Dan's Thinking About War Again...

found some right excellent writing. good style, good hands-on info into the soft war on terror. very intercultural, very insightful. Read:

I began to wonder – and not for the first time - where the hundreds of men down the hall, currently employed by the Iraqi government and the United States Army, had been one year ago, before the Reconciliation. Before the Sawha. I was fairly certain to the answer to my question was caked in AK-47 gun powder and dripped with American blood. I trusted that some of the Sheiks truly believed in freedom, if not for their country, at least for their neighborhoods and for their people. Did their pipeswingers? Did these paramilitants believe in anything beyond the promise of a monthly stipend … and should they even have to? Can someone with a full stomach and a warm bed ever rightfully doubt the intentions and ideals of those without, who are seeking the same thing through whatever means present themselves?

I didn’t know the answers to these questions. Not yet, at least. So I began to type what I did know.

[ahem]

So, tomorrow I am taking a rather important test: the National Criminal Justice Officer Selection Inventory, as phase one in my attempt to become a New York State Trooper. It's a pretty important test. I could use a good job. And, hey, I'd look pretty awesome in the uniform. We'll see what happens...

today in world news....

My apologies to anyone who still reads this, I have been rather busy lately. Mostly this is her fault:



But I have to say I have been spending a good majority of my online time here and here and here. Yes, you're right, I never actually pay attention to my facebook wall or posts or inbox. That's because there is no score and bragging rights attached. Speaking of bragging rights, I now have plenty of time to blog because my 10-3, #1 in the league Team Billabongeritis got knocked out in the first round of playoffs by some Hutchdaddy 6-7 upstart from Shenawana and his friends with influence, notably the running-back gods and whoever's great idea this blizzard was.. So much for the best record in the league. I hate playoff systems.

So all this to say, years back I found something notable on from the internet monk, shared it with a few people, and completely forgot about it. Apparently I have done something with my life, as others latched on to the old philosopher. Thanks to brother Jeff, who has no quicklink because he lives in the Dark Ages where he would rather wander the Serengeti in pursuit of small, helpless grazing animals to pick on, I have rediscovered the monk and added him to my regularly browsed feeds on Google Reader. I like the simplicity of his Advent meditation.

This is pretty cool too, if you like Phil Collins.

Oh. And Merry Christmas to all!

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Tegan (look! you get a special mini blog post all to yourself! you should be proud. anecdotally, i was very happy the other day to remember my xanga password for the first time in months and actually be able to read your blog again. it made me happy. where was i? oh, her name is eileen and she works for upward bound and likes to dance and wear hats which she describes as "cute" and read Barbara Kingsolver and try out new recipes with organic and local food and in fact she is a not-a-lot-of-meat-arian and there are quite a few things about her but i will be skewered by many if i fail to mention that she also likes coffee quite a lot. can you tell from my writing that i finally bought a Dave Eggers book? i did.)

Well, Tegan, just because I can, I dedicate this song to you.

This is what I did Tuesday

First snowy day of the season...bad time to go canoeing.

watch the "video on demand" to see Ange Szymanski in his red Search and Rescue jacket.

the most accurate article.

Yeah, I'm a volunteer firefighter. Wear your lifejackets, little children.

"Beam’s writing never gives in to a jaded or purely ironic tone—and in 2007, that’s no small accomplishment...What Iron and Wine’s music seems to be urging toward more than anything is innocence, and the touchstones in this quest are frequently religious in nature...the heartfelt prayer of Our Endless Numbered Days’ “On Your Wings”: “God give us love in the time that we have / God, there are guns growing out of our bones / God, every road takes us farther from home.”

"But while it may puzzle some that a self-confessed agnostic like Beam would find consistent inspiration in biblical images and characters that are as likely to converse with the Holy Spirit as they are to address a love interest, for Beam it’s a natural, essential part of his writing process. “I like to use [religious images] because it starts you off a little bit further along in the story. You know, you could say Bob and Jerry did this, but then you have to explain who they are. But if you say ‘Cain and Abel’ it carries a certain weight. They have a connotation everyone understands, they symbolize the duality in us all. ... I like using those, because it’s our mythology.”

"...With a second round of mojitos on deck and a crackling, dry August heat making its presence felt on Guero’s outside porch, Beam pursues this line of thought further. It turns out that religion is not merely a cultural shorthand or creative prop for Beam but, like Johnny Cash before him, it constitutes one of the only three topics he’s genuinely interested in as a writer. “You have your three big things that you can talk about, basically, if you’re going to write something that actually means something to you as a human being, which is Love, God and Death. That’s basically the thing. Love, which occupies a lot of our time, because we don’t like being lonely. God, because everyone wants to know that there’s a reason behind what they’re doing and what the hell is going on. And death is just the reality of your finite time here.” "

--From the Paste Magazine interview with Sam Beam, otherwise known as "Iron and Wine," the most whole and full music I've heard in a while. Thanks to Kat for Paste, Mike for introducing me to Iron and Wine, and much jealousy to Becca who saw Iron and Wine in concert, in a tiny venue, before they were big, because her brother was opening the show...

"with the plastic eyeballs, spraypaint the vegetables/dog food stalls with the beefcake p****hose"

[censored lyrics in honor of mrs. kjbls]

Courtesy of dad, I now have the amazing Uncle Jay in my life.

Think Family Life Network gone horribly...right.

"with butane in my veins and I'm out to cut the junkie"

3.

Sometimes I wake, and, lo! I have forgot,
And drifted out upon an ebbing sea!
My soul that was at rest now resteth not,
For I am with myself and not with thee;
Truth seems a blind moon in a glaring morn,
Where nothing is but sick-heart vanity:
Oh, thou who knowest! save thy child forlorn.

10.

When I no more can stir my soul to move,
And life is but the ashes of a fire;
When I can but remember that my heart
Once used to live and love, long and aspire,--
Oh, be thou then the first, the one thou art;
Be thou the calling, before all answering love,
And in me wake hope, fear, boundless desire.

George MacDonald, Diary of an Old Soul, which you can read online here.

In the time of chimpanzees, I was a monkey

And, in other news, something I agreed wholeheartedly with before it was even broadcast.

A Belated Question

What are the long-term consequences of American unilateralism--namely, the willingness of President W. Bush to employ American military force unrestrained by international consensus or the United Nations?

The answer is increased global insecurity--no one knows who the US will decide to strike next. Additionally, the status quo rules for the use of armed force have changed. If it's acceptable for the US to pursue its interests abroad, unilaterally, using diplomatic, economic and military force to strong-arm lesser countries into compliance, then there is no moral ground to condemn countries such as Russia and China for doing the same. In fact, it's in their interest to cooperate, because the world's sole superpower is being downright bully-ish in pursuing its interests. And they can even use "security" and "combatting terrorism" to justify expansion into other spheres of influence.

The President's actions abroad (the global war on terror, the iraq war, ignoring the UN and global cooperation) and at home (encroachments on civil liberties and the right of habeas corpus, the Patriot Act, labeling dissidents as unpatriotic, labeling criticism as aiding and abetting the enemy) may not be actually immoral, unjustified, and a threat to human rights and the stability of the international community.

But they belong to--and by similarity tacitly lend approval to--the international rulebook of totalitarian and imperialistic governments. They have placed the United States squarely into a moral and structural grey area where totalitarian states exercise military force to achieve their own interests unrestrained by the necessity of membership within an international community. In undermining the authority of international institutions like the United Nations and by ignoring treaty obligations, the cowboy president has made the world a distinctly less orderly, and potentially less peaceful, place. If the United States can invade weaker countries in the name of security, while leveraging economic and political power to obtain consent and compliance from other countries, who is to stop Russia, China, India, or Pakistan (all nuclear-armed countries) from doing the same?

We should be wary of exercising "we can, and we will" diplomacy--lest we be held to the same principle in a weaker moment. This especially worries me in a world where basic democratic freedoms and institutions are disappearing under strongmen such as Hugo Chavez (yes, Steve, it does pain me to say it) and Vladimir Putin.

[in rereading my journal I find quotes]

"We are human and finite, and thus cannot live perpetually in a sense of expectation, or in a continuous Advent. We are distracted by many things. Our spiritual awareness waxes and wanes. If an attitude of expectancy, or an inclination to poignant spiritual experiences, is cultivated by conscious effort of our own, we will suffer severe limitations.

"Such effort totally misses the mark. We will get lifted up in moments of tenderness but we will be cast down in in hours of dryness. The swing of emotions is natural to us, and some are more subject to its swings than others. We musn't despair about this. But we shoudl be aware of cultivating religious emotions under the delusion that these are the workings of the Holy Spirit. Such...are unstable. They get in the way of our communion with God...

"God has come to us because we, by our own power of soul, by our own emotions, even the noblest and most sublime, can never attain redemption, can never regain communion with God...

"True expectancy, the waiting that is genuine and from the heart, is brought about by the coming of the Holy Spirit, by God coming to us, and not by our own devices. Spiritual depth, if it is true, is the working of God coming down and penetrating to the depths of our heart, and not of our own soul's climbing. No ladder of mysticism can ever meet or find or possess God. Faith is a power that is given to us; it is never simply our ability or strength of will to believe.

"To put it simply, spiritual experience, whether it be of faith, hope, or love, is something we cannot manufacture, but we can only receive. If we direct our lives to seeking it for ourselves, we will surely lose it, but if we lose our lives by living out daily the way of Christ, we shall find it...


"The most striking revelation...is the laying down of power that is revealed in his birth. Christ did not spring armed from the head of Zeus. He came as a child...This pattern of complete abandonment of human strength in total surrender to God's will is vital...When we experience God's love we turn away from the notion that...we by our religious efforts can set something in motion that God must obey in response."


"To believe that we, by an effort of will, can mount nearer to God or add one cubit to our stature is as un-Christian as the belief that we have no task as Christians for the mundane affairs of this world. Both beliefs have the same root--the pride that seeks to climb its way to God--and produce the same kind of confusion as the ancient attempt to build the tower of Babel."

--Phillip Britts

fairly amazing...

"click on the pictures to watch the photoshopping in progress"

(no, it really doesn't have anything to do with Firefly, but I'm tired)

the photoshopping is incredible...i want to be a model now. heck, with that computing power, i could be a girl model!

see also make sure you see the change in her arms--it's absolutely staggering

see, I don't like this. people are f***ing with my mind, and it's practically subliminal. a little color here, a little wash there, a little tweak there, and suddenly I'm not interacting with real people anymore. I'm interacting with unconscious expectations in between me and them. I'm judging my life and my experiences against some airbrushed, fanciful unreality.

and it's not just sex and beauty--I'm getting these notions that work should be hyper-engaging, my recreation should be both stylish, exotic, and intensely satisfying, and my relationships should be nourished by sarcastic one-liners and an overweening sense of self-importance.

sigh. the Sports Illustrated guy wrote something quite important when talking about Barry Bonds' breaking the home-run record under allegations of steroid use: these days, it's paramount to always keep spare batteries for the bullshit meter.

or, in the amazing words of Beck,

"don't believe everything that you breathe."

--

edit: and, of course, somebody had to do this, which simply rocks.

Old Poem

If I can speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but am destitute of Love, I have but become a loud-sounding trumpet or a clanging cymbal.

If I possess the gift of prophecy and am versed in all mysteries and all knowledge, and have such absolute faith that I can remove mountains, but am destitute of Love, I am nothing.

And if I distribute all my possessions to the poor, and give up my body to be burned, but am destitute of Love, it profits me nothing.

Love is patient and kind. Love knows neither envy nor jealousy. Love is not forward and self-assertive, nor boastful and conceited.

She does not behave unbecomingly, nor seek to aggrandize herself, nor blaze out in passionate anger, nor brood over wrongs.

She finds no pleasure in injustice done to others, but joyfully sides with the truth. (Weymouth NT)

Love never stops being patient, never stops believing, never stops hoping, never gives up. (GWT)

The love doth never fail; and whether there be prophecies, they shall become useless; whether tongues, they shall cease; whether knowledge, it shall become useless;

for in part we know, and in part we prophecy;

and when that which is perfect may come, then that which is in part shall become useless.

When I was a babe, as a babe I was speaking, as a babe I was thinking, as a babe I was reasoning, and when I have become a man, I have made useless the things of the babe;

for we see now through a mirror obscurely, and then face to face; now I know in part, and then I shall fully know, as also I was known;

and now there doth remain faith, hope, love -- these three; and the greatest of these is love. (YLT)

" THE fact is that purification and austerity are even more necessary for the appreciation of life and laughter than for anything else. To let no bird fly past unnoticed, to spell patiently the stones and weeds, to have the mind a storehouse of sunsets, requires a discipline in pleasure and an education in gratitude."

--G. K. Chesterton, 'Twelve Types.'

a good thought on postmodernism:

"'Tis the very difference between the artistic mind and the mathematical that the former sees things as they are in a picture, some nearer and larger, some smaller and farther away while to the mathematical mind everything, every inch in a million, every fact in a cosmos, must be of equal value. That is why mathematicians go mad, and poets scarcely ever do. A man may have as wide a view of life as he likes, the wider the better: a distant view, a bird's-eye view, but still a view and not a map. The one thing he cannot attempt in his version of the universe is to draw things to scale."

--from the same

So I Don't Post So Much When I Don't Have Free Pix Messaging

It's true.

So this will be an imagination post. Close your eyes.

Wait. Open them. Read a paragraph. Then close them and call visions of yours truly to mind.

I have a wicked awesome Leroy Townes shirt, from a wicked awesome show, a few weeks ago. They are fun, souldful, witty, putting the wild west and the lonesome and the down and out back into country and western. It has a bright red rooster on a dark green background, fronted by crossed pistols, and in my head it is the standard for some sort of western rebellion populated by grizzled, weatherbeaten cowhands, desperate prospectors in floppy hats, Mexican priests and weary barmaids with scrappy children. Ensemble la Revolucion!

Recent events have led me to two conclusions: the best moments in life cannot be planned--the best you can do is keep your eyes open, don't get lost in self-pity, dive into whatever is present with gusto, and earn your lumps or victories accordingly. You may not come out a rock star in the end, but you will come out grinning fiercely.

Ya see a curveball coming, and you just have to step up to the plate and swing. "For the rest of your life, you'll look back and wonder what would have happened if you got into that car..."

Speaking of Transformers, I'm sorry, the battered and classy old Camaro is totally cooler than the flashy plastic one--old Detroit iron will always maintain depth of character over electronics and injection molding and air conditioning and other farkle of the like.

So anyway, stepping up to the plate and swinging is what got me in the Genesee River last night, courtesy of Noel and his devilish ladies and evil sidekick miniCronk. But that is another story, for another day, and I may have gone down, but I went down in swinging', and that's what counts, right? Because who knows...next time might be a home run.

[edit]


judge for yourself. classic, weatherbeaten, monkeywrenched with great love on summer days in the driveway by some kid in Detroit saving his bucks for something loud and fast...

or plastic.

Now That's What I Call Music...

just plain awesome. Check out soma fm for more "extremely independent internet radio," especially "Groove Salad."

in other news, Nickel Creek at TitS (that's "Thursdays in the Square" for all ya'll not-Buffalonians) tonight! Free!

Be My Netflix Friend!

So if you Netflix, you should Netflix friend me. Then I'll know which movies you're getting and I can crash your party instead of wasting precious queue spots on movies I could be watching at your house!

And vice versa...

click here!

It's Great Being A Guy

My housemate, Nate, and I took the hour-long minute pilgrimage to Hornell last night, the abode of the only decently stocked grocery store for three counties in any direction. We'd been living off rice, canned beans and tomatoes, and pasta for the last week and it had been a good solid month since we last darkened a grocer's door.

Two shopping carts (and approximately forty cans of tomatoes, black beans, black-eyed peas, chili beans) later, with luck, we won't have to do that again for another month. We are men. You pull down the biggest wildebeest in the herd so that you don't have to do it again for a while, even if you lose a few expendable tribesmen in the process. (Leading, inevitably, to the expression, "It pays to be alpha.")

Incidentally, we stopped along side the road to pay our respects to a sleek apparition of beauty, in excellent condition, a 1997 Honda CBR900RR, in the red and black. From the days when sportbikes were still naturally aspirated, the '97 double R is a beautifully smooth, elegant, well designed machine of death. I know this because it was for sale, and the owner asked me if I wanted to take it out for a spin.

I'll summarise: the owner (Sean) said that it will do 90mph in first gear, and 135mph in 3rd, and that he's afraid of losing his CDL license and/or ending up like his friend, a local BOCES teacher. He's got good reason to worry--that machine has a very obscene amount of power for two wheels. It bike has six gears, but I was too terrified to get to third. I never buried the throttle, but I can verify--it does do 90 in first. Without even trying. It's an utterly terrifying sensation--you could let your mind wander and hit three digits in no time. Flat.

That's the thing that I like about my bike...it goes fast (well, not really, when you compare it with a raging testosterone fiend like the 900RR), but you have to work hard get it to really move. When you want play screaming demon in the twisties, you have to really get your head into it, hit the right spot in the teensy-weensy powerband, work your way carefully through the gears, being terrified the whole time because every little wobble in the road translates through a less-than-performance suspension. If you relax, it relaxes with you, and you can enjoy a nice sedate, comfortable, fun ride through the rolling countryside.

There is no "relax" button on the 900RR (the two "R"s designating its purpose: Racing, and more Racing). It just goes and goes and goes and goes and goes, and if you want a little more power, you just twist deeper in to the throttle, and--whammo--you get way more than a little power. In the words of the inimitable Mr. Jacoby: "You don't ever have to leave first gear! It's the easiest bike in the world to ride!"

So, that was fun, and terrifying, at the same time, and I am happy to go back to my not ridiculously insane, ordinary-mortals motorcycle. Except that there's this taste of the incredible disparity between a minuscule wrist-movements and incredible horsepower response lingering wistfully in the back of my head...

Thoughfulness

I've been researching the Iraq war, and the military in general, and it struck me--whether or not the war is an unpleasant reality that we'd like to push to the edges of our consciousness in order to get on with our lives of cheerful consumption and self-importance, the entire adventure (or debacle, or task of nation-building, however you see it) is the expressed will of the American people.

The American political system, as shaped by the American people, is one in which decisions are made based on powerful emotions: emotions of borrowed superiority appropriated through belonging to a particular ideological identity, for instance, or pride in being courageous, tough, and in touch with the harsh realities of a dangerous world full of nuke-toting terrorists bent on the destruction of Western Civilization.

We are, I am convinced, political consumers. We pay people to produce convincing and stylized political rhetoric that seductively courts our desire to feel both impressive and correct, then we loudly parrot that rhetoric. And we, the people of the United States of America, are content with that system, regardless of its negative impact on the rest of the world, or its great untapped potential to improve the lives of all sorts of people, Iraqi and otherwise.

I feel like we're in a science fiction movie, where our creations have turned against us--the institutions of democracy and the free press have become institutions of mass group reaction, the enemies of sustained community deliberation. We react to events and causes as they occur, and then forget them when something new comes makes headlines. We have the political attention span--and memory--of five year olds. And the dialogue to match.

So. There are new machines. I was absolutely fascinated this week to read, for the first time, news in primary sources. I found blogs by American soldiers both for and against (and ambivalent towards) the war; I found blogs by Iraqi citizens, describing how their lives have changed since the downfall of Saddam and the beginning of a civil war. I found frontline documentary films by PBS, and independent reporters who fundraised from their websites.

I came to three conclusions:

One. The men and women of the armed forces are, for the most part, policy-implementers, not policy-makers. Their loyalty is the mission, and the mission is decided by the elected representatives of the people of the United States of the America. If those people think the mission is important, they will pay attention to that mission from the day the President declares a war (or a conflict), they will research it and critique it and be involved in the process with a long-term view in mind. They have a moral responsibility to, as it is their bombs and bullets that changing other peoples' worlds--and I think Americans have failed their duty to the rest of the world. Not feeling the direct impact of their war (unless agony-at-the-pump can be considered of equal distress with suicide-bombing-kills-hundreds-in-a-market-and-nobody-bats-an-eye-because-it's-business-as-usual), the American people haven't been terribly concerned about being informed of the details of the war and nation-building, until the shit really started to hit the fan and we started to not only look bad, but sustain uncomfortable amounts of casualties.

One Point Five. It's very sad to read in various blogs that fundamentalists are gaining social and political power and bullying/threatening people for things like playing soccer, reading books, doffing headscarves in public, and shaving. The saddest moment in my readings was when a Muslim woman described her decision to start wearing the headscarf.

"I realized how common it had become only in mid-July when M., a childhood friend, came to say goodbye before leaving the country...She was getting ready to leave before the sun set, and she picked up the beige headscarf folded neatly by her side. As she told me about one of her neighbors being shot, she opened up the scarf with a flourish, set it on her head like a pro, and pinned it snuggly under her chin with the precision of a seasoned hijab-wearer. All this without a mirror- like she had done it a hundred times over… Which would be fine, except that M. is Christian.

If M. can wear one quietly- so can I." from Baghdad Burning, 05-08-2006.

Two. Iraq, like anyplace, is quite complex. In some areas, American efforts have been more successful than others. It's entirely plausible that while the US Occupation may be successful and valuable in some areas of the country and completely futile in others--that the Iraq war could have both good and bad outcomes, dependent on circumstances and perspective. Of course, it's increasingly bad, but knee-jerk generalizations about the hope/hopelessness of the and idealizations about the use of military force have certainly hurt the war effort. Each voice on the ground, each primary source will have a different interaction with the US invasion. Sometimes the differences are subtle, sometimes they are grand--no system of government is perfect.

Three. But some are better than others, and right now, I'm tempted to say (without much concrete research into conditions under Saddam to back it up) that maybe, by way of generalization, the average Iraqi was better off under Saddam before the war, and even better off before sanctions were first levied. This is the cost of American will, and it is a cost we inflicted on the people of Iraq quite whimsically. We owe it to the Iraqi people to not cave in to sentiment or knee-jerk reaction or emotive self-important ideology politics, but to have well-thought-out reasons for whatever we do with this mess that is Iraq. We have to give them the best possible chance for the stablest, most effective, fairest chance at peace that we can--whether that means staying the course, pulling out, or working hand-in-hand with the various unsavory characters who occupy positions of authority in Iraq at the moment. It's the least we can do, since we, each and every one of us, through our choices, actions, and inaction, put them where they are today.

research continues

Bibi Z...

it's amazing how long a history Iraq has had. I read an excellent book (that I then lent to Tegan and never saw again) by a sociologist's wife about her time in a small, conservative Iraqi village under the monarchy, and her experiences with the women behind the abayas...

at any rate, can it be said that as long as the Iraqi people have their bibis, and their memories of better days and better people, they have hope?


[edit]

and the headscarves are back. this happened in Iran, too...

[edit]

I think the worst is the breakdown of social order. It's not that you're afraid to die--you're just afraid to die whimsically, or for the wrong reason, or for no reason at all, in the middle of what used to be a semi-developed, secular and mildly prosperous country.

[edit]

PBS on Iraqi Police Training: Quantity over Quality, and lots of Haraka Haraka and all the Baraka that goes with it!

American Soldier Hoo-Rah Airborn.

wisdom

in their own words

so there he goes singing the gospel again

"and I could write a song a hundred miles long
Well that’s where I belong and you belong with me
The streets you’re walking on, a thousand houses long
Well that’s where I belong and you belong with me
Oh what good is it to live with nothing left to give
Forget but not forgive, not loving all you see
Oh the streets you’re walking on a thousand houses long
Well that’s where I belong and you belong with me
Not swallowed in the sea

You belong with me, not swallowed in the sea
Yeah you belong with me

Not swallowed in the sea."

Coldplay