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More and more people are asking these days, Are the Democrats bankrupt as a political party?

Ask a Dimslow. Is the Pope Catholic?

Now, I may be slower than a glacier with arthritis most ways, but even a Dimslow can pull the trigger pretty quick on that one.

The Ds aren’t the only thing that’s bankrupt of course. So’s the whole voting system, where you’ve got to be a zillionaire or agree with all the other zillionaires to even get your hat thrown in the voting ring in the first place. Well, a Dimslow is used to facing long odds. So we’re going to rear back these next years and throw our hats just as far as the common wind will take them. Spread the words, folks. Talk up a storm. Bang the pots and pans. Because the Dimslows have long since had enough.  

The Democrats and Congress have totally repudiated the will of the voters and the larger public in regard to the Iraq War. The Democrats’ refuse to cut off the Iraq occupation funding. Their so-called troop withdrawal deadlines are phony. They aren’t even considering the reparations the US owes Iraq, or money for the UN to help Iraq with the horrific destruction and loss of life.

The Democrats have proposed essentially nothing, or worse, the same old, same old—the typical continuation of the status quo, or worse, wrapped in the typical layers of PR—which once again makes the Democrats liars on the same scale as the Republicans and worse in some ways, because some of the Republicans don’t lie in as many layers about what they are doing. Some of them are more willing to be more upfront about the thugging around. Thug Nation, invasion and occupation—that’s the current reality of DemRep action in relation to Iraq, etc.

Overall the Republicans are somewhat more destructive, even if the Democrats lie in more layers. Both are bankrupt.

Did Genghis Khan’s grandson Hulagu conquer and occupy Iraq as violently and destructively and lethally as the US is doing?   

Power Forth With Comedy

Divine Comedy

     Julian Gough

What is wrong with the modern literary novel? Why is it so worthy and dull? Why is it so anxious? Why is it so bloody boring?

Well, let’s go back a bit first. Two and a half thousand years ago, at the time of Aristophanes, the Greeks believed that comedy was superior to tragedy: tragedy was the merely human view of life (we sicken, we die). But comedy was the gods’ view, from on high: our endless and repetitive cycle of suffering, our horror of it, our inability to escape it. The big, drunk, flawed, horny Greek gods watched us for entertainment, like a dirty, funny, violent, repetitive cartoon. And the best of the old Greek comedy tried to give us that relaxed, amused perspective on our flawed selves. We became as gods, laughing at our own follies.

Many of the finest novels—and certainly the novels I love most—are in the Greek comic tradition, rather than the tragic: Rabelais, Cervantes, Swift, Voltaire, and on through to Joseph Heller’s Catch-22 and the late Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse 5.

…

Universal Declaration of Human Rights Article 6:

“Everyone has the right to recognition everywhere as a person before the law.”

Even a Dimslow can see that this so-called human rights article is outrageous. What is this, some kind of anarchistic doctrine? Everyone a person? Everyone? Surely the framers and ratifiers of the UDHR have not met all the Dimslow family.  

In my humble opinion, I, John Doe Dimslow, believe that only the good loyal consumers of Patriotica should ever be recognized as persons by the state or by anyone else for that matter–period. And I define a good loyal consumer of Patriotica as someone who makes and spends a minimum of 50 percent more than the median income and believes with the first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, John Jay, that “the people who own the country ought to govern it.”

“Everyone has the right to recognition everywhere as a person before the law”? Don’t make me laugh. Everyone knows that the only people (and other entities) fully entitled to such rights are corporations, their executives, and all such clones.

Therefore we must strike this UDHR article from the Dimslow presidential election platform and replace it with a more sane article regarding recognition worthiness.  

How about this one: Article 6: You got money, big money? Then you get the keys to the country (countries) to do with all us Dimslows as you will, for we are all your loyal imprisoned consumer slaves, dear Sirs, forever, amen.

People are people? Who would have thought? Those anarchists are everywhere, I swear. Rest assured, dear voters, further modifications to the UDHR will be made as needed on our long road to liberty.   

“Pentagon unveils troop care measures” — intends to immediately withdraw from Iraq and the rest of the globe, sparing untold numbers of lives and saving hundreds of billions of dollars annually that will be put to use saving and improving the lives of millions of people in the US and abroad.

This “Pentagon Plan,” as it has come to be called, will be implemented just as soon as the Bush plan to shrink Congress to a total of five members is realized. Pressed for comment, President Bush vowed, “Formally abolish Congress, then watch me really work.” No report yet on whether anyone believes it matters if Congress is abolished or not.

In other news, the dead continue to pile up in Iraq and the maimed continue to grow. Bush said, “This shows clear signs of progress. Piling up and growing is a good thing. This is a promise of what is to come.” 

When finally reached for comment, the (full of) Vice President Dick Cheney said, “I couldn’t have said it better myself. We have moved beyond the ‘last throes’ of the insurgency and are in the end stage. Soon, there will be no more tomorrows whatsoever. And we will have the President’s devout leadership to thank for it.” 

The (full of) Vice President appeared to begin making the sign of the cross in front of his chest (or reaching for a cup of coffee, it wasn’t clear) when his hand caught fire in a burst of flame and sounds of singeing and hissing. Within the swirling smoke and the smell of brimstone, his aides rushed him out from behind his desk and into a bathroom, with doors that audibly clicked as they locked shut. 

(These brilliant flare-ups happen on a regular basis. This time, precautionary extinguishing measures were taken. Other times, the (full of) Vice President is left alone to sit and torch a bit. Purifies his constitution, he claims, which we reporters have no reason to doubt.)

Most of the media contingent fell to their knees on the grass outside and gasped for fresh air after being escorted rapidly away. Nevertheless none chose to file a report on the matter of spontaneous combustion since there is only a certain level of heinousness that they consent to and are allowed to report. This particular incident did not pass the smell test, so they made no note of it at all, just as their editors, publishers and owners wished. 

“I promise to withdraw from Iraq when the time is Right,” said the President. “So help me, God, I solemnly vow.”

No comment yet from God. Word has it that God has gone dove hunting with the (full of) Vice President. 

So help us God, be assured any news will be reported as soon as it passes the smell test. 

All in all, this has been a typical day in the big time political reporting business: a bit of news but not too much; the grim reality with some manufactured hope; and good pay under tolerably ridiculous circumstances. 

No thanks required — our reporter’s pleasure is to serve.  

“Venezuela, in exchange for exports of oil and building materials to Cuba, is currently benefitting from the work of nearly 20,000 Cuban doctors who have opened medical clinics in barrios and rural communities that had never previously enjoyed medical services, while Cuban-staffed literacy programs ‘have taught 1.4 million Venezuelans to read and write during the past year alone’.”

John Doe Dimslow takes note: under the leadership of President Hugo Chavez, Venezuela has recently made great advances in extending education and health care to its citizens. The U.S. meanwhile has recently made great strides in extending prison care to its populace now that it seems about 1 out of every 2 Americans is behind bars.

Meanwhile, as it has for years, the U.S. continues to spend about half its budget on war and the military — equaling the military spending of the entire rest of the world combined — the vast majority of it making the world a far more dangerous and deadly place. That’s Dimslows’ dollars we’re talking about being sucked away to impoverish and smash the world.

Fortunately John Doe Dimslow has the solution to all these problems: call it, reorganizing our assets. The Dimslow proposal is to shut down all the schools in the United States and convert them into boot camps for the military. Train everyone. Then skim off the few wits needed to run things and put the rest of the poor slobs — about 80 or 90 percent of all students — directly into the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines. This will not only guarantee plenty of lethal cannon fodder for years to come, but also provide the standard veterans’ health care and retirement benefits to many who would otherwise go without.

I, John Doe Dimslow, for one demand something more, that we be militarized all — no matter what age or circumstance. We Dimslows don’t care how dangerous or low paying it is, at least there will be base housing, base health care, retirement pay, and guaranteed employment. Who needs Hugo Chavez, democracy, education, and enlightened and humane social programs when corporate-militarism will do the trick as well?

Please, Mr. President of the United States, invest in Dimslowland by going from this halfway militarized economy to a total militarization of the economy, society, and culture. Hup One! Hup Two! Hup Three! Please Mr. President make me a soldier so I can have even more of the good life — however lamentably short and brutalized.

And why not? Doesn’t everyone know by now that the good life is best reached through war, and a culture of war? — as said so well in this vital appeal: Please, Mr. President, Attack Appalachia.

So me and the whole Dimslow clan had dinner with this other candidate for President who wants to win the all-important Dimslow vote so as he can win the election. Well, I’ll be dimpled, if this here candidate did not come on just like the other guy. Hell, I thought I was talking to the same man the way he said whole bunches of things and nothing at all.

What the hell for we got to have two candidates more like fraternal twins than anything, is what I want to know, old John Doe Dimslow. Oh hell yes they bicker like the dickens and all but in the end you can see they’re little more than kissin’ cousins putting on one big show to show off how distinct they try to look one from the other, to show they got some sort of identity they like to call all their own—but what brothers don’t? They’re kissing cousins, I tell you that. I don’t trust neither one of them farther than I can throw a horse. Lord, do they know how to smile and look sincere when they come a visiting. But then I suppose they are—for the moment. Seems to me all they want to do is crack a pearly line right across the middle of them there faces. Spare me the pearlies when you’re trying to sell me, I always say.

“Caricature is an art, and not an easy one. But when well done, a very important one.”  –Noam Chomsky

Noam Chomsky on Orwell, caricature, and thought control in societies:

About Orwell’s 1984, I thought, frankly, it was one of his worst books. Could barely finish it. Some parts (e.g., about Newspeak) were clever. But most of it seemed to me — well, trivial. The problem is not a very interesting one; the modes of thought control and repression in totalitarian societies are fairly transparent. In fact, they often tend to be rather lax. Franco Spain, for example, didn’t care much what people thought and said: the screams from the torture chamber in downtown Madrid were enough to keep the lid on. It’s not too well known, but the Soviet Union was also pretty lax, particularly in the Brezhnev era. According to US government-Russian Research Center studies, Russians apparently had considerably wider access to a broad range of opinion and to dissident literature than Americans do, not because it is denied them but because propaganda is so much more effective here. Orwell was well aware of these issues. His (suppressed) introduction to Animal Farm, for example, deals explicitly with “literary censorship in England.” To write about that topic would have been important, hard, and serious — and would have earned him the obloquy that attends departure from the rules.

 

Caricature can be very well done. Swift is marvelous, for example. Animal Farm is pretty good, in my opinion. But 1984 I thought was a serious decline from his best work.

 

Caricature is an art, and not an easy one. But when well done, a very important one. As for dealing with Orwell’s problem,* I try to do it in the ways I know how to pursue; 1000s of pages by now. No doubt there are other ways, maybe better ways. But others will have to find what works for them.

*[Orwell’s problem: how is it that oppressive ideological systems are able to] “instill beliefs that are firmly held and widely accepted although they are completely without foundation and often plainly at variance with the obvious facts about the world around us?”

___________________

See also:

by  Tony Christini

Symbolism Over Politics 

   JoAnn Wypijewski 

So here’s the question: which was Don Imus’ bigger offense, calling the African-American women on the Rutgers basketball team nappy-headed or calling them hos? Almost all the commentary I’ve read on this now is all about the “racially charged” aspect of the comment, and the response to the “hos” part is: these girls are A students, they’re Girl Scouts, they’re musical prodigies, they’re future leaders. In other words, there are some women whom you might reasonably call hos, but not these women….

There was a time when shock worked, because there was intelligence behind it: Lennie Bruce, Richard Pryor. There was a political point to it. If you compare what those guys were doing to the world of fine art, you’d have to look back to the first guy, the Russian Malevich, who painted an all-black canvas. And then an all-white one etc. And that was in 1913 or so, and it was a hugely daring thing to do. But now what does it mean to paint an all-black canvas? It has no meaning, no shock, no daring, just imaginative exhaustion….

At the end of the day all of this seems like another triumph of symbolism over politics, whether he stays or goes. If he stays, the symbolism of apology; if he goes, the symbolism of a demonstration firing. Change will come only through changing the culture, the political culture. But it makes a little more sense as a diagnosis, I think, to say that the culture made the man. You can get rid of the man; you’re still stuck with the culture.

 Rachel’s Words’ Silenced Again

    Tom Wallace

Once again the play “My Name is Rachel Corrie” has been cancelled, this time in South Florida.

In New York and Toronto the play was cancelled due to pressure from the Jewish community or those that claim to speak for the Jewish Community. The play was successfully staged in NYC at the Minetta Lane theater. It is currently enjoying an extraordinary run at the Seattle Repertory Theater and many more are planned.

Wherever it has been staged, there has been support from the Jewish community as well as criticism. The Jewish community is not monolithic and no-one speaks for “it,” though many claim to.

Much has been written about the play and though theater critics have mostly given glowing reviews, some have been luke warm, and a scant few have even been negative. That is how theater works.

I called the police. Sometimes you have to. I called the police on the President of the United States. I called the police when President Bush invaded Iraq. That was illegal. I called the police when President Clinton bombed Iraq, and elsewhere — all illegal under international law, not least. I asked the police, “Aren’t you going to do something about it?” Even if breaking laws is nothing new for presidents.  And what did the police say down in Dimslow Hollow? 

“Sir, that’s a bit outside our jurisdiction.” 

Just what they always say.

“Ye shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free,” I pronounced, putting on my best mock preacher’s voice. “Or is the truth outside your jurisdiction, too?”  

“Look, we’re all up against a lot of bigger truths, Sir. There’s no standard operating procedure for that, you see. Not in these parts anyhow.” 

“No truth?” 

“No, I guess not.” 

“Then you won’t arrest the President? He commits crime after crime for all the world to see.” 

“Would you like me to send a squad car all the way to Washington to circle outside the White House just to have a look? Check for disturbances?” 

“No point. The crimes are committed all across the country and world. They only originate in that Whitest of Houses.”

“Well that may be.”

“So no arrest?” 

“Not by us, Sir. You?” 

“A citizen’s arrest? Believe me, I’ve tried.” 

“Oh, yes, Sir, I believe you. And if I recall correctly, you still have the right. Unless it was tossed out in the Patriotica Act.” 

“They always say I don’t have the authority.” 

“The authority — or the power?” 

“Ain’t it the truth.” 

“Some would say.”

“I’m missing the power — seems like it could be around here somewhere — but I’ve already got the authority, we do.”

“If you say so.”

“I have to.”

“No you don’t.”

“Oh but I do.”

I, John Doe Dimslow, hereby declare my candidacy for President of the United States.  

This is not an April Fool’s joke. Though I wish it were.

The political platform on which I will base my campaign and which will serve as guide if elected is not the Holy Corporate Charter but the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, signed into law by the United States and other nations over half a century ago, a declaration that has still not been lived up to, and for no good reason.

My main planks will not be based on the lunatic motto of capitalism that “private vice leads to public good” but instead will be based on the various articles in the UDHR.

The decision of selecting a running mate has been a long and arduous process that I have suffered through for some time now. I have finally decided to select as running mate someone who I believe will give me immense credibility, someone who will be able to stand up to the candidates for the Dems and Reps with credentials every bit as distinguished and fine, someone brilliant who burns with a keen sense for expanding civilization for the benefit of all everywhere, someone who will back down from nothing and no one, someone utterly reliable, dependable and someone who holds the best interests of the American people close to his heart—someone, again, I cannot emphasize enough, with a proven track record and solid credibility, someone equal to and every bit as good as any of the likely candidates for the D’s and R’s. And so now I hereby proclaim to be my running mate, Vice Presidential candidate for the 2008 elections, the next esteemed Vice President of the United States of America: Genghis Khan!

Actually, not the Genghis Khan, the renowned Mongol invader of centuries past but a descendent of his, a long since naturalized American, who yet retains the most outstanding characteristics of not only the great Genghis Khan himself but also of his grandson, Hulagu Khan, who conquered Iraq some eight centuries ago. No less is to be expected of my vice presidential nominee, who, given his acclaimed heritage, it should be clear to all, is the ideal candidate to square off with any likely candidate selected by the D’s and R’s. Welcome to the Dimslow campaign of 2008, O great descendent of Genghis Khan. 

April Fools! 

April fools, not regarding my own candidacy, which will proceed as scheduled, but regarding my choice of candidate for Vice President – a choice I have in fact not yet made. The Genghis Khan descendents will have to look to the policy establishments of the D’s and R’s for their continued employment.

In the meantime I urge everyone everywhere – Genghis Khan devotees aside – to pitch in on the UDHR Dimslow efforts for now, for ‘08, forevermore.

They’re coming after John Doe Dimslow Junior at school. Now with the deaths of Iraqi guerillas and civilians and U.S. soldiers and private mercenaries mounting every day, U.S. military recruiters are having trouble recruiting soldiers into the “all-volunteer” forces. So they have to make it more and more a mercenary military of Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine troops to go along with the private mercenaries. They have to offer cash to kill: “$20,000 bonus for enlisting, $9,000 more if enlistees ship out in the next 30 days, and even better, $70,000 for college.”

The big bucks tempted J Junior so much that he gave the recruiters the a-okay to come over to our home for a home visit. Except he never cleared it with Daddy-O, one John Doe Dimslow. So when those recruiters climbed out of their shiny SUV and came striding across the lawn and up the walk I met them on the porch with a twelve gauge double barrel sawed-off, and I ordered them to stop, to halt, to cease and desist. And then I asked them if they recognized what I held in my hands. They did. And then I stepped off the porch and pointed up at the sky over the empty field and woods and gave it a shooting off. And I don’t know if they were impressed none but at least now I had their attention. “Come on in, boys,” I told them. “Let’s have us a little talk. And I’ll just keep my friend here by my side.”

Well them boys ain’t soldiers for nothing, I suppose, so they came on in, and we sat around the kitchen table with J Junior and his mother Jane Doe Dimslow and I had them boys go over the dollars again, and then I asked, “And how much does J Junior here get for a blown off arm and a blown off leg? I mean, does he get paid an arm and a leg for an arm and a leg that’s been blown off? And how many arms and legs is he going to have to blow off himself to get them bucks? And how much more of that oil money is he going to get?” And then I turned to J Junior and I asked, “How much of that oil money do you want, son? I figure now’s the time to ask for all the world and all to hear. Name your price to these gentlemen and see just how much you can get.” And J Junior said, “Well, I don’t know anything about oil money.”

And I said, “Well, these boys do. They get their share. Now you’ve got to get yours, if that’s what you want. Is that what you want? Oil money? And blood spilt to get it? You better get what you can now, I tell you what, because it’s going to be like trying to pull teeth trying to get any later. Them fat cats are going to lap it all up, quicker than you can pull any trigger.”

J Junior said he didn’t want any oil money.

And I turned to the recruiters and I said, “You heard the young man.” And smiled. And we all just sort of ignored any guns that had been brought to the table and the blood and the oil, and the recruiters went out onto the porch and strode down the walk and crossed the yard and climbed in their SUV and drove away.

After I locked the gun in the cabinet, J Junior and I stood on the porch gazing out over the fields and forest, and J Junior said, “The money makes you think.”

And I said, “Is that what it does?”

And J Junior said, “It makes you think their way.”

And I said, “And what kind of way is that?”

And J Junior said, “It’s the way of the killer.”

“The killer thief,” I said, and I turned around as Jane Doe Dimslow came out onto the porch.

And J Junior said, “And that’s no way. It’s no way at all.”

And it’s all over the dim-damned TV. All these phony political dee-bates that get me all riled up under the skin the way them warhawks get going and all. It isn’t nothing how they look, it’s what they say. They all say we got to destroy Iraq to save it. More or less. And to hell with anything else. To hell with riling up them mad bombers, which is what it does more and more. To hell with everything – they say, we got to up the firepower on Iraq to have peace. We got to break it to fix it. We got to smash it to restore it.

Maybe I’m missing the candle for the wick, being a John Doe Dimslow and all, but these guys are nuts gone mad, warhawks all, blowing up Iraq, blowing up Iraqis and using our boys and girls, men and women as the cannon and the cannon fodder both. Pouring gasoline on a bonfire, all so that we, but not me and you, can own the oil and threaten to cut it off from other folks, rather than just keep buying it like everyone else. The troops ain’t dying and killing for nothing, of course. There’s oil there! And power! And a WMD hornet’s nest is what we’re a-makin’, by a-killin’ and by a-stayin’. And somebody not no way related to John Doe Dimslow is getting rich. That’s what them troops are dying and killing for, as the place goes to the hell it’s being made into. And more than a few of them troops know it and are angry about it. And for starters we can thank the big dollar folks and politicians and big media types like the ones we see all over the damn place for making it so.

But what do I know, old Dimslow?

Maybe I can find a horror film on TV to watch tonight or something like that, something a little less chilling than them warhawks I see on TV chirping and pounding away at each other like they are cannons come to life, each one eager to be a bigger cannon than the other.

If only them warhawks could be confined there on the tube – but now I hear Iran is next for the blasting and smashing – and soon. It’s the whole planet and everyone in it that I get worried about, that I got to speak out about, that them warhawks seem eager to set about destroying. They act like they’ll destroy almost anything to get elected or stay in power. And the thing is, it don’t, in any way, seem like no act.

__________________________________________________________

FROM TROPETOPIA

John Doe Dimslow says:

At long last a final solution to the unemployment problem — imprison the populace. Lock up all us Dimslows everywhere. And why not? It costs less to lock someone up than it does to pay them a living wage with decent benefits. Plus, then the prisoners can be put to work in the prisons at cut-rate slave wage rates, rather than at the full scale slave wage rate of the federal minimum wage for those on the outside. It certainly pays to be more efficient. Build more jails and prisons, I say. Lock us all up for our own good and for the good of the corporate economy of Patriotica. Give us bars or give us death! Shouldn’t that be the stirring cry of every righteous American? Continue reading Prison Power — One of Every 138

 (The Powerdrunk Rulers)

“The debate over Iranian interference in Iraq proceeds without ridicule on the assumption that the United States owns the world…. In this case, however, even ridicule — notably absent — would not suffice, because the charges against Iran are part of a drumbeat of pronouncements meant to mobilize support for escalation in Iraq and for an attack on Iran, the ‘source of the problem.’ The world is aghast at the possibility.”
     – Noam Chomsky, “What If Iran Had Invaded Mexico?“

Iran declares war on Mexico. Threatens to pray the United States back to the Stone Age, flint arrows and all, if it so much as meddles with the imminent invasion of its neighbor to the south. (Or if not back to the Stone Age, the Gossamer Age, at least.) Any Americans found sneaking across the Rio Grande will be detained indefinitely. Iran says its imminent invasion of Mexico has nothing to do with the famous Iranian yen for Mexico’s famed Tabasco Sauce (or oil). Iran would have invaded already but it had to pray first. Iran trusts that America will do the same before it considers any Mexican interference of its own.

The U. S. Quandary

Dick Powerdrunk, the (full of) Vice President, noted in his response to Iran, “We will rip out your eye teeth and crush and grind them into powder for use in our heart medications.”

What to say about this stellar official? He may be one gun-blasting, murderous bombing, corporate-money-raking gun-of-a-gun, but he’s our gun-of-a-gun? What blessed land deserves this full of vice president? What contest in whose hell did we win? The corporate coffers – though not their employees’ accounts – threaten to explode with the amount of government and oil money this vice leader is cashing through. Who cares that it is stained Iraqi (etc) blood red? O to be the vice leader, and company. Ain’t it rich?

Dick Powerdrunk – our stellar full of Vice Inc. President – he said, “Iran and Mexico, we own them both, but we can’t have them invading one another. My plan it simple yet effective, profound yet easily grasped by the common man – we will destroy them both first.”

Condi Powerdrunk, the Secretary of (the failed) State was more measured in her response. She said, “Tabasco Sauce is not worth it, really.” Wise heads on TV nod sagely.

Like so many of her fellow Patriots, Condi Powerdrunk never saw a bomb she didn’t like, never saw a land she wouldn’t reduce to bare sand. She never saw a human right she would let stand when fixed on the goal of getting oil (and blood) on her hands. I hear she likes a good book — well, let her recite the Book of Blood, the one she knows so well by heart. And so the old tales goes, the one that plays time and again, as she and her colleagues act out the pleasant symptoms of the neo-feudal system of our day, the one we let play and play, until when? Until the whole world is deCondistructed into nothing more than a pure chunk of clay?

Don Powerdrunk, the ex-cabinet Secretary of Glorious War could not be reached for comment at this time. Rumor has it he is hoarding Tabasco Sauce.

What more do we need to know? Don Powerdrunk helped lead the U.S. into a glorious war that the soldiers and people are so glad to have been invited along for. After all, you go with the powerdrunk Secretary of Glorious War you have, not the one you may wish for.

Oh, and of course the Iraqis couldn’t be happier. I guess it only goes to show that you can conquer some of the people gloriously some of the time, even if you can’t conquer all of the people gloriously all of the time. Hey, support the Generals. Tell them to “Stand Down.” Now. Might spare them a future appointment with a Crimes Against Humanity and War Crimes Tribunal. Nothing but raw power could spare Don Powerdrunk now. Such are the glories of war, after all.

And what of George Powerdrunk? – our great leader. He exercised profusely. He slaughtered the people who owned distant oil. Never would he invade for Tabasco Sauce. He did not say, “After us, the deluge” – he said, “I am the deluge.” He said, “The American People” — and not the corrupt electoral and judicial systems — “have poured my bowl full of liquor, and I intend to spill it all.”

He exercised profusely, and this made us all quite proud to have him as our model spokesman. He said, “I got mine. You got yours?” He said, “I will preserve a bubble or two of the world because us rich people need to have something to cherish while the entire rest of the world collapses.” He said, “Let it deluge.” He said, “Katrina is a nice name. We must not let the Hurricane besmirch it.” He never hardly went to church but he tried to make it look like he did. The better to slaughter the people who own distant oil. And he exercised profusely.

George Powerdrunk loved Tabasco Sauce, and so he vowed to see Iran’s imminent invasion of Mexico and further raise the stakes. Much further. When you own the world, after all, you can do what you want with it. George Powerdrunk, perhaps inspired by the famed Texas author Cormac McCarthy and Wisconsin Senator Joseph McCarthy both, has decided to fully commit himself to the apocalyptic path of turning the world into a McCarthy-ite Road, from which of course he will provide an exit for himself to live in a nice little bubble ranch for the rest of his powerdrunk life.

As for Iran, let them invade Mexico for all he cares. George Powerdrunk has been keen to launch World War III for a long time passing now. And why not? He answers to “a higher Father,” he says. He believes he has every right.

He doesn’t even have to pray about it. He has the direct line.

So we know what the Officials are doing.

And the people?

 My Name is Rachel Corrie Staged in Seattle

   Gina Whitfield 

The purpose of art is to inspire us to be more than we are, to question our own assumptions or our entrenched ideas. My Name is Rachel Corrie certainly achieves this; it is an impassioned call to action. The depiction of her life forces the audience to question their assumptions about a young radical, who was in fact not dogmatic or hateful, but whose spirit was caring and who was desperately trying to find good and genuine beauty amidst a hideous conflict. Her words, which form the core of the play, often brought the audience to tears, describing the appalling conditions of life endured under occupation….

My Name is Rachel Corrie, however, has had to struggle to get a run on stage at all…. It’s unlikely to be at a theatre any nearer to you anytime soon.

…

My Name is Rachel Corrie made its West Coast debut last week at
Seattle’s Repertory Theatre. The one-woman play is based on Corrie’s life and untimely death. The
Olympia Washington native was killed four years ago, in March 2003, at the age of 23. She was crushed by an Isreali bulldozer while she tried, along with an International Solidarity Movement team in the Gaza Strip, to protect a Palestinian home from demolition. Rachel Corrie’s life, her personal and political passions, and her desire to contribute to peace in the Middle East are compellingly acted out by
Seattle’s Marya Sea Kaminski, who brings her talents to a play that has encountered many obstacles in being brought to stage. The play is based on Corrie’s journals and email correspondence, which were published in the UK Guardian after her death, and was originally conceived by actor/director Alan Rickman and Guardian editor Katharine Viner. Corrie’s writing is both the inspiration and the script; the young woman was a colourful and talented writer, eloquently describing her wish to not be complicit in her country’s central role supporting the Israeli occupation. The play is effective both because of Kaminski’s delivery, but also because it injects the personal hopes and dreams of a young woman – loves lost, career plans, and family dramas – in addition to Corrie’s evolving political views.

The play has sparked controversy wherever it has been produced or, more accurately, wherever people have attempted to produce it. This has left the British creators screaming censorship, and left many in the artistic community questioning just how free speech is in
North America, where the play hits political nerves. My Name is Rachel Corrie was deemed “too hot” for the Big Apple, for instance.

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British Iraq TV Drama

    Sean Rayment

The Mark of Cain, to be broadcast this Wednesday, is understood to have infuriated officers at the Ministry of Defence (MoD). The drama involves a group of soldiers from a fictional regiment posted to Basra for peace-keeping operations. They are confronted by a population that views the coalition forces as oppressors.

Soldiers are seen taking part in an orgy of violence against detainees they suspect were responsible for the deaths of two colleagues. The soldiers are shown urinating on their captives before forcing them to commit sexual acts.

Tony Marchant, who wrote The Mark of Cain, says he spoke to more than 100 former and serving Iraq veterans and their families when researching the project.

DC GUERRILLA POETRY INSURGENCY

The DC Guerrilla Poetry Insurgency (GPI) is an anti-authoritarian, collaborative pro-humanity artists’ collective incorporating music, rhythm, spoken word, community and resistance. The GPI is part of a community of artists of all persuasions from D.C. and around the nation. Some of these groups include: The Rhythm Workers Union; Young Women’s Drumming Empowerment Project ; Word of Mouth; DC Poets Against the War; The Collaborative Arts Insurgency in San Francisco; The Fuse in New York City; and The Guerrilla Poet Insurgency in Richmond, VA. We also support allied groups with similar means and ends, such as The Blackout Arts Collective and the Supersonic Samba School in San Diego.

WHAT IS THE GPI TRYING TO ACCOMPLISH? The GPI assertively wields and empowers creative voices to promote progressive social change . GPI’s primary goals include: inventing new media, reclaiming public space, building diverse communities of artists and activists, and facilitating the expression of individual convictions. One way to conceptualize our action model is as “push marketing” for political perspectives in real space. Performing on the streets, in trains, malls, anywhere with high pedestrian traffic, the GPI literally gets in the public airspace that passersby might otherwise ignore. The Guerrilla Poetry Insurgency model can be manifested anywhere (see our Lyrical Ambush Recipe), and we plan to support any artists seeking to start a new dialogue and create a new world wielding words instead of weapons.

WHAT DO WE DO? The GPI’s signature action is a bi-monthly “Lyrical Ambush” in Washington DC’s Dupont Circle every first and third Monday at 7:00pm. We blur the line between audience and performer, welcoming everyone to linger and participate. We use art to explore themes such as racism, social justice, war vs. peace, corporate domination vs. meaningful democracy, the “war on drugs” and the misuse of fear to degrade civil liberties, and whatever you or your kids bring to the mic. Ambushes include whoever shows up to listen and share their truth. GPI actions are community-building events.

Performing as requested, the GPI serves the broader activist community by bringing talented artists, DJs, drummers and poets to organizations in need of fundraising entertainment for their events and rallies. We also conduct workshops in the community and at local schools; visit universities; and perform in public spaces both in DC and around the East Coast. The GPI has conducted workshops at conferences including the National Conference on Organized Resistance and the American Studies Association Annual Meeting, as well as on campuses including Wells College and Woodrow Wilson High School, among others.

Like any insurgency, the GPI is more a loose and flexible network than a formal organization. Public events often consist of picking a time and place to create a varied and diverse artistic result composed of whoever shows up. Bi-weekly organizing gatherings are a forum to share information on various projects and help individuals create their own projects and shows. There is no “approval” structure, as individuals are empowered to envision actions and make them a reality by garnering the support of both core members of the GPI and an expanding network of artists. Recently, GPI assisted a high school peace initiative needing trainers on a wide range of subjects by compiling a contact sheet including over 30 organizers throughout the city.