yahoo indeed

a friend of mine hooked me up with the yahoo unlimited music service for my birthday. i think he paid $50 or $60 and i get access to all the songs yahoo has, which is considerable but not everything. for instance i've noticed they must not have given michael jackson any cash because there are virtually no beatles songs. similiarly, radiohead must have failed to sign on with yahoo. (and hey, sometimes the computer is a more convenient vehicle to play music, compared to fishing through a rack of cd's to find a desired song.)

in short, i really like the service. i seem to be reconnecting with my inner-80s man. (stranger still, i must have been more effeminate in the '80s than i recall because abc and talk talk and soft cell and many of the bands i sort of left behind, were tragically unhip and teetering on the brink of quentin crisp, if you know what i mean.)

all this browsing and rediscovering reminded me of where music was a few years ago as an industry. napster was seemingly banishing music exec after music exec to a life on skid row and metallica was sueing and mtv hosted round tables and legislation was introduced all in the name of the struggling business of selling music.

let me approach the point i am struggling to make from a different perspective. reading a new yorker article on brent scowcroft the other day i was reminded the main reason for the first gulf war was because saddam hussein had invaded kuwait and american oil interests were jeopardized. where vietnam seemed more an idealogical war, (we feared the soviet union and in light of the cold war made a high priority of fomenting democracy, [capitalism,] abroad,) george h w bush took us to the gulf to protect american business interests. and while lives were not lost protecting the music industry, the government did step in with similiar goals; protect an industry's interests. instead of oil supplies, the music industry required the protection of intellectual property.

something about this doesn't sit well with me. i know we've bailed out other industries in the past. i know we've loaned money to chrysler and a couple of our aircraft builders and none of these sit well with me.

it has been said that insider trading does the stock market a favor. it nudges prices in the direction they are going to go anyway thereby abating sudden, more cataclysmic shifts that could initiate the harm of panic. i think that's crap too. when you are constantly propping up systems to avert challenges (problems,) you are essentially just hiding problems with the system. if the market needed the pre-movement spurred by insider trading, (which it does not,) the viability of the market as a system would have to be questioned and a systemic change would need to be implemented as opposed to relying on a group of cheaters to make it right.

when chrysler had it's trouble in the '80s, the federal government should not have intervened. if our economy took a hit, it would only have caused us as a nation and a society to work harder to right the ship.

books are free at libraries, (as they should be.) the intellectual property rights are not protected in the manner of a recording artist, nor should the recording artist's rights ever been protected in the way they were/are.

by constantly propping up various industries within our economy, we do it a disservice. it is no longer organic. the economy no longer takes on a life of its own as capitalism suggests it should. instead of growing into areas as demand deems, it tends to stay within a fenced area and in effect, eat it's own ad nauseum.

i believe had congress left napster to its bidding those years ago, we would have arrived at this current state of bliss known as yahoo music engine much sooner. the consumer has known the album was a lousy way to purchase music for a long time. the industry sold us this idea that the album somehow represented a larger work. it could cover a period of time or even a concept but the idea was, it was better than the single, which was so limited by its accepted format. well this was a slimy way to sell us poor u2 songs like 4th of july, when i look at the world and bass trap. (in fairness, u2 has been the kosher hot dog of bands over the years, very little filler, compared to others.) the idea was that we were all collectors interested in the arc of the life of the band blah blah blah and it was just so serious. right. . .

well, the single is making its return and not in its old form. with the yahoo music engine, (and yahoo is just one of many companies, likely not even the best at it, offering similiar service,) the consumer can pick and choose songs to listen to or purchase. the price i've seen seems to be between 79 and 99 cents per song. as an example, (and sticking with u2,) at 99-cents per song, i could have paid about $8 for the songs off of how to dismantle an atomic bomb that i like and ignored the last three songs. that is a more consumer friendly business by light years than the old model.

is it unfair in some way to the artists? hell no. in fact, it merely rights previous wrongs, (selling us filler we nver asked for.)

did you ever hear a song called birds fly (whisper to a scream,) by icicle works? i liked that song back when it came out so at some point in time, i went out and bought the whole record. every second of the record outside of that song sucked. it was horrible.

how about tell that girl to shut up by transvision vamp? digging your scene by blow monkeys? what was that song by robbie neville? how about interpol or the spin doctors? (in their cases, since every song sounds just like the one i liked, all the rest of the songs are filler.) collective soul? that evan dando got a lot of mileage out of one good song because the record company sold an album full of filler and had the good fortune of some media critics proclaiming the emperor to be exquisitely attired but now we can admit the truth, the lemonheads sucked.

so i am ecstatic about the emergence of this form that is the yahoo music engine. there are about three jet songs i really like and one by the darkness and one by remy zero and several songs from the past i need to pick up for a cd i'm compiling to give out as a favor at my wedding and i can do this for the cost of one album.

had legislation never passed to beat down napster, it is likely the music industry would be weaker today as people would still be freely sharing, (something we were all taught to do in kindergarten,) their music with one another but it would have evolved more quickly, in search of the avenues of revenue recently discovered. these devices such as the mini ipod and the nano would have come along sooner.

oh really. . . (*yawn*)

a friend of mine sent me a story from bill o'reilly's blog. my friend knows i tend to disagree with o'reilly but i think he finds o'reilly fairly agreeable and thought as i once studied journalism, i would be interested in o'reilly's thoughts. the story is reachable by clicking on the header, in case you want to see for yourself.

about 3-4 weeks ago the new yorker ran a story on the la times, specifically on what is happening to their business. (bill was correct-it is in decline. in fact, i need to cancel my subscription. some days their sports section does not even run a kings story. sports is usually 8 pages during the week and the quality is poor in comparison to other local papers like the daily news or even the oc register. i prefer to read the san francisco chronicle online.) but i digress in talking about sports. . .

the new yorker's article got me to thinking about the role of the press. their stated role. at least in many cases, should be similiar to that of a watchdog. it is why we have the freedom associated w/ the press. so they can watch our leaders while we're doing the dishes and picking up the kids. if, in our current culture and political climate, they are considered liberal, so be it, (though i find them far from liberal enough, by and large.)

still, the real question that occurred to me upon reading about the la times' business was one of supply and demand. more and more the editors of our papers around the country are forced to treat their work like a business. this is to say, they have to give the public what it wants. you might disagree with me if i say the public gets dumber by the hour, but then again, you might agree w/ me. and as such, the public wants less and less as it relates to real news, controversial stories, facts about our leaders, etc. so the press is in a quandary. give 'em what they want, or continue its role as public watchdog? well, business wins, generally. and so it looks like we will let the press go to pot. and i would say this is yet another early sign of the decline of the empire.

as "the people," if we can't take a stand with our business community to say we will find ways to perpetuate journalism as we know it, to hold journalism to a standard in the tradition of our great journalists like pulitzer and bernstein, we have a problem. because if we are willing to let the quality of journalism decline, if we are willing to cater to the lowest common denominator, it is us who loses, specifically later generations. it is us who will not catch the politicians when they are hiding things from us and/or not doing what we pay them for.

and it is not just politicians whom journalists check. they check the cops lest they get too heavy-handed. they check the corporations lest the top executives raid pension funds or use fuzzy math to show profits that don't exist or hide their money in offshore tax shelters. the stories appear every day but it seems no one is reading them.

and so, journalism finds itself at a crossroads. feed the people what they need or what they want? right now, it appears what they want is getting the upper hand. still, i have hope we still yet get it right.

i get frustrated w/ journalists who act as if the public knows, (100% and unerringly,) what is good for them. the truth is, often they do not. when scarborough goes on the air and says americans prefer this to that by a 55-45% margin, he means to lend the choice some sort of innate divine right of kings blessing, as if the majority could not possible be wrong. but we know better than that. right?

the truth is it can go either way at any time. sometimes the majority is spot on. other times they're overwhelmingly wrong. but to posit that their (our,) endorsement makes it so is ludicrous. and if we can get to this point where we admit the public sometimes does not know what is good for it, it seems to me it isn't much further until we get to the point where we value journalism and its role in our society so much that we protect it, (nurse it back to health even.)

media outlets that gain money from the basest instincts of its consumers should pay a tax to promote the public service side of the business that puts those reporters out there watching the various entities on our behalf, that gets that front page section ready every day and promotes a lively debate in the op-ed pages. how do you ensure they do such a thing? mandate it? i guess not. but i don't purport to have the answer. i am more interested in the questions.

why does bill o'reilly say many newspapers do not want to report the story? is it true? i suppose maybe it is but it's hardly a part of the story considering how much coverage the story's gotten. i've been reading about it for a long time. i think the following two paragraphs say much about bill o'reilly:

There are a number of reasons for the depressing situation, pardon the pun. The internet provides news efficiently, the decline of public education means fewer Americans care about what's going on, and people are very busy these days. Many of us don't have time to spend an hour reading the paper.

that paragrph was factual and reasonable. and he hit the nail right on the head. he is accurate-these really are the reasons newspapers are in decline.

But the collapse of journalistic standards is another reason some have turned away from the press. Most Americans are not ideological junkies, craving their daily dose of political propaganda. Just give us the facts, and some lively opinion based on the facts. The political jihadists who have taken over some newspapers are driving people away.

the first sentence clings to truth in journalism by sheer hint. in fact one could say almost anything in this manner and be basically correct. for example:

the adherence to religious dogma is another reason the u.s. leads the world in murders per capita.

i'm sure that is a true sentence and yet, it is far from relevant, really. the fact that americans are not ideological junkies, (that characterization may hint that o'reilly's staged outrage is wearing on him,) craving our daily propaganda, is a platitude. i find o'reilly's use of the word "lively," to be most telling. what scholar would say the debate need be lively? how about evenly matched? or erudite? well supported?

but lively is bill's game. he gets in there and blusters and talks like a man who is ever ready to take someone behind the wood shed and give them a whooping if necessary, and he is lively. but in a way he is right too, despite his swipe at self preservation. the facts are key. the debate is a natural but we do not need to hold it sacred. whenever two or more gather, there will be debate. no need to protect it.

the facts are another matter. they need to be accounted for at all times. hence, we need the journalism of ethics and standards. bill's last sentence in this paragraph, (i have to admit,) gets on my nerves a little. again, it's quite colorful. as if the islamic culture is not being demonized enough over here and americans are just not frightened enough, bill takes the opportunity to use "jihadists," to drive his point home. political jihadists. this is meant to say the liberals who stand by their journalistic standards demanding all things political be held accountable, are conducting a holy war against the people who might have subscribed, (i think i am supposed to get, the good and decent people who might have read their paper.)

bill gives opinion which is how he gets away with a sentence like that (again.) the political jihadists, (who these people are we must guess. bill could be implying it's the owners of the new york times but who really knows? he goes on to say the times ran 53 articles critical of the president in 30 days over katrina. katrina may represent the single most easy episode to be critical of the president for in his tenure and given the number of op-ed pieces the times prints, is almost two a day really that much? is it overkill?)

maybe the jihadists is the chicago tribune corporation which took over the la times or maybe it is the owners of the nyt, for bill? but these are also the papers whose ownership is most alligned with o'reilly's values. the corporate owners are the ones most focused on profits and therefore, most willing to listen to what the people want.

it is interesting to note the family owned papers like newsday have maintained staffing levels at a higher rate than the corporate owned ones and allowed profit margins to slip down in order to maintain their journalistic integrity. (meanwhile, the la times wins a record number of pulitzer prizes and loses its editor in chief and another fraction of staff, not to mention pages.) so bill attempts to bite the hand that feeds him in order to perpetuate the myth he is really trying to sell here, which is that the media is liberally-biased.

oh? and so, the jihadists is really just liberals again. bill is ranting against liberals. i totally get it now and i should have gotten it sooner but the truth is, one has to dissect what a guy like bill o'reilly says if one is to understand it for what it is. seriously, he uses language like a tool in order to promote his opinion. it's worth saying too, o'reilly is an articulate fellow.

when bill goes on to say this paper or that paper has 9 to 1 liberal columnists to conservative, he further means to polarize. and this is what i dislike about bill o'reilly. it's not the bloviating so much as it is the divisiveness. if he were less obsessed with polarizing people, less concerned with telling his audience they must be attached to an accepted wing of today's ideological poles, i wouldn't mind dealing wth what he actually has to say.

later o'reilly mentions the new york times (in a way meant to imply they are especially liberal,) yet it was an nyt reporter who was doing the bidding of the current administration when joe wilson wrote a piece critical of their motives for going to iraq, (and critical of their "evidence,") by publishing the name of a cia operative who was undercover, (joe wilson's wife.) (robert novak, another right wing schill faux journalist was also involved.) when her (judith miller,) editor removed her from all things washington and assigned her elsewhere, because of the appearance of journalistic impropriety, he later said she kept drifting back over there. this is to say, she continued to turn in the occasional story on national affairs and washington politics. and no wonder, she was the tool of karl rove and scooter libby who of course, are tools of dick cheney.

the point is, o'reilly should stop lumping everyone together. it does none of us any good to label ourselves or stigmatize another perspective we see as contrasting with our own. so it is that o'reilly later says this:

And then there is the hate factor. Not only do many newspapers aggressively push an agenda, but they demonize those with whom they disagree.

i guess o'reilly would say i am demonizing him right now if he were to read my lengthy retort, but i don't mean to demonize him. i mean to take issue with his methods and techniques, and with the substance of the things he says. in fact, i hope i have said enough to withdraw myself from liberalism's corner while pointing out the error of o'reilly's way, which of course is his liberal use of bias and innuendo. . .

the nba sends a message?

when the nba mandates a white, business-oriented dress code for its players, i wonder if it has fully considered the message it is sending.

on the surface, the message is: society is more comfortable with people who dress in a certain fashion, (the fashion itself, a non-fashion of coats and ties and slacks and loafers and tucked-in shirts,) therefore, because the league's image is in need of a cleanup and because the league needs the players to look like role models, (even if they are not that,) for the many black kids who look up to them, (so the league can sell the players and itself and make lots of money for both parties, but disproportionately more for the owners and executives whose job it is to supply the capital on the front side and market the league believing all the while theirs is the real talent and guys who are athletic and play basketball well are a dime a dozen so the league is justified in taking the lion's share of profits,) we impose this dress code to make our athletes who happen to be mostly black, look, well, white.

is that the message the nba meant to send? the underlying message is directed at those young and impressionable the nba deigns to tell that clothing, yea fashion choices, make the man, which should be considered a lie. the nba is telling kids not to dress like a rapper and one can only speculate about the reasons. is it because rappers are considered bad or evil or in poor taste? is it the white man's incessant fear of the black man? (and if so, isn't that fear a natural byproduct of the slaveowner-slave relationship?)

are jay-z and sean "puffy" combs not role models?

look, draw your own conclusions here. i'm always more interested in the questions than the answers but this move by david stern is topsy-turvy.

the nba is in effect saying, (by this dress code edict,) the clothing of the white man is respectable and anything that deviates from it is not. (at the same time they are saying long live the status quo, hooray for the establishment, and rich people rule.)

this is not the message we should be sending to our kids, especially those who do not come from advantage. we should be telling them substance is what matters, not attire. maybe the dress code is not even about black and white. maybe it's about young and old. maybe the kids who play basketball for a living are doing their version of the vietnam war protest, only their rebellion comes in baggy, low-riding pants and throwback jerseys, backwards baseball caps and doo rags.

are the black kids who enter the nba still wet behind the ears, embracing white, corporate america? or are they merely paid by that monolith, happy to take the cash and accompanying lifestyle, but inclined to move off in their own direction as it relates to their personal and private lives? for way too long we have asked if david stern approves of ai. i wonder if ai approves of david stern. i wonder if stephen jackson is a fan of ken lay. does ben wallace endorse the corporate world of the halliburtons et. al., shuffling money off to the caymen islands to shelter profits from taxation and paying off politicians in nigeria at the expense of the people whose babies will breathe polluted air?

is the nba telling all kids the uniform preferred by corporate america is the only acceptable attire? if so, is that fascist and misguided?

also, if shirts and pants today, is hair next? will wallace's corn row/afro puff tandem be replaced by a fade? or is corruption solely the realm of fashion? what about cars? can they pull up to the arena in a stretched hummer limo with spinning rims or will they be required to own a town car or a navigator? and what of tattoos? so associated with jail and drugs. . .perhaps stern can ban them? surely he would have to grandfather in the tatted players of today but he could get the word out that outside of the tats in existence this very day, tattoos are banned from the bodies of nba players and punishable by laser removal and a charitable donation.

how pathetic the various elder statesmen of sport, too, this past week lining up in support of david stern's misstep. the anti-role model charles barkley declared the new code good for the black kids of america and michael irvin could be seen grinning on espn in support of a dress code that would tolerate his suits, (which tend to look magnanimous in a hollywood nightclub but would likely get a young, black kid in a corporate job interview a "good-luck-and-we'll-keep-your-resume-on-file," and the door.)

isn't it time we stopped kowtowing to the insecure? who cares what the person is wearing? care about their performance. care about their actions. ron artest is not a thug because of his clothing. nor is jim brown a thug because of his skull cap. actions should define people, (and it could be argued they do for the reasonable but in this case, the unreasonable exercise command.) when teaching children i think it is wise to denounce the action, as opposed to the man. (by the way, for those who haven't been paying attention, jim brown is closer to being a saint than a thug.)

on the other hand, if the lesson the guys in the nba and the black kids are getting is: the world is not fair and does not necessarily makes sense but if you do not conform, it will break you so it is important to choose your battles wisely and suck on a lemon from time to time, then that is a whole other thing and brings up an entirely new set of questions.

the blank page

ahh, the blank page. at once so liberating and so initimidating, the question (to love,) is: why do i write?

the answer is a mish-mash of catharsis, vanity and aptitude.

i write because i need to write. it is catharsis. when i write, i take the time to study my motives, to listen to how i've come upon a conclusion or why i've arrived at a certain place. if god is truly in the details, i understand god is understanding. i sense the little steps of meaning.

recently i have come to the realization that i have something of an authority complex. it did not just dawn on me one day while napping in the park. i arrived at this epiphany through a complex series of smaller epiphanies.

from an early age i distrusted the adult world. i had three childhood homes. in the first, my grandfather sat around the house collecting disability and devising new and improved ways of tricking people and padding his bank acount all the while tinkling cubes of ice in a glass of scotch whiskey. he was a severe man, wise in the ways of the world, dumb to the means of true happiness. next i lived in an abusive home wherein actions were dictated by a sinister drug; heroin. finally, i spent my teen years in a fundamentalist christian environment. instead of thoughtful answers to questions, instead of conclusions drawn from standing on the shoulders of giants, i received stock dogma.

writing has been my redemption and my reward. writing allows me to hear what impels me through my days. writing helps me to shhhhhhh.

it is funny too, i am so insecure about my writing. i want anyone who reads it to like it. i want them to consider it worth reading or at least satisfactorily written. moreso, i want someone who writes to consider it a quality product, (because i think in writing they must have some kindred aspect to myself.) simultaneously, i really do write for me and i could hardly care less how it is received or if it is received. (most of what i have written has never been seen or heard by anyone but me.)

still, i write. here, on a blog. in a file i call (ingeniously enough,) "writing," in email, on smack boards in cyberspace, in journals kept at the side of my bed, in the note pad of my blackberry, in a personal file at work, whenever and wherever. whatever. it is not a sentence, nor is it a glory. it simply is.

korn again

get ready to be sold. emi group is giving korn about a $15 million advance in return for an over 25% stake in their sales, publishing, merchandising and touring revenue.

read the article in the la times, (click header,) and you may get the feeling it is a groundbreaking deal people interested in business should ooh and ahh over. it seems barnumian in so much as the record company is banking on their ability to sell you a product.

the product, of course, is korn's music and image. an emi executive is quoted in the article saying the quality of the soon-to-be-released record played a role in the commitment the company made to the band.

in fact, the company has merely negated the risk they usually confront. by committing the upfront money to a band whose sales have dropped over their last two albums, (and 5+ years,) significantly, they are simultaneously committing to spending enough money to ensure sheep will listen. by sheep, i mean the easy targets of marketing who never consider the fact they are being marketed to and are indifferent about the effect of that marketing on their lives.

emi has assessed the risk and calculated statistical information on how their investment will perform and they have found the numbers wholly agreeable. they are now set to persuade the public and bully their way into markets they were not formerly a part of.

with all the record industry has been going through, you had to know these executives were conspiring on how to save their places in an industry that has produced massive amounts of wealth for a relative few.

i hated the way things turned out with napster. by protecting the artist's rights, courts have chosen to support industry over humanity. a kid in a room in italy likes a record so much, he wants to put it up on his website for anyone to download and enjoy just as much, (connecting him incidentally to a kid in hoboken, and let's face it, there is only so much music one person can consume,) is vilified in favor of the idea that the artist can own this piece of art they created in such a way they deserve the right to collect on it from virtually everyone who enjoys the record too, or even doesn't enjoy it but for whatever reason was allured enough to make the purchase.

the artists are kings, the recording industry is the catholic church and collecting is the divine right.

if this right was taken from the artist, he or she would have more avenues to make money but might be less likely to make the sheer volume of profit that may well be available to korn as they embark on a relationship that will severely hamper their ability to make business, if not artistic, decisions. not only is there not anything wrong with forcing the artist to work harder and perhaps in a more locally oriented way, it would create an environment that would push back on the globalization and homogenization currently having a greater and greater impact on the industry and the quality and diversity of product available.

korn has recently hauled in about 20% of what they did in the late '90s. their angle is clear. struggling band wants to maintain spot in current canon of globally available artists for obvious reasons. by giving up unprecedented control of their business, they get the golden egg of top notch, well funded, marketing.

(go ahead, sing the reel big fish song with me: "sell out, with me today. sell out!")

if you are one who will go out and buy the korn record, you are one of the sheople. you do not mind being manipulated. the integrity of your taste is seriously in question. because of the relationship between the artist and the corporation, the product has to be ba-aa-aa-aaad.

walk on

terra took four steps at 10 months, and one week, (or 8 days to be precise.) she never looked back from there. never was interested in crawling really. only invested seven weeks on it.

some day i want terra to know she began walking at this age. i suppose i want her to know everything really. i want her to understand as much as she can so she can make the best decisions possible.

three weeks later she disdains crawling altogether. sometimes she wobbles, (but then, who doesn't?) mostly she sets her mind to something she must investigate and she walks to it. there she attempts to taste it, she pokes it with her index finger like she is interrogating a surly suspect, and she tries to pick it up and drop it. or throw it, though her throws have a soft touch tossing sort of style.

tonight she handed a ball off with me, back and forth. her brain is whirring as she pieces together how to operate herself, a little like a loony factory worker unsure of the capabilities and controls of his machinery, sure, but with an aptitude and improvement curve that would blow your socks off.

she is a little girl, so full of promise and delight, so life-affirming. i am anxious to see her choices. i'm anxious to teach her and learn from her, a process in full swing, really.

i'm anxious but patient for all of our shared experiences: active vacations and games and holidays and lazy afternoons and open houses and the both of us snuggling up to her mother during rainy, thunderstorming nights.

i'm anxious but patient for her experiences: school and work and social activities and learning music or a foreign language and staying up late with her friends, baking, kissing a boy, backpacking in europe or joining the peace corps and travelling to a faraway land, starting a family or doing something great.

i'm anxious but patient for the difficult times too. i'm sure a day will come when i will be chagrined by her behavior. i know we will grieve together and i hope i am a good example and deserving of her trust through the worst of times. i expect she will suffer disappointments and i hope i hide my own disappointment well and bathe my reaction in love.

the world is open to us, me and terra. she is a child in the world and i am a child of the world. i sense my essence in the imaginary question mark i see hovering over her head. from here we grow together, learning to live in love.

cold

I am so cold this morning. The weather in mid-august has turned chilly. Clouds have taken the morning and the thought that sunshine hides out awaiting a glorious return seems like astrology.
The air-conditioning in my building, in my office, is set to "august," so my hands feel thick and slow. I feel these nipples on my chest, contracted and taut beneath my shirt, and I know the cold is real and not just some paranormal concoction of my brain in response to everything I see and sense this morning.
When I arrived I turned the key in my office door and flicked on the lights. Once I had taken a seat and pushed the button on my computer, I glanced at my phone and the red alert button denoting the presence of voice mail, and I remembered the ominous buzzing of my pager from the evening before.
The voice on the first message was one of my employees updating me on her daughter's health. The previous day the daughter had a tumor removed from the surface of her brain. All had gone as planned and on this day, the ides of august, she had endured a heart transplant. My employee informed me the surgery had gone well and her daughter was breathing on her own and she had even opened her eyes briefly though slowly.
She emphasized how slow her daughter's motion had been and I slowly moved the handset from one ear to the other, trying to ignore the budding frost in my office and my own lethargy. I made notes: "Heart Transplant went okay-breathing on own-opened eyes." My employee planned on coming to work the next day.
An icy smile cautiously pursed the corners of my mouth as I reached out and erased the good news. Star-D to delete. I should have savored that message. I should have listened to it twice, maybe even saved it. I was too cool just letting it go as if I can always expect good news and everything always works out for the best in the end.
The next message was marked by uncontrollable sobbing. My employee coughed and wheezed and her breathing was like another language communicating the same message on some foreign wavelength to a felt but unknown audience as she explained the reason for her 4:37am call: "Michael, I won't be in today. . ."
In that moment I begged in my mind to hear something other than what I knew I would hear in seconds. I didn't pray to god nor did I call upon any higher source, I merely begged in my thoughts as if throwing pleas against the inside of my chest, the lining of my stomach, as if hurling these wishes so forcefully within myself could create a hole in my being, could create a vacuum in the universe and suck all the numbing news and tragedy out to a place far away from me. I wished she wouldn't say it. I wished it weren't so.
"My daughter passed away two hours ago." Aww fuck. My employee cried and wheezed and clamped down on words before releasing them like a rolled-up, damp towel was strapped between her teeth.
"MMM-mm-michael, I just wah-wwwh-wanted you to know. I won't be innnnn, this week." Near the end of her message her words were like silence. Gradually I could hear no more sobs, no more panting, no more clenching phlanges.
". . .need to reach me my cell phn nmbr zz eenh-oonh-hee, ay-hoo-o, hay-ainh-hree-hainh." It was clear mumbling. I scratched out the numbers below my previous note. Star-D. I had grown used to listening to messages from this employee. For about four weeks she had been leaving them at all hours almost every day. I would listen regularly around 6:30am and one of the days she made it in to work I joked with her about the loneliness of my morning not having heard from her.
She will be lonely now. Her daughter is gone. The time she had her will never be long enough. All the happiness she brought will be remembered and when it is, it will be followed by bitterness and anger and frustration and despair. (No other response would be sane.)
My employee joked back that morning, exhibiting the strength only women know. When things were bad, she had the strength to cry. When they were good, she went to work and laughed when it was appropriate to laugh.
Today is my brother's birthday. He lives in a cell in a prison in another state. It is winter in my office. Yesterday I received a letter from him. He wants me to send him a care package I can purchase online. Hygiene products and microwaveable stews and chicken breasts, these are the commodities of prison life.
I wish I could go to a bar with my brother today and down a pitcher of beer and talk about how good it is to be together for our birthdays, (mine was four days ago,) but we are not together. One month ago I became engaged to be married. I wish my brother could be there on the day faith and I wed. problem is, wishes do not cause holes in the chest nor the universe. I will wish anyway.
My office is like an igloo now and I sink down into my chair in order to increase the surface contact with my skin. What I wouldn't do for some warmth.
There is one more message on my machine from another employee. Seems he has diarhea and won't be able to make it in today. He actually said that word. Star-D.

yeats' quote

The best lack all convictions, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.

yeats earned his ink with that line alone. bad ass.

i'm reading this book that is essentially a big interview with bono. in a passage i read today, bono was quoted on alternate lyrics he wrote for ave maria singing with pavarotti at a charity event a couple years ago. (i understand the alternate lyrics appeared in about every major newspaper in italy the next day and i wondered about a people so in love with their opera singers.)

(may 25, 2003, u.s.'s intention to go to war in iraq evident around the world)

ave mariawhere is the justice in the world?
the wicked make so much noise, ma
the righteous stay oddly still
with no wisdom, all of the riches in the world leave us poor tonight
and strength is not without humility
it's weakness, an untreatable disease
and war is always the choice
of the chosen who will not have to fight

side by side it is as if bono is merely elaborating on yeats' theme, projecting the sentiment of yeats' in his time to that of the righteous in our time, ripping him off perhaps or paying homage.

(surely it is homage.) but the relevance of the discovery herein is this: the essence of man is unchanged. the essence of man is 51-49, good to evil or light to dark.

as i get older i realize how gray the world really is. and perhaps this is why our artists love the greens of nature, the blue of the sky, the golden yellow of a sunflower and the black of night.
i have to come to revile the characterization of a man as good. "you're a good man, charlie brown."

the intentions are great but intentions are fleet-footed warriors who go awol as often as they fiercely battle. charlie brown was more likely 51% of a good man and perhaps 49% of a bad one. when shulz wasn't capturing him in stills for us, brown was likely picking his ass or telling lucy some crazy lie trying to get to that other 2nd base. (not that there's anything wrong with 2nd base, au contraire, but trickery to get there is shameful.)

the world is gray and george w bush himself is a good man, (probably 30%.) most of us are somewhere closer to 50-50 and herein is the hope.

forget god.
forget a 2nd coming.
don't be lazy.
strive on behalf of goodness.
learn.
challenge yourself.
push for righteousness.
evolve.
do nothing flippantly.
relax to the max.
work hard, but always in the direction of goodness.
teach.
forgive, (including yourself.)
grow and interact.

live your life by these ideals and you will be noble, for you will be pushing the envelope of the evolution of the human species in a positive direction. if reason gives us anything over the animals, it is the ability to change and project our light upon future generations and in that, we should find a balance of living for ourselves and living for our posterity.

my generation

so this is my generation, eh?

watching an hbo documentary about tommy smith and john carlos' fists held high to symbolize black power at the 1968 summer olympics in mexico city and suddenly i was struck with shame. the '60s were 40 years ago, (a generation,) but they seem an eon away.

i'm about to turn 40 years old. where is my generation's bobby kennedy? where is our martin luther king jr? our malcolm x? our people's park? john lennon?

'power to the people' seems to have got sucked into the vacuum that was the '80s, (for lack of a better explanation.) the generation that was chided by ronald reagan elected him president and instead of reacting, my generation embraced him. we embraced his trickle down economics. we embraced his mentality of 'grab for the brass ring now and let later generations take care of themselves.'

it is horrifying to look around and see what we have become. most people i know admit that corruption is intrinsic in our politics. this is to say, a person is unelectable to any office of any worth unless they are ready to repay favors for favors. if tobacco money gets a senator elected, that senator needs to repay the favor by fighting for tobacco's interests on capitol hill.

this is a shame. where is our revolution? is everything just so groovy now that my generation is in complete agreement with the status quo?

i can hardly write this. it is that frustrating.

i had a friend tell me recently, when i asked why the president should not be required to just come out and answer every question put forth on this whole karl rove affair until we the people are satisfied, it's just how the game is played. instead the white house press secretary pleads the fifth on the basis of not interfering with an ongoing investigation. everything nowadays is couched in language so whipping out the old "ongoing investigation," clause is hardly something our current leaders are shy about.

why should we stand for that? some time back when they asked the president directly if rove was involved in this affair and rove was standing over the president's shoulder, why shouldn't he, (as jon stewart suggested,) just look over his shoulder ask him for himself, (for all to hear?)

you know what my generation stands for? my generation stands for buying a house. this is what we hang our hat of self esteem on when we get home from work every night. my generation stands for "family," as if outside the boxes we live in lurk so many thugs opposed to that value.

my generation does not stand for civil rights. a previous generation can claim that victory. my generation lets those affected carry on the fight, or a gifted and enlightened few. my generation would rather regress.

my generation stands for not confronting one another, not discovering the differences, never reaping any of the benefits of diversity yielded only through confrontation. my generation stands for feeling superior to their neighbors, their loved ones, their coworkers, the people they see on tv, all from the comfort of their safe, living room, (with american idol on in the background no less.)

my generation stands for getting along. my generation stands for the individual's right to be right in the face of any evidence to the contrary. my generation stands for marketing. my generation stands for more cops on the streets, tougher laws on crime, plastic surgery, hair dye and restoration, lyposuction and botox.

a criminal president, blood on our hands, sullied institutions such as the current state of journalism, a debt/weakening economy blowing up by the hour, utter disregard for the environment and hence, future generations, and still we think everything's cool. so long as we have our houses and our latte mocha frappucinos.

all this is not to say we do not have ralph nader and noam chomsky and howard zinn and many, many more. but what about the every day guy? are we all taking our cues from tiger woods and michael jordan? is ryan seacrest our guy?

my generation is pathetic.

disappointment

i preface this piece with a word about the importance of recognizing a moment in time, not being trapped by it or held hostage, but rather admitting a temporary defeat, understanding the sheer humanity of it, and learning to entertain the idea of a next day when everything is glorious, birds chirp, trees provide cool, breezy shade, food is brilliant and love is sublimely cradling my every step and gesture.

sometimes it weighs.

i come home from a disappointment disappointed. i would be angry but i'm too tired for that, too disappointed to express the energy of anger. i wake the next morning to the upbeat sound of a radio show host talking about the loons of the fox news network and i am disappointed it is time to get up and about the situation in iraq. i trudge to my dresser then to the shower where i am disappointed by the performance of the drain. it is clogged and the water, along with the soil and soap scum i generate, builds around my ankles. toweling off, i am disappointed at how creaky my knees are from playing ball the previous night. age is disappointing and the mirror only highlights my need to exercise, which my knees and back disagree with like outmanned troops on a battlefield. my hairline is receding and time takes its toll on my person in several ways.

i am disappointed in myself as i am late arriving to work. the work i find in my virtual inbox is disappointing but then, not so much in comparison to how i felt about coming to work in the first place. i find it can be endured. i am disappointed by the urge to orally gratify myself but the trail mix i reach for tastes good and time passes.

after two hours of working i look over to my right and find my first moment of joy this day. a picture of terra with her lips pursed, a close up of her face with a quizzical, honest look about her, catches me off guard as if i'd never seen it and i smile, (inwardly if not outwardly.)
the moment is fleeting.

i am disappointed i am not in a higher position. i am disappointed about reporting to my boss, a person i find lacking in too many ways to enumerate. i am disappointed by the effort it takes to mend relations with her, trying to make her feel secure and like my intentions are golden in trying only to please her and make her look good, while also wanting those above her to recognize my value to the organization in the proportion i see it in. office politics disappoint me.

i am disappointed by the status quo. things can be better, i know they can.

i am disappointed by my many coworkers who make happy all day, every day. i wonder if they crash later in the day. i wonder if they crash every day. i wonder how ugly it is when they crash. i hope they do not crash but experience tells me sometimes they do.

i am disappointed by spending eight hours a day, five days a week, toiling in an office, creating trainings and managing people and updating records and talking to customers and coaching representatives and having lunch.

i am disappointed when my phone rings and someone requires something of me. i am disappointed when things do not go right at work. i am also disappointed when they do because my job, (like so many,) is hardly a challenge at all. surely a rhesus monkey could do it.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/wildfacts/pictpops/473.shtml

lunch disappoints me. perhaps "bores," would be a better word than "disappoints."

i am disappointed i still live check to check. i am disappointed i have not shown the discipline to save money after all these years. i am disappointed i still rent. i am disappointed people with short attention spans can claim they have attention deficit syndrome, (they have a diagnosis,) while instant gratification syndrome has not yet received the status of official diagnosis. surely i have igs. my bar tab should serve as evidence. what kind of an idiot would spend so freely on beers and prepared food except the one who cannot control his own impulses to please himself instantaneously?

i am disappointed when i have two more hours in the office before i take my leave. i am disappointed when i do leave at what i have not accomplished. i am disappointed in what my company has become and how they treat me, the average guy. i am disappointed i have not up and left by finding another job with a more employee friendly company.

i am disappointed by how full i feel after lunch, but i am pleased with my dessert, two red vines. i am disappointed my company has increased restrictions on internet use through our i.t. department barring me from blogging from my office, (during lunch, of course.) i wonder if updating my fantasy baseball team, a morning ritual, will be next.

i am disappointed by how much work there is in life, (voltaire be damned.) it seems to me, we the masses work in order to sustain while a class above us reaps far greater rewards for our efforts. i recognize it is nearly impossible to live a creative life without starting out wealthy. but i want to find my own way to make my life rewarding in that way. i want to create things for me. i want to take in as much as i can-it is the books and articles i read, the music i listen to, the art i feel upon viewing, the movies that move me, that enrich my life and nourish my being. it is important for me to make time for these things. i can't get too ridiculous about dusting fixing the fixture in the bathroom.

i am not quite ecstatic when my time to leave work arrives. there is a feint sense of ecstasy within but it just feels too deep to quite define. i can discern it is a good feeling though, so i focus on it. it seems like a little red tootsie roll pop buried at my own mushy center, emanating a goodness that fails to reach me but remains nearly within reach none the less.

traffic is disappointing. mine is a tiny drive home and i am used to the traffic emanating from la and going my way but still, all these cars, all these people. who was it that said the planet is a living organism and like any organism it has diseases and humans are the earth's disease?

picking terra up from the babysitters is a joy. it's my first moment of the day when i forget about everything that disappoints me. i see her smile back at me and the noise of life ceases but doesn't become nothing. it becomes better than nothing. there is a clear stillness, not ringing air but a crystalline sense, a hyper-awareness, and the babysitters voice and the bark of buster the dog, are pleasant accompaniment to the clarity and terra wiggles in my arms and the involuntary recognition is like an unexpected gift. how sweet.

i bring her home and a bowel movement makes me feel healthy. but disappointment is persistent and there are household chores lurking around every corner. some days i tackle one. some days i need to lay down after baby-proofing the room and read a spell. i need that, sometimes. and if terra naps, i may nap though i feel somewhat guilty for not doing more than my very basic every day tasks like cleaning baby bottles and taking out various things.

faith deserves more.

dinner disappoints me. i enjoy cooking but rarely do it. going to a restaurant costs money i shouldn't spend. faith's meals require her to do work in addition to her feeding the baby and (hopefully,) taking over for me at some point in the evening to give me time to spend watching a game or reading a book or writing before bed.

insomnia can be diagnosed but who wants to tax the liver with meds for sleeping. i endure and sometimes i have weeks of getting to sleep quickly and easily. but not in the hot months. the thoughts of finances and my relationship and plans and responsibilities and insecurities about my performance as a father, (among other things,) open my pores and make me aware of my digestive tract.

sleep comes one to two hours later. it is disappointing i spend two of my waking hours trying not to be awake.

"a sad day for the country and a sad day for the Constitution."

a sad day for the constitution indeed.

if you do not think supreme court justices are important, if you do not think the idealogy of the president who appoints a supreme court justice is important, please consider this article. (Click on header to be directed to it.)

today the court increased the ability for a state or the federal government to sieze a person's private property.

The Constitution's Fifth Amendment says that private property may be taken by the government if fair compensation is paid to the owner. But there is a second requirement: The property may be taken only if it is for "public use."
The precise issue before the Supreme Court was whether a privately owned development project amounts to a "public use" of the homeowners' former properties.

the effect of the court's ruling, is to define "public use," as that which has any public benefit. the case before the court involved a group of citizens in connecticut who were displaced, (and disenfranchised,) because by removing them, the state would be able to increase the value of land in the area and thusly, charge higher taxes. voile, increased revenue for the state is translated to mean, "public use."

it has been said that the bush family got rich via a government invocation of the eminent domain law. the same has been said about the o'malley's in los angeles, in which case thousands of people who lived in chavez ravine were displaced from what was considered a slum housing project.

(in fact, ry cooder has recently worked on an album he says was inspired by the plight of those people. read about the musical project and a bit of the history here: http://csmonitor.com/2005/0623/p11s01-almp.html )

for a real understanding of the history of public housing programs in this country, try reading this paper-it's truly a lucid account of the many factors which have affected the various decisions over the years. http://www.fanniemaefoundation.org/programs/hpd/pdf/hpd_1102_hoffman.pdf

i'm concerned with the court's decision because i think this country was founded on individual rights. while i am a firm believer the public good is the greater good, and recognize decisions like these sometimes have to be made, i am concerned by the continuing shift in this country toward segregation.

the proliferation of gated communities is alarming. personally, i can't help but feel like tearing down one of those gates every time i see it. they exist on a presupposition that bad people lurk right out there somewhere and these gates may be what keeps them at bay. methinks the division created exacerbates the insecurities of those who might commit crimes to begin with.

where do we stop? when will the supreme court of this country stand up for the little guy? lately they never do and if rehnquist retires as hannity suggested yesterday, the liberals on that court are in for a constant thrashing for a while right along with the little guy.

and how is it that south pasadena has been able to stave off the 710 freeway extension all these years when connecticut can separate people from their property in the name of higher taxes? (Read about that here: http://www.nationaltrust.org/news/docs/19990603_pasadena.html )

reading and trying to understand the implications of many of the laws involved in relevant cases, i see this is an especially complex issue. but it strikes me as fundamentally bad when the government can run people off a piece of land in the name of higher taxes.

silence speaks

Human character evermore publishes itself. The most fugitive deed and word, the mere air of doing a thing, the intimated purpose, expresses character. If you act, you show character; if you sit still, if you sleep, you show it. You think, because you have spoken nothing when others spoke, and have given no opinion on the times, on the church, on slavery, on marriage, on socialism, on secret societies, on the college, on parties and persons, that your verdict is still expected with curiosity as a reserved wisdom. Far otherwise; your silence answers very loud.
-Ralph Waldo Emerson

a friend of mine was so distressed by bushco's underfunding of television programming which is in the public's best interest, he just had to shoot his blog off about it.

you can read about what pissed him off here: http://www.scpr.org/news/features/2005/06/preservefunds.html
or you can read him at:
http://ceep71.blogspot.com/2005/06/screw-putsch-cpbs-war-on-balanced.html

(a quick word about the term "bushco." i borrow this from mark morford, a columnist for the san francisco chronicle who writes a sweetly sour column called 'notes and erratta,' which can be found here: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/gate/archive/2005/06/17/notes061705.DTL morford coined the term to refer to all things of george bush's administration. since bush himself, is hardly a genius divining all this evil and hostility behind the privacy of a black curtain stage left a la the wizard of oz, morford likens him to a corporation, acting on a dark agenda and in support of a set of similar values, but as a corporation with many moving parts, [i.e. cheney, rumsfeld, rice, et. al.])


it makes me cheer when a friend tackles such a heady subject. i think any subsequent debate is vital but more importantly, the individual is nourished by considering these things.

my friend's thoughts about not addressing the issues of our day leaves me cold because i think it is shameful to just walk away from issues which might upset you or which, you might find to be unjust, because you feel impotent.

my thought is: one should do what one can. one engages in intellligent discourse. that's something. any little thing is noble, but pushing against the forces which keep us from evolving is absolutely essential.

i think we have to recognize there will be only so much change in our lives. if one cannot reconcile themself with the idea that in 40 years there will still be much to be ashamed of, progress will have been impeded drastically often in the name of dividends for the few, corrupt men will still be making public decisions, etc., then you need some serious counseling.

that said, these jerks who want to cut public funding are the assholes who want to privatize everything. privatizing what should be the public's domain, what should be publicly funded, is almost always a thinly veiled grab for cash. you can bet the corrupt congressman who supports the privatization of (insert industry here-we'll go w/. . .) prisons!, is getting fat cash campaign support from the wackenhut corporation or whatever other players exists in that realm. (you can read about them here: http://www.eyeonwackenhut.com/ )

the basic idea of socialism posits that the masses should to some degree take care of the weak among us. if you are crippled, if you cannot communicate w/ the rest of us because of autism, if you are loony or criminal, (and it should be noted those who refuse to participate in capitalism are bound to end up being classified as one of these, or they will live on the street,) the socialist aspect of a society may take some responsibility for your well being. this is as obvious a sign of our inherent goodness as a species, as you can possibly identify.

(and isn't it odd that the right, so identified w/ christianity which is said to identify w/ ideals associated w/ feeding the hungry, clothing the cold, medicating the infirm, wants to privatize everything and leave these, the least among us, to fend for themselves?)

one thing bushco and many of us have gotten clearer on these past several years is the fact that controlling the airwaves gives you the best chance to control the mindwaves. propaganda is. prior to bush coming into office, i remember much rhetoric bandied about on how hollywood was corrupting the morals of our country and our children and how they needed to reach into that realm to counter the immoral liberalism springing forth. i can actually remember thinking, (good luck suckers, art is a foreign language to those of your ilk.) but alas, i was wrong in so much as they have been more creative than i gave them credit for.

yes, they've been involved in major motion pictures, but more importantly, they've continued the consolidation of the means of communication. they love rupert murdoch who speaks only the language of wealth, (or so it seems,) and they're happy to see the number of entities they have to deal w/ in trying to affect change in this realm, dwindle. rupert is easy. he already leans heavily in their direction. the corporations are pretty easy-crooked right-wing politicians have been getting scratched and scratching those backs so long you'd think they just grew an upside down hand out their hairy-ass backs.

michael powell facilitated the tearing down of longstanding laws put in place by wise men who knew an easily accessible and diverse array of broadcasters was in the public's best interest. i've noticed the christian networks are making movies, (and i mean besides mel gibson.) they're bad movies but they'll get better and as the dumbing down continues there will be a cosmic meeting in the middle ground.

i'm sure this present darkness or one of those cracky tim lahaye books will get made into a major motion picture and special effects along with evangelism will push it's profits skyward and facilitate more of them being made. . .and i'm sure it will be in the same vein as the hollywood crap of the day which is short on thought and plot but long on technical quality and mind-numbing attributes that titillate and dumb down. these things are coming, son. i have no doubt.

(note: i read 'this present darkness.' this is a piece of crap novel. those who like it, like it because it paints a fantastic picture of fantastical images and events they've imagined many times because they believe they will come to pass but when compared to the classics or even the good novels of our day, to say it pales is a vast understatement. it is rank and amateurish.) http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0891073906/104-6388507-4743932?v=glance

and what about that area of the gulf of mexico right off mississippi where they are going to allow oil exploration all of a sudden after decades of protecting it? (it is the home of a shitload of dolphins who may just one day rise out of the ocean and speed into outer space singing, "thanks for the fish. . .but your environment has grown increasingly toxic so, sorry, but we gotta go." douglas adams is spinning right next to ben franklin and i swear no one's got any common sense around here any more.)

and you know what, if we love our children, if we love our kind, if we know what the fuck real love is, we have to push back. we have to educate. we have to trust. the bottom line is we are not dunking women in salem anymore. we are not raping and pillaging. our crusades are just gatherings of dumbasses in tents now, or glass buildings.

and this is our lot in this world, the human condition. ours is fat w/ struggle, and it always will be. is there a caveat or a feather we can stick in our caps to lean on in the face of those who would bring the lot of us down? yeah, there is. it's called history.

history doesn't remember the george bush's in a kind light. 400 years from now his name will be a footnote, an obscure reference to a despot long gone. abraham lincoln will still be remembered.

john f kennedy, a man i learned in college, "was a terrible president who could not get anything through congress-he just didn't have the sales and people skills of say, ronald reagan,"-(this is what you get when you attend college in the san gabriel valley of southern california, at mt sac in a district gerrymandered as a means of hoodwinking voters,) will be remembered because of his ideas and because of what he said that was so important. addressing the nation on the cuban missile crisis, he said, "We will not prematurely or unnecessarily risk the costs of worldwide nuclear war in which even the fruits of victory would be ashes in our mouth; but neither will we shrink from that risk at any time it must be faced."

big ideas make big men. bushco, (the whole lot of them,) have zero big ideas. if they are remembered at all it will be as tyrants and warmongers.

but we cannot rely on evolution. we must create it. we must be vigilant, constantly pushing against that which brings us down or represents the worst sides of man's character.

erstad

darin erstad plays baseball for the la angels.

he epitomizes what someone who specializes in a sport and plays it for big money at the highest level should be, (unfortunately, not what they are.)

erstad is no nonsense. when he holds a runner on first base, he does not talk to him as if it's two guys from the "got-rich-in-the-show club," stepping aside for a brief chat. it's all business w/ him. erstad treats the runner like he's from the other team, the one trying to beat his team so they do not make the playoffs so they do not ultimately win the world series, practically taking food out of his family's mouth. and this is as it should be.

in the last six years (or so,) erstad has changed positions more than john kerry, and like kerry, he did it for the right reasons. he did it for the good of the team, sacrificing the chance to please his agent by establishing a top dollar reputation at one position, (his natural being centerfield where his speed and daring earned him a reputation as one of the best in the game, even displacing a pretty good ballplayer in jim edmonds,) opting instead to play the game to win the game, which has involved shuffling back and forth from center to 1st base a few times.

erstad is a singles and doubles hitter. but, the key word there is hitter. he is the embodiment of that word. he hits in a lineup of utterly undisciplined hitters. vlad guerrero and garret anderson are first pitch swingers who make up for their lack of plate discipline by being great bad ball hitters. in other words, when they guess wrong, as baseball players often do, they often still do damage to hopeful pitchers.

free swinging hitters can be a dream to a pitcher. if he's on and he has some luck getting those guys out, it's a long night for the angels because his pitch count will be so low he can stay around for the late innings.

erstad takes pitches and he does it for the team. he gets many of his hits, (he is currently batting .295,) with two strikes on him. why? for the team, damnit! this is who he is.

i guess he's from fargo, north dakota. i don't really care to know much about his personal life. it's none of my business. but as a baseball fan, (and one who slung some leather in my day,) i appreciate his pro-style game.

a couple weeks ago he gave johnny estrada, (the atlanta brave's catcher,) a concussion bowling him over as he scored a run. he came in hard, saw the ball was going to beat him and that the catcher was partially blocking his path to the plate, and despite the likely pain that would ensue, he crouched forward on the dead run and layed a shoulder into estrada that produced five, square-dancing, tweety birds just over estrada's cranium. had estrada held onto the ball, erstad would have been out. the ball rolled free on contact and from the heap, erstad rose and stretched out over the fallen catcher to record the run.

why do we watch sports? to pad the ego of some guy who spent all his time playing one game in order to excel and cash in instead of reading the works of rushdie and viewing the films of the young, mexican directors, and getting a feel for all the various sports and having a head for politics and becoming a scintillating conversationalist, and understanding the light and dark sides of human nature and growing into a citizen of the world, mostly at peace except in the face of injustice, violence and intolerance?

not that all the rich jocks are dumbasses, but the majority possess a singular focus which is likely why they are able to play at the level they do. it follows then they do not have the luxury of variety, the luxury of time to explore the corporeal world of the modern man, (though surely the cash affords them abilities to see much of the physical world and really, to pursue virtually any endeavor or passion.)

i hope we merely tolerate asshole athletes. i hope we watch sports for the excitement of the contest and for the prowess on display. i think we draw parallels in our lives to the games, and we use them to escape too, or as a pastime.

like many angel fans i booed jose guillen tonight, from my living room. i booed him not for the mistake he made last year w/ the angels that caused mike scioscia to demand the organization trade him at the end of the season while they made him leave the team for the pennant drive and the playoffs. i booed him for losing his temper last night. (no other player lost their temper in any visible way.)

it is said the blue-collar worker gets paid for the sweat of his brow, while the white-collar worker gets paid to swallow the natural urges and tendencies toward aggression that humans have. this means, when someone says something you do not like or disagree with, you practice the ability to not act out, especially with violence or anger. if a person can swallow those natural urges and respond in any other way, ideally w/ reason, besting the act or word that sparked the urge to begin w/, well, the better a person is at it the better they are at white-collar work, the greater their chances of getting promoted and making money, (or, more money,) in that environment.

guillen's behavior suggests baseball is blue-collar work and surely, the players who play games sweat. but w/ compensation so high in professional sports, i think we hope the players also possess white-collar skills.

it is understandable that tensions run high-a game is a competition after all. but today's athlete is conducting himself in front of millions of fans almost nightly. comportment should be a top priority. when a player misbehaves, (in fact whenever i used to see lou piniella acting like a fool out there throwing bases around as part of a tantrum,) i think of his parents and how poorly it reflects on them. (if he grew up an orphan or something like that, he gets some slack in the form of forgiveness but only some.) otherwise? bad parents.

erstad strikes a pretty good balance. he is a fierce competitor as evidenced by his hard-nosed style of game, but he is also utterly classy. five years ago he lead the league in hits, (pre-ichiro,)-he was more of a free swinger then. now he hits for average, getting on base often for teammates to drive in while increasing pressure on opposing pitchers.

even a-rod with his sculpted image, (and similar hair,) does not compare. he is a nice guy but he sounds like a robot, (though his game is absolutely above reproach.) his answers to interview questions sound like they have tested well in demographic studies.

erstad simply avoids the limelight. if a reporter asks him a question, he tries to answer it honestly, from what i can tell. what he says does not make for flashy journalism. good for him. it's refreshing a player does not seek out the limelight and try to make commercials for some hair product or another.

every team that wins a world series in major league baseball has chemistry. a good example, (though they did not come close to winning the championship,) is last year's dodgers. that team had chemistry, which is what took them as far as they went, further than any dodger team during all the years eric karros and mike piazza were there.

last year's champs, the bosox, had johnny damon and david ortiz, (and perhaps a few others.) clutch guys who came up w/ clutch hits. manny ramirez was and is the talent on that team but these guys get manny somewhere he would be unlikely to go without them: winnersville. (in a playoff series in which the sox swept the angels, erstad had a great series but seemed like a one-man show at times.)

in 2002 the angels won it all. erstad was the guy i'm describing. what? down a couple runs in the 7th? erstad will get that key double down the line that starts the rally to win the game.

if baseball had more guys like erstad, contests would be more fiercely fought and the level of play would elevate. (there are other guys like erstad and damon and ortiz around the league too, michael young of the texas rangers comes to mind. looking at a perennial spot in the all-star game he agreed to move to shortstop when a-rod left for the big apple despite the fact he would be an unlikely candidate to ever get there going up against the likes of miguel tejada and derek jeter and the rest of the best infielders in baseball.)

these are the guys we, as fans, should hang some glory on. i'm tired of that guy who has a huge year in a contract season. some guys focus like that constantly, (adrian beltre.)

as for erstad, i don't mean to be his apologist. he's just a ballplayer, though one who is easy to respect for his talent, style and choices.

favors for favors, or, a lie by any other name. . .

from the favors for favors dept . .

it seems one of our republican congressmen from the golden state is up to business as usual. randy "duke" cunningham recently sold his house in del mar to a defense contractor for at least $700,000 more than it was worth. cunningham sits on the armed services appropriation committee. since the sell, the contractor's business, (which had been flat,) has spiked on government contracts.

but wait. there's more. (ho-hum.)

cunningham's real estate agent brokered the deal and she is a campaign contributor. this one clearly stinks.

you can read all about it here: http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/4441.html

but hey, i'm less concerned with the politics of the day because they'll always be there. there will always be people lying and cheating and stealing, trying to get ahead because they think it will make them happy, (which it won't,) just as there will be those who try to uncover those wrongdoings.

i'm more interested in another story involving cunningham, which made news a few years ago. at that time, cunningham was involved in bringing forth legislation that would impose the death penalty on drug kingpins. later, his son was caught smuggling 400 pounds of marijuana into the country. cunningham appeared before his son's judge asking for leniency, (and getting it.) his son did about 11 months in the big house.

i know, i know, i'll be the first to agree his son was not a drug kingpin but i can't help but think the son saw the father as a liar.

how can a father ask a son to live an honest and decent, (moral even,) life if their own life is filled with corruption?

i would contend, (and this comes from my own experience,) that children recognize the lies we tell them. they see hypocrisy but they feel barred from calling it out. (barred by the belt, most likely.) and so, i believe they act out and rebel based on that. i suspect, on some subconscious level, they lose trust in the person who has always claimed to be the ultimate truth-giver, and so they question much more of what has been handed down, maxims like: drugs bad, justice system just, college good, america free, etc.

and where does this all start? i think it starts with santa claus. such a lighthearted, gnomish, imaginary gift-giver and yet, he is a lie and children invariably figure it out. children come to know the easter bunny is phony and the tooth fairy doesn't exist.

however, they may never come to realize the god they were given was a hoax. they may never suspect our president tells lies. they may never question authority at all, a maxim we were supposed to have adopted in the '60s.

i'm sure "duke" cunningham looked down upon his son after that episode and cried, "why have you failed me?!" and the son probably suffered low self esteem and apologized profusely thinking himself a bad seed.

and dad went to work representing the good people of north san diego county where he brokered shady deals but told a reporter he has never so much as puffed one time on a marijuana joint. still, he probably felt like the paragon of dignity and respect, doing some sort of hocus-pocus shoeshine shuffle in his impish, status quo, establishment, favors for favors head.

belief?

i don't believe in god.

and it's hard to be an atheist in this world where everyone feels so certain they are right that there is this god creature, despite the fact that everyone believes something completely different about who he is or what he is up to and the fact that there has never been one shred of proof suggesting any of the various belief systems are correct.

and i don't suppose people get how i feel about god. to me, this belief system is what keeps us in the dark ages. differences about our beliefs in god is what has caused more bloodshed and turmoil and chaos and death and destruction than any other single factor in the history of mankind. and it goes on today. as a people, we fear the muslims, (these people who actually sacrifice in the name of their belief system.) we fear them because they are so different from us and they believe in a different imaginary creature. perhaps we fear their god will bury our god since history is written by the victors, and so we are afraid of a future without our god and with only their god. (that very same future is the one that causes the most ardent, fundamentalist and extreme muslims to have the happiest of night time dreams.)

men are dying in iraq today, (men whose blood is red and who share the same genetic makeup of one another despite the side they represent,) because some prominent members of the establishment see the convergence of two agendas. by plundering this country as we are doing today, these guys make a lot of money and we make inroads in destroying their god, (the wrong, evil god, we think.) (it's worth noting, too, that many gods have heretofore been destroyed. no longer do we speak of ra or isis or the earth mother goddesses of yore, or so many others. . .)

so in this country we think of christianity as being all nice, god loves you and jesus died for you and awwww, it's all about love. many nice people subscribe to the tenets of the various christian religious systems.

why won't the pope approve contraception for catholics, which in and of itself would end a lot of misery in ireland and south america, among other poor places? because he would be eliminating catholics.

why is the moral majority, (truly an immoral group,) trying to run american politics today? because they have an agenda and they are pursuing it. is the agenda to carry out the values of the historical man jesus? feed the poor, etc? nope. they are interested in amassing more and more political clout so they can legislate the values of americans, censor their tv and radio, return us to puritanical days and ways, times when we suspected women of being witches and threw them in lakes so we could burn them at a stake if they swam, or feel bad about the mistake if they drowned.

this is real stuff. i consider it evidence relative to what we see and what we have today. history is studied so we can learn from it, so we can see trends and know past outcomes and ideally, make a change. it is outrageous how certain americans tend to believe that their god is the right one, considering the various belief systems in the world, especially when our society is so immoral by comparison. (two words as support: enron and iraq.)

onward christian soldiers used the war metaphor for a reason. the war is over who gets the most converts. when king james and the cronies of the day were putting together the bible as we now know it, it was important to have paul's epistles with their exhortations to go ye into all the world and preach the gospel because this is the foundation of the religion. if christians were less concerned with converting people to their belief system, it would wither up and die out in relatively short order.

to me, christianity is among the most horrible of the religions on this planet. the evil it wreaks bothers me on such a level that sometimes to hear my people, people i love and care for, say outlandish things like, "we pray fives times every day," knowing full well they have not studied christianity nor any other religion for that matter and certainly do not perceive the gravity which such a statement represents, i get bothered. i want to ridicule them, (people i care deeply about,) on some level to shake them and wake them up. they could be walking forth in the world, strong and independent, dignified men, afraid of no knowledge, but instead they choose to sally forth in the same cloud of ignorance they have always tarried in.

i get that they know no better, and we may think that they do no harm but truly, this tacit agreement with the status quo is still wreaking much havoc and destruction in the world.

despite my strong feelings about christianity, which come from having a background in it, i recognize many religions are much worse. (surely islam with its metaphor of god despising us and forever on the brink of smashing our world into oblivion for which the adherents pray so often in order to hold back god's smiteful hand, has as much blood and destruction on its hands as any belief system,) but i am here and it is now.

some state in the south has put stickers on their grade school text books declaring evolution to be an unproven theory as it relates to how the world came into existence, to include the life on it. that, is crazy. evolution is a proven fact and can happen in as little as one generation. in ohio they are trying to put creationism into their text books. there is no proof whatsoever that any of that miraculous stuff took place. these things are the product of a scared people and i would we all went forward bravely.

godlessness does not mean you have to just up and go off the deep end of commiting sins. i think that's what a lot of people fear, about others and themselves. i am a far more moral person today than when i was a christian, mired in a slump of guilt, constantly trying to cover my "sins" up. but, it's because the president claims to be christian that so many people will sit idly by and let him lead us, as a nation, to where we have gone. it is also because the president claims to be a christian, which most americans associate with goodness, that someone like me ends up sounding like some loony conspiracy theorist or troubled soul out on the edge or whatever.

who goes on saying they believe in something without knowing anything about that thing they believe in as it relates to the history of the same, what all it entails, etc? a lot of people i love and care about because they are my friends and family.

some believe in times of poor health but say they just really don't know when they are fine, and it's a tough lot being an atheist. here i am considering the basics of some of the most important ideas we can possibly fathom and i am ignored and ridiculed for it, poo-poohed quite regularly, despite the fact i put more energy into the thought and study of these things than most. it's frustrating.

so my frustration slipped out a bit recently. i feel bad that it did and i always do when it does but i apologized. a man must have certain standards to apply to situations like these, especially in light of the regular pummelling he feels relative to these things.

in the aftermath of this incident it was suggested that perhaps i have no light, so who is ruling my life, my loved one wondered? (darkness, they suggested?) i totally disagree. i am letting the light of reality seep into my world when my ancetors refused to allow that.

i think the idea being put forth when it is said that there is light and darkness, good and bad, a god and a devil, is age old, but i do not subscribe. my refusal to acknowledge a fantasy creature we call god, in my opinion, ennobles me. i am of an elite class. i have no need for god. one day i will die. i have no problem with that.

know that i say all i said here to give a glimpse of where i'm really at. people get so offended when i say these things which makes it hard to say them but in truth, i always think i am the one who should feel offended. sometimes i worry i can't keep my christian friends and i worry too that if i disavowed myself of them, it would make family relations all the more strained as well. but of course, i am a man of my time and i must find ways to make peace despite mine disagreement.

communism cafe

i have an idea for a new business. i call it: communism cafe.

communism cafe is a hip diner/coffee bar. it would be ideally located at universal city walk and all the other trendy spots where wolfgang puck and croc cafes usually reside.

the decor would be minimalist with huge images of the proletariat working class manning jackhammers and sporting huge muscles. high ceilings and black poles and commie propaganda posters and waiters dressed like mao. (perhaps we could even excerpt marx inside the menu?)

speaking of the menu, this is what would draw customers into the store. alongside the cost of every item in the menu, we print our profit margin on that item. we would print the profit margin, (and figure the profit margin,) for everything we sell. . .

you see, this is what is so appalling about our brand of capitalism. we don't have monopolies in this country. we have boards. we don't have companies acting in collusion to drive the cost of a thing up because in the age of boards and investors, it is unnecessary. investors demand such high returns, collusion would just be overkill.

i've seen two great examples of this recently and one is my own company. my company was formed as a limited liability partnership between two much larger corporations. those two companies, along with a group of investors, infused my company with a certain amount of cash with which to run the business. the monies gained from the investors represented short term, high interest loans. (i've not studied keynsian economics, nor any other for that matter, so i am just laying this out as i understand it in layman's terms. it's likely in some ways and areas, i'm a bit hazy or slightly off.)

what happens, and what happened, is, the "investment community," monitors the actions of the company. if the company lays off long term employees that cost them more, if the company raises prices and increases revenue, if the company cuts costs, (not only by downsizing,) but also by eliminating things that can be done without, (such as cell phones for their managers,) the investment community gives a big thumbs up to the company who then returns to ask for a lower interest and much longer term loan to pay off the high interest short term loans.

this is the "investment community's" way of exerting pressure on companies to drive profit margins up by any means necessary. collusion obsolete.

here, let me give you an example that might be closer to home. in the case of the dodgers, mr frank mc court knew the system and did exactly the same thing. he garnered a packet of high interest short term loans in order to purchase the team, then he moved in and made changes. goodbye to player's names on the backs of jerseys. farewell, ross porter. hello new seats at astronomically higher prices in front of former front row seats. these are the moves that received a modicum of media attention but rest assured the mc court's cleaned house to a much higher degree.

mc court sent that message those investors needed to hear. he said, i am willing to cut costs by any means necessary, (which i am intimating should be to the chagrin of his customers.) in turn, last week he took out a 25 year loan to pay off the other loans and put him in a more secure position as the owner of the club. he could never have gotten the second loan without the steps he took. (i, for one, already miss you ross porter. and, i still can't tell which one is jd drew and which one is jeff kent, to say nothing of that guy who plays 3rd.) and he could never have wrested ownership of the team without the first set of loans.

so, back to communism cafe. profit margins are too high and it would be great to have a high profile business to make the point and show that it doesn't have to be how it is. it could be the cafe would need one gigantic corporation to stand behind it in the case of a giant lawsuit. (the real idea here being that defending against a giant lawsuit could bankrupt a company all by itself, so the support would be for legal fees to fight any such lawsuit.)

while i believe this issue does have something to do with high profit margins, i do not think these things are in the proper proportion. i feel certain most any company in this country could be run with a 20% reduction in their profit margin and that is what communism cafe would be all about.

if a cheeseburger at applebee's or chili's, (because this is the quality plane i see communism cafe operating on,) is $7, the same burger at communism cafe will be $5.60. if a mocha latte costs $3.75 at starbucks, it will cost $3 at communism cafe.

people, nay consumers, will respond to this. they will beat down the door to pay 20% less for the same product. and that product can be given to them at that price.

one last part of this equation is the pay structure for the employees of communism cafe. employees will be paid commensurately to their counterparts at chili's and applebee's and starbucks. the difference is, those at the highest end will not. if i am an owner of the business and act as a ceo, i will not make the kind of money people with those kinds of titles generally make. i will make more than the next position lower than me and it will be in a step by about the same amount as he makes more than the guy below him.

i'm guessing as owner/ceo, i might expect to make $100,000-$125,000 per year. if communism cafe became a huge chain of stores, it might increase based on the expanding number of employees and the salary scale windening but nobody needs the kind of money today's ceo's make, nor should it be available to them.

imagine, running my own business based on a premise i am passionate about. going to work every day would be a joy. i don't need gobs more money than the next guy. i don't need arrogant opulence.

i just think it would be good if we could check profit margins, (and wall street,) by setting an example, showing it can be done, and watching as business booms and others feel the sting of the intelligent consumer.

sparkle!

i have a picture of terra in my office at work. she is holding her hand up to her chin, smiling slyly and looking off to the right with a sparkle in her eye.

i don't believe in reincarnation, (i'm just not one to believe in myths and theories that can't be substantiated by proof,) none the less, i like to imagine it true occasionally anyway, (just for fun.)

my dad has remarked a couple of times that terra looks like my grandpa and i can see it. you see, she looks like her mother more than anyone else, hands down. but she does look like a tiny female version of the crass, old, curmudgeon that was my grandpa. it is mostly in her eyes. terra has a characteristic that runs in our family. there is a certain glimmer or sparkle that is evident in the eyes of most of my family members. my grandpa had it, to be sure. often times, if you looked at him, you might have gotten the impression he had something up his sleeve. it was like a little droplet of optimism that was always present there. maybe he was scheming or maybe he was secretly pollyanna's third cousin but either way, this little glint of light that played in the pools of his eyes, that danced around even when the light in the room and he remained stationary, was undeniable.

once i wrote about seeing it in a certain photograph of my mother. it caught me by surprise that she had it too. and i've seen it in my own eyes on occasion, moreso as i've grown older. my dad also has it. with him it looks like a bubble is welling up behind blue eyes but only he knows what it really is. maybe the bubble is getting ready to burst. maybe it's some secret, super spiritual remedy for all of mankind's ills.

my grandpa passed away about four years ago. wouldn't it be nice if he had a spirit and that spirit was in some sort of samsara waiting room until terra's birth? i look at terra, at this picture displayed in my office, and i see him.

i see his craggy old face with the eyes of a young man sparkling back at me. i hear his voice, calling to me in muted tones, a giant baritone supporting all other voices, all other sounds. i can feel his love, so warmly cold.

and i see terra's smooth, little face with a grandpa's eyes twinkling back to me. i hear her voice, "dab-dab-dab, dab-dab," so opposite to his in every way: flute to his bass drum, reed to his crashing cymbal. and i feel her love, his love, through her, welcoming me into the fold of humanity, inviting me to open up and express vulnerability, imbuing me with the strength of weakness.

and i know that love is love is love. the abiding love between my grandpa and i and the love between my daughter and i is all the same; one love.

and i think i am the baby in so many ways, so much to teach but so much to learn.

i originally posted a more recent pic because i love it, but here's the one i have in my office. see the sparkle? 

gee! could i be happier? 

race part iv - the epilogue

favors for favors. . . tom delay has taken luxurious trips to golf in scotland, et. al. it seems some of these have been paid for by a republican lobbyist named jack abramoff. delay contributed $15,000 to the campaign of melissa hart who came to represent the 4th district of pennsylvania. abramoff hosted a fundraising dinner for hart's campaign at a restaurant he owns. delay is about to place hart as the chair of the ethics committee which is about to look into his affairs. favors for favors?

read all about this at http://www.jackinthehouse.org/ or check out the organization crew, citizens for responsibility and ethics in washington at http://www.citizensforethics.org/.

abramoff referred to the native americans he was defrauding of large sums of money as "monkeys," "troglodytes," and "idiots." (here's merriam webster's definition of troglodyte, by the way: "1 : a member of a primitive people dwelling in caves 2 : a person resembling a troglodyte (as in reclusive habits or outmoded or reactionary attitudes)"

so what's this got to do with race? well, i think it's interesting that three guys started out talking about race but never came near reaching any sort of concensus or agreement about anything. (in fact, i think we did agree about things at times but. . .)

my original hypothesis was that race tends to act as a diversion and a division. i think for those who are trying like hell to hang onto their money and make more and pass it down to the next generation, they're only too happy to have people invest their lives and souls, (and of course, their lettuce, cabbage, geetus, & greenbacks,) into the issue that is race and race relations.

if you go to that website and you read about this creep; jack abramoff, you will come to understand that cash is his god. my dad used to say that everybody has their god, even atheists. for some it was their christian god with allhis glorious attributes but for others, (he would say,) it might be their porsche or their youthful looks or their tv or their bon-bons or their incessant gossiping. it could be a person place or thing, or it could be as inanimate or esoteric as imagineable, but everyone has that thing that sort of propels them through their life and without which, i guess they would be a heaping mass of confusion.

so when abramoff refers to the native american tribes with epithets, one can read between the lines and see that this guy not only worships and lives for money, he looks down his nose at those who do not think as he does. creep.

it may be that i'm finally disappointed about this dialogue which has occurred on these blogs. it is stimulating but alas, i am beginning to see us as the unwitting participants in this diversionary tactic in the class warfare that is race. it's true, i do not have to walk around every day in white america as a black man, enduring the smirks (and much more,) of a confederacy of dunces and perhaps if i did, i'd feel differently. maybe i'd be so fed up with it, railing against it would be all that restrains me from going postal on a local nordstrom's?

as it is, i find those who would separate themselves from the mass of humanity by accumulating wealth so they can live in the gated community on the hillside, (i see you creeps in arcadia trying to horde the gorgeous view from your gated community,) (please read this if you love righteous activism: http://heavytrash.blogspot.com/2005/04/april-24-2005-for-immediate.html) so they can feel superior to their neighbors, so they won't feel so insecure. . .far more offensive.