i see dems

i watched most of the democratic national convention this week and found i could really relate to some of the speakers.

yesterday there was a guy from indiana named barney smith who kept talking about how his job had been shipped overseas and a foreign worker was now doing it. he had the great line about how america needs elected officials who care more about the barney smiths than about smith barney. barney smith oozed middle america in his gingham print shirt, lisping slightly but with a compelling message.

another woman spoke of owning two pet stores in florida while also having a part-time job and still not being able to afford health insurance.

in years past i recall seeing and hearing similar stories from the conventions. i always thought the tellers were middle americans who lived in the heartland and who were bearing the brunt of economic downturns. i knew they were autoworkers, and farmers and from other industries which happened to be moving to india or china at the moment.

they are me now. on august 6th, i was laid-off. so when these democrats spoke of our current recession and the various policies that are either ruining america or could help us, i was even more attuned than usual if only from self interest.

much of what was put forth was rhetoric. much of that could be considered valuable rhetoric, rhetoric worth listening to, but until it is achieved it remains just rhetoric. for me, i feel like i need to fast forward by four to six years to reach a time when the economy may be ready to give me a viable job again. does that sound bleak? well, i believe things are bleak.

in fact, my favorite speech from the entire dnc was given by dennis kucinich. his was a call to action for americans to "wake up," and elect barack obama. that speech made me choke up a little bit and i guess that is because in kucinich and perhaps more importantly, in those who appreciate him and vote for him and agree with him, i recognize kindred spirits. so to hear the voice of him who knows, (to borrow from baudelaire,) screaming at the rest of us to get on board and begin to fight back against injustice is especially poignant.

i think obama will win, though i would not be shocked if i end up being wrong. if he does win the presidency, he will have to make the tough decisions that could conceivably help us get back on track in this country but it will take a considerable amount of time. in the time it takes, he is going to be forced to endure attack after attack. he will be blamed for all he is trying to fix. this next presidential term is going to be an ugly one for whoever holds the office.

it was easy to watch the dnc this week because i was sick so i had few choices for how to spend my time. on wednesday night during bill clinton's speech, my wife called me from the pharmacy where she was picking up my prescription. the doctor prescribed me 10 tablets of 75mg tamiflu, (in additon to ibuprofen for fever.) its cost, she informed me, was $85.

i thought the idea of health care insurance was to keep an illness from overly impacting one's budget but with $85 meds and $35 copays and a $5,000 yearly deductible, i see that is certainly not the case anymore. health care in this country is a joke. i am happy to hear obama and clinton talk about ensuring every child in this country has access to health care. as a first step there is certainly nothing wrong with this idea. however, the single payor system kucinich promoted in the primaries is the only plan that can fix what has gone horribly wrong.

when i left the urgent care facility late wednesday afternoon, the cashier asked me if i knew my insurance was set to expire on september 1st. yes, i was aware, i explained. i told her i was in the process of switching to my wife's insurance because i had been laid off on august 6th. she gave me my card back along with the receipt for my copay without making any eye contact.

getting laid off is a bit like catching hepatitis or leprosy. you can try to hide it but that is giving into the idea that the condition is shameful, which it is not. when you are open about it many people respond with grace and empathy.

the day i was laid off i came home and updated my resume. next, i sent an email out to virtually everyone in the address book of my home email informing them i had been laid off and asking them to keep me in mind if they knew of anything i might be the ideal match for. it was part of my three-pronged strategy for gaining employment anew: work the online job databases, leverage contacts, (nepotism,) and target desireable companies.

i received many responses to my email. most simply wished me the best of luck and said they would be on the lookout for me. some expressed some amount of shock, which was unsettling. in their tone and some of their suggestions, i could hear chicken little and i worried perhaps my sky really was falling, (is falling.)

in the early part of this decade ownership of the company i worked for changed several times, three, to be exact, in five years. in the midst of all that "change management," and as two organizations merged, the two call centers on opposite coasts had to be addressed.

in deciding what would be best for the business, three options emerged. one; contract all call center operations out to india just as our primary competitor had already done. two; direct all calls to local branches so that the guys who delivered water could deal with the needs of their customers personally. three: merge the two centers into one. while i was not involved in reviewing those options and making that decision, i was close enough to the top to have friends who informed me as to what was going on and who believed the value of keeping the call center in america with the employees under the company banner was real and so they went about making that case to the newest owners.

the decision was made to keep the call centers and even to integrate them as opposed to merging them. so it worked out that time though it did not for our competitors who worked at a call center in brea, california, which was closed.

i mention all of this because what i did not hear from the democrats was any talk about globalization. no mentions of nafta, cafta, gatt or any of the other acronyms that are all about screwing the american worker. yet, even though i am not an auto worker nor have i worked in a factory, these kind of deals mean the world to me, or, the end of the world to me.

as long as american companies are allowed to go overseas for cheaper labor, without being checked by any restriction or moral outrage, they will and in turn, guys like me will get laid off and have strain and risk added to their lives. it's unpleasant.

i suppose i don't know what to make of it. i feel like i can do anything. i think i would need some guidance and/or training for just about any job but i feel like a better prospect based on my overall insight, communication skills, adaptability and work ethic. but i have zero confidence in my ability to get anyone to believe this is true without knowing me. i just feel like they're looking at the resume and they see a void where they want to see a degree.

as the days drag on i sense my self esteem being affected. its subtle but i beat myself up a bit for not banking that degree a long time ago, for not focusing on my career and income over the last 15 years as i probably should have so that my issues would not be on such a basic level and for not being more focused on making money as a rule, if only for my family.

despite my personal concerns, i felt good about the dnc on the whole. i believed there were many good men there. i am hopeful this group will effect some change in the coming years which will positively affect people. i also hope my own prospects improve.

laid-off

i woke up early on august 6th, as i did on every day i went into the office recently. three or four days per week i had been working from home and on those days, i could sleep until as late as 7am, but when i went into the office, a 50 mile drive for me one way, i was up around 5am to arrive at the office before 7am.

i arrived in the office at 6:40am on this day, having consumed my coffee and breakfast bar on the road. i had an uneasy feeling however. recently i had not been as busy as i once had. at the end of 2007 i had worked 10 hour days as a norm. from the time the school year started in august, right through the beginning of december, i had just been slammed, handling virtually all of our customers in the state of texas.

for the last 8-10 weeks, however, i had been less than busy. the company was failing and the signs were everywhere. people got laid off. others went on indefinite sabbatical. the direction we were moving in was murky to say the least and plans changed almost as soon as they were put into effect.

two to three weeks earlier i attended a meeting in which my boss conveyed our new business plan to have all account managers go ahead and sell our product. any boundaries between account managers and salespeople were abolished and we were told compensation in the form of commission would be worked out. the important thing was for us to get busy trying to boost the organization's sales.

towards that end and because i had not been so busy recently, i developed a cold-calling script. i started making calls and working on plans to be systematic in my approach. as for my accounts, it was a low season. i had several customers with whom i had communicated and who planned on beginning the program in mid to late august as the school year commenced.

while i had some successes in my sales efforts, almost none of them were in terms of actual sales. (i had one or two small sales but those just landed in my lap.) still, i had laid groundwork and made some real inroads.

so i went to work that morning and made some calls early, before others arrived. (i worked in cramped quarters and preferred to make my calls prior to all the hubbub that occurred after our tutors arrived.) i exchanged emails with one of my customers from a tiny, texas town, who i had imposed upon a week or so earlier to take advantage of a special offer we were having at the end of july. as it turned out she explained via email she was not put off by my sales pitch whatsoever and in fact, she said she shared my passion for getting english language skills to people who needed them. she just could not take advantage of this offer at this time.

i was insecure about my work recently because i had not been so busy and because i had not yet had any luck selling. so to have this customer soothe me a bit and tell me that she appreciated me was nice.

around 11am my boss came in. it was her custom to work from home on wednesdays so this was unexpected but i was glad to see her because i had a couple of issues i wanted to speak to her about. however, she stalked around the office with her head down and i could tell she was not in a good mood. the signs were clear and i knew to avoid her when she was like this. someone tried to approach her and she brushed them off rudely, implying the importance of whatever task she was working on.

by 11am all of the tutors were in the office as well and one had returned a movie to me that i had loaned her, leonardo dicaprio's 11th hour. she and i had a brief chat about the movie, agreeing across the board on the overall value and the positive message at the end.

as i walked around the pods to return to my cubicle, my boss asked me if i could come into her office for a minute. i went to her straightaway but when she stood by her door and closed it behind me, i knew exactly what was happening.

as she closed the door she let me know that our h.r. manager was joining us by speaker phone and asked me to sit down. i could not help but chuckle. part of me wanted to rage but i knew there was no point. why burn bridges when a decision had been made? this decision was typical of the decisions the company had made of late.

so there it was; i was laid off. i was asked not to mention it to my fellow workers as i returned to my desk for whatever i needed to gather. my buddy asked me if i was ready to go to lunch in that moment but i lied and said i had lunch plans. i grabbed my few photos and almost nothing else.

i felt like jack nicholson in that movie where he is a retiring actuary and he comes to the realization that no one wants the files he has built and maintained for so many years. no one needs any sort of briefing from him before he leaves. whoever takes over his customers is just going to figure it out as they go and this approach will in fact be fine.

it will be fine in my situation as well. someone will have to figure it out and they will figure it out and my clients will not be incredibly put off though they may notice a sinking ship when they see one.

i fired off an email to my wife before i left letting her know i had been laid-off and she called me as i drove out of the parking lot. she asked if i was okay and i said i was. i was, too. i was determined to be positive about all of this.

that morning i had not known it was coming but i did know my company was floundering. i had thought recently about beginning a job search, which in retrospect i clearly should have done, but i felt like that would be a betrayal of the mission of my company to whatever degree.

i worked for a start-up company with about 25 employees. if nothing else there was a sense of mission there, a sense of camaraderie, and i had bought into the rhetoric of the ceo and the idea that if we worked hard we could in fact make a difference and turn the company around and become profitable and pay back our venture capital debtors. i believed those ground-floor shares i had would one day be worth something, even unto the end.

i did pristine work. i did the best i could with my accounts. my contacts were very happy with me and often made comments to my regional manager and to me to the effect of them feeling like they were my only account.

the thing was most of my accounts bought our product under a grant and so, they received everything at half price. my record at getting my customers to re-purchase our product or services at full price was not entirely good though some did and i managed a couple of the best accounts we had as an organization.

so did i feel snubbed and unappreciated when i was chosen to be laid-off while four others remained in my position? certainly. others were laid-off a few months before me, (as well as two others on the same day as me,) and i did not necessarily agree with those decisions either, though i did not voice my concerns. in any case, it is here and it is now and i am unemployed.

i'm scared. i do not have an undergraduate degree. i feel like my skills are soft skills, skills i have nurtured and developed but that are none the less nebulous by nature. i am what you would call a customer service professional. i know how to defuse potentially volatile situations. i have trained literally thousands of customer service representatives on how to empathize with others as well as a host of other soft skills. i was hired into the start-up company for these same soft skills. they wanted someone to manage a program remotely and ensure our customer contacts stayed 100% happy after their purchase.

i used to tell my classes when i trained virtually everyone in a 150+ seat call center that customer service skills would travel with them, which was to say, they would employ these skills in every job they would hold for the rest of their lives and even in their personal lives. so it is no wonder that i feel like virtually everyone does have these skills i have been refining these past 13 years and that these skills are undervalued.

it is important to me to do a good job at whatever i undertake. at times i need to focus on speed, which is to say i have to remind myself to work fast. quality on the other hand comes naturally to me. i always do good work and i am always thoughtful about it, considering everything to ensure my work is above reproach.

still, how am i going to get a job? i have heard it said that many hiring managers take a pile of resumes for a given position and pare it down first by making two piles. those candidates who have their undergraduate degree go in one pile while those without go in another, the pile that goes directly to the trash bin.

if i had my druthers i would find my way into a career writing but that is like a pipe dream to me. no, i have to conduct a job search for a customer service manager or call center position, knowing the lack of degree could mean i have to start significantly further back down the ladder from where i had recently been.

i remember 13 years ago when i started working for the home delivery water service company how i thought one way of covering up the lack of an undergrad degree would be to stay put. this is to say, if i stayed in this company, i believed i could rise, which i did. merit is merit after all, and so i thought i could move up and any boss who knew me and my work would recognize me as a better choice to promote than some college grad who might be brought in.

this is what happened, too. in my 12 years in that call center i went from making under $10 an hour part time to an annual salary of about $56k. i was rewarded for my hard work and insight with steady promotions, raises and new and interesting challenges.

after all that time, however, things changed and moving on from that company was in the best interests of myself and my family. i found the start-up company on monster.com and though they were a significant commute, they had one thing going for them no other companies i came across had, which was they offered me the job. i took it, perhaps too hastily but based on my need to make a move...

right now security is at a premium. looking past that fact, i still think i did the right thing. i needed to make a move, instead of stagnating where i was. still, right here, right now, i am worried.

mark's big adventure

i took mark to his first ever dodger game today. they had a rare, getaway thursday, day game against the rockies and since i am unemployed and had mark at home with me today, i figured it was optimum to get him out among the dodger faithful. we had a great time and i hope one day he has the opportunity to read this blog post.

it was an eventful day in many ways. before we even left the house it took some cunning to get everything together and ready for our big day. i packed mark's bag with diapers and wipies, an extra onesie in case of accident, snacks, two bottles of juice, and my dodger hat. i dressed mark in one of his dodger onesies and wore my own dodger jersey from a softball league i played in years ago. (unfortunately in this photo mark's glove hand is blocking the view of his LA logo.)

as expected mark fell asleep for the ride to the stadium but we made great time and i woke him after only a one-half hour trip. they seemed to be renovating the dodger stadium parking lot so as i entered i was funneled into the upper corner of the lot, (lot 8,) above the right field reserve seats and overlooking downtown. when i got mark's sleepy butt out of the car i wanted to point out the buildings i recognized and tell him where i used to live right down there on bunker hill. i wanted to point to chinatown and tell him about my elementary school there but alas, he is 1.6-years-old and only getting onto his first words now so i'll wait and tell him those things way too many times in years to come.

i was hell-bent on us sitting in the left field pavilion. i imagined manny ramirez cracking a high, three-run drive into the upper section of said pavilion and me catching it on the fly and begging the dodger organization to help me get manny to sign it to commemorate mark's first game. so i trekked all the way down all levels and across the parking lot to the game day ticket booths outside that left field pavilion. when i made it to the front of the line, the salesman told me the left field pavilion was sold out. my $13 budget seat was moving on up to the $19 reserved level so i told him to give me one in the right field reserved section since i was parked over there. walking with mark's bag on my back and mark volleying back and forth from my right and left sides, i hiked back across the lot to the right field side and up all those steps i had just come down, (field to loge, loge to club, club to reserved levels.) i was winded when i reached the top and felt good that i had gotten some exercise in.

stopping at the concession stand for a coke and a dodger dog, mark and i made our way to our seats. we missed the first pitch which was thrown out by someone the dodger stadium public address announcer and a former high school friend of mine, eric smith, introduced as, "snoop d-o-double g." we missed the national anthem and we missed clint barmes getting to 3rd base but we did see matt holliday hit a sacrifice fly to plate barmes and thus, the dodgers trailed 1-0 and our seats were barely warmed. (in this photo, mark is peering out at the scoreboard above the left field pavilion as they were showing mr. dogg enjoying the game in his box seat.)

mark ate a couple bites of my dodger dog but then stopped, perhaps intuiting the deathly levels of sodium present. so i busted out one of his bottles of juice i had packed and he drank it down without stopping. he also made quick work of the cheerios i had packed. it was blazing hot but we were so high in the right field reserved seats we were under the awning and in the shade, (which was a real plus.) my coke disappeared as quickly as his cranberry juice and water.

mark got antsy in the 3rd inning and wanted to get off my leg and venture forth. problem was there was little room to venture and i was less than comfortable with mark hitting and brushing up against the 400lb man who sat two seats over on our right. he did not complain but still, i tried to hold mark down after he got his stretch in and had to point out every helicopter that passed, every bird in the air, and the police academy in the distance, which i explained to mark was just across the street from my first little league field. i remember that team i was on was the giants, which was one team name they should have left out of that league. i did not understand at 7-years-old why random people in the area would tease me when i wore my jersey. dodger fans are nothing if not loyal. distracting mark to get him to stop fidgeting was kind of fun, anyway.

during the top of the 4th inning i noticed wetness seeping down my right side. at first i thought it was sweat but quickly realized, i was not sweating that much. mark's diaper was not holding in his pee for which i have the huggies corporation to thank. i gathered our stuff, kept him right over my wet spot and headed back out the concessions and bathrooms area only to discover there was not a men's room with a changing table in it. drats.

so i headed further and further out towards right field where no one was and eventually, i got to an area where i was able to stop behind a little building and put mark's little mat down and change him right there. off with the soaked, (but super cool skater shorts,) off with his dodger onesie, off with his shoes and off with his diaper which was really not all that wet. it was as if his pecker was poking out the left side of the thing or something when he decided to take a leak.

(again it's...

Kimberly-Clark Corporation (Huggies diapers)

Dept. INT

P.O. Box 2020

Neenah, WI 54957-2020
...in case you were wondering how to contact these evildoers.)

in any case, i made the change in relative peace, except for all the cheering. what luck. as i was changing a diaper nowhere near in a position to see the game, james loney was singling in manny ramirez to tie the game. still, mark made the transition from his skater shorts and dodger onesie to no shorts and his pearl jam onesie, the black one with the crazy little screaming guy from their alive and ten days, in fine form.

i was hot so we grabbed another coke for me and some popcorn f0r the two of us. dodger stadium does not really have suitable kid's food. i found no chicken tenders or grilled cheese sandwiches anywhere. my total expenditure including parking and my ticket had reached the $50 mark. woe was me.

sitting next to mark and me were four mexican guys, all slightly large, all wearing dodger jerseys, all super cool in my book. when a guy wearing a yankee hat walked by in front of us one of them yelled out, "yankees?! get out of here!" mark enjoyed the commotion.

later when a guy wearing a red sox hat walked by i heard the same guy say, "boston?", to which i added, "go home!" so when we returned from our leaky adventure, these guys offered help in getting me back to my seat seeing as i was weighed down with mark, bag and concessions.

in the bottom of the 5th, matt kemp had gotten to 2nd on what should have only been a single and andre ethier followed with a solid single to right center scoring kemp and giving the azul a 2-1 lead. (ethier was throw out at 2nd on the play and should have thought better of trying to stretch the run-of-the-mill single into a double.) the cheering brought mark to life and he began clapping then and about every five minutes thereafter, (and for no apparent reason,) which was cool.

in the 6th inning a guy way down in front of us but on our deck failed to catch a pop foul so i boohed loudly. one of the four guys complained about the bumbler because he was wearing a dodger jersey and i turned and suggested perhaps the guy should go become an angel fan. since i was decked out in dodger gear, it was my own little joke. no one there knew my affinity for the halos.

in the 7th inning with one out, derek lowe gave way to hong-chi kuo, and mark and i headed for the exit. his antsyness was reviving and i figured six full was probably all i could ask of him on this his first outing. we got right to our car and encountered zero traffic on our way out. i was spent. mark stayed awake until we hit pasadena and i listened to the end of the game on the radio.

in the top of the 9th, jonathan broxton came in to close it out and gave up a double off the wall in right field to ian stewart to open the inning, then he mowed down baker, tulowitzki and grilli with a barrage of 97 miles per hour fastballs that just sounded utterly overpowering on the radio. that is how it ended. i listened to the final out in our carport then got out and carried mark sleeping inside and to his bed.

before coming to the computer to blog about our day, i got out of my dodger jersey, which oddly did not smell like urine, cleaned up a bit and got into a pearl jam t-shirt. what a great day.

the question of merit

whether it is capitalism or just the american way, we live with some false notions in our society regarding merit. there is this idea that in a free market, the cream rises to the top. this is to say, those who possess merit are promoted and reap rewards. while things do work in that manner occasionally, it is not necessarily the exception. still, this myth of merit deserves examination.


have you ever read atlas shrugged? in this piece of fiction the heroes of capitalism and the leaders of industry, are portrayed as towering, fair-haired, blue-eyed, indefatigable pistons of the free market, golden and glistening in the sun as they tirelessly create better lives for everyone by believing in their ideas and pursuing them single-mindedly. steel and oil barons contend with lazy masses of ne'er-do-wells, listless slackers who give up easily, often resorting to crime when things get tough, and generally stewing in their own shiftless juices throughout the course of the novel. i do not think ayn rand meant the novel to be absurd but in some respects it is just that.


what i have learned in my days and years of work is that the higher one is on the proverbial totem pole, the less work one does. yes, more expertise is required. better judgment and perhaps more creativity are also required the higher one gets, but gone are the days of punching clocks. gone are the days of having one's shoulder looked over once a certain level is achieved. gone are the days of 15 minute breaks.


some do work harder and longer hours at whatever it is they do as they get higher in the pecking order but their work also tends to be interesting and closer to something one could reasonably have some passion for. (show me a csr who is passionate about their work, or someone who works in insurance, and i will show you a buffoon.)


as people advance in a work place many factors play a role in that advancement. merit is one of those factors but for the most part, it doesn't hold any greater sway than any of the other factors. nepotism often plays a large part. friends can be seen promoting friends all through our society on a daily basis. people often promote their nieces and nephews or their buddy's kids. ass kissers are often rewarded for their humble efforts. all manner of favoritism occurs.


i have seen big people promote big people in the work place. i've seen blacks help blacks up the corporate ladder, asians watching each other's backs, latinos protecting the interests of other latinos, caucasians helping their melatonin deficient friends out, as well as about any other manner of race-related affinities. i have stood by as gender was a deciding factor. i have seen preferential treatment based on region. i have witnessed religious affiliations determine promotions just as i have seen political party's play a part. of course, wealth favors wealth everyday, everywwhere and all about us. all of this is to say i have seen many forms of discrimination in the work place and in life.


luck plays a role as well and to illustrate this, i will point to the fact that i often see the dull and obtuse leading their intellectual superiors around the work place. since it cannot all be based on nepotism, luck must be involved in many of these unimpressive bosses gaining their positions.


in addition to the topsy turvy nature of the corporate ladder, soft skills are overvalued and/or overstated in our society. engineers are engineers. they are experts and they assume their roles as they should and this can be said of all experts such as doctors and physicists. once you get away from those fields that require expertise, (without any doubts,) there are many other fields for which the expertise is overrated if not exagerrated.


ceo's get paid whopping amounts of cash supposedly for taking ultimate responsibility and providing direction for a business. in addition to judgment, the skills they are expected to possess include some expert knowledge of their industry, how to use some software, how to report, how to present, the nature of things political, and perhaps a few other nebulous and soft skills.


rupert murdoch makes a good example. murdoch knows how to do math. as a businessman and journalist, (of a sort,) he practiced some tried and true techniques... he parlayed a silver spoon and some luck into ownership of a newspaper. the newspaper did not turn ultra-successful or anything but murdoch constantly tinkered with it, ultimately making it profitable and using good credit and a favorable bank interested in promoting aussie businessmen to purchase another paper. he and his papers have often gotten involved in politics. this picture as a cycle is perpetuated by murdoch still. murdoch possesses the quality most common among all living species, he is opportunistic.


conventional thought suggests murdoch has a blend of skill sets uniquely suited to excel in business and the world of business. i would argue his fortune has been nearly random. in building his empire he has merely been willing to play to the lowest common denominator as he embraced tabloid journalism. face it-most people simply tend to make better moral choices. for example, if you were to go to school for journalism and came to know the nature of tabloid journalism and its affect on society versus a non-sensational journalism that is less profitable but seeks to serve mankind, in addition to any profit motive, you would choose lower profits along with the altruistic goal. right?


i think there is a substantial segment of the population who could do what rupert murdoch does on a daily basis successfully. surely i could step into murdoch's shoes for a quarter and maintain profits, image and the rudder. if murdoch suddenly disappeared, another person of similar values would pop right into his place, (to that person's detriment.)


how about a pro sports coach? these guys get media coverage that portrays them as geniuses if they are successful. surely i could step into the shoes of a pro sports coach for a month and maintain the status quo, without any special training. the coaches do not play the games.


what about united states congressman? since congress is typically made up of people from diverse backgrounds and professions, it is obvious that no special skill set is required. armed with robert's rules of order, surely i could serve a couple of months in congress without even getting noticed, (at worst.) in fact, in congress i would have advantages over our elected officials as i would not owe any of those infamous favors for favors.


what other faux-meritorious positions are there?


what about consultants? surely i could step into say, a hospital, interview their department heads on what is wrong with the organization, draw some conclusions, create a great report with lots of color, present some ideas for positive changes, and thereby wow the top-dog with my consultant expertise.


how could our economic system be meritorious if so much of the reward ends up in the hands of investors who do not do any of the work? a meritocracy would proportionately reward those who accomplish that which causes profits; the work. surely i could step into a position as a stockbroker with a firm who would explain their philosophy and direct me on the basics and i could do that job for a spell without doing anything out of the ordinary compared to the average.


how about running a hotel? the person responsible for everything needs to have a good financial person below them to balance books. he needs a good kitchen staff and basically just good staffing all the way around. after that, the job is customer service. piece of cake.


how is it that many young actors end up in the director's chair? this one is ironic, too, because i think directors are the foremost artists of our age but in reality, theirs is to make decisions and stand back and watch how scenes look within frames. it would be one thing if they were all like von trier and wrote their own material but especially in the case of big-time hollywood directors, they do not. they simply get a script and a production schedule from the producers and they step in and direct. i mean, i could do that. right?


surely a regular guy like me could be the mayor, or the restarauteur, or the chief of police, or the building manager, or the park ranger. it's not like you have to know how to do algorithms for these things.


the thing is, as kids we are taught that the american way is to reward the person who works hard. we come to believe the mythology of ayn rand but then we get into the real world and we realize the theory resembles the reality at best.


where is the merit in tax shelters? where is the merit in foreign-based businesses? i suppose halliburton and the others are just doing what businesses do; they seek to maximize profits. avoiding taxes in dubai and going to where the money is and away from where the money clearly will not be soon, is simple business sense.

what about the authority given to universities and the degrees they confer?


my u.s. history class from my junior year in high school should have taught the real nature of the united states and its brand of capitalism. the curriculum should have focused more on the history being made today and the legacy we will leave imprinted on history. after all, it is to be a guide for future decisions, right?

these examples of faux-merit merely underscore the fact that capitalism is a system which should be watched and checked closely. capitalism naturally encourages dishonesty and deceit. i believe it encourages good things too, such as hard work for personal gain, which again, is not in and of itslef bad. still, instead of buying in to rand's images, (and those continuing to be put forth today by the rand institute,) the nature of capitalism should be noted and america should pursue a blend of socio-economic systems.

merit in and of itself is not a myth and all who work hard deserve credit. the point of this essay is merely to suggest we should be honest with ourselves about our society, l'est we pass falsehoods on to our children.

a reflection

when you have not been to a cemetary in several years, and you go to your mother's gravesite after so much time has passed, emotion comes upon you like a stranger accosting you on the street.

you drive to rose hills tentatively, not knowing the route exactly but knowing the offramp and that there will be signs to guide you. you remember vaguely that it's not far from the main front gate to your mother's grave-she is up and to the left. just stay left you tell yourself and you will certainly find it.

you pick up some flowers to lay there wondering how long it has been since flowers graced her stone.

you recall how you actually went to visit the grave often back in the early '90s, when you returned from serving in the military abroad and your life was rudderless. you were unemployed and you could not afford your car. eventually you had no place to live, your car was repossessed, you saw yourself where the road diverges. one path lead to drugs and self-destruction. you could see yourself embracing some of the kind-hearted but misguided people you met at reggae concerts all over southern california, delving into drugs with them, crashing where they crashed, posing as the heart and soul of rastafari.

you had these thoughts as you sat their atop your mother's grave. it was 1991 and '92 and you went there every couple of weeks because it was peaceful and you felt solitary there. you felt alive, even if the entire world found you inconsequential. here you felt things and you were there and people could see you and you could see them and you borrowed flowers from other graves because you could not afford them and you set them there for your mom who seemed to be the only person who listened to you back then.

the other road, the one you chose, involved doing just enough begging of your family and friends to get by, hoping to find yourself in a different place, somewhere on your feet down the road somewhere. you moved back in with your dad and his new wife. you asked a best friend if you could sleep on the floor of his living room. you hated the asking and you inwardly railed against a perceived vacuum of generosity that occurred, even though your friends and relatives came through and gave to you.

you finally got a job and you asked for favors from the manager who was kind to you because she loved you in a way. and lo, two or three years went by and you did find yourself elsewhere and elsewhere was better. you had not been the active take charge of your life type but you had made conscious efforts to do well at whatever you did and to try to improve yourself along the way by ingesting the classic novels and learning new skills.

you worked it out right there, at fir lawn.

on this day you grab flowers down the street on your way into the park. you stop to talk to the guy about directions just because you know it is all about staying left, and you have a feel for how far up it is but you can imagine walking around a few rows off and feeling like you might not even be on the right lawn. so you say her name to the man and he types it into his computer and he gets the spelling right and her name pops right up along with the phrase on her stone, "his living stone." the man says it out loud, "his living stone," he says. "oh, that's very nice," he adds generously. you turn immediately and nearly run into the man who walked in behind you without you realizing it. you scuffle by, out the door, and you grab your emotions with a stranglehold because it feels oddly discomfiting to lose your composure in public.

you get back to the solitude of your car, to the flowers there on the floor of the passenger seat, to the keys. you drive up cautiously because a sheriff passed you in the opposite direction and you wonder if he would bust anyone up here for a fix-it ticket, or expired registration, or driving on the wrong side of the road even.

you park and you walk directly toward the grave. you glance around a bit, only slightly confused then you seemingly turn around, look down, and there she is. or, rather, there is her stone. "his living stone." sure enough. it is still a classy looking stone. 'his living stone' was a reference from the book of acts, you think you recall. something about jesus being called the living stone, the rock the church is built on or some such thing. but the stone is actually living in you. you remember clearly how good your dad felt about that phrase on her stone. the imagery of the church as the bride of christ compared favorably with him and he imagined his bride and how special that relationship had been.

it must have been agonizing for him to even imagine his life going forward without her; the person who had loved him unconditionally since the day he became a man. you remember the tenderness present in his grief. gone was the guy who got mad because as teenagers you were exposed to the secular world and wanted to partake. he admonished you to avoid it, stomping around and yelling as if... gone was the macho sports-oriented guy. here was the most honesty you had ever known from him. his period of mourning, what you saw of it, was the shining moment of his fatherhood, the humble, honest and giving father setting a deft example of how to conduct oneself in a real-life situation.

you pull the flowers from one another and you spread them on her grave, below the letters. you have a realization tears are running down your face. your reaction is innate and unconscious. actively you think of how she was like a peer to you in many ways, the strife between you was honest and childlike, devoid of any structured systems or philosophies-it was just two humans conflicting without pretense.

she was, of course, your mother. since you were 11, anyway. your dad was your uncle because his sister, your mother, was unable to care for you. you had two moms, really.

further down somewhere you know she represents innocence. she represents a time before you knew ultimate pains, perhaps before you could have known ultimate joys. the absence of pain can be an intoxicating memory, you think.

you glance over at her father's grave, unadorned and you borrow some of her flowers to put on his stone. here was the embodiment of kindness. he played steel guitar and the organ for you as if he had been playing it all his life, (which he had,) getting you to sing along to 'it's a small world.' you remember him, grey at the temples, a devout baptist of 6 feet and perhaps 4 inches.

that is when the focus changes for you. you realize it is about mortality, coming to grips with it for yourself, something you expect to be a life-long struggle, and being ready to speak to your children about it. your thought process exhibits a life of it's own, being born and innocent then maturing even unto death.

you drive home in silence, turning the volume on your liberal talk radio from zero to two only after 10 minutes. 30 or 40 seconds later you gently move it to four and you can begin to hear words. you repeat the intervals slowly arriving back to your life of keeping a stiff upper lip, back to the time when you do your work and prepare for what's next.

omar vizquel

did you bay area fans know about omar vizquel's art? i guess you must. jon miller is no slouch, after all.

http://www.skylinepictures.com/La%20Fiesta%20%20full%20%20image%20-%20Vizquel.htm

to see his painting, la fiesta, paste that link into your browser. i understand it adorns his own name brand of salsa back home, (for omar,) in venezuela.

yeah, i am an apologist for vin scully but this is the kind of stuff vin brings to the game of baseball, (so i can google it right in the middle of a slow, 4-0 death for the giants at the hands of one chad billingsley,) that imbues a snaillike exercise in athleticism with a flavor and color worthy of appreciation. omar vizquel paints? what?!

so i google images and i see at least one bad painting. omar peers over the top of his own glove and the painting is called "the look," or some such cheeseball thing. it would be one thing if he was a killer closer or something but shortstops are not exactly known for the stare they issue over the tops of gloves. (nor should they be.) they're about motion and poise, nimble, fleet-footed thieves of glory. omar might have painted a contorted back, diving, parallel to the earth, leather outstretched like the head of a giraffe eating fruit.

still, other paintings were quite good. i saw motion in the paintings, and depth. i saw hidden things to look at and some thoughtfulness in the brushstrokes, even if that aspect lacked meaning for me. ultimately i came away with an appreciation for omar vizquel as a guy who loves sport and plays it at the highest level, (truly the highest level and for a long time,) but is not locked into a stereotype.

these are some of my favorite athletes. this is why i choose kareem abdul jabar, muhammad ali, roberto clemente, wayman tisdale, todd christenson, and yeah, vin scully an artist of a baseball broadcaster.

oh, and my new favorite shortstop from a team despised, omar.

2 american political figures?

two american political figures died this week: george carlin and tim russert. perhaps it is because i watch msnbc, but it seems to me tim russert has been released with great fanfare, while the news of carlin's demise has been somewhat muted.

they both seem like nice men who deserve to be mourned but carlin is a saint. there is a temptation to label carlin as iconoclastic or sharp-witted but these are mere words that do not serve in his case whatsoever.

you had to know his life, follow his work, understand the power of satire and comedy. carlin went into everything on his own terms. he was like lenny bruce, only he survived, thrived even, to grow old for us and refine his act and more importantly, his ideas.

russert hosted the sunday morning political chat show and george carlin challenged us through his comedy.

russert was a nice man and while others have called him a first rate journalist, i will stop short of that. as mainstream journalists go, i found him to be competent and certainly above average. russert wrote books about his relationships with his dad and his son. he extolled the virtues of hard work and sang the praises of the american dream which allowed a working class kid like him to grow up and anchor meet the press.

i can't imagine begrudging tim russert's life in any way, but when companies other than his own broadcast tributes and friends and family refer to russert miracles that occurred in and around the mourning process, while carlin is mentioned almost as a means to bring up the titillating seven words you cannot say on television, i can't help but be dismayed.

george carlin was a john the baptist for our day. he was the voice crying in the wilderness warning us about the numbing effects of marketing and decrying organized religions penchant for playing the naked emperor. carlin was a coarse man who would be unwelcome at a bush family dinner, which is to say he was unimpressed by wealth or place.

the issue with the words is important, too. the media coverage seemed to trivialize the issue as fox news anchors were chuckling as they explained, "you still can't say those words on tv." of course, the point is lost on the obtuse. the point carlin made, (and lenny bruce before him,) was that words are only words while only the ideas they represent should have the power to offend.

perhaps carlin would have asked why does shit have the power to offend while poop seems clean and nearly cute. they are both words and they mean basically the same thing but one is considered derogatory primarily because it has come to popular use as an expletive. this is the basic point of carlin's rant about words-they have only as much power as one gives them. when writing i find i tend to choose the curse word over the milder option because it has power, because it gets attention and often bothers people. to parents i guess carlin might suggest they use the bad words that would come up on television or elsewhere as an opportunity to parent, to explain why a certain word was used and how a mature mind should think about being confronted with that word.

i love that tim russert championed the common man. i enjoyed hearing his son say russert was especially comfortable coming up to his son's college to watch a game and drink beer with him and his friends. it is okay, too, that he was beloved.

on the other hand, maybe it is not okay that carlin is not more beloved. people cannot be blamed for what they are not exposed to but at the same time, it is a sad testament to america that this voice was not more hallowed. for those who do miss carlin and plan on carrying a bit of his hell-raising spirit with them through the rest of their own lives, i know it will serve them and i congratulate them on their thoughtfulness and taste.

u23d

u23d

after seeing the u23d movie, i feel like i have just engaged in a guilty pleasure. i suppose deep down i do not find them as relevant as i once did, though they remain both noble and important. still, i love the music and the spirit in which it is delivered.

relevance is relative and subjective. in some ways, u2 is more relevant than ever as can be seen in the movie when u2 promotes the coexist brand, where letters are symbols of belief (or thought,) systems and the message is tolerance. (hence, the word "coexist," as a directive.) when u2 promotes an idea like this, they are relevant and they do make a difference.

in this movie and in the live concerts the film was culled from, u2 is reaching millions of people around the world with this coexist message and while the people they are reaching may not represent the demographic in power, those who can make change, the millions they reach will be in that demographic someday. this is real change, the kind of change politicians can only aspire to. it takes time, but this is how change happens.

u2, as a brand, is managed especially well.

by producing this movie, u2 satisfied fans who have wanted to see them and simultaneously added to their legend. 3d is not what it used to be. it's better. the technology has evolved and in this movie all the improvement is on display as the viewer, through the lens, hovers over larry's shoulder as he pounds away at the drums, perches just above and behind the front few rows of fans as they dance and cheer and snap photos from their cell phones and wave arms and sing their lungs out, joins the band on-stage to peer out at a sea of humanity, sees the u2 live show experience from every imagineable angle, in all it's joyful, serious, warm glory .

u2 is a rock band and so they are about sound. they make music and getting to hear that music in a movie theatre trumps your car or your house. getting that level of sound quality and being able to see the edge's facial expressions as he effortlessly moves from song to song is a treat and again, trumps those seats in the 80th row that cost $100 in certain ways.

ultimately, u2 continues to push out at the boundaries that would constrict them as artists. they want to appeal to all of your senses if they can and in u23d, they get your ears and your eyes, while teasing the tactile, as everyone in themovie seems like someone you could just reach out and pat on the back. if a day comes when they can feed you a coexist wafer while vibrating your seat at various time and filling the theatre with odors of snacks, other people, the night air, or ireland, they will.

this film is a tribute to u2 in so much as it exemplifies the spirit of their art to always invest in its own quality, push every boundary imagineable, especially that of technology, and seek relevance through meaning.

personal philosophy

everyone should have a personal philosophy. i think i have been developing my own ever since reading heinlein's job: a comedy of justice, when i was 21, borrowing liberally from the dean.

i can't say i have a reason why anyone other than me might be interested in my personal philosophy. i offer it none the less, like this blog, obsolete by math but filled with heart and soul.

my personal philosophy borrows from eastern thought in promoting virtue and right action. i also think it is important to maintain a macro-oriented, holistic and big picture view of one's life, (which is probably not the norm in our society.)

in youth we should come to recognize the flaws and inconsistencies in our fathers. some of us may rage and some of us may have little reason to rage, the point is to figure out, some time perhaps between 16 and 40, that our fathers are real and human and imperfect. and since they are imperfect it makes sense we would be upset about certain things.

the trick is not be paralyzed by that dissatisfaction. limiting that which renders us unfocused or less effective in our endeavors makes a foundation for taking responsibility for one's life, so we seek to conduct and command a life we can be proud to base our parenting on, so we grok the brotherhood of man in such a way as to feel a part of the massive organism humanity, so we gain meaning through doing and interacting and touching and growing and perpetual learning.

in our primes, (40 to 60?) having acquired balance we should learn to forgive most if not all transgressions of our fathers. as sons we come back to the middle, understanding the complex nature of life, having flaws and inconsistencies of our own.

and yeah, it seems to me life comes at us in 20 year segments. from 0-20 we confront the physical world, learning how to use our bodies and getting a sense life. from 20-40 we enjoy our physical prime but develop interests in headier subjects, climbing maslow's pyramid through love, competition, avocation, work, worship, self-awareness, aesthetic sensibilities, subtlety, taste, interaction, dynamics of every variety, dynamic in every way. youth, mournfully adored in our society is certainly a fun and interesting time of life. this segment represents the physical apex, or adult prime, of life.

as we are mental creatures, the 40-60 segment represents the overall prime of life, the mind being more firmly attached to our essence as well as more enduring. if one has a life's work, it should be accomplished in this period. (and one should have a life's work.)

60-80 should be about coming to grips with our nature, including the temporal aspect. it should also be about sharing wisdom

for me, in the early part of this third, prime segment, being a new father, i am interested in parenting as a life's work. i also feel like i have developed this certain world view, my own credo if you will. it borrows liberally and loosely from any number of traditions but it is in itself akin to a belief system.

• 
  
  we should always seek to be noble.


• noble, or right, action, begets nobility.


• the absence of nobility is the absence of value by measures.


• humanity is evolving.


• evolution has been utterly positive for humanity.


• anything that pushes forward the envelope of evolution is noble.


• that which detracts from or impedes evolution is ignoble, even if it creates a beautiful and demonstrative reaction.


• right action is its own reward.


• karma is less a law than an inevitable outcome.


• a light heart does sleep well.


• a heart engaged in deceit beats tensely and feeds upon itself.

these are of the main tenets, off the top of my head. it is not as if i am organizing a new religion. rather, i find religion obsolete. still, if all peoples could all agree on a similar set of basic values, i believe we would see the evolution of belief.

at the same time i wonder about people who do not construct and order their beliefs and values. i suppose some take them all from an institution or a book. others may rely on their own conscience to know what is right and wrong. many likely bend these things regularly making convenience the ultimate law.

as for me, i take pride in my morality, which may sound ridiculous but here's the bottom line: if i was in any way uncomfortable with myself in that way whatsoever, i would make a change, (which happens occasionally.) it is important for me to think on the important things in life and the big picture.

i also think it is worth talking about these things.

skepticism

perhaps this is one of those questions i should leave unanswered. maybe this is an area where labels, in spite of our affinity for them and their usefulness, should be purposely avoided. still, i have been considering the contrast between atheism and agnosticism.

i know this is an odd subject. our society avoids big questions like this. still, if i am to blog i prefer to spend some time blogging about the biggest of issues. if someone read this and was given pause, i could ask for no more.

strictly speaking i am an agnostic. i don't claim to know there is not a god anymore than i claim to know martians do not exist, (or the easter bunny or father time or the tooth fairy for that matter.) rather, i employ inductive reasoning in assuming there is not a god, in the sense most people think of such a being or creature.

i have not seen any evidence of god's existence nor do i know of any in the history of mankind. i have seen the folly of belief. i have the seen the tremendous amount of disagreement on the subject. i have seen the fruit of that disagreement in the form of holy wars and crusades. i understand why confucius would call belief the opium of the masses since the poor seem to harbor far more zeal than the wealthy.

belief is so subjective that if god did exist and was represented by a set of properties, the number of those who had it exactly right would be miniscule. it would probably be like 42 people in the history of mankind.

still, i can't claim, as a textbook atheist might, that i know there is no god. it is, after all, another unproveable belief. however, i prefer to call myself an atheist over an agnostic anyway. it feels less ambiguous and more honest. the fact is, i think this mass of people around the globe of varying degrees of zealotry, are mislead, deceived, confused, wrong.

the dictionary definition for agnostic:

ag·nos·tic (ag näs′tik)
noun
a person who believes that the human mind cannot know whether there is a God or an ultimate cause, or anything beyond material phenomena
Etymology: coined (1870) by Thomas Henry Huxley < a- + gnostic
adjective
of or characteristic of an agnostic or agnosticism

huxley was basically saying if it was not tangible, it could not be verified and therefore, could not be accepted as fact, which happens to be a large part of my argument against belief.

the dictionary definition for atheism is:

athe·ism (ā′t̸hē iz′əm)
noun
the belief that there is no God, or denial that God or gods exist
godlessness

it is my belief there is no god and i do think of myself as godless so this label works too. however, in believing something i do not and cannot know, i feel just like any other believer. so you see my quandary?

it's just semantics i suppose-i have no faith. still, ask me sometime and see what i say.

justice (part 1)

Injustices in society make me angry. Perhaps, angrier than most. I am bothered by things out of tilt, seeing the vulnerable taken advantage of, people who seem out of balance in a karmic respect.

I am easily perturbed by my country's self-perception. As Americans we grow up with this idea that we are the greatest country on earth. We are the white hats of the world and we stand for everything good and honest and wholesome. Whenever I feel the presence of this notion, I feel an anger rise inside of me along with a massive compulsion to dispel such mythology. In fact I love this country but I would prefer we as Americans were honest with ourselves about our past, present and future. In that way I think we can attain some of these ideals we merely profess to embrace.

This anger tends to be perceived as some form of self-hatred, (or anti-Americanism anyway,) instead of being recognized as sheer disappointment at how little of our potential we realize.

I suppose I have been conditioned in ways which define me and make me who I essentially am. My world view came from never having met my Father, from growing up with my Mother incarcerated, from living with grandparents and aunts and uncles, (all on my Mother’s side, of course.) This world view came from the methadone clinic, from oldies but goodies, from going out on Halloween as a “beer belly.”

This world view came from a dearth of familial intimacy, from a detachment from any cultural identity amidst a society so overwrought and overblown and supremely over-interested in their race and ethnicity and color and background that their heads are stuffed with pounds and chunks of self-aggrandizing local color and flavor, which serves to occupy the mind like Cops or American Idol or the TV Land reruns, dulling and stupefying like a bulldozer of mediocrity, pile-driving the shit out of sensibilities, so people are unable to connect with one another, unable to discern truth when it confronts them, unable to feel or empathize with those less fortunate and by less fortunate I do not mean that cute, starving vision of innocence in the pamphlet for your favorite charity, I am talking about the freaking murderer who seems so heinous and evil but who obviously had some crazy stuff happen to him to render him inclined to do the nasty and dark deeds he committed, unable to imagine anything outside one’s own realm, outside borders or economic strata, unable to organize and fight back against naked powers that be, be they simple propaganda or long held fallacies, unable to make a fucking move.

This world view came from speaking in tongues, a late blooming sex life, deprivation of the classics, the jockacracy, Ronald Reagan, "I Found It!", Christian schools, John Hughes, Josh McDowell, beach cruisers, La Puente, Covina, and Cardiff by the Sea, The Six Million Dollar Man, and smog.

This world view came from waking up in a perpetual frat party existence and realizing I neeeded to start reading the great writers. It came from giving up on my faith at 28 followed by 10 charming years. It came from being poor and nurturing the anger of youth. It came from spending a few days in LA County, booked on irresponsibility.

From all this, this life, I offer justice as something to speak on or of. It is what interests me and I think you might find it interesting in the same way.

Justice is like a rare, stolen, underground Picasso to me. It’s like a million bucks or anything perfect. It is nearly intangible, but it does exist and I love it as much as I love life itself. When Andy Dufresne pulls his shirt off in the driving rain after crawling through a tunnel of sewage to his freedom, and the warden blows a hole in his own head at the end of Shawshank Redemption, that’s the kind of justice I crave.

And that’s just the phony stuff. When it is real life, when I. Louis Libby gets convicted of a crime and is disbarred, my heart soars in spite of the knowledge it is not nearly enough justice for Libby. For a moment anyways, I cannot be bothered by the fact Libby will continue to lead a life of financial comfort, never coming close to the measure of justice he should know. (My world view suggests Libby feels the rest of the justice he deserves in an unseen, karmic sort of retribution.)


I rejoice when big corporations get it right in the pocketbook.


I love it when little towns in New England or countries in Europe legislate Donald Rumsfeld's fate to be arrested for war crimes if he ever sets foot in their territories. That is sublime to me, if only a stopgap unit of joy meant to tied my otherwise angry and dissatisfied person over until the next morsel of justice happens along.

I see justice in how the puritans who conducted the Salem Witch trials are viewed today. I see justice in Nuremberg. I see justice in Pinochet's legacy, how he will be remembered as the despotic military dictator placed in Santiago by Washington DC who ruthlessly killed his people, villifying him and those who supported him from abroad. I see justice too, in Reagan's legacy. Reagan will be remembered for taking the solar panels off the white house and restoring our dependence on foreign oil, for authorizing the sale of arms to Iran to supply a ruthless regime in Central America, (or two,) for using the bully pulpit against the college kids of People's Park as well as hoses, gas and clubs, for marketing propaganda more effectively than any person in his time with his nine most terrifying words in the English language, ("I'm from the government and I'm here to help,") and his "War on Drugs," for telling the air traffic controllers to go screw themselves because he could and because of the message it sent, for trickle-down clearly not trickling down, and for lying like Nixon.

Justice makes me smile. It sets my mind at ease. I am not referring to the justice that occurs in court rooms, though I am sure that justice plays its role. The justice I adore occurs more organically and is closer to truth.

I am happy to exclaim I see plenty of justice. It seems always at the heels of injustice.

"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."

-Martin Luther King Jr.

an open letter to keith olbermann

tonight i watched hillary clinton and barack obama give speeches as the tallies rolled in from the final two primaries in montana and south dakota. both showed a great deal of poise and class. i was especially impressed with how they showed appreciation and admiration for one another.

an open letter to keith olbermann:

dear keith olbermann,
for all the good you have done in holding the president accountable for any number of crimes and misdemeanors, your vitriol against hillary clinton has become unbearable. even tonight as chris mathews blathered on as usual during terry mcauliffe's introduction of mrs. clinton, you emerged later to inform us of what mcauliffe had actually said. apparently he introduced her as the next president of the united states. you scoffed as if it was just more dirty pool from the clintons, your perspective spinning off its axis and into utter chaos. so hillary's audience was amassed in a basement that does not allow for cell phone contact. so there were no television monitors in the room. you and your ilk are not so important and i thought you knew that.
i suppose you were too close to all of this to have the vision to see that hillary made a choice back around the time of the texas and ohio primaries to stay in this thing and fight. she had plenty of reason to do so, too. this was a close nomination process. indeed clinton won the majority of states most likely to be won by the democrats in november. (if you would challenge this idea, let's just point out then that she won california big.) the actual vote margins as well as delegate margins across the country were especially tight. so what's a bit of theatre in politics? apparently to you it was some major affront. the point the clinton campaign was making, keith, was that her campaign stayed relevant and vibrant right up to the last day of the primary season. hillary single-handedly invigorated the process even making puerto ricans and the typically irrelevant south dakotans and montanans feel important and involved. (why else would they turn out in such numbers?)
it was not easy for clinton and obama to draw distinctions from one another. it seemed at moments the clinton campaign wanted to bring up the fact that some people in this country are racist and would automatrically dismiss obama from the possibility of receiving their vote. since her campaign had always focused on beating the republicans prior to realizing they would need to shift their focus to the formidable obama, clinton had courted the independent and left-leaning republicans in the key swing states of ohio and florida from day one. hence why she was strongest in those places. however, you were enraged by her every maneuver.
you claim to not vote because you think it is inappropriate given your watchdog position as a journalist and yet, your preferences could not be more transparent.
when clinton depicted herself the more experienced candidate, better suited to answer a late night phone call alerting a president-leader to some unknown but massively dangerous threat in the world, you showed a particularly thin skin. obama responded, (because the media has broadcast his every move throughout the entire season,) and moved on.
the point is, these two great candidates have understood the nature of the endeavor they are engaged in from the beginning. it is obvious already they have not taken the fact that the other campaigned hard and tried to show themselves the better choice for the most high office personally.
within the next two days obama will announce hillary as his choice for vice president. and so, while you may have fallen in love with obama during the primary season as one is wan to do , it will be time to fall in line for the general election.
so quit killing your credibility when you attack president bush for subverting the constitution instead of protecting it, by disparaging the clintons. you do not owe it to this country to serve it, though you do in a capacity. similarly, the clintons have not owed it to the people of this country to serve and yet they have with distinction and for a long time. they have not been perfect by any stretch but they have been a force for positive change.
your voice has been so important these last several years. you are finally beating the propagandist bill o'reilly in the ratings on some nights and you deserve a great deal of credit for this and your work is important. the free pass the present administration was granted in the wake of 9/11 was phenomenal and your voice, (along with only one or two others, really,) has finally started to penetrate the fear and paranoia that permitted that free pass in the first place.
as you might say to president bush, please sir, regain your perspective.

a day in the life of a sports nut

from the why i enjoy sports department... for me today began with an early morning car crash. i was jolted from a standstill on the 405 this morning by a mercedes ramming into me from behind without even braking. I'm fine despite some stiffness in my neck but the disruption and subsequent shock caused me to turn around and come home for the day so i could get comfortable and start the process of dealing with insurance companies and possibly doctors.

the opening day of the tournament is a solid vacation day choice so to wind up at home, (literally,) by accident on this day, was ironically pleasant. i kept the volume low and glanced enough to keep up with games as i gave statements over the phone and accomplished some of my normal work.

by the time the evening session rolled around i focused in on the usc-k state game. the trojans responded especially poorly to k state's pressure around the perimeter and their point guard hackett seemed defeated by it. it was disappointing to see sc lose but still exhilerating to see all of the outcomes unfolding as they do: four games staggered by a few minutes at four sites around the country four times per day, (for these first two days of the tourney.) it is truly a spectacle of madness. i missed the caesar's palace sportsbook of years gone by when every missed free throw draws a collective groan and every slam dunk a cacophonous roar.

as usc lost, cbs let me see the end of the duke-belmont game, which in spite of the turnout is what the tournament is really all about. i flipped into the upper reaches of my cable system and found sam cassell was on tv only in a celtics uniform. i had no interest in that one and never returned to it.

when ucla finally took the court, my sports evening was in full bloom. besides the number one seeded bruins opening game, the lakers were in utah, the kings were in phoenix to play gretzky's coyotes and despite the void of charisma in the men's tennis game, nadal was in the desert to play james blake. that's two, nine, 30 and 31 on my cable system and i worked it like a champ. the slightest hint of a carl's jr commercial got my thumb busy and tonight, the advertisers lost.

ucla took a big lead early but the game was still entertaining. the kings and coyotes scored 10 goals in regulation and i must have missed eight of them in real time. the lakers jumped on the jazz right out of the gate and for a change, maintained a comfortable lead throughout.

blake outplayed nadal but lost the first set. he outplayed him again in the second set and won the crucial points to take it 6-3. they were on serve at 4-3 in the third when i had to grin to myself...who would have thought i would spend more time watching the tennis than any of the other games? it was refreshing to see a tennis match that commanded my attention, which had much to do with the blake being the only american player i deem interesting enough to watch. blake took nadal's serves early and put his opponent off balance by drilling returns at his feet all night. nadal for his part showed his class by winning most of the pivotal points on which the match turned. he lost two crucial points in a row in the second set which blake gained confidence from but when the critical points came around again in the third set, (yes, in the infamous eighth game,) blake wilted and nadal came to life. in a matter of five minutes, the 2+ hour match ended with a whimper. still, i won because i was glued to the tv set for tennis.

the kings-coyotes game went to overtime and eventually a shootout. neither team will play in the post-season but it's still a great game and the four-on-four hockey for the ot was exciting and the shootout took an extra round for anyone to beat a goaltender and lo and behold, it was the king's patrick o'sullivan with the game-winner. (4 for 4 in shootouts on the season.)

back to channel nine for the lakers where the jazz pulled to within nine but the lakers closed it out. kobe was super down the stretch except for one ill-advised three. at game's end kobe made an over-the-shoulder-while-spinning-in-the-air 40-foot pass to odom for a dunk and turned to jazz fans while tugging on his jersey to emphasize his number 24 and make a case for his mvp campaign. the clinton campaign has nothing on kobe and while some laker fans in the arena could be heard chanting "m-v-p," another threw a water bottle from on high to the surface of the court and others boohed a malicious, malevolent boo. i wish kobe was a more respectful and classy kind of superstar. i wish he was all the young kevin love seems poised to be. but he is not and i have been disappointed enough by this simple fact. i am ecstatic the lakers are in first place. gasol and ariza are readying to return and the playoofs loom.

what a day. (what a night!) oh, and look at that? while a dull baylor squad that had no business in the tournament got bounced today without fanfare, a flip to espn finds the snubbed sun devils of arizona state beating the southern illinois salukis in the nit by 15 with 30 seconds left.

ralph nader

who is will durst and why isn't he funny and why is everyone bashing ralph nader? are they dumb? did eddie vedder lose his mind? is stephanie miller and thom hartmann suddenly delirious. did susan sarandon and tim robbins accidentally flip on the stupid switch?

as much as i like dennis kucinich, he is no ralph nader. his illustrious record hardly holds a candle to ralph nader's. perhaps this is the greatest testament to how low our expectations have fallen within the realm of politics.

what happened in 2000 was unfortunate but face facts, ralph nader is a much better candidate for president than al gore. nader has a long and storied history of standing up for the american people, (and by domino effect the people of the world.)

so it seems we have come to have two sets of preferences: one might be our preferred candidate then two would be our preferred candidate of those we consider electable. isn't that sort of pathetic? and isn't this what ralph nader represents and why he is still a candidate? his candidacy is like a finger wagging in our faces to remind us of just how low are expectations have gone.

hillary clinton and barack obama are light years better candidates than the lying warmongers who would mutilate the constitution on the republican side but they are just alike in terms of policy. their health care plans both suck. neither has suggested a single payor system. hillary clinton kowtows to the fearmongerson the right and barack obama refused to vote in favor of a billl that would cap credit card interest at 30% interest. so if you're wealthy or a trial lawyer, perhaps the mainstream candidates really are for you. but otherwise, if you're of the people, ralph nader is far and away better for you, (and me.)

i have recently heard many people i respect immensely come out against ralph nader as if he owes it to us not to run. every single one of these people can choose not to vote for him and they can also choose to shut their fat traps. so far they only seem to be choosing the former.

i was discussing the ralph nader documentary; ralph nader:an unreasonable man, with a friend recently, and she said after watching the movie she found ralph adorably unreasonable. i could hardly give him a better endorsement.

brotherly love

"i love yous," have always been like daggers to me. they make my ears prick up whenever and wherever i hear them. they're like streakers. they call to me and i just can't ignore them.

i suppose anyone who was not raised by their natural parents can likely relate to my emotional reaction to this phrase. my aunt and uncle loved me. they loved me enough to take me into their home and raise me from the time i was 11-years-old. they never did adopt me, opting instead to keep me officially a ward of the court. I think this status provided them a modest monthly income.

the "i love yous," my aunt and uncle shared with me tended to be of the written variety, scrawled in greeting cards on my birthday. the dearth of "i love yous," in my childhood made my uncle keith sound weird when he would visit and tell me he loved me virtually every time he saw me. i can still remember those "i love yous." i remember my uncle keith offering them up and me thinking it was odd and that he seemed uncomfortable in delivering them but in retrospect, i see it was me who was uncomfortable in receiving them.


today my brother paged me out of the blue and said he loved me. it's not the craziest thing ever for him to do this though i don't think he's done it before. he has told me he loves me though, even recently. he has been out of prison for about eight months and i think he has a fresh lens on life and he has perhaps been trying to speak his mind and let his loved ones know he appreciates them. still, this "i love you," was unexpected and it caught me like a left hook.


i love my brother. i loved him when we were reunited at 6 and 11, when i took to kissing him goodnight but was chided by my uncle not to do that as it was not manly. i loved him when we were kids playing matchstick in the pool out back. i loved him in the ocean when he surfed past me as i lay on my boogie board, wishing i had his talent for hanging ten. i loved him when he left and went to denver, even though i felt like i did not know him in those days. i loved him when he was locked up. i sent him books and wrote him letters, reported my thoughts on the sports world and waxed poetic.


we celebrated our birthdays together this past year for the first time in a number of years and at the end of the night, (or the beginning of the morning,) eating pistachios on a balcony and swigging the last of many beers, he revealed some insecurity. i spoke my mind in saying he had a unique opportunity in so much as he has the chance to live two lives. Yes, he is the man who made some mistakes and spent some eight years locked up, neck deep in the prison gang culture. unlike most of his peers in those days, he is out and has chosen a completely different environment for himself. that is laudable in and of itself.


i think the "i love you," stems from that evening. it comes from all that he is going through but in addition to saying he loved me, tommy said something about how i was always there for him and i never wore a mask. (of course, i do wear masks but the one that represents my brother's best friend feels completely honest and authentic.)

i do not begrudge my aunt and uncle for withholding their "i love yous." i would sooner be angry if they had said it from a sense of obligation. i had a chip on my shoulder growing up in their house. my sister was loved obviously and i could not begrudge her that, either. she deserved it and i wanted her to have it. the relationship she had with her mother was intense like only a mother and her child can have.

i appreciated her honesty, too, in not faking it with me. i nurtured the chip on my shoulder and was angry at the world for the fact i had no mother, (or rather, my mother was incarcerated for the length of my youth and died from a drug overdose when i was barely a man.) but i withheld, too. at christmas time as gifts were spread over the breadth of the living room, i opened mine one by one and feigned shock and ecstasy.

in my first year in my aunt and uncle's home my shock and ecstasy were real. i went from receiving one present per christmas to this year in which i received an air hockey table and a host of lesser presents. it was like winning the lottery and my amazement was real and palpable. in years that followed i could never duplicate that emotion, which had clearly impressed my aunt and uncle. i think it was like a drug to them. i think they felt pretty great at being able to affect a child in such a way. in later years i sensed their disappointment at my inability to duplicate that first christmas response.

in reality, i could have done it. acting is easy. but i would not have been true to myself which is the golden rule of my life and so, no. i could not act as impressed as i initially was. and i could not act like i meant "i love you" to them when i had no real idea what "i love you" meant in those days. i was able to lie on occasion. embarking on band camp or church camp or some such thing when i would be away for several days we often acted out this real family saga in which we would exchange tepid "i love yous," like alligators pushing up on front legs as if to stand and walk but merely exposing stumpy haunches, barely creating way for a snail's passage beneath. such grandiloquence.

in offering these "i love yous," i traded on my survival skills. i never felt good about socking someone in a fight either but if it was me or him, i socked. "i love yous," were the punches that kept me in my family and away from the unknown foster parents who would make my life so much more hellish and angry.

a girl at work said i love you to me recently and i was quietly flabbergasted. i knew she only meant well and i recognized it came from her 21-ness and that's all nice. the very next day i heard her say it to someone else and i could not help but think how nice it must be for her that she can throw that phrase around. when she said it to me, my response was to say, "right back atcha." that's it. that's the best i can do.

it is interesting to me too, that this girl says the phrase full-on. she intones every part of it: "i llluvvv you." when i have used the phrase under duress i have tended to shorten it, turn it into "love ya," or "i love ya." in this way i feel truer to myself while also doling out the phrase that pays.

"i love you" is just too intimate. it means too much to me and it has a certain power that makes it like a gun i can't know if it's loaded. i just don't mess with it.

at home with my little girl and my son, i consciously say i love you often, (i think.) i want to be sure they hear it and from me. i want them to be able to use the word appropriately, easy enough but not without sensing the gravity of it. and i want to be sure i can say it to them. "i love you" means i continue to get healthier as i grow older. and i do love my two little darlings, like nobody's business. i love them so much i am afraid of the pain i could conceivably know.

i love my brother too. he's been here with me through it all. i love my dad who was my uncle. i love my wife. i love my sister and my friends and the rest of my family and my extended family and yeah, in a way, i love that 21-year-old girl from work who helped illustrate this lesson for me.

here: check this out. i can say it to you right now and i don't even know who you are.

"love!"