(no subject)
Terrorism is a funny word... If it's using scare tactics to get your way... then, isn't that exactly what we're doing in the Middle Easy right now... Trying to scare Iraq into playing by our rules, having only the weapons that we tell them is okay, and meanwhile the same standards don't apply to us and our weapons... Why? Is it because America has a better track record with weapons of mass destruction?
Ask Japan about that one at some point...
Anyhow, I'm not an idiot and I do know that certain countries because of economic and political desperation and goals that include such intelligence as "getting all the Jews out of here", some countries are better equipt to deal with nuclear and biological weapons than others... of course, that's like saying that some people are better have with their finger on the button than others... and really, a question like that makes you wonder why there's even a button at all, and why it's such a deeply ingrained human quality that we don't even question anymore the inevitability of these weapons... It's the "someone's gotta have them, and it might as well be us, because we can't trust THEM"...
So, what separates us from terrorist? Is it that our "way" is more noble? That's to some degree subjective, but again, we live in a country that at least pretends to value freedom... even though lately, we seem to value security a little more... When Bush in his STOTU address said, "freedom isn't America's gift... but God's gift to the world.." it neglects that a fundamental aspect of freedom involves the apply to say what you take and where you take it from... there are a great many people in the Middle East who probably don't want American influence in any form, even if it's to give them freedom... Think of what Bush just said, and you'll realize that we no longer have a mature government in charge... we have a government which is inseparable from our God... and what is "our God" well, it's belief in a higher power, but let's be serious and remember what Bush represents to the nation and the world... He's a Christrian... and he's not just bringing freedom, he's bringing freedom with our GOD attached to it, and whether he intends to or not, his way will inevitably disrupt the way of life of people who don't want our influence, because they don't want our value or our God in their lives in any way...
Think about what that does to the ego and spirit of a religious people when we show them that OUR GOD gave the gift of freedom to you, through us, his true believers, while your God gave you dictators and cruelty... How can people raise their children with the values they hold most dear when we've swept in an undercut all their promises of hope and good? Think about this? Thank Allah for the Americans? I don't know...
Maybe food keeps mankind alive, as it's said in at least one place, Dostoevesky anyway... but, damn
It'd be one thing if people viewed America as truly a multifaceted land full of all different kinds of bright and beautiful people and religions and beliefs, but we don't have that yet... We don't send that image out to the world... So long as our government is willing to sacrifice the initiative of equality to pressing concerns of security and the protrail of an undivided front, we will never come across to the world with the values which truly make this nation special... We're not free, because we'll fight, no... We're free because we can always put our hatred for each other aside long enough to pound the shit out of anybody else... Courage and pride are great things, but there's just components to the hammer and add nothing to hand that most weild it... Where's honesty and integrity... We have a President who will not speak to those who don't understand his case... He will not clearly justify his actions... He claims a basis for war in the name of God, hoping that vagueness and ambiguity will shroud the fact that it's his God he has in mind and that not everyone in America believe in it... We're not free if we can't stop what's happening...
That's the simple truth to this... We're not free if we have no say in this. And if they try to tell you that it's the decision of elected officials, then point at the recent presidential elections and ask yourself how that illustrates the will of the masses when the masses voted one way, but the results, due to the design of process gives a different result... And yeah, it's unfair to claim that the election was anything more than a standard screw-up which happens all the time in anything, and it's a real credit to our nation that we didn't implode after that... In fact, a pat on the back to everyone who thought about rioting if OJ was convicted, but weren't too concerned with who the president was... good show, America... way to retain that solidarity when it really counted.
Protest and be arrested or detained, but that's not so bad... Really. There's the fact that protesting in America is often something that's seen as a lazy, uninformed, under-educated persons tactic. And apathy is more consistantly rewarded in this country... Even this bitching that I'm doing and you're doing, will be seen as just another loser with time on his/her hands who's chose to do nothing productive for society except bitch about problems that he/she doesn't have the faintest clue about... Besides, what hurts intelligent discourse is stupid blind discouse... The sort of anti-Bush, anti-government drawl that is spiked with fashionable wit, but doesn't have anymore than a sprinkle of facts as a mere distraction from a lack of thought.
Any running there mouth about stupid nonsense like "BUSH MUST DIE" and "LET'S IMPEACH BUSH" is just imature and looking for something to shout about.. and anyone who went to my stupid college will see that in the PROTESTS or rather the We Don't Want to Go to Class rally and the RAGE AGAINST NOTHING parade... People are showing themselves as stupid, and worse, they're making any kind of cause look like it's just toddlers throwing temper tantrums... What I'd say about them, despite the fact that they're numbers, is that they're worthless... And really social disobedience has been brought down to the level of excessive drinking and partying...just something kids do and they get over it... and sometimes, silly adults do it so they can still feel "cool"....
But it's funny when I'd still look back at college feeling glad that I'm more known for excessive drinking and self-interest than political activity... I think it makes a lot of sense now looking back considering what we had to work with... I'm not proud that I neither fought my problems or problems on the whole, really... but only through skill, intelligence, and quality work can you seriously hope to affect change... The whole nation is clamoring over stupid American Idol... if at the beginning or end of one of those horribly rendered hits from the 80's, somebody said, "I don't want us to go to war" then that would, sadly, mean something to a lot of people...
So what can you do, except hope to create things, put a little bit of problem into them, show what's going wrong.... And more than that... Notice how all the smart people you know want to be writers and actors and journalists and such... Who wants to run the government? Who wants to think up answers? Who's really all that smart afterall? People who write about all that's gone wrong, or people working around the clock to figure out what's right?
Sure, this preaching and begging needs to be done, but I doubt anyone is listening to me, and I don't think that making the stride to get people to listen to me is really going to matter... So yeah, I'm glad for those extra studious people who point others in the direction of someone more intelligent, who can tell them which side is up, because I sure as hell am not qualified to do this...
And I guess that's what's important if you want to make an actual statement and not just run your mouth... Qualification. Creditability. And for some people Entertainment Tonight has more credibility than the SOTU and you see this in opposite effect when they ask the elderly about the STOU and they say, "He's the president, so we have to agree with him." Makes me think the world has already changed so much in last few generations, that maybe the 60's weren't a bust afterall, and when things get really down to the breaking point, the old guard's going to slip, and hopefully, it won't be too late by then... As long as the kids stay sharp, or at least angry, I think we have an honest shot at an honest government somewhere in our time... I think it's the duty of every American to just keep it together, until then... believe, buy lots of groceries, hope, and don't let mad men tell us what's best without making a clear cut case... when they ask for money...say no... when they ask for your life, move to Canada....
That's all.
Ask Japan about that one at some point...
Anyhow, I'm not an idiot and I do know that certain countries because of economic and political desperation and goals that include such intelligence as "getting all the Jews out of here", some countries are better equipt to deal with nuclear and biological weapons than others... of course, that's like saying that some people are better have with their finger on the button than others... and really, a question like that makes you wonder why there's even a button at all, and why it's such a deeply ingrained human quality that we don't even question anymore the inevitability of these weapons... It's the "someone's gotta have them, and it might as well be us, because we can't trust THEM"...
So, what separates us from terrorist? Is it that our "way" is more noble? That's to some degree subjective, but again, we live in a country that at least pretends to value freedom... even though lately, we seem to value security a little more... When Bush in his STOTU address said, "freedom isn't America's gift... but God's gift to the world.." it neglects that a fundamental aspect of freedom involves the apply to say what you take and where you take it from... there are a great many people in the Middle East who probably don't want American influence in any form, even if it's to give them freedom... Think of what Bush just said, and you'll realize that we no longer have a mature government in charge... we have a government which is inseparable from our God... and what is "our God" well, it's belief in a higher power, but let's be serious and remember what Bush represents to the nation and the world... He's a Christrian... and he's not just bringing freedom, he's bringing freedom with our GOD attached to it, and whether he intends to or not, his way will inevitably disrupt the way of life of people who don't want our influence, because they don't want our value or our God in their lives in any way...
Think about what that does to the ego and spirit of a religious people when we show them that OUR GOD gave the gift of freedom to you, through us, his true believers, while your God gave you dictators and cruelty... How can people raise their children with the values they hold most dear when we've swept in an undercut all their promises of hope and good? Think about this? Thank Allah for the Americans? I don't know...
Maybe food keeps mankind alive, as it's said in at least one place, Dostoevesky anyway... but, damn
It'd be one thing if people viewed America as truly a multifaceted land full of all different kinds of bright and beautiful people and religions and beliefs, but we don't have that yet... We don't send that image out to the world... So long as our government is willing to sacrifice the initiative of equality to pressing concerns of security and the protrail of an undivided front, we will never come across to the world with the values which truly make this nation special... We're not free, because we'll fight, no... We're free because we can always put our hatred for each other aside long enough to pound the shit out of anybody else... Courage and pride are great things, but there's just components to the hammer and add nothing to hand that most weild it... Where's honesty and integrity... We have a President who will not speak to those who don't understand his case... He will not clearly justify his actions... He claims a basis for war in the name of God, hoping that vagueness and ambiguity will shroud the fact that it's his God he has in mind and that not everyone in America believe in it... We're not free if we can't stop what's happening...
That's the simple truth to this... We're not free if we have no say in this. And if they try to tell you that it's the decision of elected officials, then point at the recent presidential elections and ask yourself how that illustrates the will of the masses when the masses voted one way, but the results, due to the design of process gives a different result... And yeah, it's unfair to claim that the election was anything more than a standard screw-up which happens all the time in anything, and it's a real credit to our nation that we didn't implode after that... In fact, a pat on the back to everyone who thought about rioting if OJ was convicted, but weren't too concerned with who the president was... good show, America... way to retain that solidarity when it really counted.
Protest and be arrested or detained, but that's not so bad... Really. There's the fact that protesting in America is often something that's seen as a lazy, uninformed, under-educated persons tactic. And apathy is more consistantly rewarded in this country... Even this bitching that I'm doing and you're doing, will be seen as just another loser with time on his/her hands who's chose to do nothing productive for society except bitch about problems that he/she doesn't have the faintest clue about... Besides, what hurts intelligent discourse is stupid blind discouse... The sort of anti-Bush, anti-government drawl that is spiked with fashionable wit, but doesn't have anymore than a sprinkle of facts as a mere distraction from a lack of thought.
Any running there mouth about stupid nonsense like "BUSH MUST DIE" and "LET'S IMPEACH BUSH" is just imature and looking for something to shout about.. and anyone who went to my stupid college will see that in the PROTESTS or rather the We Don't Want to Go to Class rally and the RAGE AGAINST NOTHING parade... People are showing themselves as stupid, and worse, they're making any kind of cause look like it's just toddlers throwing temper tantrums... What I'd say about them, despite the fact that they're numbers, is that they're worthless... And really social disobedience has been brought down to the level of excessive drinking and partying...just something kids do and they get over it... and sometimes, silly adults do it so they can still feel "cool"....
But it's funny when I'd still look back at college feeling glad that I'm more known for excessive drinking and self-interest than political activity... I think it makes a lot of sense now looking back considering what we had to work with... I'm not proud that I neither fought my problems or problems on the whole, really... but only through skill, intelligence, and quality work can you seriously hope to affect change... The whole nation is clamoring over stupid American Idol... if at the beginning or end of one of those horribly rendered hits from the 80's, somebody said, "I don't want us to go to war" then that would, sadly, mean something to a lot of people...
So what can you do, except hope to create things, put a little bit of problem into them, show what's going wrong.... And more than that... Notice how all the smart people you know want to be writers and actors and journalists and such... Who wants to run the government? Who wants to think up answers? Who's really all that smart afterall? People who write about all that's gone wrong, or people working around the clock to figure out what's right?
Sure, this preaching and begging needs to be done, but I doubt anyone is listening to me, and I don't think that making the stride to get people to listen to me is really going to matter... So yeah, I'm glad for those extra studious people who point others in the direction of someone more intelligent, who can tell them which side is up, because I sure as hell am not qualified to do this...
And I guess that's what's important if you want to make an actual statement and not just run your mouth... Qualification. Creditability. And for some people Entertainment Tonight has more credibility than the SOTU and you see this in opposite effect when they ask the elderly about the STOU and they say, "He's the president, so we have to agree with him." Makes me think the world has already changed so much in last few generations, that maybe the 60's weren't a bust afterall, and when things get really down to the breaking point, the old guard's going to slip, and hopefully, it won't be too late by then... As long as the kids stay sharp, or at least angry, I think we have an honest shot at an honest government somewhere in our time... I think it's the duty of every American to just keep it together, until then... believe, buy lots of groceries, hope, and don't let mad men tell us what's best without making a clear cut case... when they ask for money...say no... when they ask for your life, move to Canada....
That's all.