McDonalds v. Burger King

posted by Ilyse Kazar

That's how "Reverend" Billy Talen, Green Party mayoral candidate here in NYC termed the contest of two career politicians to be our next mayor.

Billy raked in 0.8% of the vote. Considering he is a performance artist, activist and all-out, no holds barred critic of the power structure, I think it's great that 8 in 1,000 people voted for him!

The other "nice" thing about the mayoral vote was the 51%/46% split between Bloom-Borg and Thompson. Mayor mike is not as loved as he wanted to think. Especially considering the enormity of the differential in the money they each had to spend, Thompson's percentage is significant.

Response to a comment: Trickle-Down Piss

posted by Ilyse Kazar

A good buddy on Facebook commented on my post about today's VA and NJ governor races:

I wonder if it really Obama - that has people voting R - versus just how bad the economy is. Think we may not be finished with bad economic news (commercial real estate) And Americans want instant fixes - without them paying for it

I think people realized full well how bad the economy already was, and sensed how bad it might get, when they voted in November '08. I think people were hot to see some very tangible things done that directly benefited them. I think people were absolutely ready, in fact, would have cheered from the sidelines, to see the robber barons go down hard.

I also think people understood that fixing Dubya's mess was gonna cost and would not be a free lunch.

When we were on the purported precipice of complete economic meltdown, the people would  have been sobered by the need to pump a trillion dollars of funny money into the system, that will cost us so much as we move forward. But if the money had gone as deferred loans directly to keep real people in their homes, thereby ...

• saving whole neighborhoods from the sad loss in property values and crime and desolation that has resulted from foreclosures
• staving off the costs that we have yet to even calculate in feeding free lunches and offering other services to homeless children and families
• helped folks keep their jobs or find new ones quicker (it's nigh impossible to keep a job or walk into an interview like a positive fresh-faced prospective employee, when one is hungry and homeless)
• kept mortgage payments (preferably re-financed ones) coming into the banks that were crying they were collapsing because of mortgage defaults
• providing a way for the government to at least partially recoup our money when those homeowners get on their feet 

...  then folks could say, well, we can see the real benefits of this costly bailout in front of our eyes. They would have been sobered but not angered at so much money going down a stinking sink-hole while nothing changes in their towns and cities, nothing improves for their families.

Ditto if the money had been put directly into financing small businesses, to create or save jobs and help re-stimulate the Main Street economies.

I haven't noticed any revival of Main Street. I haven't seen the reversal of Reagan's trickle-down theories that have held sway in this country, to a huge extent, ever since 1980. The only thing I've seen is more piss trickling down on the little guy.

The Status-Quo Sucks (us back under)

posted by Ilyse Kazar

So, McDonnell takes VA and Christie takes NJ. This is just hunky dory. The Conservatives will now be spreading the meme that this is a rejection of Obama.

The distinction that will be lost: This is not a rejection of the Obama who promised to sock it to the special interests. This is a rejection of the glacial pace at which anything has been done along those lines.

If politics in Washington had ridden the tidal wave of sentiment re the little guy suffering at the hands of huge power blocks, if Washington had done a trickle-up bailout of homeowners instead of a fairly useless (to 99.999% of us) bailout of Wall Street, if Obama were pushing harder for the Dems to include a make-no-bones-about-it public option and if his administration had done a better job of selling it to the people, if stimulus money had gone directly to folks who needed to save or wished to start up small businesses, if Congress had immediately enacted some sort of real incentives to encourage Earth-friendly consumption and energy-user habits, if we had not only gone up against Coal but had the imagination to plan re-training, re-tooling and thereby a boost for the employment prospects of folks in areas where Coal has historically been the only employer ... this would not be happening.

I also blame this on all of us. We were all psyched during the election. There were leagues of us talking it up, knocking on doors, standing at tables, organizing and attending rallies.

Where is the march in Washington against escalation in Afghanistan?

Where are the dramatic news-worthy public events in support of universal health care, demanding real action against global warming?

Where are the demonstrations against the subsidies to factory farming mega-corporations?

I mean, shit, in my junior high school we staged a sit-in, complete with black arm bands, against the war in Nam. Where are you, people? In November 2008 we pulled levers, touched screens or punched chads. We poured out into the streets in a spontaneous celebration when the results came in. Then we sat back to watch and complain.

Maybe the election of more Christies and McDonnells is what we actually need. Maybe we simply have not reached that howling pain-point at which we will get up off our duffs. Maybe we needed this dangerous pivot, this wake-up call that if you don't push hard and keep pushing for Change, the Status Quo is whatchergonnagit.

We were going to take back America, remember?

Quote of the day: Steve Lacy on Music

We don't determine music,
The music determines us;
We only follow it
To the end of our life:
Then it goes on without us.

Excerpt from 'Saxovision' by Steve Lacy

Poem of the day: Lao-Tzu on non-being

We join spokes together in a wheel
but it is the center hole
that makes the wagon move
We shape clay into a pot
but it is the emptiness inside
that holds whatever we want
We hammer wood into a house
but it is the inner space
that makes it livable
We work with being
But non-being is what we use.

(Lao Tzu)

... this is one that saves me again and again.

Journalist of the day: Helen Thomas

Dana Milbank - Washington Sketch - washingtonpost.com:

Helen Thomas is 89 years old and requires some assistance to get to and from the daily White House briefing. Yet her backbone has proved stronger than that of the president she covers....

"Has the president given up on the public option?" she inquired from her front-row-middle seat....

"...[W]hy do you keep asking me?" Gibbs inquired.

"Because I want your conscience to bother you," Thomas replied.

Let's just give her a lifetime achievement Best Journalist award, come to think of it.

Quote of the day: Thos. Jefferson on Christian dogmatism

the greatest of all the reformers of the depraved religion of his own country, was Jesus of Nazareth. Abstracting what is really his from the rubbish in which it is buried, easily distinguished by its lustre from the dross of his biographers, and as separable from that as the diamond from the dunghill, we have the outlines of a system of the most sublime morality which has ever fallen from the lips of man; outlines which it is lamentable he did not live to fill up. Epictetus and Epicurus give laws for governing ourselves, Jesus a supplement of the duties and charities we owe to others. The establishment of the innocent and genuine character of this benevolent moralist, and the rescuing it from the imputation of imposture, which has resulted from artificial systems,* invented by ultra-Christian sects, unauthorized by a single word ever uttered by him, is a most desirable object, and one to which Priestley has successfully devoted his labors and learning. It would in time, it is to be hoped, effect a quiet euthanasia of the heresies of bigotry and fanaticism which have so long triumphed over human reason, and so generally and deeply afflicted mankind; but this work is to be begun by winnowing the grain from the chaff of the historians of his life.

* e. g. The immaculate conception of Jesus, his deification, the creation of the world by him, his miraculous powers, his resurrection and visible ascension, his corporeal presence in the Eucharist, the Trinity; original sin, atonement, regeneration, election, orders of Hierarchy, &c.

From Jefferson's letter to William Short, Oct. 31, 1819.

House Expands Federal Aid to College Students

Hip Hip Hooray. Say good-bye to the multi-billion-dollar annual boondoggle that generously pads the profits of banking institutions for writing up student loans, while the Federal gov't (translate: taxpayers) takes all the risk:

“This legislation provides students and families with the single largest investment in federal student aid ever,” said Representative George Miller, Democrat of California and chairman of the House Education and Labor Committee, who wrote the bill. “Today, the House made a clear choice to stop funneling vital taxpayer dollars through boardrooms and start sending them directly to dorm rooms.”

Under the current program, the government pays subsidies to lenders and guarantees the loans. All colleges would be required to convert to the federal Direct Loan program by July 1, 2010.

The measure passed handily in the House; looks like it will breeze through the Senate also. Finally some measure of sanity prevails, if only for a moment.

Cutting back on salt could save U.S. billions

Cutting back on salt could save U.S. billions - Diet and nutrition- msnbc.com:

...researchers estimate that if the average sodium intake fell to the recommended level of 2,300 mg per day, there would be 11 million fewer cases of high blood pressure each year. (Estimates are that about 70 million American adults have high blood pressure.) The costs of treating high blood pressure and related heart disease and strokes would fall by $18 billion.

Cutting sodium consumption down to 1,500 mg, they say, could save $26 billion.

So before we go spewing about how some group of Others costs the taxpayers money we didn't agree to spend, each of us oughtta check our diet. How many mg of sodium a day do you consume? Do you know? If not, why not?

Wanna give your baby its best shot at life? Move to a country with socialized health care.

posted by i.n.kazar

As a follow-up to my examination of life expectancy here is a selected list of countries in order of "number of infant mortality deaths per 1,000 live births. On this list, the closer one is to #1 the worse the survival rate of newborns, so I'm starting from the end.


224. Singapore: 2.31 infant deaths/1000

223. Bermuda: 2.46

222. Sweden: 2.75

221. Japan: 2.79

[and again: "OK but where's the U.S., did you skip it??"]

217. France: 3.33

214. Norway: 3.58

211. Czech Republic: 3.79

204. South Korea: 4.26

198. Netherlands: 4.73

196. Australia: 4.75

193. United Kingdom: 4.85

189. Canada: 5.04

["WHAT ABOUT THE U.S.?!" ... hang on, I'm almost there]

181. Cuba: 5.82

[and now quite a decline between Communist Cuba and the next one on the list ...]

180. United States: 6.26

Yes, that is right, according to the CIA's figures your baby born in this country is 2.7 times as likely to die in infancy than a baby born in the top-ranked Singapore. At number 38 from the end of the CIA's reverse-ranked list, the U.S. ranks near the bottom of the second decile when looking at the survival rate of infants around the globe.

Still think that our money-driven health system is something to cling to? I have some ideas as to why our infant mortality rate would be so high, but I'll leave that for a possible future post.

Photos of the day: California Wild Fire

The Boston Globe has assembled a stunning, scary collection of photos for their Big Picture online section, such as this one:

Wanna live longer? Move to a country with socialized health care.

posted by i.n.kazar

Countries in order of life expectancy, as reported by the CIA Factbook, with details on the health care systems of some of the countries (enough to communicate my point) as reported by the World Health Organization and other sources. Oh, and by the way, many of the governments topping the list have panels empowered to examine health expenditures in the final year(s) of life. Contrary to the 'death panel' hysteria promoted by groups in the U.S. that wish to preserve our lovely status quo, countries whose governments take stock of the expenses and questions of dignity at end-of-life have the LONGEST life expectancy. If you don't believe me, click some of my links and do some reading for yourselves, instead of just repeating what your favorite columnists and radio hosts might be spouting.


1. Macau: 84.36 years -- Mixture of government-provided healthcare and private services overseen by the government. (WHO and Wikipedia)

[hmmm... not the U.S.? where we are not subjected to "the nightmares of government-controlled medicine"?]

2. Andorra: 82.51 years -- 92% of the population covered by the government health agency (WHO pdf)

3. Japan: 82.12 years -- "In the Japanese health care system, healthcare services, including screening examinations for particular diseases at no direct cost to the patient, prenatal care, and infectious disease control, are provided by national and local governments. Payment for personal medical services is offered through a universal health care insurance system that provides relative equality of access, with fees set by a government committee. People without insurance through employers can participate in a national health insurance program administered by local governments. Since 1983[1], all elderly persons have been covered by government-sponsored insurance. Patients are free to select physicians or facilities of their choice.... It is compulsory to be enrolled in a Japanese insurance program if you are a resident of Japan." (Wikipedia)

"The basic principle governing the delivery of health care services is that all citizens should be able, at any time and place, to receive the care they require, with an affordable personal contribution.

"The Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare announced a health promotion programme, the National Health Promotion Movement in the 21st Century (Healthy Japan 21), in 2000. The movement, unlike traditional programmes, emphasizes ‘primary prevention’, aiming at early detection and treatment of diseases." (WHO)

4. Singapore: 81.98 years -- "There is a dual system of health care delivery. The public system is managed by the Government, while the private system is provided by private hospitals and general practitioners." (WHO)

[OK but where's the U.S., did you skip it??]

5. San Marino: 81.97 years

6. Hong Kong: 81.86 years

7. Australia: 81.63 years -- "Australia’s health care system is a partnership between the Federal, State and Territory, and local governments. Through the Health and Ageing portfolio, the Federal Government provides national leadership, determines national policies and outcomes, and shares responsibility for funding services....

"The system is complex, with delivery provided by both the public and private sectors." (WHO)

8. Canada: 81.23 years -- "Canada has an extensive social security network, including old age pension, family allowance, employment insurance and social assistance. Basic health care is provided to all Canadians through a universal free health care system." (WHO)

9. France: 80.98 years

10. Sweden: 80.86 years

13. Israel: 80.73 years

19. Italy: 80.20 years

[WHAT ABOUT THE U.S.?!]

23. Spain: 80.05 years

30. Netherlands: 79.40 years

36. United Kingdom: 79.01 years

38. Jordan: 78.87 years

40. South Korea: 78.72 years

50. United States: 78.11 years

Poem of the day: Song

beauty is a shell
from the sea
where she rules triumphant
till love has had its way with her

scallops and
lion's paws
sculptured to the
tune of retreating waves

undying accents
repeated till
the ear and the eye lie
down together in the same bed


-- William Carlos Williams

Four-Paragraph Descriptive Essay

brown boy spins
limbs spread
a twirling human asterisk


on a swivel-seat office chair
in the street
spun by hydrant water


white teeth laugh
at flying bricks


wet brown boy.


-- ilyse kazar. written 24 July 1980 in rebellion against, it seems, all the four paragraph essays I was forced to write for years, yet somehow still true to the form

NY Times invites reader interaction with content

Just now the New York Times published a CIA report detailing abuses that took place inside secret prisons.

The entire pdf of the report is published within an online document reader. A brilliant feature is that readers are invited to interact with this content by helping to annotate it.

Hip hip hurrah, NYT.

Poem of the day: The Hebrew Mamita

Vanessa Hidary is one of my faves amongst the poets who appeared in the six seasons of Russ Simmons' Def Poetry series on HBO.

This performance is especially deep for me, because I have been that girl on that barstool, I have been told many times "gee, you don't look Jewish" and remained silent (or, worse, took it as a damned compliment). On the other hand, I have been known to let people go on and on about "this Jewish bastard" or about "the Kyke landlord" or about "the Jewish conspiracy that owns all the world's stocks and plots to limit my access to the pharmaceuticals I need" (yes, that is an actual meme out there) ... let them go on and on until they have taken all the rope they need to hang themselves, and then stood up and before leaving the table have let them know THEY WERE TALKING TO ONE.

But I have not done the whole trip that Hidary has done (at a much younger age). I never fully processed the shit I've sat and listened to that people felt safe to say in front of me because I "don't look Jewish" (odd, also, because I think I do "look Jewish") ...

Thanks, Vanessa, for crossing the desert for me and bringing this back with you:

Quote of the day: Police Chief Stamper on Legalizing Marijuana

Any law disobeyed by more than 100 million Americans, the number who’ve tried marijuana at least once, is bad public policy. As a 34-year police veteran, I’ve seen how marijuana prohibition breeds disrespect for the law, and contempt for those who enforce it....

Perhaps the biggest objection to legalization is the “message” it would send to our kids. Bulletin: Our children have never had greater access to marijuana; it’s easier for them to score pot than a six-pack of Coors. No system of regulated legalization would be complete without rigorous enforcement of criminal laws banning the furnishing of any drug to a minor.

Let’s make policy that helps, not handcuffs, those who suffer ill effects of marijuana or other drugs, a policy that crushes the illegal market — the cause of so much violence and harm to users and non-users alike.

that was Norm Stamper, Seattle police chief from 1994 to 2000, in a Room for Debate piece in NYT in July.

Poem of the day: And I Always Thought

I have had this poem pinned to my wall or laying around ever since i bought my first electric typewriter and typed it out on an index card.

And I always thought

And I always thought: the very simplest words
Must be enough
When I say what things are like
Everyone's heart must be torn to shreds.
That you'll go down if you don't stand up for yourself
Surely you see that.

Bertolt Brecht, 1956
Translated by Michael Hamburger

Doh of the day: control air traffic around Manhattan

Why would this be a matter of debate for more than 3 seconds?

The freewheeling nature of the corridors has spurred debate about whether to place tighter controls on the airspace or to restrict who can fly in them.

America's Seniors are the real "Me Generation"

Ezra Klein pulls together a brief analysis of who supports and opposes the public option in the Health Insurance debate:

...one reason that it's been hard to explain the appeal of the bill to the insured population -- which tilts older and votes in higher numbers -- is that it doesn't have a lot to offer them.

Hot Females Rule Evolution

FOR the female half of the population, it may bring a satisfied smile. Scientists have found that evolution is driving women to become ever more beautiful, while men remain as aesthetically unappealing as their caveman ancestors.

As reported in UK's Times Online and many other sites...

Protecting the Gun Rights of Capitol Hill Visitors

E.J. Dionne Jr. in today's Washington Post:

Isn't it time to dismantle the metal detectors, send the guards at the doors away and allow Americans to exercise their Second Amendment rights by being free to carry their firearms into the nation's Capitol?

I've been studying the deep thoughts of senators who regularly express their undying loyalty to the National Rifle Association, and I have decided that they should practice what they preach. They tell us that the best defense against crime is an armed citizenry and that laws restricting guns do nothing to stop violence.

If any proponents of unlimited individual gun rights does not see the irony, kindly elucidate.

Partisan Schmartisan

--posted by Ilyse Kazar

A party-line Senate committee vote on legislation to remake the nation’s health care system underscored the absence of political consensus on what would be the biggest changes in social policy in more than 40 years.

Sheeeeeesh. I feel SO done with all parties.

Bogus Unemployment Numbers are Nothing New

--posted by Ilyse Kazar

David Leonhart reminds us that

The national unemployment rate has risen to 9.5 percent, the highest level in more than a quarter-century. Yet it still excludes all those who have given up looking for a job and those part-time workers who want to be working full time.

And let's not forget that the unemployment figures also do not include small business owners whose businesses either are not supporting them with adequate income or who have had to close up shop.

Mind you, this has always been the case. Only those eligible for unemployment benefits are counted as "unemployed". This leaves out ...

- the underemployed
- starving small-biz owners
- the homeless
- the long-term unemployed whose benefits have expired

During good times, perhaps these four groups of people are a very small proportion of the working (or wish-I-were-working) public. But during hard times like these I would think the percentage is signifcant since far more people might, for example, need to fold their business, or not be able to secure new employment before their benefits run out.

The Obama administration has begun creating "real" budgets by throwing out the bag of tricks that has been used in the past to make overly optimistic projections. This was a good and important change. Now it's time to start providing us with "real" unemployment figures. I'd wager it's around 15 percent now and climbing.

News Analysis: Sarah's Lapse of Facts

Ah, Sarah. We knew you were cooking something up. [I believe a free account on washingtonpost.com is necessary to view this].

Palin's editorial attacking President Obama's cap-and-trade plan is terribly misinformed and/or purposefully misleading. Unfortunately, in today's infopropegainment (one of my favorite Jon Stewart words) news style, Sarah Palin gets a lot of air time, and as much cannot be said of her opponents.

 First, some general points.

We must remember that this is a woman who does not believe that humans are causing global warming. Her arguments for further use of dirty energy sources is tainted by her inaccurate concepts.

It's also significant that Sarah Palin is building a base founded on controversial issues in what I consider to be her early campaigning for the 2012 Presidential Race. It is classic Republican campaign strategy to be against taxes (although their actual track record tends to suggest otherwise).

Let's break down her arguments, shall we?

"The Americans hit hardest will be those already struggling to make ends meet... So much for not raising taxes on anyone making less than $250,000 a year."

The Cap-and-Trade (TRADE, not TAX) plan generates $650 billion in federal funds over the course of seven years, $80 billion of which will be contributed towards middle-class tax cuts. [1]

"Job losses are so certain under this new cap-and-tax plan that it includes a provision accommodating newly unemployed workers from the resulting dried-up energy sector, to the tune of $4.2 billion over eight years. So much for creating jobs."

The proposal would create jobs in a new rapidly growing clean energy sector. The proposal promises that new jobs created will not be outsourced [2- pg 100]. Pew reports that between 1998 and 2007 job growth in the clean energy sector has progressed at nearly three times that of the economy in general -- even though the government has favored making financial contributions to fossil fuel energy over green alternatives [3- pg 3]. The report goes on to say that by giving clean energy a boost through President Obama's plan, new lasting jobs (this is significant because we know that fossil fuel is non-renewable) will be generated. This projection is supported by Pew's research on state energy programs. [3- pg 40-41].

"In Alaska, we are progressing on the largest private-sector energy project in history. Our 3,000-mile natural gas pipeline will transport hundreds of trillions of cubic feet of our clean natural gas to hungry markets across America."

Projected cost of the Alaskan Highway Pipeline project is over $20 billion and will not begin producing revenue until 2016 [4]. Obama's plan begins producing revenue in 2010. The pipeline plan will only further entrench our economy in an extremely harmful energy culture whose days are numbered. While natural gas is preferable to coal in emission levels, it still is not clean. Environmental impacts of actually building a 2,140 mile long pipeline to Canada and then distribution pipelines from there is yet to be determined.

"We can safely drill for U.S. oil offshore and in a tiny, 2,000-acre corner of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge if ever given the go-ahead by Washington bureaucrats."

The 2000-acres only refers to the land on which the rig supports actually touch the ground. The actual area affected would be much greater due to multi-directional drilling technology - "horizontal production wells" [5]. Plus, drilling crews need to build roads through the nature reserve to bring them to drilling sites, and then carry very heavy equipment along these roads which harms the ice shelf.

The Energy Information Administration reports that there is a 95% probability that ANWR contains 5.7 billion gallons of recoverable oil [6]; that would fuel the USA for less than a year at current rates.

Bottom line, Palin's arguments are simply inaccurate.

---

Citations:

1. Samuelsohn, Darren and Bravender, Robin. "Obama's draft budget projects cap-and-trade revenue." Scientific American. 02/26/2009. <http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=cap-and-trade-obama-budget>.

2. EPA FY 2010 Budget Overview -- <http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/asset.aspx?AssetId=757> [PDF]

3. The Pew Charitable Trusts. "The Clean Energy Economy." June 2009. <http://www.pewcenteronthestates.org/uploadedFiles/Clean_Economy_Report_Web.pdf> [PDF]

4. "Alaska Highway Pipeline". 2009. <http://www.jobmonkey.com/oilindustry/html/alaska_highway_pipeline.html>

5. "ANWR Arctic Technology". <http://www.anwr.org/techno/drilling.htm>

6. Energy Information Administration. "Potential Oil Production from the Coastal Plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge". <http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oil_gas/petroleum/analysis_publications/arctic_national_wildlife_refuge/html/execsummary.html>

---

Further Reading:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=cap-and-divident-not-trade

http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/

http://environmental-economics.blogspot.com/2007/09/carbon-tax-cafe-standards-and-cap-and.html

Evil Trouser Wearing Women

BBC NEWS | Africa | Sudan women 'lashed for trousers' -- and Obama didn't even mention Sudan?

Is there nothing to be done about theocracies that brutalize their women? That is not a rhetorical question, I really wonder about the implications of doing nothing and also about the implications of interfering.

Still wondering whazzup that Prez O did not take one of the most cruel African regimes to task when he had the chance.

TY to Nick Kristoff for his FB post on this.

Every time ... Sweep before you Vacuum

If you sweep first you will then vacuum less. The benefits of implementing this tip are manifold:

Economic/Practical

• save money on vacuum bags, especially if you have furry animals around the house
  
• be more likely to notice and retrieve small items that have fallen to the floor

Health

• burn more calories
  
• subject your household members' nervous systems to less mechanical noise pollution

Green

• less bags used, therefore less energy and raw materials used to manufacture vacuum bags
  
• less energy used and pollution produced by shipping vacuum bags to stores
  
• less frequent (possibly carbon-burning) trips to the store to get vacuum bags
  
• less electricity burned due to reduced vacuuming time
  
• less waste produced because less bags in the waste stream
  
• your vacuum will last longer, saving additional materials, energy and waste

Mental and Emotional Health

• rhythmic activity is beneficial and therapeutic
  
• sweeping (like many other household "chores") can be enjoyed as an interlude that lends itself well to calm planning, letting suppressed thoughts and emotions surface, meditation or free-wheeling thought

Metaphysical *

• the act of sweeping one's path in front of one physically aids in keeping one's path through life clean and clear on the astral plane, which is something only you can do for yourself and which one gets better at with practice **

* look for a post some day soon on my decision to include metaphysical observations, learning and personal experience and theory in this blog

** I was lucky to have a dream once in which I was crossing a plane of light, on foot, deliberately and patiently and meditatively sweeping just in front of myself before taking the next step. This 5-second dream was actually a huge vision for me.

Father of the Year: Michael Rosen

Gotta love the Internet and the way one's local ties and virtual ties start to interconnect. Makes me think of spider web spokes connecting the center to the widening circles, and the outermost circle to the absolute center.

Some time ago, I signed up by means of serendipitous clicking for some East Village-oriented email announcement lists, and today received my first message from one of them pointing me to the relatively new blog of community resident Michael Rosen, who yesterday posted a powerful piece called "an Open Letter to the Fathers of my sons". So the spider had walked from beyond the edges of my tangible world out there in cyberspace, back to my very neighborhood.

As the mother of one daughter whose father multi-abandoned her (coming back between long a absences asking the child to once again open her heart to daddy), and another daughter who had a DNA contributor who never made the slightest effort to even meet her (while living only several blocks away)... I have special appreciation for what Michael Rosen and his family have done for seven young men in our neighborhood and for the work he has done/is doing now to write up his story and his insights, as well as to build a Web resource where folks can come for suggestions or to share their own stories.

One photo on Michael's site looked to me like it might be from the penthouse or roof of a building in which I know my younger daughter has visited a penthouse residence of a grade-school friend of hers. Sure enough, Michael mentions the name of his son Morgan, who is indeed Jude's friend... the spider had arrived at the very center of my life's web.

Snazzy Beans -- quick, easy, cheap

Ingredients:

1 quarter of a fresh ripe organic pineapple (use canned if you must)
1 can Whole Foods' "365" brand Organic Baked Beans with Onion and Maple
cooked brown organic rice

1. Trim and cube the pineapple
2. Put beans and pineapple cubes in a skillet, warm gently
3. Put on rice

4. eat & enjoy!

Upcoming Brooklyn Museum Exhibit: Yinka Shonibare

Art - Headless Bodies From the Bottomless Imagination of Yinka Shonibare - NYTimes.com

June 27.

The Women - The Daily Dish | By Andrew Sullivan

The Women - The Daily Dish | By Andrew Sullivan

Shared via AddThis

Quote of the Day: Barack on Fatherhood

From the White House Blog:

On the 100th anniversary of Father's Day, the President writes a piece on fatherhood in Parade Magazine talking about his own life and highlighting the responsibilities all fathers must step up to:

In many ways, I came to understand the importance of fatherhood through its absence—both in my life and in the lives of others. I came to understand that the hole a man leaves when he abandons his responsibility to his children is one that no government can fill. We can do everything possible to provide good jobs and good schools and safe streets for our kids, but it will never be enough to fully make up the difference.

That is why we need fathers to step up, to realize that their job does not end at conception; that what makes you a man is not the ability to have a child but the courage to raise one.

Music Break: Gipsy Lovers

Nashtastica explains

On the YouTube page for the video embedded in last post, YouTube member Nashtastica provides answers in a series of comments:

The ballots are perforated into two slips. First part includes the voters details including full name, fathers name, national ID number and so on. The officials check your ID and fill this part out before tearing off your half of the ballot (second part) for you to write down the name of your candidate and cast your vote. The first part is then kept by the official for future reference and in case of fraud investigation.

In this video the guy first goes through the second half of the ballots then fills out the personal details of the alleged voters in what appears to be the first half of the ballot as the other guy reads them out. I also heard the name of one of the candidates, Mohsen Rezai, 40 seconds into the clip. The context was unclear but it indicates that the clip in fact is related to this election.

This seems to have taken place in a relaxed environment which given the fairly quick announcement of the election results I assume took place before the election. The kid in the background towards the end of the video is talking about ice-cream!

And another piece of useful information is that a good majority of major voting stations are in mosques which happen to be where the Basij militia is based and they are pretty much in charge of everything there and needless to say they are fanatic supporters of Ahmadinejad. I was involved a few years ago as an independent monitor in a voting station that was a major mosque in Tehran and the process was laughable and shameful at the same time.

Fraud was widespread. I myself found a stack of blank ballots on the street on my way back home from that very voting station and returned it to the station. They wanted to annul that station but after some dispute and phone calls it was accepted. It pretty much highlights the fact that it is not the voters but the ones who count the votes who dictate the results. The process is highly inefficient and leaves plenty of room for both error and fraud.

Iranian vote-fixing? You decide.

I've been following, a bit haphazardly, the citizen reporting being done on Facebook and other sites. The reports and images being posted ought to be taken with a handful of salt because so much of the citizen reporting coming out of Iran is (by its very nature) unverified as to date and source. But I have, at the same time, deep admiration for the Iranians who take risks to get the word out to the rest of the planet. And many of the "rumors" posted to the 'Net have panned out to be true.

And I feel more strongly than ever that the Internet, regardless of the intentions of its inventors, has taken on a life of its own as the most remarkable social-evolution tool to date in human history, providing us with a reflection of our own nature (from heroic to hateful). Most of all, the 'Net offers the potential for people around the globe to inform and influence each other, hold the feet of leaders to the fire by means of publicizing what is actually happening, to transcend the limitations of nationalism.

Early on after the Iranian authorities announced Ahmadinejad's landslide victory, newscasters, reporters and analysts noted their skepticism about the official results. Inside Iran, the statements of leaders from the various factions are contradictory. Comments posted on the Internet from inside Iran and from expatriate Iranians are also of mixed opinion (though leaning very heavily towards the belief that fraud was committed).

But what about any evidence? I hadn't seen any presented by anyone. Just a sense that Mousavi actually took the popular vote and that the results were fixed.

But yesterday on Facebook I saw this video. (Apologies for the quality, because Facebook vids can only be seen by FB member; what you see here is a movie of the movie.)



I would love to hear from anyone who speaks Farsi, and especially from anyone in Iran who knows what the ballot looked like. It sure as shootin' looks like these men are working off a list of voters and pre-filling ballots.

Whether this is irrefutable evidence (what I want to believe) or an attempt to set someone up or simply fan the flames of protest, whoever shot & leaked this video has guts.

Journalist of the Day: Roger Cohen

A Jewish journalist from Brooklyn toughs it out in Tehran, writing an unforgettable piece published in today's NY Times while simultaneously protecting his own hide and helping those around him. Strong stuff.

Hero of the Day: David Rhode

Can you imagine being captured by the Taliban in November 2008 and a full SEVEN months later, still in captivity, having the presence of mind to scale a wall and escape?! ...

[New York Times reporter] David Rhode, who was kidnapped seven months ago near the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, scaled a wall and fled to safety at a nearby army base.

Kudos to the Times for keeping the incident completely under wraps, and to other news orgs for cooperating with that request. If only the WSJ had done the same when Daniel Pearl was nabbed ...

Praying it ain't true

According to a liveblogging article on NIAC's site,

6:14 update: Through Facebook we have received news that Mir Hossein
Mousavi, Mehdi Karroubi, and Gholamhossein Karbaschi are under house arrest.

Six Minutes from Iran

This is likely 5 minutes and 30 seconds more reporting, by Lindsey Hilsum bless her soul, than you will see tonight on the average US tv station. (Hey, "digital" is not the only improvement we needed. How about "substantial" and "thorough" and "global"?)

Herbert broadens the view

... as a f/u to my last post pointing at Frank Rich's article, Bob Herbert reminds us that a rising tide of murderous extremism is hardly confined to white supremacist christians, and the language of hate does not only stem from Fox News and Limbaugh.

Whazzup, America? I honestly don't believe (contrary to many of my co-liberals) that guns are the problem. Why are we "up in arms"?! Has anyone tried to answer this critical question, since Moore's Bowling for Columbine?

American white-supremacy/fundamentalism

OK. I admit it. Frank Rich's article has me scared.

Iranian perspective on the election

Interesting interview of the author of Reading Lolita in Tehran, on the English Al-Jazeera site:

The results of these elections have taken the world by surprise. Was there a failure here of the international media to guage Iran's affairs and sentiment?

Yes! That is what fascinates me most ever since coming to the US. When I wrote about students reading Lolita in Tehran, I was accused of saying Western literature is great. That is not what I was saying - I was saying people in Iran are taking these texts and analysing and seeing them in their own way - in a way the West doesn't.

The homogeneous picture of extreme belief where the majority of people believe in orthodox Islam which comes out of Iran is not true. Iran is a country of different ethnic minorities and different religions. Many of the Muslim minorities have been oppressed by the regime. This is not Islam - this is a state using Islam for power and we have to break this myth.

You've talked about and write about the importance of literature and culture in the fight for human rights and liberty in Iran and around the world. But is art, culture, literature ever going to be more powerful than religion? Is it enough to start a revolution?

If you look at it in the long term - yes it is. I never forget when Paul Ricoer, the philosopher, came to speak in Iran. He was an eighty-year-old but was treated like [the American rock star] Bon Jovi.

At one point the minister for Islamic Guidance said to him: "People like us [politicians] will vanish but you people will endure." That will always remain with me. We don't remember the king who ruled in the time of [14th century Persian poet] Hafiz, we remember Hafiz.

future mall

http://arieff.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/06/01/rethinking-the-mall/

no-pay gigs on craigslist.org

just a sampler from this morning's postings:

--Popular CEll Phone Blog Seeks Contributors
We are looking for individuals to blog about their current and past experiences with cellular devices and wireless carriers. This is a great opportunity for a new blogger, or an experienced blogger.

--Recording Studio Assistnat/Intern (Dumbo)
A professional recording and mixing studio is looking for a part-time intern/assistant. The position is unpaid.

--Camera man interested in taping celebritys for TV show?
Established TV show looking for Camera man who would be interested in taping a Television show with celebrity's in Manhattan. The show consist of a live band, host and celebrity's. Please send in your availability, if you have a camera or not, a little bit about yourself and a photograph. Looking for hungry camera man who wants to be in this business on a high level. No gimmicks. But a little work is involved.

--Seamstress for new clothing line
Hello, I'm Tracy. Iam looking for a seamstress who can sew Maternity clothing. This is a new clothing line I'am producing. The pay wouldn't come until later, so I'm looking for an eager, driven business person as well. My goals are to go far with my idea.

--Event Production Intern Needed for Tomorrow & Sunday!! (TriBeCa)
Fashion & Trade Event tomorrow and Sunday!!
We will need 1 and possibly 2 interns to help with the production of the event and setup and breakdown. You will be assisting the marketing manager and the event producer with any tasks needed. If you want to get some experience in event planning/production this is for you! Fashion students are also welcome! There will be 11-13 designers that you may be able to network with and maybe even speak to about future opportunities! (No promises!).

--Music Video Directors (Union Square)
All you need to participate is the will, the time, and the means to create a short music video and deliver it by the end of September. The style and content (barring illegal activity and porn) are entirely up to you. NO PAY for anyone (including the organizers), but lots of good vibes.

Answering the Writing Tutor Ad

OK. The only way I can deal with this process of seeking paying work in June 2009, is to turn it into words on paper. (Words on screen sounds just awful, doesn't it?)

I answered an ad on craigslist.org for a writing tutor. A guy who was brought up in India and who now works in the Financial District in downtown Manhattan as a software engineer, wishes to bring his written English from "quite good" to "like a native English speaker/writer."

Went to meet him yesterday. This would be for a couple of hours of work a week -- a fact that was pretty clear from his ad. The poor guy now has to wade through EIGHTY responses that he received within an HOUR of posting his little ad. Poor me had to sit there at my age, asking only $20 per hour, going over the top to qualify myself. Never mind being published since the age of 13, or the national writing award in high school, or the honorable mention from the press association, or fifteen nonstop years doing the sort of business and technical writing he is interested in perfecting. I am up against 79 other persons, some of whom quoted $10 per hour.

Quote of the day: Shovelin' the ____?

After the ceremony at which Obama announced his proposed expansion of Americorps ...

Mr. Obama and Mr. Clinton doffed their coats and ties to travel together to Kenilworth Park and Aquatic Gardens to plant trees in a muddy riverside marsh. The two presidents seemed in good spirits and teased each other about their tree-planting ability.

“I think the president has pretty good shoveling skills,” Mr. Obama said after watching Mr. Clinton demonstrate the proper technique.

Benjamin Franklin on Jesus

"As to Jesus of Nazareth, my Opinion of whom you particularly desire, I think the System of Morals and his Religion, as he left them to us, the best the world ever saw or is likely to see; but I apprehend it has received various corrupt changes, and I have, with most of the present Dissenters in England, some Doubts as to his divinity; tho' it is a question I do not dogmatize upon, having never studied it, and I think it needless to busy myself with it now, when I expect soon an Opportunity of knowing the Truth with less Trouble...."


(from a letter to Ezra Stiles, president of Yale University, about one month before Dr. Franklin's death)

Quote of the Day: George Burns

"Too bad all the people who know how to run the country are busy driving taxi cabs and cutting hair."

Heros: Judge White and Jose PadillaMaybe Hall of Shame: Obama Administration

A judge appointed by W himself seems disinclined to dismiss charges against Bush's White House counsel John C. Woo, for his determination that the rights guaranteed by our Constitution can be overriden by the executive branch.

In yesterday's New York Times:

Lawyers for the Obama administration struggled on Friday to persuade a federal judge here to throw out an unusual civil lawsuit against John C. Yoo, the former government lawyer whose memorandums on torture were used by the Bush administration to justify sweeping policies on detention and interrogation.

Despite their efforts, the judge did not seem inclined to dismiss the lawsuit, which was brought by Jose Padilla, an American citizen who spent more than three years in isolation in a military brig as an enemy combatant.

The judge, Jeffrey S. White of Federal District Court, explored the arguments of Mr. Padilla’s lawyers thoroughly, but he appeared to be skeptical of elements of the government’s argument.

In fact, Judge White, who was appointed by President George W. Bush, even told the government’s lawyers that Mr. Yoo’s 2001 memorandum stating that the constitutional protections against unreasonable searches and seizures can be overridden was “a pretty scary position.”

Jose Padilla spent three years of his life locked up. Why is he a hero? This:

Mr. Padilla seeks monetary damages of just $1. His real goal, in this case and a number of others against other current and former United States officials, is a declaration from the government that his incarceration and harsh treatment were wrong.

“Plaintiffs seek to vindicate their constitutional rights,” the complaint stated, “and ensure that neither Mr. Padilla nor any other person is treated this way in the future.”

And a tentative Hall of Shame position for the Obama administration for trying to have this suit dismissed. "Tentative" only because the Times makes no note of any effort to get an explanation either from papers filed requesting dismissal, nor to contact White House spokespeople directly. All the article gives us on this point is:

President Obama has shown little interest in prosecuting officials of the previous administration, and it is not clear whether there will be a government-sponsored investigation of Bush administration polices.

Haiku to Claire

Gaelic girl, Scythian sword.
Born and bred to o'ercome all,
Fu dog at her heels.

There is no room for self-righteousness, O Ye Comfortable Ones

There are those in our country who are expressing denial, disbelief or, worst of all, self-righteousness regarding the awful plight of so many Americans. I have seen sentiments ranging from "You made your bed, you sleep in it" to "the reason jobs are being lost is because people believe Democratic scare tactics and are not spending money -- spend your money folks!" This is in utter blindness to the cold hard fact that so many of us have none to spend and cannot even pay the bills.

Today in my World Wide Meanderings I came across the full "Meditation XVII" by John Donne. This piece contains a very famous phrase, but is so beautiful it deserves a full read and then a mulling-over.

It gets to the crux of my own innate sense that what happens to one of us happens to all of us; that the mistakes made by one of us have been made by all of us; that where each one of us remains open to growth of understanding we each can bring all of us along; that where one of us remains willfully blind we none of us can see. Donne's quaint and beautiful Jacobean prose still resonates so powerfully, these 386 years after he quilled them:

No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend's or of thine own were: any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.

Neither can we call this a begging of misery, or a borrowing of misery, as though we were not miserable enough of ourselves, but must fetch in more from the next house, in taking upon us the misery of our neighbours. Truly it were an excusable covetousness if we did, for affliction is a treasure, and scarce any man hath enough of it. No man hath affliction enough that is not matured and ripened by it, and made fit for God by that affliction.

I and I

"Do I contradict myself?
Very well then I contradict myself,
(I am large, I contain multitudes.) "

-- Walt Whitman

What He Said

Frank Rich in Sunday's New York Times:

PRESIDENT Obama did not offer his patented poetry in his Inaugural Address. He did not add to his cache of quotations in Bartlett’s. He did not recreate J.F.K.’s inaugural, or Lincoln’s second, or F.D.R.’s first. The great orator was mainly at his best when taking shots at Bush and Cheney, who, in black hat and wheelchair, looked like the misbegotten spawn of the evil Mr. Potter in “It’s a Wonderful Life” and the Wicked Witch of the West.

Such was the judgment of many Washington drama critics. But there’s a reason that this speech was austere, not pretty. Form followed content. Obama wasn’t just rebuking the outgoing administration. He was delicately but unmistakably calling out the rest of us who went along for the ride as America swerved into the dangerous place we find ourselves now.

Worth reading the rest!

Obama Restores Worldwide Women's Health Services

Just days after President Obama took the oath of office, he reversed the "global gag rule." His executive order reversed the awful policy -- issued by Reagan, continued by Bush 1, overturned by Clinton, reinstated by Bush 2 on his first day in office in '01 -- that canceled US funding to women's health clinics worldwide if they so much as mentioned family planning methods as an option.

The global gag rule forced health clinics in developing countries - which often serve as the only source of birth control for the world's poorest women - to cut their staff, limit services, and sometimes close their doors entirely.


When Obama first launched his campaign, he surveyed his supporters asking what we would like to see him do as his first act as President. My answer was: Overturn the global gag rule that Bush reinstated on *his* first day in office. I feel like my wish came true and am SO grateful that my sisters around the world will be supported by our country in having control over their lives and their health, instead of having their biology rule their destiny and suffering from women's health issues with no local clinics to turn to. And we have rejoined the modern age, in recognition of the need for population control on our overtaxed Mother Earth.


Please consider joining me today in thanking President Obama for his swift action on behalf of women everywhere.

Inaugural B&W crepes

Creamy pale bananas and rich chocolate make this a perfect breakfast or snack this week, LOL.

Serves 2 banana & chocolate freaks. If you make this into 2 crepes like I did, they are humongous. But you'll still wish you had more.

-- a bar of Green & Black's Organic 70% cocoa.
-- 1 c organic unbleached white flour
-- 1 c + about 2T organic 2% milk (untested: substitute unflavored soy milk)
-- 1 egg from a happy, veggie hen (in my book, if the egg has the telltale "fertilized" bloodspot, that was a happy hen)
-- 3 organic bananas
-- decent cooking oil (do yourself a favor & avoid saturated fat, k?)

2. In a mixing bowl, beat the egg and add to it one cup of milk. Slowly add the cup of flour, whisking constantly, until the mixture is very smooth

3. Put half a bar of the chocolate into the top of a double-boiler. Add 2 T of milk. Over a gentle heat, don't forget while doing the below steps to keep checking it. It should just melt slowly, it should NOT simmer. Whisk occasionally.

4. Peel and slice the bananas. Heat up some oil in a frying pan to a nice high temp.

5. Toss the bananas around in the pan long enough to sear the outsides (to a toasty brown color, not charred!). Remove the bananas from the pan.

6. Heat up a 10-12 inch frying pan (or crepe pan if you have one) with a light coating of oil, medium heat. Pour half the batter in a spiral; tilt the pan to nearly cover the bottom. Let it sit over the heat until the top is dry and the edges are very slightly golden-brown. Flip with a spatula and let the other side heat for a minute or so. Slip it out of the pan onto a plate.

7. Spoon half of the bananas in a stripe near one side of the crepe. Roll it up. Generously drizzle the chocolate on it.

8. Repeat steps 6 and 7 for the second crepe.


If you have extra chocolate in the double-boiler, pour it over a peeled banana or some strawberries. Put them in the freezer for a bit, then move to the fridge.


Clean-up tip for the fried-banana pan (and for any kind of mess in a pan or on the stovetop): Put in about 1" of water, bring to a simmer, sprinkle baking soda over the entire surface of the water, simmer a bit more, sprinkle more baking soda and shut the heat off. It will clean up easily after it cools.

Tupac, do ya feel us today? Please pay us a visit

Come on come on
I see no changes. Wake up in the morning and I ask myself,
"Is life worth living? Should I blast myself?"
I'm tired of bein' poor and even worse I'm black.
My stomach hurts, so I'm lookin' for a purse to snatch.
Cops give a damn about a negro? Pull the trigger, kill a nigga, he's a hero.
Give the crack to the kids who the hell cares? One less hungry mouth on the welfare.
First ship 'em dope & let 'em deal the brothers.
Give 'em guns, step back, and watch 'em kill each other.
"It's time to fight back", that's what Huey said.
2 shots in the dark now Huey's dead.
I got love for my brother, but we can never go nowhere
unless we share with each other. We gotta start makin' changes.
Learn to see me as a brother 'stead of 2 distant strangers.
And that's how it's supposed to be.
How can the Devil take a brother if he's close to me?
I'd love to go back to when we played as kids,
but things change, and that's the way it is.

(Come on, come on) That's just the way it is. Things'll never be the same.
That's just the way it is. aww yeah...


I see no changes. All I see is racist faces.
Misplaced hate makes disgrace for races we under.
I wonder what it takes to make this one better place...
let's erase the wasted.
Take the evil out the people, they'll be acting right.
'Cause mo' black than white is smokin' crack tonight.
And only time we chill is when we kill each other.
It takes skill to be real, time to heal each other.
And although it seems heaven sent,
we ain't ready to see a black President, uhh.
It ain't a secret don't conceal the fact...
the penitentiary's packed, and it's filled with blacks.
But some things will never change.
Try to show another way, but they stayin' in the dope game.
Now tell me what's a mother to do?
Bein' real don't appeal to the brother in you.
You gotta operate the easy way.
"I made a G today" But you made it in a sleazy way.
Sellin' crack to the kids. "I gotta get paid,"
Well hey, well that's the way it is.

We gotta make a change...
It's time for us as a people to start makin' some changes.
Let's change the way we eat, let's change the way we live
and let's change the way we treat each other.
You see the old way wasn't working so it's on us to do
what we gotta do, to survive.

And still I see no changes. Can't a brother get a little peace?
There's war on the streets & the war in the Middle East.
Instead of war on poverty,
they got a war on drugs so the police can bother me.
And I ain't never did a crime I ain't have to do.
But now I'm back with the facts givin' 'em back to you.
Don't let 'em jack you up, back you up, crack you up and pimp smack you up.
You gotta learn to hold ya own.
They get jealous when they see ya with ya mobile phone.
But tell the cops they can't touch this.
I don't trust this, when they try to rush I bust this.
That's the sound of my tune. You say it ain't cool, but mama didn't raise no fool.
And as long as I stay black, I gotta stay strapped & I never get to lay back.
'Cause I always got to worry 'bout the pay backs.
Some buck that I roughed up way back... comin' back after all these years.
Rat-a-tat-tat-tat-tat. That's the way it is. uhh

The At Long Last Death of William Zantziger

So now I find myself wishing that the Christian idea of some sort of final judgment is true. And hoping that Hattie Carrol's family breathes more freely and walks a bit lighter now.

This is what happened in 1963, a short stark write-up from the New York Times.


This is perhaps the best commentary on this "incident" among thousands upon thousands of similar "incidents" in the history of America (and of "civilization" in general):