...OK, so now for the ill part.
What is so frickin' difficult about presenting a united front on the day your beleaguered, often despised political party actually gets its first whiff of power in years?
Those of us over 40 (or with any history of leftist activism in what my 4-year-old daughter calls "the old days"), well recall the sectarian hair-splitting that turned the left -- and the Democratic Party -- into a kind of academic exercise in intellectual gridlock. From the Port Huron Statement through the identity politics movements (each one of which was fractious and filled with venomous infighting over ideological correctness), and down to Ted Kennedy sucker-punching the incumbent Jimmy Carter in '76 and the Dukakis camp playing very public hardball with Jesse Jackson's people, the left has often brawled away while the Republicans kept their in-fighting behind closed doors.
It's difficult, in my opinion, to overestimate the cumulative effect that all this public fratricide has had on the citizenry's perception of the Democrats. Pundits have always attributed the electorate's historical disenchantmnent with the Democrats, and the fraying of the New Deal consensus, to the mere presence of so many "interest groups" in the party -- blacks, gays, union workers, etc. And no doubt there is some core of American voters who have been turned off by the very appearance of a party of diversity. But I believe thhat the Democrats' hubris, in electoral terms, has been their willingness to get down and dirty among themselves in full view of everyone they want to vote for them. Starting in the 1960s and stretching down through the 1992 primary, they have often seemed unable to control their bee-yatchinest instincts, smacking each other down in front of the hungry media and airing their soiled underthings for all to see and smell.
If the Democrats post-1980 could have played half as nice with each other as they did while they were falling all over themselves to kiss Republican booty, if they could have played half as rough with their opponents across the aisle as they did with their allies, then the electorate might not have turned so sour on them for so long.
Furthermore, since so many of the disputes seemed to be matters of really petty ideological or intellectual concern, they started to look like what the Republicans acccused them of being: a buffoonish caricature of Soviet-era ideological purity warriors. The party of FDR left itself open to the taunts. This red-baiting was more about the Democrats' STYLE of politics than their substance, in some ways. It played in the heartland, and it played in Dixie. It was a tarry brush, and it stuck to the Donkey's asses like sweet Southern molasses.
All of which is why a couple of news items from Day Numero Uno of the New Democratic Era feel so discouraging -- at least if, like me, you've been hoping merely that the Democrats can gain some political traction going into 2008.
One is minor and involves Charles Rangel, never a retiring type and now rapidly approaching an I-don't-give-a-shit-anymore dotage where he'll just say anything that pops in his head. Asked about his agenda for the new Congress, he replied that he would have to wait for Speaker Pelosi to get to him. "She's on a 100-hour agenda, I'm on a 2-year agenda," he said, and hinted that he thought her 100-hour pledge was a bunch of political bull. It's not a big deal, but c'mon, it's the FIRST DAY, how's about a little uniting behind the game plan here. What are you, the New York Giants?
Add this remark to Rangel's election-night gloating about kicking Dick Cheney out of some plum office in the Congressional building and returning it to the new Ways and Means Committee Chairman -- namely Rangel -- and finding Cheney some room in the basement. Look, it's funny, but let's get the party back on track electorally. The Congressman from Harlem is looking like a loose cannon, loaded with balls. It's funny and refreshing but it's also grist for the Republicans' media machine mill.
The bigger internecine bullshit wafts our way from the toxic fallout over Pelosi's smackdown of fellow Cali Democrat Rep. Jane Harman, who had lobbied hard for the House Intelligence Committee Chair, only to be rebuffed by Madame Speaker. Pelosi opted instead to give the chair to Silvestre Reyes, a Texas Democrat and former border cop. Why bypass Harman, who was next in line? Because Harman is a moderate who equivocated on condemning the Bush administration's domestic surveillance program. I say, Good for Pelosi; if the Democrats can't agree that it's both ethically right AND good politics to oppose El Presidente and his junta listening in on our phone calls and wiping their butts with the Constitution, well then there's not much to make them an opposition party. So Harman picked the wrong time to take the Liebermanesque rightward road, and it cost her. Now she's moaning and backbiting about how Congress has "lost its lustre" for her. Shut up and get behind the Mule!
All of which is to say: Make nice publically, all you donkeys, keep the fights around the proverbial kitchen table and get something done. One thing's for sure: many of us have such diminished expectations after the last 8 years thhat you all really should be able to look good rolling into 2008. Now smile for the camera.
Thursday, January 4, 2007
A Fresh Ill Wind a' Blowin' (Part 1)
So today's the day a fresh ill wind blows in Washington. Or fresh AND ill. First the fresh part.
The new Congress is set to begin today, with the Democrats holding on by the skin of Tim Johnson's teeth to both houses. And there are some refreshingly decent, proactive bits of legislative business likely to come out of the House of Representatives soon -- even if it'll take longer than those famous "first 100 hours" of Nancy Pelosi.
There are six main bills that House Democrats are likely to push as they attempt not to fumble the initiative the voters handed them. From uncontroversial to mildly confrontational, they are:
1. Allow Medicare to negotiate for lower drug prices on behalf of seniors. This will pass and Bush will sign it.
2. Lower the interest rates on federal student loans. The Dems are looking to cut the rate in half, from 6.8% to 3.4%. Another done deal like prescription drug reform, but as for the future of social spending, take ominous note that for the first time in his administration's storied career of squandering money and running up an unprecedsented budget deficit, El Presidente yesterday started "challenging" the Democrats to "work with him" to balance the budget in the next 5 years -- funny how all he did when his own party was in power was cut taxes and spend spend spend.
3. Raise the minimum wage from the level of poverty hell to the level of poverty purgatory ($7.25 an hour is the target, try living on that my friend). This also will wind up with so many loopholes attached for so many typres of businesses that it's pretty much political window dressing. Cue the crocodile tears: "Sops for the poor! Sops for the poor!"
4. Approve the 9/11 Commission's recommendations on homeland security. This is the kind of political cudgel the Donkeys can use to make the Elephants look unpatriotic and incompetent. That's mainly because the 9/11 Commission somehow escaped critical scrutiny and almost instantly came to be seen as some sort of above-the-political-fray panel of Olympians issuing high-minded, omniscient edicts like thunderbolts. (It's funny how in a democracy, it's always the unelected who are perceived as best representing the interests of the people -- but that's an inversion best left for another post). Everyone will be shamed into passing this and Bush will look like even more of a dick than he already does if he resists it -- but be on the lookout for President A-Hole to attach another of his famous "Signing Statements," which basically boil down to him saying "I signed this because I had no choice politically but I reserve the right to construe from the words herein the exact opposite meaning."
5. Allow research on stem cells. The Martyr Bush, true to his intellectually blighted love affair with Jeebus, will certainly veto this, and in a bracing return to modernity, Congress will likely override his Crusade. Welcome back to the 21st century, y'all.
6. Tax oil company profits and use the revenues to fund research and development of alternative energy sources. Unsurprisingly, this most vital and intelligent policy initiative will be the hardest to push through. Every oily politician on Capitol Hill will be sneaking through the backdoor to attach riders, formulate loopholes, and generally hang the process. Whatever Frankensteinian form the bill ultimately takes, there's still little chance President Halliburton will sign it.
If all but item 6 seem pandery and mild, the entire package of initiatives still feels refreshing -- if only by comparison to the draconian wasteland of legislative cynicism that has stretched Sahara-like across the past 6 years.
But thhere's still plenty of noxious nastiness in the air, too....
The new Congress is set to begin today, with the Democrats holding on by the skin of Tim Johnson's teeth to both houses. And there are some refreshingly decent, proactive bits of legislative business likely to come out of the House of Representatives soon -- even if it'll take longer than those famous "first 100 hours" of Nancy Pelosi.
There are six main bills that House Democrats are likely to push as they attempt not to fumble the initiative the voters handed them. From uncontroversial to mildly confrontational, they are:
1. Allow Medicare to negotiate for lower drug prices on behalf of seniors. This will pass and Bush will sign it.
2. Lower the interest rates on federal student loans. The Dems are looking to cut the rate in half, from 6.8% to 3.4%. Another done deal like prescription drug reform, but as for the future of social spending, take ominous note that for the first time in his administration's storied career of squandering money and running up an unprecedsented budget deficit, El Presidente yesterday started "challenging" the Democrats to "work with him" to balance the budget in the next 5 years -- funny how all he did when his own party was in power was cut taxes and spend spend spend.
3. Raise the minimum wage from the level of poverty hell to the level of poverty purgatory ($7.25 an hour is the target, try living on that my friend). This also will wind up with so many loopholes attached for so many typres of businesses that it's pretty much political window dressing. Cue the crocodile tears: "Sops for the poor! Sops for the poor!"
4. Approve the 9/11 Commission's recommendations on homeland security. This is the kind of political cudgel the Donkeys can use to make the Elephants look unpatriotic and incompetent. That's mainly because the 9/11 Commission somehow escaped critical scrutiny and almost instantly came to be seen as some sort of above-the-political-fray panel of Olympians issuing high-minded, omniscient edicts like thunderbolts. (It's funny how in a democracy, it's always the unelected who are perceived as best representing the interests of the people -- but that's an inversion best left for another post). Everyone will be shamed into passing this and Bush will look like even more of a dick than he already does if he resists it -- but be on the lookout for President A-Hole to attach another of his famous "Signing Statements," which basically boil down to him saying "I signed this because I had no choice politically but I reserve the right to construe from the words herein the exact opposite meaning."
5. Allow research on stem cells. The Martyr Bush, true to his intellectually blighted love affair with Jeebus, will certainly veto this, and in a bracing return to modernity, Congress will likely override his Crusade. Welcome back to the 21st century, y'all.
6. Tax oil company profits and use the revenues to fund research and development of alternative energy sources. Unsurprisingly, this most vital and intelligent policy initiative will be the hardest to push through. Every oily politician on Capitol Hill will be sneaking through the backdoor to attach riders, formulate loopholes, and generally hang the process. Whatever Frankensteinian form the bill ultimately takes, there's still little chance President Halliburton will sign it.
If all but item 6 seem pandery and mild, the entire package of initiatives still feels refreshing -- if only by comparison to the draconian wasteland of legislative cynicism that has stretched Sahara-like across the past 6 years.
But thhere's still plenty of noxious nastiness in the air, too....
Tuesday, January 2, 2007
Death American Style, Part 1: The President and the Godfather
Laying in state is weird. Is it just me?
I've been riveted by the twinned images of the President and the Godfather, the multitudes turned out to see these men off -- ex-President Ford in a coffin that looks like the highest-end industrial-style Yuppie fridge, itself then draped in the flag; and the Godfather of Soul James Brown, resplendent in his open casket, wearing what he might have worn for another brilliant, powerhouse gig New Year's Eve at B.B. King's Blues Club in New York City, had he lived another few days.
James Brown had way more cool titles than Gerald Ford. Ford was Senator Ford, and then Vice President Ford, and finally, Zelig-like, President Ford. James Brown, on the other hand, was the Hardest Working Man In Show Business, and also Soul Brother Number One. He was the Black President, and in the end he reigned as the Godfather of Soul -- and he reigneth forever.
Ford was the kind of decent, conservative statesman and only mildly unethical rich man that we now have a name for - we call such people Democrats. He was a modest man who almost literally stumbled into the most powerful office in the world when Spiro Agnew had the lack of grace to take a petty bribe from a minor camapign contributor (apparently unaware of the truest truism in politics, "Steal a little and they throw you in jail, steal a lot and they make you king"). In came Ford from the Senate, a loyal and competent sort, and soon out went Nixon and, well, you know the rest.
Then there was James Brown, who apparently could be a real dick but was certainly the type to leave his mark on the world. A rigid taskmaster who fined his musicians for too many notes, too few notes, or missed dance steps; a man capable of hitting his wife on occasion; a musical and terpsichorean innovator with one good foot planted in Africa and the other right here in the African American ghetto; in short, a man with real drive, pulling himself out of the kind of Georgia childhood that swallowed multitudes of Black Americans in the first few decades of the 20th century, but which by God would not take him without a motherfuckin' fight.
Ford had much of what usually is considered glory handed to him by fate, by coincidence, by Dick Nixon. James BRown clawed and scratched for every dime he spent or saved, and every ounce of glory he ever tasted. The President-select and the Godfather by acclamation.
It is typical of poor old Gerald Ford's lot in life that his death, too, should be so thoroughly upstaged. But then, that befits Ford's willingness to laugh at himself and allow himself to be somewhat overshadowed: he was the junior partner in his marriage, as it's safe to say that the Betty Ford Clinics have made a more lasting contribution to American culture than anything Ford accomplished as President. He will probably go down, in fact, as only the THIRD-most historically important member of HIS OWN ADMINISTRATION, what with Rummy and Dark Lord Cheney getting their first intoxicating whiffs of the Oval Office, testing the outer limits of the evils of statecraft under Ford's tenure. Now even as a dying American President, Gerald Ford is Number Two (Three, actually if you count Saddam Hussein's death the same week). It's appropriate that Ford looked sort of like Charlie Brown all grown up. Good Grief!
So there's President Ford's coffin, in the stentorian chilliness of the Capitol Rotunda, draped in the flag. Mourners file by, some lay a hand on the flag while others shed a tear. Memories echo in the air, unseen. And there's Soul Brother Brown, sprawled out for all to see at the Apollo Theatre on 125th Street in Harlem, where he recorded one of the greatest live albums of all time and where he made men dance and women swoon. Lines stretch out into the cold Harlem night. This last gig may be the Godfather's best performance yet.
I've been riveted by the twinned images of the President and the Godfather, the multitudes turned out to see these men off -- ex-President Ford in a coffin that looks like the highest-end industrial-style Yuppie fridge, itself then draped in the flag; and the Godfather of Soul James Brown, resplendent in his open casket, wearing what he might have worn for another brilliant, powerhouse gig New Year's Eve at B.B. King's Blues Club in New York City, had he lived another few days.
James Brown had way more cool titles than Gerald Ford. Ford was Senator Ford, and then Vice President Ford, and finally, Zelig-like, President Ford. James Brown, on the other hand, was the Hardest Working Man In Show Business, and also Soul Brother Number One. He was the Black President, and in the end he reigned as the Godfather of Soul -- and he reigneth forever.
Ford was the kind of decent, conservative statesman and only mildly unethical rich man that we now have a name for - we call such people Democrats. He was a modest man who almost literally stumbled into the most powerful office in the world when Spiro Agnew had the lack of grace to take a petty bribe from a minor camapign contributor (apparently unaware of the truest truism in politics, "Steal a little and they throw you in jail, steal a lot and they make you king"). In came Ford from the Senate, a loyal and competent sort, and soon out went Nixon and, well, you know the rest.
Then there was James Brown, who apparently could be a real dick but was certainly the type to leave his mark on the world. A rigid taskmaster who fined his musicians for too many notes, too few notes, or missed dance steps; a man capable of hitting his wife on occasion; a musical and terpsichorean innovator with one good foot planted in Africa and the other right here in the African American ghetto; in short, a man with real drive, pulling himself out of the kind of Georgia childhood that swallowed multitudes of Black Americans in the first few decades of the 20th century, but which by God would not take him without a motherfuckin' fight.
Ford had much of what usually is considered glory handed to him by fate, by coincidence, by Dick Nixon. James BRown clawed and scratched for every dime he spent or saved, and every ounce of glory he ever tasted. The President-select and the Godfather by acclamation.
It is typical of poor old Gerald Ford's lot in life that his death, too, should be so thoroughly upstaged. But then, that befits Ford's willingness to laugh at himself and allow himself to be somewhat overshadowed: he was the junior partner in his marriage, as it's safe to say that the Betty Ford Clinics have made a more lasting contribution to American culture than anything Ford accomplished as President. He will probably go down, in fact, as only the THIRD-most historically important member of HIS OWN ADMINISTRATION, what with Rummy and Dark Lord Cheney getting their first intoxicating whiffs of the Oval Office, testing the outer limits of the evils of statecraft under Ford's tenure. Now even as a dying American President, Gerald Ford is Number Two (Three, actually if you count Saddam Hussein's death the same week). It's appropriate that Ford looked sort of like Charlie Brown all grown up. Good Grief!
So there's President Ford's coffin, in the stentorian chilliness of the Capitol Rotunda, draped in the flag. Mourners file by, some lay a hand on the flag while others shed a tear. Memories echo in the air, unseen. And there's Soul Brother Brown, sprawled out for all to see at the Apollo Theatre on 125th Street in Harlem, where he recorded one of the greatest live albums of all time and where he made men dance and women swoon. Lines stretch out into the cold Harlem night. This last gig may be the Godfather's best performance yet.
Monday, January 1, 2007
Happy New Year 1400 AD.
"They're selling postcards of the hanging
They're painting the passports brown
The beauty parlor is filled with sailors
The circus is in town..."
-Bob Dylan
There's video clips all over the Internet of a gnarled old man with a shaggy beard and a noose around his neck. Pixellated images. Occasional belches of video noise and digital artifacting tell us that this was someone's cell phone, probably, pointed above the crowd in an arc. Held aloft by a shaky hand. Everything about the form is soothingly postmodern -- after all, postmodernity is where we live. Hell, this distorted footage could have been taken at the Super Bowl. A hip hop show. A comedy club on the Sunset Strip. Paris Hilton's limo.
Yeah, the form. Familiar as a porno by now, easy on the soul. The content? That's something else.
All events are not equal, even if the way we consume them is shockingly the same. We eat this stuff up, on YouTube, via e-mail, all over the Net. We get it downloaded straight onto our cell phones through V Cast. We stare over a co-worker's shoulder at TMZ in a cubicle at work. Content.
There's lost footage from Dave Chappelle's show. There's Britney getting out of a long black limousine with no panties on. There's the beheading of some Western journalist with a kitchen knife by some men in black hoods with Arabic writing all over the wall as they hack and saw relentlessly at this skinny white neck, blood spurting everywhere. There's clips of Japanese baseball pitchers throwing 98 MPH. There's a once beloved comedian having a psychotic racist meltdown. There's some awesome band from MySpace.
There's Saddam on the gallows.
I'm not here to shed a tear for Saddam Hussein. Just maybe a couple for the rest of us. All it cost us to see this brutal asshole of a dictator die in terror was 3,000 American lives and counting; at least 10 times that many Iraqi lives and counting; a few decades' worth of international diplomacy and institution-building; and not a small chunk of what we once called our souls.
This holiday week, while Christians celebrated the anniversary of the birth of the Prince of Peace, I walked my very sentient, precocious 4-year-old daughter past the newsstands of Brooklyn and tried to keep her distracted with stories about Santa Claus, as the front page of every major daily offered grainy blown up, blown out images of a fucked up old bearded man about to swing by a rope around his neck. Someone in Baghdad has a really nice cell phone. Someone who can't get potable water or more than a few hours of electricity a day, and for whom a trip down the street is a life-threatening gambit, held that cell phone high over his head in the square and pointed it right at the gallows. A tiny chip inside this little hand-held machine set to work, processing signals with unbelievable precision and speed, and captured a series of brief moving pictures of a public execution.
See how we are. See how far we've come. We have all the technology of the 21st century, combined stunningly with all the savagery and barbarism of the dawn of the 15th. Gawk at that -- hell, take a picture, it'll last 14 minutes longer.
They're painting the passports brown
The beauty parlor is filled with sailors
The circus is in town..."
-Bob Dylan
There's video clips all over the Internet of a gnarled old man with a shaggy beard and a noose around his neck. Pixellated images. Occasional belches of video noise and digital artifacting tell us that this was someone's cell phone, probably, pointed above the crowd in an arc. Held aloft by a shaky hand. Everything about the form is soothingly postmodern -- after all, postmodernity is where we live. Hell, this distorted footage could have been taken at the Super Bowl. A hip hop show. A comedy club on the Sunset Strip. Paris Hilton's limo.
Yeah, the form. Familiar as a porno by now, easy on the soul. The content? That's something else.
All events are not equal, even if the way we consume them is shockingly the same. We eat this stuff up, on YouTube, via e-mail, all over the Net. We get it downloaded straight onto our cell phones through V Cast. We stare over a co-worker's shoulder at TMZ in a cubicle at work. Content.
There's lost footage from Dave Chappelle's show. There's Britney getting out of a long black limousine with no panties on. There's the beheading of some Western journalist with a kitchen knife by some men in black hoods with Arabic writing all over the wall as they hack and saw relentlessly at this skinny white neck, blood spurting everywhere. There's clips of Japanese baseball pitchers throwing 98 MPH. There's a once beloved comedian having a psychotic racist meltdown. There's some awesome band from MySpace.
There's Saddam on the gallows.
I'm not here to shed a tear for Saddam Hussein. Just maybe a couple for the rest of us. All it cost us to see this brutal asshole of a dictator die in terror was 3,000 American lives and counting; at least 10 times that many Iraqi lives and counting; a few decades' worth of international diplomacy and institution-building; and not a small chunk of what we once called our souls.
This holiday week, while Christians celebrated the anniversary of the birth of the Prince of Peace, I walked my very sentient, precocious 4-year-old daughter past the newsstands of Brooklyn and tried to keep her distracted with stories about Santa Claus, as the front page of every major daily offered grainy blown up, blown out images of a fucked up old bearded man about to swing by a rope around his neck. Someone in Baghdad has a really nice cell phone. Someone who can't get potable water or more than a few hours of electricity a day, and for whom a trip down the street is a life-threatening gambit, held that cell phone high over his head in the square and pointed it right at the gallows. A tiny chip inside this little hand-held machine set to work, processing signals with unbelievable precision and speed, and captured a series of brief moving pictures of a public execution.
See how we are. See how far we've come. We have all the technology of the 21st century, combined stunningly with all the savagery and barbarism of the dawn of the 15th. Gawk at that -- hell, take a picture, it'll last 14 minutes longer.
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