusfar, Robert...

It's bullshit...

Love,
Ben

Still not convinced?...

Al Queda's No. 2 Threatens London, U.S...

...that the war in Iraq made us more vulnerable to terrorist attack?...

Read on...

Love,
Ben:):):):)...

My listening pleasure:

Dropkick Murphies...The Last Letter Home...
Toby Keith...American Soldier...
Dixie Chicks...Traveling Soldier...
...and then American Soldier for the third time, for good measure:):):)...

I think I understand better now:):):)...

You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown/the 1999 Broadway revival/Anthony Rapp and gang...Happiness...Rascal Flats...These Days...Diamond Rio...Beautiful Mess......Livingston Taylor...If I Only Had a Brain...Darryl Worley...I Miss My Friend...Hootie and the Blowfish...Hold My Hand, their cover of Tom Waits' Closing Time, Time, their cover of Bill Withers' Lean on Me, and Let Her Cry...Van Morrison...Moondance...Tracy Chapman...The Promise...Harry Connick, Jr...If I Only Had a Brain...You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown/Kristen Chenowith/Ilana Levine/Kimberly Grigsby/B.D. Wong/Anthony Rapp/...My New Philosophy...Schroeder...Little Known Facts...My Blanket and Me...Sinead O'Connor...You Do Something to Me...Ray Charles...I've Got a Woman...Bye-Bye Love...Hit the Road, Jack...Georgia on My Mind...9/11 dedication with Lee Greenwood's God Bless the USA and Ray Charles' America the Beautiful...Shake Your Tailfeathers...Old Man River...Five Blind Boys of Alabama...Old Time Religion...I'll Fly Away...Marching up to Zion...There Will Be a Light...None of Us are Free...Down By the Riverside...When a Man Loves a Woman...Randy Newman...You Are So Beautiful...with Lyle Lovett...You've Got a Friend in Me...Rednecks...Political Science...Dixie Chicks...Top of the World...Toby Keith...American Soldier...

...ok...

I think that should hold me at least until the end of this post:):):)...


Kenny's comments in my last post have finally helped me unlock the real mystery that I've been struggling with, recently...

Why so much distance in my relationships, lately...

And I think Kenny's helped me figure it out:):):)...



I have a hard time understanding lack of hope...

I've always been really abundant with hope...

As I explained to Kenny in the comments in the last post (on my Tripod blog...Singin' dem education blues...comments......about a situation that I think may be resolved at this point)...

I've been struggling a lot, lately...with why people treat me so bad around my intelligence...and education...and about being decent, generally...especially when all of my commitments in the world are that others can be similarly intelligent and decent...and that I have a lot to learn, on both counts, from others...

But I think Kenny has finally helped me figure out what I've been missing on this thing...

As I explained to Kenny...

I've lived my whole life on dreams...

My dad was younger than me -- between 30 and 32 -- when he went a million dollars bankrupt in a bad business deal...

He was just a little older than me -- 35 -- when he and my mom divorced...and when he found himself a single dad of 5 children, 3 then 4 then 5 of which lived with him...

While he's a million dollars bankrupt, mind you (perhaps the reason why my sense of perspective is so much different than many others)...

So much of my life was lived in dreams...

Because the realities were that we were broke...

For much of the time -- the great majority of the time -- that I was growing up...

And in the end:):):)...he made good:):):)...he's a millionaire, today:)...and he definitely earned those stripes he has:):)...


So...anyway...I've always just been really abundant with hope...I haven't known any other way, really...

So...I don't know what it's like to be REALLY cynical about the world...

The closest I got was in grad school...

I went through kind of a cynical period in grad school...when politics in the country was getting particularly cynical...and when I was beginning to give up hope, a little, on many of the solutions to the country's problems...

In retrospect...what I was cynical about was not our ability to solve problems...

But the ability for politicians to solve them...

Not that politicians couldn't or don't play an important role...

But that politicians, quite inadvertantly, I think...often make problems worse with legislated solutions...that need engagement by the civil society more than they need legislation...


So...anyway...I went through something of a cynical period in grad school...


But then Brandi and I broke up...


And...like when I was a kid...it was either shit or get off the pot...

I could either give into the cynicism...cynicism that likely had helped tear apart that relationship...

Or I could get about figuring out how to make that relationship work (which was my central priority in life for much of the time after our break-up)...and take care of the thing that mattered most to me in my entire life...

Or I could give up...and, as a consequence...give up on me...

So I decided to start trying to figure it out...

And I spent years studying every psychology and relationship book, article, song...ANYTHING...I could get my hands on...

To win Brandi back...

And out of all of that...

I started developing ideas that were profoundly changing the way that I thought about politics...

Because...all of a sudden...I started to understand politics at a level underneath it all that I had never considered before...

I started to understand politics from the deepest areas inside of people...places I'd never understood as well before...nevertheless seen...or experienced...

And...out of that...I started developing principles that I now call Least Possible Necessary Aggression...which try to begin to account for how policy and politics and psychology impact one another...at the deepest levels...

So...anyway...

What was the point of this story?...

Oh...grad school...hope...

So...anyway...

Brandi leaves me...

And I decide...that either I'm going to work my ass off...to open my heart for her or for whomever...or I'm never going to feel that kind of love with a woman like that ever again...

So I start working my ass off...

Emotional work is a hell of lot of work, Kenny:)...and I do it pretty regularly, at this point:):):)...

So...

I go to THREE therapists, at one point...including a family therapist...with my family...all of my brothers and sisters and my dad and my step-mom...after a Disney World vacation one Christmas where I was a total ASSHOLE to my brothers and sisters because of how much my break-up was breaking my fucking heart...and helped ruin a family vacation that we had all been waiting YEARS -- DECADES, Kenny -- to go on together...we'd been planning a Disney World trip since I was like 14 or 15 years old, Kenny:)...

And I'm reading EVERY FUCKING PSYCHOLOGY BOOK and every policy book, of course, because it was my field...and because I love politics, obviously:):):)...and I must have listened to every sappy, sad country music song about love and break-ups that's ever been written...in the last 5 years or so, at least:):):)...

And I just start to see things about policy and psychology...that I'd never seen before...

And that...I think...at this point...very few people have really ever seen, I think...

Abraham Maslow began to see it before he died...his book, The Farther Reaches of Human Nature, gets at it better than probably any book I've ever read...

Amartya Sen gets it some, I think...his book, Development as Freedom, captures it some, I think...I've not read his most recent book, The Argumentative Indian...so I'll have to read that and see what he has to say on the subject:):):)...

Joseph Nye gets it some...his work on soft power in international policy, in books like The Paradox of American Power and Soft Power, get it some, I think...

I don't think any of these guys get it completely...

But they get it better than most, I think...

So...anyway...

The point is...

There was this time in my life...when I felt more cynical...at least more cynical for me...like I said...I'm a pretty abundantly hopeful person...I've had to be...so I don't get terribly cynical, much of the time:):):)...

And this was a time when I had to shit or get off the pot...

And I decided to...well...do what I had to do:):):)LOL:):):)...

So I got to work...

But the point of this whole LONG GODDAMNED STORY...

Is to explain why I don't get cynicism very well...

But you just helped me get underneath it...and understand it better...

It's giving up, I think...and the consequences that come with giving up...

And like I said in those comments...

The reason I can't give up on others...is because...when we give up on others...a little bit of us gives up on ourselves, too...

And I think all the pettiness that people have engaged in with me...is their defenses around the pain that is involved with dealing with that disappointment...that led them to give up in the first place...

And I guess I'm just realistic enough to know that the pain of dissappointment...is FAR OUTWEIGHED...by the pain of giving up...BY FAR...because the latter is exponential...it's compound interest...it accumulates on the heart over the years...and it just sits there...accumulating dust...and more pain...with every compromise that is made in its name...

So anyway...

That kind of gets at my central commitments in education...

That everyone can learn...always...

That everyone can aspire as high as they would like...

Meaning...

Not only as big as Abraham Maslow...and Amartya Sen (and Jeffrey Sachs, another contender in economics, I think)...and Joseph Nye (and Benjamin Barber...another contender, I think, in international policy fields)...who are three of the most amazingly intelligent people in their fields, by my lights...ever...Abraham Maslow, remember, has been dead for nearly 40 years...

But they can be bigger...

They can be better...

And that we can all be bigger and better than these guys...

All of us...

My central commitment as a teacher, Kenny...is to my students and kids and friends and whomever as people, first, and students, second...

And that they KICK THE LIVING SHIT OUT OF ME AND MY LEGACY, Kenny...that they bat me out of the fucking ballpark...that they win and win big and never stop...and, as Winston Churchill said in that now famous speech in America...and probably the greatest college commencement speech in the history of college commencement speeches...legend goes that this was the entire extent of that speech...

"Never, never, never, never, never, never quit."

(I've also read that it was a 10 word speech..."Never give in. Never give in. Never, ever, give in." But that just doesn't sound like Winston Churchill to me...at least I hope he gave the speech the way I wrote it first...because it's a better speech that way...and Winston Churchill could definitely deliver a speech:):):)...

As Vince Lombardi said...

"Once you learn to quit, it becomes a habit."

(This is a really great site for similar such quotations:):):)...

As well as Robert Kennedy's bit of wisdom...

"Only those who dare to fail greatly can ever achieve greatly."

...that I found on this little speech team webpage:):):)...

Eastview Speech Team...thanks, Brie:):):)...


Anyway:):):)...

The point is that my central goal as a teacher...outside of caring about my kids and students and friends and everyone else as people, first...and students, second...

Is that they KICK THE LIVING SHIT OUT OF MY LEGACY...that they PUMMEL IT INTO THE FUCKIN' GROUND...that they TRANSCEND EVERYTHING THAT I'VE EVER DONE AND EVER WILL DO...

That they KICK THE LIVING SHIT OUT OF EVERYTHING THAT I DO OR WILL EVER DO...

That's my goal, Kenny:):):)...

I have no interest in being Abraham Maslow...

And having everyone fawn over how brilliant they think I am...and then dying with noone even trying to take over or maintain or expand or elaborate on or imagine in ways that I've never imagined...my own legacy...

I want people to KICK THE LIVING SHIT OUT OF MY LEGACY...I want them to BEAT ME...and BEAT ME BAD...

And that's when I know I'll be successful as a teacher, Kenny...

A teacher who's students are trying and failing in beating them at their own business, much of the time is FAILING by my lights...and I don't like failing, Kenny, if you can't tell...I like succeeding...I like winning...and the way that I think that teachers win...that they succeed...that they keep from failing...

Is that they teach students so that they are better prepared to KICK THE LIVING SHIT OUT OF THEIR LEGACY...

That's my commitment in life, Kenny:):):):):):)...

To prepare everyone to do that:):):):):):):)...

And for me to do the same:):):):):):)...

And for all of us to just keep playing the game of life:):):)...

As FUCKING HARD AS WE CAN FOR AS FUCKING LONG AND -- too often -- SHORT...AS WE ALL HAVE IT:):):):):):)...

So...Kenny...the issue for me...

Is that I don't understand quitting...

It's just not in me...

I think Winston Churchill is one BALLSY MOTHERFUCKER for giving that speech...

And I ADMIRE THE FUCK OUT OF THAT, Kenny...I ADMIRE THE FUCK OUT OF IT:):):):):):):)...

And that's the kind of guy I am:):):)...

And so when people start giving up on me...

I don't get it...

Because my expectation is not to beat people all the time...

My expectation is to have them KICK THE LIVING SHIT OUT OF ME (not literally, obviously:):):)...though I've gotten pretty close to that one, too, haven't I, Kenny:):):)...man...we have stories, now, don't we:):):)...AND MY LEGACY:):):)...and at anything we do together:):):):):):)...

When my neighbors, Jesse and Melissa, and Melissa -- my ex-girlfriend and roommate --and I play Trivial Pursuit (the 90's edition...which is an AWESOME edition of that game, by the way:):):)...

I've won the last couple of times:):):)...ok...I've won every time we've finished a game up until this point (though Melissa was winning a game that we quit early:):):)...so I've got competition:):):)...

And I can be pretty openly competitive...

But that's because, Kenny...I try to make clear to people...

That the competition is totally friendly with me:):):)...

And that my expectation...in everything:):):)...is that my friends and family and everyone I deal with:):):)...

KICK THE LIVING SHIT out of me at whatever we are doing:):):):):):)...

It's the only way that it remains fun for me, anyway:):):)...otherwise...it's just an ego thing:):):)...and who the fuck really needs that:):):)...

The much bigger ego rush, I think:):):):):)...

Is when people you care about:):):)...especially people who were never really convinced of their own abilities:):):):):)...

Begin to KICK THE LIVING SHIT out of you and your efforts:):):):):):):):):):):):)...

And that's my commitment, Kenny:):):):):):)...

And that's why I keep working with those guys:):):)...to prepare them to start trying or to start succeeding...

In KICKING THE LIVING SHIT OUT OF ME AND MY LEGACY:):):):):):)...

Which is exactly what my goal is when I start teaching:):):):):):)...

When I was in college, Kenny...when I was competing in forensics at Wichita State University...we went from 84th in the country, my freshman year...to 7th in the country, by my senior year...

And my biggest disappointment, Kenny...from that period...

Is that Wichita State University has never achieved that kind of success, nationally, ever again, in intercollegiate forensics...my best friend, Bond Benton:):):) (who was the third overall speaker in the nation my senior year and his senior year, the year after that:):):)...went on to lead WSU to 9th in the country, the year after I finished competing:):):)...and then nothing, Kenny...we've never succeeded the same since:):):)...

And I have no intentions on letting that happen ever again, Kenny:):):):):):)...if I can help it:):):)...


So...what I've been missing, Kenny...

Is that I just haven't understood that people were giving up on me...on themselves...always wondering when that son-of-a-bitch was going to stop...when he was going to give up...when he was going to quit...

But the truth is, Kenny...

I don't quit...

It's not in me...

I take breaks...

But I never quit (ok:):):)...I do quit trivia games when I'm overwhelmed with exhaustion:):):)...but Melissa will have her revenge, I'm quite sure:):):)...

But on the big stuff, Kenny:):):)...

I never quit:):):)...

Never...never...never...never...never...never...

I never quit:):):)...

I don't know how...

It's just not in me:):):)...

On anyone:):):):):)...

Ever...

Ever...

Osama Bin Laden may have to be killed if he threatens deadly force against someone capturing him...

But I still presume if I'm the guy charged with capturing him...that I can get him without killing him...

Being realistic, of course, that he is VERY LIKELY TO TRY TO DO SO...and STILL to try to capture him without killing him...

Because that's what America is all about...

And I believe in America...

And that's what I'm about...

And I for goddamned sure believe in me:):):)...

Thanks, Kenny:):):):):):)...I think I understand better now:):):)...

And maybe you understand how I got to where I am a little better too, now:):):):):):)...

I'll talk with you tonight, bud:):):):):):)...

Love,
Ben

Here I was saying that I never give up...

...and then I have a night like last night...

I need to learn how to be a wallflower, I think...I am just like this everpresent lightning rod for everthing that is going great and that is controversial and conflict at work...

I had a friend act like an asshole, I thought, last night...which is a trend that's gotten much worse since I've known him...which is much of why it was/has been pissing me off so bad...this is the same friend whom I thought things were resolved with in the earlier post on my work...

I told him if he was going to be an asshole...then he could put the heavy-ass steel commercial doors that we were loading by himself...

Another friend thought that I had overreacted and took up for my first friend...the second friend is not the most calm, thoughtful, constructive person in the world, let's just say...

And when things had finally died down and the first friend and I seemed to be doing better...

The second came around...talking shit...when I'm already pretty pissed about the first situation...and trying to just chill out...

So second friend and I hash it out...but not so friendly...and second friend is always trying to figure how many steps in a conflict with me before he gets to crack my skull...or at least he talks a lot of smack on the issue...

And...in the meantime...I get to look like the asshole to stand up to what I thought was bullying and bullshit on both of their parts, at different points in the night...

I wonder how much self-respect goes for these days on the market?...

Because noone seems to value mine, at all in my life, except for me...so I'm not sure if I really need it or not...

And a lot of people would definitely feel better about me if I'd learn to just roll over and take it up the ass without making so much fuss about it...

I'm caught in this really fucked up catch 22...and I think I'm the only one who cares at all about what bullshit that is...

And not enough people seem to take enough notice that our productivity -- our tier count, as we call it -- was way down, last night, relative to previous nights...and totally absorbed by a bunch of utterly useless fighting...

And the crazy part is...

I don't think anyone really gives a shit how it impacts productivity or not...

I think most folks are just interested in being right...right or wrong, really...and about reinforcing every assumption and initial judgment that they've ever had...

And to just believe that the fact that I'm such a nice guys is because I'm a pussy...and that I would be better suited to sewing or some such career...

And no matter how many times I stand up to these sons of bitches...I'm always both the asshole and the pussy...

Because it is just so goddamn impossible for them to even CONSIDER that they might just be wrong about what will improve our productivity...

And because their pissing streams are bigger than their brains...fuckin' morons...

Why do I even bother, I wonder?...

I don't know...

Love,
Ben

Every generation thinks they have it figured out...

USA Today...Newspaper criticized for firing columnist...

Jim DeFede of the Miami Herald is the latest of newspaper journalists quickly punished for behavior that the newspaper considered questionable...

Palmeiro suspended 10 days for steroid policy violation...

And Rafael Palmeiro, the fourth man in baseball history, along with Hank Aaron, Willie Mays and Eddie Murray, to get 3000 hits and 500 homers in a career, and 9th on the list of all-time home-run hitters in Major League baseball, at 569...

...and one of the most outspoken opponents of steroid use...

...is suspended 10 days after being tested for steroids...

It never fails to amaze me just how arrogant every generation is that it has finally figured out just the right balance of decency and harm they should provide for people in the name of doing good...

But rest assured...

Though this generation will be found wanting by my generation for its overreach...

My generation will get this balance right...

And though the children of those of my generation will find our efforts wanting...

Their children will finally figure it out...

And though their children will find their efforts wanting...

Their children will figure it out...

And so the cycle of arrogance and punishment and cover-up and denial continues...

Until interrupted...

By a genuine concern for doing good by people...and not trying to get people...and trying to cover our own asses...and being satisfied just looking like we are dealing with problems...rather than really dealing with problems...more concerned are too many of us...including the Miami Herald, Congress, and Major League Baseball in each of these situations...with the perception that we are doing good...rather than the reality...

With courage rather than cowardice...

Which both of these punishments are really about...

Love,
Ben

Singin' dem education blues...

Long night at work...

I was upset going into work, tonight...

I've grown really tired of having people take pot-shots at me and my education and my circumstances...and all kinds of bullshit...

I want so badly to live and work in environments where education and intelligence are taken seriously...

I talked over the situation with my lead, Fred, this morning, on the way taking him home...

Fred gave me good perspective...

Most of the guys at work are actually really appreciative of me and my education...

There are a couple that have really spoiled things for me, in some ways that have led me to feel kind of depressed about it for the last couple of days...

I think I'm just finally accepting that this is something that I will deal with for the rest of my life...

And it's depressing as all hell...

I'm hoping that if I deal with this stuff, right now...that I'll have it behind me and it won't really hit me as hard later on...

But it's been kind of hell the last 12 hours or so, dealing with it all...

And dreading having to work with one of my crew who is also a good friend who has been really nasty about this at some really vulnerable moments that I've shared with him...and my decision to just stop sharing myself so much with him, because he can never quite find it in his heart to be a friend...so obsessed is he, I think, trying to rationalize why the world is always supposed to work out...and how my haphazard journey through it just confirms for him what a loser I am...and how orderly the world really is, if I wouldn't keep upsetting the apple cart so much...

He's 21...he knows nothing about the world...so I cut him a lot of slack...he's still kind of a prick, much of the time...but I still cut him slack...I mean what else am I going to do, realistically...

But it's hurt in the meantime...

This is probably good practice for dealing with other young people...who can be equally as hurtful and worse, I'm sure...

But it's just kind of hard to deal with at the moment...and for the last 12 hours or so...

I do think that my lead, Fred, is right...that there has been some jealousy going on in some of these situations, recently...definitely crossed my mind more than once...but it still hurts...

And the thing that's really sucked has knowing that this is something that I deal with with almost everyone, at some level...though Fred has been an exception...he's just an exceptionally decent guy...not common at all, I'm afraid...

It's hard to get my head wrapped around...

I'm just not like that, really...

I really appreciate peoples' abilities...even if they far exceed my own...

When Brandi and I went to work for Bill Bradley's campaign up in Iowa...he had a poster that talked about his academic and athletic exploits (Bill was both a Rhodes Scholar...and he set NCAA Tournament records for points scored -- against my alma mater, Wichita State University, no less, in 1965...and he's won two NBA championship with the New York Knicks in 1970 and 1973...

Bill Bradley NBA History...

In Iowa...

Bill had posters that said something to the effect..."The guy you hated in high school":):):)...

But the thing is...

I didn't ever hate people like Bill Bradley in high school or anwhere, really...

I was always really impressed when people were good at something...especially atheletics...even though I wasn't that great at much of any sport in high school...

So it's been kind of a blow...post-graduate-school...

To find people be so goddamned petty...and jealous...and play all kinds of bullshit games around matters of education and intelligence...

And it's really worked itself on me, at this point...

So much so that I am beginning to wonder...

Is there ever a point where having so much education or being so intelligent -- even as I can see its impact and potential -- that it begins to be taken seriously in the places I work...where people don't waste all of their time and my time trying to defend against why it doesn't matter because it makes them feel bad...so they try to make me feel bad for having it instead...

Because I can't live my life feeling so caught between my own judgment and the often more narrow, petty, small-minded judgment of others all the time...

At some point...

I wouldn't mind spending at least some time with people who actually appreciate my contributions...

And don't spend all their time trying to rationalize for me and for themselves why being smart or decent or good or whatever just doesn't matter all that much...

It's more than wearisome for me, now...

It's really starting to drag me down...

People think that because I'm so smart...and seem so strong...

That it just doen't affect me like it does...

When the truth is that it really hurts me...

All of it...

So much of all of the bullshit that I've dealt with in the last two and half years out of school...

And some of it cuts me deep...

And it makes me wonder why I worked so hard in school all those years...

When so many people can only see it as yet one more opportunity to feel bad about themselves...

Rather than feel good for me...

And in the meantime...

Every day that my life looks like a failure to these same folks...

It just reinforces for them why being educated and being a decent person just really isn't worth their time, anyway...because look where it got me...

It's all kind of disgusting, really...

Makes you wonder why decent people do good at all, really...given how shitty they get treated, even at their best...

And today (and last night) I just don't know why, at this moment...I do it because it was what I was taught to do...and because some inexplicable faith leads me to keep being decent, despite all of the incentives otherwise...which are far too abundant to keep track of...and distort everything, really...for all of us...

I don't know...

I wish I had some hopeful aphorism to cap this all off and reassure everyone that things will always work out...

But this time in my life has challenged my faith in that principle more than any other period in my life...

And I just don't know...

I hope things work out...

But I just don't know...

I've got to sleep...

I'm exhausted...

Goodnight, everyone...

Love,
Ben

What a Wonderful World...

One of my best friends, Kenny, from work, posted recently and told me the same story at work of hearing Joey Ramone's cover of What a Wonderful World after leaving work one night...Joey was dying of cancer when he recorded this version on his last album...

Well...Kenny tells the story better than I do:):)...

Kenny's Maze...

I have to mention, here, that it is so fascinating to me how many of very good friends are big punk fans...and I am so late coming to the punk scene:):):)...I saw the Ramones at Lollapalooza long before I knew what a big deal they were in the American punk scene and in punk music, generally:):):)...they were awesome:):)...

But so many of my very close friends are big punk fans:):):)...and it's just so curious to me that I'm so late coming:):)...though Melissa rented the first 3 episodes of Six Feet Under, this week...and one of the characters on there explains it better...the lead guy is a Sting/U2 kind of guy...and she's a punk girl:):):)...AMAZING television writing, by the way, Six Feet Under, when you get a chance:):):)...

Also...if you're a punk fan...Kenny posts some punk music lyrics...he's a big Agnostic Front and NOFX fan, if you're interested (Jas...that reference was for you, especially:):):)...great stuff, Kenny's blog:):):)...

So...anyway:):):)...

Kenny tells me this story that night...

And it occurs to me that What a Wonderful World was Brandi's and my song...I had totally forgotten, really, it's been so long...

Especially Louis Armstrong's 1970 version, which I found late in our relationship...

Where Louis is talking to the kids of a similarly disgruntled and disillusioned generation...amidst a similar war...and with similar problems...

And he says to the young audience...with these beautiful violins in the background:):):)...

"Some of you young folks been saying to me...'Hey pops...what you mean what a wonderful world?...how about them wars all over the place?...You call them wonderful?...and how 'bout hunger and pollution?...that ain't so wonderful either'...

Well, how about listening to old pops for a minute...seems to me, it ain't the world that's so bad...but what we're doin' to it...and all I'm saying is see what a wonderful world it would be if only we'd give it a chance...

Love, baby, love...that's the secret...yeah...

If lot's more of us loved each other...we'd solve lots more problems...and man...this world would be Odessa...

And that's why ol' pops keeps sayin'...

I see trees of green...
Red roses too..."

And then he sings the song:):):):)...Louis also died shortly thereafter singing that version:(...and it's the most beautiful version he ever sang, I think...I definitely recommend that folks check it out:):):)...

Brandi and I used to dance to that song every time we had a chance...I love it almost above all others, really...I first heard it on the soundtrack of Good Morning, Vietnam...when it came out in 1987...and I've loved it ever since:):)...

Louis gets it more than most, I think...

That saving the world is about saving it...not about burning it down in spite of it...and that spite and bitterness and hate and hostility are no way to do anything positive or constructive in the world...

And that saving the world is about people...about caring about them...not about taking them down...

That 1970 version of What a Wonderful World should be "required":):) listening for any political theorist or activist or anyone interested in politics, I think:):)...it captures the essence of what is missing and needed in contemporary politics...and the essence of everything that is wrong with contemporary democracies...

We miss you, Louis...you too, Joey...

And I miss a time in my life when more people believed that sentiment more...

Back in 1998...during that summer Brandi and I spent in Washington, D.C....this was the spirit that drove us...

We were saving the world...we knew all the cynicism and challenges that lay ahead...and we were taking them all on, anyway...

More people need to believe that...

If we're ever going to do anything decent and hopeful and constructive in this world...

Otherwise...

We're all stuck in the same messes...

Without anything but our bitching and grumbling and gadgets and drugs and sex and money and power or whatever other kinds of bullshit we keep near us to keep the bad feelings at bay...

And all the same problems still in place...

How long does denial maintain it's grip, I constantly wonder these days?...because goddamn if it can't keep a firm fuckin' grip on folks' imaginations and dealings with reality so much of the time...

"Love, baby, love...that's the secret...yeah...

If lot's more of us loved each other...we'd solve lots more problems...and man...this world would be Odessa..."

Sing it, Louis...

Have a great weekend, everyone:):):)...

Love,
Ben

P.S. I'm working on teaching applications this weekend:):):)...I'll do my best to get back with folks who have been trying to get a hold of me...Ned and Marilyn...you too, in particular...amidst the need to be on this:):):)...but I'm thinking of you:):):)...

I'm gonna miss these bastards...

I've been putting off applying for teaching jobs...I know it's late...though, in special ed, they're always available...I'm sure something will work out...

But I've been realizing, this morning, that...in addition to being exhausted from work...

I'm gonna miss these bastards...

I never, ever in a million years could have predicted how working in a shipping dock would prepare me for the world...for teaching...for my own life...

It's not something school taught me, that's for sure...

It's just...being one of the guys...

I stick out like a sore thumb in most conversations, any more...

And it's nice to have a crew of guys that I just belong to...just as me...no qualifications needed...

And it's been interesting looking at the world...not as a teacher...or as a good student...

But just as a guy...just one of the guys...

It's nice...

And I realize...that this is how I'm going to teach...

The one really important thing that working in a shipping dock has taught me...

Is that EVERYONE HATES BEING BOSSED AROUND...EVERYONE...

And if you work with someone who leads...and they treat you decent...and they're just one of the guys...or whatever...

Then you're much more likely to pay attention to them...and to respect them...and to try to do your best...which, if given the right space, can be far better than that leader ever imagined themselves...

Today...at a meeting...I was noticing how too many of the guys weren't really paying attention...and being respectful of our supervisor...and how our supervisor was both insecure about that...and had kind of earned it, unknowingly...

And I realized that though I like our supervisor and our department lead and all of our leads an awful lot, really...

That I don't want to be that guy ever again...

I've been that guy before...

The teacher or the lead that everyone thinks is a jerk-off...because their insecurities about themselves lead them to try to constantly prove why they deserve everyone's attention...rather than just earning peoples' respect and attention because they deserve it...

And I just don't want to be that guy, any more...ever again...

Even though, in this case, that guy was/is a guy that I like and respect very much, really...

I've learned and feel in my bones, now, that I can best earn peoples' respect by being me...and learning from people...and expecting them to treat me decent...while cutting everyone plenty of slack...and giving everyone as much space as possible and as they need to be them...

And a shipping dock is an ideal place to practice this...because it's a place where you can just let it all hang out, for the most part:):):)...and it's been a luxury that I don't know what other workplaces I'll ever be able to feel that ever again:):):)...

I'm thinking that I might work the docks during the summers, if they might let me...just because I like it...which is ironic:):)...since so many people talk all the time about how they hate this job:):):)...and I really like it, really:):):)...even though it's totally not the "noble" work of teaching or policy...

In a lot of ways...that's why I like it...because when I fuck something up in this job...people don't all lose their heads that it's the end of the world...

The truth is that fuck-ups in teaching and policy are not the end of the world, either...in fact...they are two areas...policy, now...not politics, necessarily...not yet...though, hopefully this way more in the future...where people can fuck up regularly and have the stakes be high...and to more than anywhere else, I think, have a new day to start everything all over again...

But in my professional work...people always act like fuck-ups are the end of the world:)...too much, that is:)...

But the truth, I think...is that more of the world needs to have some perspective about life...and think about the things that matter in life like they are garage doors...

Garage doors matter...they keep our stuff in our garages...warm...and safe from the elements...and from those who might want to take them...

But, in the end, they're just garage doors...and the less crazy we get about them...the better job we can do with just chilling out and taking care of them to make sure they get made, and prepared, and shipped to their destinations with everything intact:):)...

And similarly:):)...

If people in schools and political and other important institutions...if they recognized that what they do matters...

But...that...in the end...no matter what mistakes get made...

We all still have to wake up the next day and do better that day...

And that while life matters...in the end...it's just life...so you might as well enjoy it, even as we get excited about the things that matter:):):)...

Then...maybe...we could all just chill out a little bit...and see better how to do a better job of things...instead of just being upset about even the big stuff...and missing opportunities to make things better...because we get so lost in looking like we're doing something constructive...rather than just focussing, calmly and patiently, on doing good...on taking constructive steps...and being creative about how we approach issues...to better guarantee...that the doors get out on time and in tact, so to speak:):)...

And learning to stick by one another, in the meantime:):)...

That's my dream, at least:):)...

I think we'll get closer by the end of my lifetime:):)...

But I'm fine with the ride, in the meantime:):)...because I like hanging out with all the people that I get to meet in my life:):):)...strengths and limitations:):)...

And I learned a lot of that working in a shipping dock...

I'm gonna miss these bastards:)...

Ben

Concerned:):):)...

A great week, overall:):)...

A lot of Hootie:):):)...I love Hootie:):)...

I've been a little concerned, today, about something...

That...

No matter how I try...

That...for some people...maybe for a lot of people...

My efforts will never really be enough...

My politics matters a lot me because it says a lot about who I am...and what kind of commitments I have in life...and how committed I am to constructive efforts to deal with difficult problems in the world...

But one relationship with one co-worker, in particular, at work...who's always looking for ways to knock me down...and with one person on a chat board that I frequent, who can be pretty nasty with me (though...to be fair to her...she's gotten a lot better:):)...

A situation with a close friend of mine...a friend who has pulled back, recently, with both me and Melissa when we've met with him...

The situation with my advisor and my grad school...and the seeming irresolvability of that situation...

The situation with Brandi...she's not writing, again...despite an effort on my part to at least engage the conversation (by email) of why she is upset with me so much that we aren't communicating, right now, for reasons that I can only imagine without hearing them from the horse's mouth...

All of these situations leave me feeling like no matter what I do...it will never be enough...

I've done everything I know how to do, thusfar, in each of these relationships...for the most part...

And a lot of times...I'm just like...

"Hey y'all...I'm human...I'm not all-knowing or all-understanding...I'm just doing my best, here, like everyone else...and a lot of times, I have NO CLUE about what to do with a situation...I just keep trying, like everyone else...and sometimes I have no idea what people want...especially if they don't say something..."

And...for all of the pretty decent people detective work...getting to know people...quietly...over time...that I think I do...

Sometimes...I think...it will never be enough...for some people...for too many people...

Makes me kind of sad, really...

What do we all want for each other, I wonder?...

For each other to match up, ideally, with our best images of one another, I think...

It's just not realistic...we all need to time and space to be ourselves and learn and grow...

I know...I know...

I guess I just wish I could know, more, what kind of learning and growing that people are working on, more...or not working on, as the case may be...

And I wish there were more people in my life who felt good about my efforts...and not so many folks wanting to put me in my place...especially when I don't think I need to be put in my place...and certainly wouldn't trust people of so little true inspiration to me or the world to try to humble me, even if I needed it...and more people challenging me whom I trust...because they're commitment to me and the world clearer to me...

On a good note...

I'm feeling an awful lot like my most idealistic periods in my life, recently...

The Hootie tunes are out of a period of my life in the mid-to-late 90's when I was feeling great about the world, largely out of some really exciting learning and growing in undergrad at Wichita State, a really outstanding summer being in love in Washington, D.C., and grad school at the University of Kansas:):)...and out of my really inspired relationship with my best friend, Brandi Fisher:):)...

But...even more than that:):)...

I've been rediscovering a sense of innocence...even amidst a sense of worldliness -- that kind of frightens me, at times, honestly:):) -- that I've been reexperiencing again, these days:):):)...at the ripe old age of 32:):):)...

It's kind of nice, in a lot of ways:):):)...

The innocence of my youth:):):)...

Coupled with the wisdom of some years of experience with and reflection on the world:):)...

The older I get...the more I recognize my limitations...my weaknesses...the inescapable confines of experience...mine...and everyone's...

Sometimes, though...

I just want again...

That sense of connection and wonder I felt...when I was in love...when I was exploring the world with someone who was as inspired or aspired to be, anyway, with the world and people and life, as much as me:):)...

I just want to share all of this experience...this life...with all of its limitations...

With someone else...

So I can say to them...

"What a crazy day":):):)...

And be grateful that they were there to share all of that craziness with me...

I don't know, exactly, where life is going to take me...or where I'm going to end up:):):)...

I don't think any of us do, from day to day:):):)...

And in the midst of all that:):):)...

It would be nice to share this crazy, unpredictable, uncertain life...

...with someone who was as excited and scared and disappointed and inspired and the whole range of human experience...

...with me...

...as open with me...

...as I am with others...

...or more:):):)...

It would be nice:):):)...

To share that kind of openness with someone:):):)...

And to know, without even thinking...as I have twice in the past:):):)...

That I was in love:):):)...

Because my heart was and is and always will be a much better guide than my mind...

...which is always and forever trying to keep up with and being broadened by my more adventurous and open and courageous heart:):):)...

I just want my wishes to be more than wishes, at this point:):):)...

And to look more like dreams fulfilled:):):)...

I better sleep before I'm little more than a walking zombie tonight at work:):):)...

Have a great day, everyone:):):)...

Love,
Ben