Looking Backward, Looking Forward

Update below

Yes, it's New Year's Eve, and I'm online. We've turned our house over to a handful of teenagers this evening for their New Year's Eve Party, while we're quietly enjoying glasses of wine, online reading, and a little novel reading (such as, American Gods, by Neil Gaiman) in our study. So while taking a break from the novel reading and straightening up a bit after the teenagers, who have gone to a nearby park for some nighttime frisbee and football-throwing, I came across a very interesting note on TPM Muckraker.

When I began this blog, I had just moved four states east and had read already a couple of books on the war in Iraq. From my reading, I was dismayed to learn of the inept handling of the war in Iraq and especially of the reconstruction efforts afterward, and I posted on that subject: here, here, here, and here, among others. Many well-known and well-respected journalists and other writers have recorded how ideologues rather than Middle-Eastern experts were chosen to lead the reconstruction efforts in Iraq. Whether they could speak the language or knew anything about the culture counted for a lot less than whether or not they had voted for George Bush or were against abortion.

So it's worth reading Zachary Roth's post on TPM, "Top Pentagon Official: Obama Team Still the 'Opposition'", posted this evening. The top Pentagon official referred to in the post is Jim O'Beirne, the special assistant to the secretary of defense for White House liaisons. As Roth reminds us,

O'Beirne led the disastrous process in which key posts in the Coalition Provisional Authority were given to Heritage Foundation research assistants who knew nothing about Iraq but were loyal to the GOP.

Ideological to the very end, O'Beirne praises the ninety Bush-appointees in the DOD that Obama has dismissed to replace with the new administration's appointments, telling them that they can be proud that their ideological purity is what made them open to dismissal. (Hmmmm.....where would that put Defense Secretary Robert Gates?) That is faint praise, indeed, coming from a man who led that disastrous vetting and recruitment of hopeful applicants to the Coalition Provisional Authority.

So here at the end of the year, it is definitely instructive to hear this voice from the past still trumpeting a failed policy. (For a review of that policy, see this article that Roth links to at The Washington Post: "Ties to GOP Trumped Know-How Among Staff Sent to Rebuild Iraq: Early U.S. Missteps in the Green Zone," Rajiv Chandrasekaran, September 17, 2006.)

One of the very hopeful signs of the incoming administration is that Obama is choosing professionals for posts in government, people with areas of expertise assigned to appropriate posts, rather than making choices based on the purity of one's ideology. It remains to be seen how successful our new president will be, but here at the end of the old year, I feel a breath of fresh air, and I don't think it's just coming from the windows we opened to remove the smoke from a badly started fire in the fireplace.

Update: Other Comments on this topic

Steve Benen comments on Jim O'Beirne's letter to the dismissed Pentagon staff in this post dated January 2, 2009: "O'Beirne Still Causing Trouble at the Pentagon", Political Animal blog at The Washington Monthly

Monuments to Self

I haven't written anything about the Rod Blagojevich scandal in Illinois; Governor Blagojevich has been accused--and has been recorded on tape--of trying to sell Barack Obama's Senate seat. Well, I lived in Louisiana for four years, and Illinois has nothing on Louisiana when it comes to political corruption. However, watching Roland Burris grin like the Cheshire cat while the corrupt and nationally reviled Blagojevich appointed him to the vacate seat, I was a little disturbed. Why would Burris want to hitch his wagon to that falling star? Oh, yeah....ego and ambition. A former Attorney General of Illinois, Burris has run unsuccessfully in the past for mayor of Chicago, for Senator of the state of Illinois, and for governor of Illinois. This appointment helps him achieve one of those failed goals. And Burris has already prepared a crypt that will announce his achievements in the afterlife. Politico includes a picture of that crypt on its website under the title "Monument to Me."

Roland Burris's monument to self pales significantly, however, in contrast to monuments built by ancient rulers. Yesterday we got a glimpse of a truly monumental ego in an exhibit at Atlanta's High Musuem of Art: the First Emperor of China's terracotta army. The First Emperor of China, from the state of Qin (hence his name, Qin Shi Huang), united China and ushered in emperial China, which lasted until 1912. History records that he began the work on his mausoleum when he first ascended the throne at thirteen years of age: now, that's a mighty confident teenager. According to the museum's audio guide, the mausoleum covers 22 acres, and 700,000 convicted criminals worked to create this sanctuary for the emperor's afterlife. Not only did the tomb include a terracotta army of beautifully crafted soldiers and horses; the area was transformed into a paradise of mercury rivers, with lifelike wildlife (ducks and cranes were included in the exhibit).

The exhibit was very fascinating, and the detail of the art work on the terracotta soldiers included (six or seven) were exquisite, with faces reflecting the diversity of the Chinese. Qin Shi Huang, however, seemed not to have been a popular ruler: all that preparation for the afterlife took too much money in the form of taxes. And he was a book-burner, too. He had hundreds of followers of Confucius massacred. Nice guy. But he created a pretty tomb which was vandalized not long after he died--and then buried and forgotten for two thousand years.

Percy Bysshe Shelley, of course, said it best:

Ozymandias

I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
`My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!'
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

The son who ascended to the throne after Qin Shi Huang died was soon overthrown, and the Han dynasty began.

Time to Go Shopping. . . at Thrift Stores

Over the past year, my family and I have enjoyed shopping at thrift stores. We bought lamps and kitchen supplies for our son's apartment in Austin, Texas, and our daughter likes to browse the rows of jeans and cargo pants. My husband looks for kitchen item replacements (an iron skillet, a spatula), and he recently found a very nice casual jacket from Orvis that only needed a tear repaired in the lining. Having grown up in a family in which hand-me-downs were the norm, I prefer brand-new clothes; I don't find much to interest me in adult women clothing at thrift stores (but recently, a yellow silk sari caught my eye--I resisted, though). However, looking through other people's junk can be entertaining, and I often find something useful or just weirdly interesting. A month ago, I replaced our well-used coasters with a nice set I found at Goodwill, and I purchased about nine wool sweaters that I will felt for crafts.

It pays to be thrifty in today's tough economic times, so check out the thrift stores as folks are cleaning out their closets to make room for those new Christmas items. Or clear out your own closets. Someone can use what you no longer want. Today's Atlanta Journal-Constitution has an article on year-end donations: "Year-End Charitable Giving Empties Closets, Fills Stores," Bo Emerson, AJC, December 30, 2008.

Science Be Damned.....Again

James E. McWilliams, professor of history at Texas State University, criticizes the U.S. Food and Drug Administration today in Slate on its poor performance in protecting our food supply. He focuses particularly on the melamine scare in baby formula. The scare began in China, where several babies died, and thousands were sickened, from having ingested the ingredient in their formula, but melamine has been discovered in baby formula in the U. S., as well. (See these stories for further information: "Calls for National Infant Formula Recall Spread," MSNBC, posted November 26, 2008; "Trace Levels of Melamine in Formula Called Safe," Annys Shin, The Washington Post, November 29, 2008.)

The most interesting detail in The Washington Post article is the FDA's sudden turnabout on what constitutes a "safe level" of melamine in food. First, the FDA stated that science has not indicated that any level of melamine is safe. Then, after trace amounts of melamine were discovered in U.S. supplies of baby formula, the FDA backtracked, stating that, well, small trace amounts pose no threat. Ummm..... upon what was this declaration based? Science? The outrage of companies selling infant formula? Caprice? One wonders.....

James McWilliams points out that the FDA warned the companies involved of the trace elements of melamine but didn't release that information to the public "until the Associated Press filed a Freedom of Information Act request for the test results and published the news in late November." He also points out that the milk powder in question is not limited to baby formula; it appears in many products the wider public ingests, such as "caramelized candies, whey protein supplements, power bars, powdered drinks, nondairy creamers, and baking mixes, among others." Suddenly, that hot cup of instant cocoa looks a lot less appetizing.

Anyway, McWilliams ends his article with suggestions for improving the FDA's performance, not the least of which is requiring the organization to base its policies on science. You can read the entire article here: "Tainted Government," Slate, December 29, 2008.

Conflicts of Interest: Medical Doctors and Pharmaceutical Companies

With a hat tip to Kevin Drum, I post this link to a book review by Marcia Angell, "Drug Companies and Doctors: A Survey of Corruption," in the January 15, 2009, edition of The New York Review of Books. In the article, Angell reviews and discusses the following books: Side Effects: A Prosecutor, a Whistleblower, and a Bestselling Antidepressant on Trial, by Alison Bass; Our Daily Meds: How the Pharmaceutical Companies Transformed Themselves into Slick Marketing Machines and Hooked the Nation on Prescription Drugs, by Melody Petersen; Shyness: How Normal Behavior Became a Sickness, by Christopher Lane.

On his blog, Kevin Drum posts his favorite quote from the review: "Quote of the Day--12.29.08". This is what jumped out at me:

A recent survey found that about two thirds of academic medical centers hold equity interest in companies that sponsor research within the same institution. A study of medical school department chairs found that two thirds received departmental income from drug companies and three fifths received personal income....

snip

In view of this control and the conflicts of interest that permeate the enterprise, it is not surprising that industry-sponsored trials published in medical journals consistently favor sponsors' drugs—largely because negative results are not published, positive results are repeatedly published in slightly different forms, and a positive spin is put on even negative results. A review of seventy-four clinical trials of antidepressants, for example, found that thirty-seven of thirty-eight positive studies were published. But of the thirty-six negative studies, thirty-three were either not published or published in a form that conveyed a positive outcome. It is not unusual for a published paper to shift the focus from the drug's intended effect to a secondary effect that seems more favorable.

snip

Many drugs that are assumed to be effective are probably little better than placebos, but there is no way to know because negative results are hidden.

As a patient who has been prescribed drugs "off-label," I found this article very interesting. Not too long ago, I was prescribed some drugs by a doctor at a well-known medical teaching institution. After my appointment, I went online to look up the purposes of those drugs, and I discovered that one of the drugs had been prescribed "off-label." Taking that drug with the others prescribed made me extremely drowsy, unable to function well had I taken them on a workday. Thus, I decided to discontinue the use of the "off-label" drug, and told my doctor I was doing so. The decision did not effect the efficacy of my treatment, which made me wonder whether the "off-label" prescription was necessary in the first place.

Now, I'm not accusing my doctor of malpractice at all. The conversation we had about the drug after I did my research satisfied me that my doctor had the best intentions. However, the experience did remind me of the necessity of one's being pro-active in determining the best treatment choices. I would love to trust my doctors fully, but articles such as this (and others) suggest that I should always do my research before relying on any doctor's medical decision.

Other Voices: "Playing the Doctor Card," Rahul K. Parikh, M.D., in Salon, Sept. 26, 2008.

A Year of Urban Gardening

In 2007, we moved to the Atlanta-metro area, within the Perimeter (I-285), and we bought a small home built in 1940. With the home came a small sunny front yard and a small shady backyard. We're lifetime gardeners; in our 30 years of marriage, we've lived on as much as 24 acres of land, with plenty of room to grow gardens and trees, and in as little space as a tiny married-student apartment at Texas A&M University, with gardening space on vacant TAMU land. Now we're challenged to grow a garden in this 1940-suburban space. Last summer we began by Tom's chopping out boxwood bushes in the front of the house; we replaced those with a wooden trellis, a bench swing, herbs, tomatoes, peppers, flowers, and, on the side of the house, blueberry bushes. Now we're planning to expand the garden into the yard proper, with a bed along one side of the yard where we will plant flowers and vegetables. This will be an experiment in suburban gardening. Most suburban gardens, if they exist at all, are hidden in back yards. Our backyard is too shady for vegetables (except for one bed for winter produce such as shallots); there we're putting in native perennials that like shade, such as ferns, woodland flowers, trillium, oakleaf hydrangea.

Over this next year, I'll try to remember to post pictures of our experiment. This week we hope to begin preparing a front flower/vegetable bed. But here's some online reading in the meantime:

• Constance Casey, "Pimp My Yard: A garden coach can transform your lawn into a farmers market in a day's time," Slate, December 26, 2008.
• Renee's Garden, online source for herb, flower, and vegetable seeds.
• Mel Bartholomew, Square Foot Gardening
• Reimer Seeds online catalogue
• The Cook's Garden online catalogue
• Georgia Perimeter College Botanical Garden website
• National Gardening Association website
• Sustainable Urban Gardens website
• Organic Gardening website
• Georgia Center for Urban Agriculture: Vegetable Gardening
• Oh, Wow! Chickens in the backyard, at BackYardChickens.com and at UrbanChickens.org and TheCityChicken.com
• "Urban Chic," at BackYardGardener.com

Science Fiction: An Escape and a Reminder

I'll admit it: we're a family of science fiction geeks. While I was in college, I read lots of science fiction novels, most enjoying the writings of Isaac Asimov and Larry Niven. But over the years my reading has tended to go in cycles: in the 1980s, I read a lot of history, biography, and philosophy (the writings of Barbara Tuchman and William McNeill; the memoirs of George Kennan, the one-year diary of Czeslaw Milosz; the non-fiction writings of Walker Percy); in the 1990s, I was into environmental/science writing (example, Barry Lopez) and, as I prepared to teach literature classes, shorter writings from world literature (my favorite: the writings of Basho); in the 2000s, my reading became increasingly political (Seymour Hersh, George Packer, Thomas Ricks, Ron Suskind, A.J. Rossmiller; online bloggers Steve Benen, James Fallows, Kevin Drum, Josh Marshall, Matthew Yglesias, Scott Horton). Of course, I read other kinds of writings during those years--novels by Anita Brookner, Barbara Pym, Penelope Lively, Joanna Trollope and her great-great uncle Anthony Trollope; poetry of Margaret Gibson, Octavio Paz, Czeslaw Milosz, Mary Oliver, Billy Collins, Seamus Heaney, David Bottoms, Stephen Dunn, etc.--but my larger focus seemed to be as I have described above.

However, I never lost my love for science fiction, which, in its projection of the human story into space and time, carries with it a certain optimism (in other words, humans haven't totally obliterated themselves) coupled with analysis and criticism of human behavior (in other words, humans keep making the same mistakes over and over while trying to find creative ways to amend those mistakes). When Benton was four years old (my husband and I had finally purchased a television after living ten years without one), he and I would watch Deep Space Nine together. As Benton grew older, his Christmas and birthday presents would inevitably include a science fiction novel or two (among his favorite writers now: Isaac Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke, Gregory Benford, Ben Bova, Robert Heinlein). Our daughter tends to like novels on the fantasy end of the science-fiction/fantasy spectrum (Terry Pratchett, Neil Gaiman, Tamara Pierce, Madeleine L'Engle, Douglas Adams, Eva Ibbotson--and, of course, Isaac Asimov). I once read Tolkien's Lord of the Rings to the kids as an evening bedtime story. We are all fans of Tolkien.

We're also fans of Firefly, a great series that Fox canceled after one season, and Space: Above and Beyond, another cancelled series on Fox. Firefly, a creation of Joss Whedon, had such a following as to support a movie to tie up the loose ends of that series (Serenity), while Space: Above and Beyond remains in science fiction purgatory, the characters caught in a war in which it's not certain humankind will survive although there is a glimmer of hope that the alien enemy is made of the same star stuff as humans.

What's so fascinating about science fiction is its creation of alien worlds so unlike our own physically that nonetheless retain characteristics that are like our world (and so, science fiction presciently describes ideas that are sometimes actualized in our world) . The stories provide escape from the ordinary while also examining what is all too human: emotions and motives. In the late 1990s, I would occasionally watch late at night a segment of the final seasons of Babylon 5. I never saw the entire series, but a couple of years ago I purchased the first season for Benton and have finally purchased the entire series for him. Benton has watched most of season 3, while this holiday break, we have all been catching up with season 2. (The series improves quite a bit from season 1 to season 2, so it's worth staying with the series through that first season.) As we've been watching episodes this week, I am reminded of events in our own world.

In the world of Babylon 5--a space station meant as a gathering place for aliens and humans to promote intergalactic peace--the Narns and the Centauri have long been enemies. The Centauri captured the Narn homeworld and enslaved the Narn; the Narn eventually freed themselves through violent, terroristic conflict. The Centauri continue to respond to their imperialistic impulses; the Narn continue to distrust the Centauri. In the episodes we have just watched, the Narn and the Centauri have taken up their ancient grievances and have begun fighting again. Londo Mollari (played by Peter Jurasik), a Centauri ambassador on Babylon-5, has made a pact (unknowingly) with an ancient, evil race in order to realize those imperialistic desires. A Narn outpost is obliterated; the Narn respond in angry and horrified violence. Another Narn outpost is obliterated; the Narn try to get the humans and aliens to unite against the Centauri.

It's the all too familiar story of human conflict. One tribe seizes the lands of another, enslaves another, and the enslaved vow vengeance. Today, Hamas launches missiles into Israel from poverty-stricken Gaza. Israel retaliates. Violence leads to violence. It is a never-ending cycle. Babylon 5 shows us characters caught up in a similar cycle; these are characters to whom we are sympathetic even as as we decry their individual choices. We are horrified when Londo Mollari makes that first commitment to a mysterious ally to have a Narn outpost destroyed; we watch in sadness as Mollari transforms from a comic to a tragic figure who realizes, regrets, yet remains committed to his bloody, genocidal choices. We sympathize with G'Kar (played by actor Andreas Katsulas) as he wrestles with his desires for revenge and his hopes for an alliance with the humans. We know that the escalating war is a cycle of attrition, revenge, and retaliation which can only be escaped by inhumanly distancing oneself from one's situation, by seeing one's enemy as one's self.

And so science fiction reflects reality in that it has yet to provide for us any other way out of the cycle of destruction and despair, of revenge and retaliation: we must see the Other as ourselves.

Today's reading:

• Greg Mitchell, "Attack on Gaza: As Usual U.S. Media (And Most Liberals) Silent--as Israeli Newspaper Raises Doubts," posted on Huffington Post, December 28, 2008.
• Daniel Levy, "What's Next on Gaza/Israel and Why Americans Should Care," Huffington Post, posted December 28, 2008.
• Matthew Yglesias, "Getting Tough," posted December 28, 2008.
• "Saudi Cleric Issues Fatwa Urging Muslims to Avenge Gaza Raids, Haaretz.com, posted December 28, 2008.
• Hilzoy, "An Eye for an Eye Makes the Whole World Blind," on Political Animal, posted December 28, 2008.

Other Consequences of Lack of Regulation

The Bush administration leaves office in January with a shameful record of governance. We've already seen the consequences of lack of regulation of the market and of financial institutions; now we're seeing the consequences of lack of environmental regulation. I've been following the story of the collapse of the lagoon holding coal sludge in Tennessee since the event occurred. The story finally received more national attention in an article in The New York Times, as authorities realized the spill was "three times as large as originally estimated." That "actual amount

was 5.4 million cubic yards, or enough to flood more than 3,000 acres one foot deep.

The amount now said to have been spilled is larger than the amount the authority initially said was in the pond, 2.6 million cubic yards. [Shaila Dewan, "Tennessee Ash Flood Larger than Initial Estimate," The New York Times, posted December 26, 2008.]

As Sue Sturgis reports in Facing South (h/t truthout), Earthjustice attorney Lisa Evans warned the government earlier this year in testimony before the House Subcommittee on Energy and Natural Resources that "the federal government's broken pledge to regulate disposal of the potentially dangerous material threatened the health and safety of communities across the country." She further emphasized that

the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said in its Regulatory Determination on Wastes from the Combustion of Fossil Fuels published in 2000 that federal standards for disposal of coal combustion waste were needed to protect public health and the environment.

Environmental activists have been trying to warn the public and our leaders of this danger for some time: See "Activists Say EPA Ignoring Threat from Coal Ash," by Don Hopey, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, March 9, 2007.

Of course, the regulation-allergic Bush administration did little for the environment in its eight years of governing (See here and here) and it is gutting what it can of environmental regulations as it begins to vacate its offices. (See here, here, here, here, and here.) Oh, and my favorite? A change to the Endangered Species Act that "reduces the number of scientific reviews of projects performed by the US Fish & Wildlife Service." The Bush administration has squashed scientific inquiry and conclusions many times during the past eight years. (See "The Ungreening of America: Dirty Secrets" in Mother Jones.)

Of course, this isn't the first coal slurry spill on Bush's watch, and the results of that spill illustrate the administration's antipathy toward environmental regulations and sympathy for businesses violating those regulations. A spill in 2000, in Inez, Kentucky, was being investigated and charges of criminal negligence being brought against the company at fault when the Bush administration moved into its offices and dramatically narrowed the focus of the investigation. (See Salon, "Dirty Business," by Philip Babich, November 13, 2003.) The experienced mining engineer, Jack Spadaro, was originally in charge of the investigation, but the Bush administration replaced him, and an investigation was implemented to get Spadaro dismissed:

The apparent vendetta against [Spadaro], and a mass of other evidence including damning off-the-record comments by officials involved in the investigation and a heavily-redacted report, raise serious questions as to whether Bush administration officials, ranging from mining safety officials all the way to Labor Secretary Elaine Chao, orchestrated a coverup to whitewash Martin County Coal of any serious responsibility for the coal slurry disaster.(Babich)

Bush had also stacked the U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration with former mining executives:

Lauriski, MSHA's chief, was an executive with Energy West Mining. Deputy assistant secretary John Caylor worked for Cyprus Minerals, Amax Mining and Magma Copper. MSHA's other deputy assistant secretary, John Correll, worked for Amax Mining and Peabody Coal.(Babich)

And that has been the Bush administration's modus operandi for most of its oversight appointments. Finally, however, our new president is turning once again to scientists and experienced environmental regulators for his environmental appointments. Maybe something will really be done about potential catastrophes such as the coal sludge spill in Tennessee.

A Happy Holiday

I would wish everyone a "Merry Christmas," but merry doesn't quite seem in keeping with the holiday spirit, which is a little squashed by the bad economy. "Merry" suggests something medieval and jolly--lots of homebrew, a roaring fire, conical hats with fabric streamers, mistletoe, kisses under, and the merry sound of dulcimer, sacbut, and lute. But happy is good enough today. We have foregone the holiday travel this year. Except for one year in the last 30 years of marriage, my husband and I have traveled to visit extended family at Christmas; this year, we're staying put, with the two kids here to celebrate: no 12-hour drive to my parents' house in East Texas, no stopover in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, for my best friend and her husband have, since last Christmas, moved to northern California. When we lived in northern Minnesota, that trip to Texas was almost a 24-hour drive, broken up by an overnight stay at a hotel with our then-small children. One was usually sick and puking in the back seat of the car. Last Christmas, I was the one who was sick, shivering with chills and fever, and it took me over a week to recuperate.

Hey, we do have a fire crackling in the fireplace although the high today is in the upper 50s (while elsewhere around the country, people are dealing with severe winter weather). For the past two evenings we've been playing board games in the evening, with winners receiving a wrapped prize. Tom has baked bread and given small loaves to our closest neighbors. I've done less baking than I usually do, but I have baked our family favorite: teacakes. The cats are dozing in front of the fire; the kids are enjoying each other's company after months of being separated.

Yes, it's almost a Norman Rockwell Christmas around here. However, fortunately for us--and I mean this--we have neighbors with a sense of humor to take the saccharine out of Christmas. They've decorated in their front yard a large, inflatable gorilla with lights and a Santa hat. The sight of it makes me want to break out the dulcimer, put on a hat with streamers, and dance wildly in our front yard.

Merry Christmas, y'all!

Conspiracy? Could Be. . .

Updates below

When I first heard of the fatal plane crash of Mike Connell, I briefly thought, "Well, that's suspiciously convenient for Karl Rove and the Bush administration," but I shook off the thought. I'm not a conspiracy theorist, and I'm leery of those who are. Yet as I read more and more about the story, I began to get suspicious again. If Dick Cheney can take to the airwaves and openly and confidently announce to the world that he helped instigate torture and that he thinks waterboarding is efficacious and necessary in warfare (when our own government has prosecuted people in the past who waterboarded prisoners), then who knows what these people are capable of doing.

Mike Connell was "a Republican media consultant who was instrumental in the presidential and gubernatorial campaigns of three members of the Bush Family" (CBS News, "Republican IT Guru Dies in Plane Crash," Dec. 23, 2008). He was also the chief IT consultant for Karl Rove. He had a

central role in building the IT infrastructure of the White House and his association with Karl Rove has brought him into the controversy surrounding missing White House e-mails relating to the firing of U.S. Attorneys and other topics, and the fate of e-mail communications sent by Rove and other administration staffers which were sent via a Republican Party Web site, gwb43.com, rather than through a whitehouse.gov address.

Connell had recently been "subpoenaed earlier this year to testify in an Ohio federal court regarding alleged voter fraud in the 2004 election. Despite exit polls showing a lead by Democratic nominee John Kerry of more than 4 percent, Mr. Bush won the state's vote by 2.5 percent, along with its crucial electoral votes" ("Republican IT Guru Dies in Plane Crash").

Evidently, Connell was worried about his safety. One news source reports that

Connell had recently said he was afraid George Bush and Dick Cheney would "throw [him] under the bus." Cliff Arnebeck had also previously alerted Attorney General Michael Mukasey to alleged threats from Karl Rove to Connell if he refused to "take the fall." (Amy Goodman, "Rove's IT Guru Warned of Sabotage before Fatal Plane Crash; Was Set to Testify," posted December 22, 2008).

CBS News reports that "twice in the past two months Connell, who was an experienced pilot, canceled flights because of suspicious problems with his plane" and that Connell "was warned at least twice about flying his plane because his plane might be sabotaged."

While investigators are looking into the causes of the crash, I suspect this story will soon be on the back-burner for lack of media interest. But how convenient for Karl Rove and the Bush administration. The one man who could have spilled all the secrets of those missing e-mails and the internet strategies for the 2000 and 2004 Bush-Cheney campaigns has died in a fire-bomb plane crash, leaving behind a widow and four children.

But some are asking, "Where's the body?"

Updates: Steve Benen weighs in on this subject with some cautionary notes (cautionary about labeling this event as a conspiracy) and more information. He also provides a link to further discussion: "Michael Connell's Death Draws Scrutiny," posted December 26, 2008, on his Political Animal blog at Washington Monthly.

Great Places to Retire

Both my husband and I have now passed the big 5-0 birthday (ummm.... I'm now a year past 50), and while we're not ready to retire, we certainly talk from time to time about where we might want to be after the kids are out of school (one is a junior in high school; the other is in his junior year in college). U.S. News has compiled lists of places for those retirees, including places that will be easier on the budget. Here's the list of low-tax places to retire:

• Billings, Montana
• Cheyenne, Wyoming
• Doral, Florida
• Henderson, Nevada
• Juneau, Alaska
• Manchester, New Hampshire
• Nashville, Tennessee
• Sioux Falls, South Dakota
• Spokane, Washington
• Stafford, Texas.

For a discussion of how those places were chosen, go to Emily Brandon's article, "10 Great Low-Tax Places to Retire."

When we have discussed places to retire, my husband and I certainly have never mentioned any of these cities. Perhaps they merit a look.

For further discussion of other retirement destinations, go to the more in-depth report at U.S. News & World Report: "Best Retirement Bargains."

Bankruptcy? Jesus to the Rescue

You knew this was going to happen: Bush and Paulson pushed through Congress that bailout to the banks, with little or no strings attached--and now the banks won't tell us how they're spending the money--OUR money. Matt Apuzo of AP News [source: Josh Marshal's TPM] records the following:

But after receiving billions in aid from U.S. taxpayers, the nation's largest banks say they can't track exactly how they're spending the money or they simply refuse to discuss it.

"We've lent some of it. We've not lent some of it. We've not given any accounting of, 'Here's how we're doing it,'" said Thomas Kelly, a spokesman for JPMorgan Chase, which received $25 billion in emergency bailout money. "We have not disclosed that to the public. We're declining to."

The Associated Press contacted 21 banks that received at least $1 billion in government money and asked four questions: How much has been spent? What was it spent on? How much is being held in savings, and what's the plan for the rest?

None of the banks provided specific answers.

Hilzoy, at Washington Monthly's Political Animal, posts on how those troubled banks that received our money in this bailout also were ones that highly compensated their executives even as the banks were struggling. And she has these comments about the super-rich:

The super-rich seem to me, during the past few decades, to have wafted off into their own alternate universe, in which of course they are entitled to have their employers pay them not just large salaries, not just multi-million dollar bonuses every year, but the bills for everything that ordinary people pay for; in which flying on public airlines seems to them the way taking the public buses seems to much of the middle class; in which any possible contact with what the rest of us take to be reality has been airbrushed away by vast quantities of money.

Under normal circumstances, I'd think: nice work if you can get it, and worry about the effects of massive inequality on public life. But these are not normal times. The very people who are getting these bonuses and chauffeurs and private jets and financial planners have just sent the entire global economy into a nosedive. They have caused massive amounts of money to disappear. They are getting bailed out for their mistakes by the rest of us -- the people who, if we're lucky, get to fly coach, and if we're not, drive across the country or take a bus.

And now Kevin Drum posts that developers are also looking for a handout. Of course, the problem is that credit is tough to get from lending institutions. Large developmental properties will be up for re-financing and won't be able to get the money needed (from those banks that were bailed out just for this purpose). As The Wall Street Journal reports:

according to research firm Foresight Analytics LCC, $530 billion of commercial mortgages will be coming due for refinancing in the next three years -- with about $160 billion maturing in the next year. Credit, meanwhile, is practically nonexistent and cash flows from commercial property are siphoning off.

Unlike home loans, which borrowers repay after a set period of time, commercial mortgages usually are underwritten for five, seven or 10 years with big payments due at the end. At that point, they typically need to be refinanced. A borrower's inability to refinance could force it to give up the property to the lender.. . .[snip]

To head off some of the impending pain, the industry is asking to be included in a new $200 billion loan program initially created by the government to salvage the market for car loans, student loans and credit-card debt. This money is intended to go directly to help investors finance purchases of securities backed by these assets. If commercial real estate is included, banks might have an incentive to make more loans to developers since they'd be able to repackage and sell them more easily to investors with the assurance of government backing.

So. . . the banks get a bailout to loosen up credit, but the banks won't tell us how they're spending the bailout money. Meanwhile, institutions, businesses, developers, home owners--a long list of borrowers--can't get the credit they need to keep their properties. What a mess.

Maybe developers should just ask Jesus to rescue them, as one developer in Atlanta hopes. Fred Milani, a builder of luxury homes, is selling his own home, a scaled-down version of the White House, because he faces foreclosure on ten houses he has built in the area: "'I believe in Jesus. He’s always blessed me, and at the last minute he’ll come rescue me,' Milani said Thursday."[Kevin Duffy, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 18 December 2008]

At 16,900 square feet, the scaled-down White House is on the market for $9.88 million (Dekalb County values it at $2.8 million). Three parties have looked at the house, the third party being from Dubai. Milani says that:

the next White House owner will be someone relatively unaffected by the country’s economic turmoil.

“Whoever buys it,” Milani said, “is going to be blessed.”

In other words, someone who does not need Jesus, in the guise of the American taxpayer, to bail him out of bankruptcy.

Torture is the Tool of the Enemy

World War II poster

from www.billbradbury.com

More Reading:

David Rose, "Tortured Reasoning," web exclusive, Vanity Fair, posted December 16, 2008.

Scott Horton, "What Motivates the Torture Enablers?," blog at Harper's Magazine, posted December 20, 2008.

And Dick Cheney on torture: excerpt from interview with ABC's Jonathan Karl

Update: And see also Dahlia Lithwick's "Open and Shut Case" on Slate, posted December 22, 2008.

The Horror of Katrina Lives On

As President Bush and other members of his administration flood the airwaves with interviews meant to rehabilitate and polish the "legacy" of the Bush administration, I fear too many people may forget the truly incompetent and irresponsible actions of our leaders over the last eight years. I remember watching those miserable scenes at the Louisiana Superdome in New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. How could the greatest nation on earth abandon its citizens for four days in that nightmare? A. C. Thompson, of The Nation reminds us of some of that horror and of the long after-effects in this video: "Katrina's Hidden Race War." Hat tip to Satyam Khanna at Think Progress.

Interview with Interrogator

Of all the mistakes, missteps, and outright wrong decisions the Bush administration has made, the one thing that has made me angriest--and most worried for our nation--is the decision to torture enemies (well, in addition to suspending individual rights of privacy and of habeas corpus). That decision not only goes against the Geneva Conventions; it also goes against everything I was taught as a young Christian growing up in the Southern Baptist church, against the advice of military leaders who worry what might happen to our soldiers when captured, and against the advice of many experienced interrogators. I've posted on this topic a number of times because I think it's very important. (Hearing friends, family, and right-wing pundits who are fundamentalist Christians justify torture has just about turned me agnostic.)

On his blog, Scott Horton has an interview with one of those experienced interrogators, Matthew Alexander, about whom I've posted before. Check out the interview:“The American Public has a Right to Know That They Do Not Have to Choose Between Torture and Terror”: Six questions for Matthew Alexander, author of How to Break a Terrorist," posted December 18, 2008.

Other voices:
William Pfaff, "Torture Opponents Have No Serious Argument,"posted at Truthdig, December 18, 2008.

Oy to the World

This week I've been decorating our house for the holidays, an activity that I've always enjoyed because, well, I just like colored lights, anyway. In fact, I leave two strings of blue lights up in the sunroom all year round. Hand-crocheted snowflakes float around door frames; origami cranes, deer, and other shapes frame an entrance-way door; Christmas gnomes of my own design smile or glower (depending on how the yarn mouths are shaped) on the fireplace mantle--enough gnomes to be just this side of slightly scary.

Earlier this week, while browsing in a rather traditional and boring gift shop, I saw a metal wreath with the word "Joy" suspended in the middle, spelled out in three small wooden plaques. Feeling a little guilty because I hadn't participated in the neighborhood's annual luminaria lighting, I thought I needed some holiday greeting for our doorway, a nod to the neighbors that the owner of the strange art car parked in the driveway wishes them well for the holiday. (Every year, the neighborhood association sells white bags with sand and candles to raise money; we're asked to line our streets with these bags and to light the candles on a designated day at a designated time. I was taking Tom to the airport that Sunday afternoon and didn't stop to buy the luminaria. Someone stuck two bags in front of our dark strip of street, trying to compensate for my lack of interest, I guess.)

However, by the time I got home with my metal wreath, I was feeling less happy with my purchase. Joy? I wondered. People are losing their jobs by the thousands; other businesses are cutting back on expenses, and employees still with jobs are hoping that they'll get just a cut in pay instead of the boot. The world is in a financial mess that's likely to get even worse. Our personal IRA's have lost up to 50% their value. Our home--well, who knows what the value of our home is now, certainly not that for which we mortgaged it.

Joy? Wall Street money manager Bernard L. Madoff stole billions of dollars from investors (note that surname!) and is accused of "running one of the largest Ponzi schemes ever." Among those investors were charitable foundations and banks and businesses around the world.

Joy? The vice-president of our country openly admitted "that he was directly involved in approving severe interrogation methods [um...that's torture, in politico-speak, in case you've been asleep at the wheel for the past eight years] used by the CIA, and that the prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, should remain open indefinitely." Oh, and he BELIEVES in waterboarding. (Maybe that "I Believe" license plate has a darker meaning than the ACLU imagines.) Peace on Earth and Goodwill to Men, Y'all.

Joy? Two official documents remind us of the lies and deceptions of the Iraq war: the bipartisan report on the treatment of detainees in American custody and a report by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction [h/t to George Packer for the links].

Joy? "So What?" is George Bush's response to the fact that al-Qaeda was not in Iraq until after the U.S. invasion. Oy!

Joy? Darfur.....Nigeria.....Congo....Somalia...the terrorist attacks in Mumbai (Bombay), India....Global Warming/Climate Change (worse than expected).....

"We ought to remove the J from Joy and leave Oy instead," I told my daughter, showing her the metal wreath. When she asked what 'oy' meant, I told her that it is a Yiddish exclamation that, roughly translated, means "what a mess," or something like that. [For a better explanation than mine to Mary-Margaret, go here.]

Mary-Margaret was so taken with the idea that she removed the letter "J" herself. I hung the "J" inside the doorway with the origami decorations.

So, neighbors, the wreath is not a mistake. It's a message for the season. Happy Holiday!

On Holiday Cards and Letter Writing

This time of year, from Thanksgiving to Christmas, is always a busy time of the year for me. For twenty-five years (with breaks for child-bearing and moving from one state to another), I taught at various colleges and universities. These weeks were always busy with grading final essays and business-writing projects, averaging those final grades for reporting, and allaying (or multiplying) students' anxiety. Now I tutor part-time, but I've discovered that just as there is a tendency to fill with material objects the space in which one lives, no matter how large, there is likewise a tendency to fill time with projects and activities. And so these past few weeks I have filled my time with work (28 hours a week) and with various projects.

Although I despise the excesses of the season, I am no holiday Scrooge. I love sending Christmas cards; often these are cards of my own making, sometimes with a bit of poetry included. If the year had been filled with particularly interesting (or sad and tragic) events, the cards would be more elaborate. I like manipulatives, so some of my cards included pop-up collages. A couple of years I designed origami holiday greetings with photo collages and fragments of poetry folded as fortune tellers, or cootie catchers, as they are also known by many generations of school kids.

Years ago I was a prolific letter-writer, but the joy in that activity diminished over time as so few friends kept up the correspondence. And so it is with holiday cards. At one time I received many holiday cards or letters reassuring me that family members and scattered friends were still living and sentient. But as the cards failed to arrive year after year and enough people complained that they had no time to send cards or to write letters, I thought it must be time to end this tradition as well. Why continue to do something that just makes other people feel guilty for not reciprocating?

And so last year, I purchased on sale some pretty, hand-craft styled Christmas cards, thinking that these would be the last cards I would send. Rather than making my own cards, I would crochet some small holiday object: a star or a snowflake for a tree or window, or small old-fashioned doilies in holiday colors to serve as coasters for those wine glasses toasting the season or for the glass of milk or cup of coffee of my alcohol-abstinent friends. These I would include in each card, a parting gift to friends and family. And thus would end my holiday card giving.

"This is the last year I'm sending Christmas cards," I told my daughter, as I filled the cards with hand-crocheted items and addressed the envelopes.

"You said that last year," my daughter replied, unimpressed.

"Did I? I don't remember that."

And so the tradition is likely to continue just because I can't remember from year to year that I've resolved to cease sending holiday cards. So it must be for many traditions: they continue limping along past all real meaning and relevancy because people just can't let go.

"Torture. . . inconsistent with American principles"

Updates Below (Tuesday, November 2)

When those first Abu Ghraib pictures were released, I was horrified. As an American citizen, I am strongly against torture. Nothing I have read convinces me that torture is a successful device in war (even short-term "success" has negative long-term consequences), and everything that is moral convinces me that it is wrong. As the war in Iraq wore on, we learned that leaders in the Bush administration discussed torture and justified its use. Now military personnel are telling their stories. The Washington Post published today an editorial by Matthew Alexander (a pseudonym used for security reasons), a senior interrogator in Iraq and former Air Force Special Operations pilot. Alexander led a team of interrogators in Iraq; his Washington Post article is titled "I'm Still Tortured by What I Saw in Iraq," and his book is titled How to Break a Terrorist: The U.S. Interrogators who Used Brains, not Brutality, to Take Down the Deadliest Man in Iraq.

Alexander describes how his team's interrogation methods convinced one of the associates of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi to give up the location of the leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq. (Zarqawi's followers blew up the golden-domed Shiite mosque in Samarra, an act that "unleashed a wave of sectarian bloodshed" and bloody reprisals in 2006.) That intelligence led to Zarqawi's death. The interrogation methods Alexander's team used? Not torture, but rapport and smarts:

I taught the members of my unit a new methodology -- one based on building rapport with suspects, showing cultural understanding and using good old-fashioned brainpower to tease out information. I personally conducted more than 300 interrogations, and I supervised more than 1,000. The methods my team used are not classified (they're listed in the unclassified Field Manual), but the way we used them was, I like to think, unique. We got to know our enemies, we learned to negotiate with them, and we adapted criminal investigative techniques to our work (something that the Field Manual permits, under the concept of "ruses and trickery"). It worked. Our efforts started a chain of successes that ultimately led to Zarqawi.

Not only did the interrogation methods lead to the death of a man responsible for horrible terrorist attacks, but those methods also led to a greater understanding of the men who were taking arms and money from Zarqawi:

Over the course of this renaissance in interrogation tactics, our attitudes changed. We no longer saw our prisoners as the stereotypical al-Qaeda evildoers we had been repeatedly briefed to expect; we saw them as Sunni Iraqis, often family men protecting themselves from Shiite militias and trying to ensure that their fellow Sunnis would still have some access to wealth and power in the new Iraq. Most surprisingly, they turned out to despise al-Qaeda in Iraq as much as they despised us, but Zarqawi and his thugs were willing to provide them with arms and money. I pointed this out to Gen. George Casey, the former top U.S. commander in Iraq, when he visited my prison in the summer of 2006. He did not respond.

Perhaps he should have. It turns out that my team was right to think that many disgruntled Sunnis could be peeled away from Zarqawi. A year later, Gen. David Petraeus helped boost the so-called Anbar Awakening, in which tens of thousands of Sunnis turned against al-Qaeda in Iraq and signed up with U.S. forces, cutting violence in the country dramatically.

The Anbar Awakening is cited over and over again by pundits on the right and the center-left as crucial in the resultant diminishing violence in Iraq. Now, in the wake of the terrorist attacks in Mumbai, it behooves us to listen to men such as Matthew Alexander. We cannot defeat terrorism with military power alone; we have to understand the roots of terror, the people who become terrorists, the causes that inspire them to turn to murder. Alexander writes:

I know the counter-argument well -- that we need the rough stuff for the truly hard cases, such as battle-hardened core leaders of al-Qaeda, not just run-of-the-mill Iraqi insurgents. But that's not always true: We turned several hard cases, including some foreign fighters, by using our new techniques. A few of them never abandoned the jihadist cause but still gave up critical information. One actually told me, "I thought you would torture me, and when you didn't, I decided that everything I was told about Americans was wrong. That's why I decided to cooperate."

Alexander reminds us, as have so many other writers, that the detainee abuse inflamed many foreigners who flocked to Iraq and escalated the violence there. Abu Ghraib became a recruiting tool for Al-Qaeda.

As a new administration takes office in January, Americans should stand with brave military officers such as Matthew Alexander "to protect our values not only from al-Qaeda but also from those within our own country who would erode them."

Update:Since writing this post, I've read other bloggers' responses to Matthew Alexander's op-ed. Here are links to a couple of those:

• Scott Horton, at Harper's Magazine: "How Many Americans Died Because of Bush's Torture Program?"--posted December 2, 2008.
• Steve Benen, at Washington Monthly: "Torture Doesn't Work Redux," posted December 1, 2008.

Climate Change

The Bush administration is spending these last days in office pushing through hundreds of rulings. One of those rulings has to do with limiting greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act. According to the Washington Post: "A 2007 Supreme Court decision required the Environmental Protection Agency to issue such a ruling, but the White House made it clear in its e-mail [sent last week to city mayors] that it does not think that is a good idea."

This is just one more indication of the bankruptcy of the Bush Administration, an administration that gave us: an unnecessary war; the suspension of habeas corpus against not only foreign enemy combatants but American citizens; a grossly politicized Department of Justice; the poor (and almost criminal) response to the Katrina disaster (a study indicates that kids who stayed in trailers provided by FEMA are extremely sick); an astronomical debt; an economic crisis of enormous proportions--to name just a few.

The Bush administration's poor record on climate changes seems particularly egregious in light of recent results of climate studies. Kevin Drum has links to some very gloomy prognostications here on his blog at Mother Jones: "Climate Change in the Himalayas."

Juliet Eilperin, "White House Prods Allies to Oppose Limits on Greenhouse Gases," The Washington Post, Wednesday, November 26, 2008. (h/t Matthew Yglesias)

Mary Carmichael," Katrina Kids: Sickest Ever," Newsweek, online November 22, 2008; published in magazine issue dated Dec. 1, 2008.

R. Jeffrey Smith, "A Last Push to Deregulate: White House to Ease Many Rules," Washington Post, October 31, 2008, Page A01.

"Who Takes Loaded Weapons to a Toys 'R' Us?"

Adding to the murderous frenzy of the holiday season is the story of the two men who killed each other in a Toys 'R' Us in Palm Desert, California. Evidently, a brawl erupted between the women accompanying the men, and the men pulled guns from their pockets, started shooting, and killed each other. A press release from Toys 'R' Us claimed that the dispute was not related to the shopping season called "Black Friday," but rather was the result of a personal dispute. However, we all know how frenzied the day after Thanksgiving is, with tempers flaring at the smallest provocation. What struck me most, however, was a statement from Palm Desert Councilman Jim Ferguson:

"I think the obvious question everyone has is who takes loaded weapons into a Toys "R" Us?" he said. "I doubt it was the casual holiday shopper."

Where has this man been? Gun purchases increased dramatically after the presidential election because right-wing wackos (and some otherwise sane people) think Barack Obama is going to take away their guns and declare martial law. You bet there are "casual holiday shoppers" toting guns. Here in Georgia (as of July 1, 2008) people who are licensed to carry concealed weapons (these are ordinary folks, not law enforcement) can leave their guns in their vehicles at work, can carry guns in their purses or under their jackets on public transportation and in train stations. They can carry guns in restaurants as long as they don't consume alcohol while there. They can carry guns in public parks and recreation areas where guns are not prohibited by federal law.

When Governor Sonny Perdue signed Georgia's new gun law, Ed Stone, the president of GeorgiaCarry.org, had this to say:

By signing this legislation, Gov. Perdue has expanded the rights of law-abiding Georgians who lawfully arm themselves to protect themselves and their loved ones

So I guess, according to Ed Stone, that's just what those two guys were doing in Toys 'R' Us, protecting their loved one. Oh, yeah, casual holiday shoppers are totin', and they're gunning for the last Guitar Hero on the shelf.

Gillian Flacus, "Witnesses: Fatal Shooting Followed Toy Store Brawl," Associated Press, Nov. 29, 2008.

James Salzer, "Perdue Signs Law Allowing Guns in Restaurants," Atlanta Journal-Constitution, May 14, 2008.

Update on the Thanksgiving Turkey

This year we bought a turkey to cook for Thanksgiving. Our sixteen-year-old daughter wanted a traditional meal, and my husband, who is vegetarian, agreed to cook the turkey. I had had an opportunity earlier to get on a list for an organic, free-range turkey from a local farm, but I passed up that opportunity because I thought we would opt for a less traditional feast--which just goes to show you that young people can love tradition as much as an old fart. So my husband bought a small "pre-thawed" turkey at a large chain grocery store. In fact, my husband did most of the cooking; he loves to cook. I did my small share in making the sweet potato pie and lettuce salad. So this was our menu:

• Lentil and Squash Soup
• Baked turkey with chunks of turnips added to the turkey dish/drippings the last 45 minutes of baking
• Cornmeal dressing (with tofu in the mix--Tom's concoction!)
• Red Lettuce Salad: the lettuce, radishes (including wonderful watermelon radishes), green shallots--from Riverview Farms; the carrots, cranraisins and sunflower seeds not.
• Warm, home-baked, sesame-seed topped yeast bread
• Red wine (A to Z Oregon Pinot Noir, 2007 ("Aristocratic Wines at Democratic Prices"), iced water, choice of soda
• Pecan and Brown-Sugar topped Sweet Potato Pie (in a homemade oil pastry--I no longer use shortening)

Tom's tofu-cornbread dressing was a little dry, and Tom thought the spices were "out of balance," but it tasted pretty good with some of those turkey drippings dribbled over it. The lentil and squash soup was scrumptious, the bread and sweet potato pie even more so. But the turkey--well, it lacked flavor. Eating some turkey leftovers this afternoon, I tried to describe just how that white meat tasted: sort of like wet, shredded paper, I said. Our daughter was even more disappointed. Next year, she said, the lentil and squash soup should be the main dish.

And so, I'm with Matthew Yglesias (here and here) on the Thanksgiving Turkey.

Black Friday

I know I must be un-American in this choice: I have never participated in the mass mania of shopping on the day after Thanksgiving. I'm not much of a shopper, anyway. Two hours into my doing any kind of shopping, even looking for items I need, my enthusiasm flags. One personally anxious year, I even had a panic attack in a Bath and Body Works shop. And this was at a small mall in East Texas. But there were just too many people muddling around in the narrow aisles between towers of body lotions and lip gloss. The lights were too bright, the colors almost neon, and the smiles of the clerks uncannily cheerful.

I don't understand the desire to have something so much that a person will camp out in a parking lot of a big box store. And I certainly don't understand the fury of shoppers so anxious for that special that they actually kill a store clerk. A Black Friday Stampede at a Wal-Mart in Long Island resulted in the death of a 34-year-old Walmart worker. Good God! No Guitar Hero World Tour is worth a man's life.

Happy Thanksgiving

The college-aged son is here for the holidays before returning to his university campus for the last two weeks of the fall semester. The high-school daughter is happy to have her older brother home; they've been sitting in the diningroom this morning, drawing. I told my son he should give up aerospace engineering, take a couple of art classes and do art instead. I wasn't really serious, but the art is important, I think. My daughter, who wants to follow in her mother's footsteps and be an English teacher (though she's wanting to teach high-school students instead of college students), evidently spends her spare time in classes doodling in her notebooks. I've got my favorite drawing of hers here on my desk.

My husband is glad for the son to be home because he has someone who can go exercise with him. He is preparing for the Houston marathon in January; this will be the third time he's participated.

Anyway, much to be thankful for today as we prepare a traditional Thanksgiving feast. Most of the vegetables are from Riverview Farms in Ranger, Georgia. We're part of a Community Supported Agriculture group, and what was delivered in our box yesterday determined much of today's meal. I'm thankful that such farms are sprouting up all around and in Atlanta, bringing us locally grown food.

The cats in our house are thankful, too, or they would be if they could express thanks.

Killing Fields

A few days ago I clicked on a link to a YouTube video of Sarah Palin giving an interview at a turkey farm. She had gone to the farm in her role as governor of Alaska to "pardon" a turkey. After the pardoning, she remained to answer some questions from the accompanying reporters, her words coming out in that syncopated way we've come to know so well, describing the brutal pace of the campaign trail and segueing at the end to a statement of how thankful the governor was and how she enjoyed participating in a turkey pardoning.

Nothing unusual there, except that in the background a man is slaughtering turkeys. Viewers can't see the slitting of the turkey's throat, but they can see the man pushing the turkey in a metal cone to drain the blood, which is caught by a large trough below. The turkey struggles a bit during this exercise. Meanwhile, the governor keeps talking, with the blood flowing in the background.

One version of this video by KTUU NBC Anchorage, Alaska, has now been viewed over a million times. Of course, the video is fascinating because the typical political patter of the governor, who is holding a styrofoam cup of coffee in her hand, is so incongruous with the scene behind her: the struggling turkeys that haven't been pardoned from appearing on Americans' dining tables this week, the blood draining from their necks, and the nonchalant blood-spattered farm hand. People are grossed out by the scene and laugh at the governor's obliviousness to how she appears in this setting.

I, too, had a chuckle over this video, and then I began thinking. I grew up in the country where people slaughtered their meat. I plucked the feathers of many dead chickens in my childhood and adulthood, helping to prepare the birds for the family freezer. (Though the smell of the singed feathers and death and blood always turned me off chicken for at least a couple of weeks after the slaughtering.) My father has raised cattle all his life; that cattle went to local butchers to be slaughtered; the fine grass-fed meat graced our table every day. I have watched family members slaughter pigs. As a child, I watched family members skin rabbits and squirrels. Now, for health reasons, my husband is vegetarian, and I no longer eat red meat (except when I visit my parents). But I know the process of getting meat from the farm to the table. Nothing in the background of that video of Governor Palin's interview on the turkey farm is new to me.

But I can tell from many responses to this video, that the slaughter distresses many viewers. Most people are totally removed from that meat-production process. The chicken one picks up from the freezer at Publix or Kroger is so devoid of the life it once lived that it may as well be a muffin to most shoppers; they think so little of that life and of the bloody process that brought the pale, scentless, boneless breast to its plastic and styrofoam enclosure.

And so I wondered:

What if above every freezer in every supermarket, videos played scenes of animals being slaughtered? Or--even worse--of animals being kept in the very tight and miserable quarters of factory farms before being led to a slaughter totally devoid of the kind of respect afforded those chickens and cows on my family's farms. When I was a child, I remember my father's killing and skinning a squirrel and then placing the squirrel on the kitchen counter before preparing it for a meal. The denuded body of the squirrel was still jerking, and I stood there, mesmerized by the sight of this dead thing continuing to show the movement of life. I vaguely remember laughing in my childish horror and fascination at the scene. When my father saw me, he made me leave the room. I realized then that not only was my father wanting to protect me from the ugliness of death; he was also protecting the squirrel, which deserved dignity in that death. This was a lesson that has remained with me all my life: meat is sacred. Just as life is sacred. And unlike Governor Palin, who told the reporters she was fine with where she was standing for the interview, my father would have asked those reporters to move to another location. He would have been cognizant of the life draining away behind him, and he would have respected that life by allowing it dignity in death. He would not have wanted the farm hand distracted from his sacred duty by turning away from it to the glare of the cameras. I know that not every person who grew up on a farm has this kind of respect for the animals he or she has killed or has led to slaughter--but my father did, and that's the lesson I learned, an important lesson for the world, I think.

More importantly, what if those millions of video viewers gave equal attention to the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of people in the world? What if behind every television appearance of a politician the background revealed the consequences of that politician's decisions? Sarah Palin pardoned only one turkey; the rest of those turkeys were not pardoned, and this video so clearly communicates to us the consequences of that decision. What if behind every CIA operative who participated, rolled video footage of the enemy combatant being tortured? What if behind every politician who has cheered on the war in Iraq, rolled video footage of children dying in the streets, of mothers wailing at funerals, of blasted bodies, bloody entrails? What if behind every politician who has sneered at the need for universal health care, rolled footage of the long lines of suffering people in emergency rooms and the death side scenes of people who couldn't afford adequate care? What if, behind every president and leader who sought war with another nation, rolled footage of their soldiers falling in battle, close-ups where viewers can see the light going out of those young eyes, can hear the death rattle in the throats? Would we care then? Would we demand different and better leadership?

There are many killing fields in this world. What if we paid more attention to those?

When I am Old[er]

There is a scene in the film Winged Migration that immediately captured my imagination the first time I saw it. Eurasian cranes settle into the waving grasses of a windswept field. Near this field is a stone house. A donkey peers from a fence around the house; a woman opens a gate. There are close-ups of the cranes searching for food, such as frogs, in the windswept grasses dotted with meadow flowers. A heavy old woman dressed in a blue patterned dress with a dark blue scarf on her head walks slowly toward the cranes, a metal bucket in her hand. I imagine that the woman comes out every year with this bucket full of grain, trying to get close to these beautiful wild birds that migrate so far, 2500 miles, we are told. The donkey brays in the background. In one close-up of the cranes' pecking in the tall grasses, one can hear chickens clucking in the background, a perfect blend of the domestic and the wild.

I imagine I am that old woman. I want to be that old woman, with the wrinkles around my eyes caused by squinting in that open landscape of grass and sky. When I think of growing old, of dying, I imagine my last years in a place such as this, in Aubrac, France. A low fire will be flaming in a fireplace inside the stone house. I will arise every morning to throw grain to the chickens and to take the excess grain across the fields to stare at the sky, waiting for the return of the cranes.

Other places I've seen on film arouse similar feelings in me:

• the scene of the Dashwood cottage in Andrew Davies' recent adaptation of Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility. The cottage is set on a cliff by the coast in Devon, England. A lot of the country scenes there are of rain and dark skies and pounding waves against a desolate coast.
• Scenes from PBS's mystery mini-series Oliver's Travels, set in the far Orkneys of Scotland. The scenery is enhanced, of course, by the accompanying handsome, craggy visage of British actor Alan Bates.

Most of us probably have an image in our heads of where we would like to be in old age. I don't want to be in a retirement village or a bright home in Florida. I want to be somewhere desolate but beautiful where I can contemplate mortality and re-live memories among domestic duties and sky-gazing, "all passion spent."

As Michel de Montaigne wrote: "I want death to find me planting my cabbages, neither worrying about it nor the unfinished gardening."

New Life for Political Signs

Turn them into folk art. This simple celebration sign took about thirty minutes.

Update, Monday, November 17, 2008: There's a bit of a political sign war in our neighborhood. I just read an e-mail on my neighborhood listserve from a disgruntled neighbor who wants us all to remove political signs from our yards. She quotes from the city code which evidently prohibits political signs in yards a week past an election. Self-righteously, the neighbor says that she removed her signs immediately after the election in order to "maintain a prettier neighborhood." Now she demands that everyone else remove their signs. Then another neighbor posted that the Georgia state legislature passed a law that pre-empts the city's code:

"no municipal, county, or consolidated government may restrict by regulation or other means the length of time a political campaign sign maybe displayed or the number of signs which may be displayed on private property for which permission has been granted."

O.C.G.A. Section 16-7-58(a)(2)

Could I get around the city code by calling my sign "folk art"? What prompts a person to take her neighbors to task so?

Ancient Philosophers, Modern Life

I am reading Alain de Botton's The Consolations of Philosophy, in which the author takes the ideas of well-known philosophers and applies those ideas to modern life. The book is easy to read, probably too easy for those who might want their texts a bit more dense, but good reading for those few moments between tutoring sessions where I work. I bought the book because there is a chapter on Seneca and his philosophy of stoicism. Each chapter contains some biographical information about the philosopher and a clear discussion of some of the elements of that person's ideas. Seneca's chapter is titled "The Consolation of Philosophy"; Socrates's chapter is titled "Consolation for Unpopularity"; Epicurus's chapter is "Consolation for Not Having Enough Money." The next chapter is "Consolation for Inadequacy" and is based on the ideas of Montaigne. The book is meant to be therapeutic, I think, to illustrate how these philosophies can help us become happier or at least deal more adequately with the vicissitudes of life.

After reading this book, I plan to read Seneca's letters and essays; some of his letters I have already read.

A few of Seneca's aphorisms:

• What need is there to weep over parts of life? The whole of it calls for tears.
• That which you cannot reform, it is best to endure.
• All outdoors may be bedlam, provided that there is no disturbance within.
• Reckon on everything, expect everything.
• Fortune gives us nothing which we can really own.
• We are mistaken if we believe any part of the world is exempt and safe....Nature has not created anything in such a way that is immobile.

Lee Atwater: Master of Mass Manipulation

Last night I watched Frontline's "Boogie Man: The Lee Atwater Story," about the political operative who ran George Herbert Walker Bush's 1988 campaign and who had a profound influence on the campaign tactics of the Republican Party. The documentary was very interesting, providing insight into how dirty tactics work in campaigns. Atwater was a master of "framing" an opponent, creating a narrative that places the opponent in the worst possible light from which it is hard to escape. As the narrator--and some of the interviewees say in the film--Atwater destroyed Michael Dukakis. Scenes with Dukakis in his home, setting his table, retrieving milk from a refrigerator, are particularly poignant.

Winning is everything to some people; it doesn't matter how one wins. The losers are quickly forgotten, and the winners often have enough apologists and sycophants to polish their images long after they're dead.

I know that politics is a nasty business and that one needs to be tough to win and to lead, but I also think that there's a line between what can be accepted and what should not be accepted in political discourse. As interesting and complicated a man as Lee Atwater comes across in this documentary, I think he crossed that line, as have the Republican operatives who have followed in his footsteps, such as Atwater's protege Karl Rove. Fascinating documentary......

A BIT Crazy and Off Base?

I thought of starting a wingnut watch on my blog, but after a few days of reading reactions to Obama's presidential win, I concluded I would have neither the time nor the stomach to keep up with the crazies. Just a local example: In an interview with the Associated Press this week, Georgia Republican Congressman Paul Broun warned the public against Barack Obama's establishing a dictatorship with a Gestapo-like civilian corps:

Broun cited a July speech by Obama that has circulated on the Internet in which the then-Democratic presidential candidate called for a civilian force to take some of the national security burden off the military.

“That’s exactly what Hitler did in Nazi Germany and it’s exactly what the Soviet Union did,” Broun said. “When he’s proposing to have a national security force that’s answering to him, that is as strong as the U.S. military, he’s showing me signs of being Marxist....[snip]...“We can’t be lulled into complacency,” Broun said. “You have to remember that Adolf Hitler was elected in a democratic Germany. I’m not comparing him to Adolf Hitler. What I’m saying is there is the potential of going down that road.””

Ummm..... In other words, Broun is indeed comparing Barack Obama to Adolph Hitler. Broun represents Georgia's 10th Congressional District in northeast Georgia, which includes the cities of Augusta and Athens. Broun won a run-off election in 2007 by a slim margin over his opponent Senator Jim Whitehead. The two men were vying in a special election to fill the congressional seat vacated when U.S. Representative Charlie Norwood died. Broun carried 90% of the vote in the Athens area, where he was supported by Democrats as well as Republicans. An opinion article in The Wall Street Journal at the time suggested that folks were angered by Jim Whitehead's comment that the University of Georgia, a "liberal bastion," ought to be bombed.

This November, Broun won a full-term by a landslide--61 to 39 percent--over Bobby Saxon, his Democratic challenger. When he was announced the winner on Tuesday, November 4th, Broun "pledged....to set aside party labels and look for bipartisan ways to solve to (sic) the nation's problems." Obviously, his promise didn't even last a week.

Hat tip to Josh Marshall at TMP. For the full story, you can go to: "GA Congressman Calls Obama Marxist, Warns of Dictatorship," in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Monday, November 10, 2008.

Sarah Palin Watch 1: Secret Service Revelations

Our political attention spans are often too short. The onslaught of news from all kinds of sources, the tragedies and triumphs of international events, and our own hectic daily lives conspire to engender in us an unacknowledged amnesia. I've discovered this tendency in myself. And so, looking forward to the next presidential election, I'm going to keep watch on the political actors that appeared in this election as well as other presidential hopefuls and policy leaders who are being put forward by the political pundits. With that in mind, here is my first installment of my Sarah Palin Watch.

According to Tim Shipman, of the United Kingdom's Telegraph, Sarah Palin's "demogogic tone" in her attacks on Barack Obama at the McCain/Palin campaign rallies "provoked a spike in death threats against the future president.":

The Secret Service warned the Obama family in mid October that they had seen a dramatic increase in the number of threats against the Democratic candidate, coinciding with Mrs Palin's attacks.

Michelle Obama, the future First Lady, was so upset that she turned to her friend and campaign adviser Valerie Jarrett and said: "Why would they try to make people hate us?"

We need to remember the tone that Sarah Palin took in this national race, as it tells us something about the woman. McCain aides are now griping publicly that "Mrs. Palin took it upon herself to question Mr. Obama's patriotism, before the line of attack had been cleared by Mr. McCain."

I'm not one to believe everything the McCain aides say; they're trying to save their reputations. However, I do think that Sarah Palin's very successful use of demagogic language reveals something about her, about her tendencies to bifurcate the world into "those against us" and "those for us." She excited the fringes of the Republican base in a very dangerous way.

For Further Reading about Palin and the Republican Party:

• Mark Lilla, "The Perils of Populist Chic: What the Rise of Sarah Palin and Populism Means for the Conservative Intellectual Tradition," The Wall Street Journal, November 8, 2008.
• Ed Pilkington, "We Feel About Her the Way You Feel About the Queen," The Guardian, November 10, 2008. (www.guardian.co.uk)
• Steve Benen, "Coming to Grips with Republicans' Anti-intellectualism," Political Animal blog at The Washington Monthly, posted November 9, 2008.
• Rasmussen Reports, "60% of GOP Voters Say Palin Helped McCain," Friday, Nov. 7, 2008 (Hat tip: Think Progress):

  When asked to choose among some of the GOP’s top names for their choice for the party’s 2012 presidential nominee, 64% say Palin [snip].....The key for the 44-year-old Palin will be whether she can broaden her base of support. An Election Day survey found that 81% of Democrats and, more importantly, 57% of unaffiliated voters had an unfavorable view of her.

• Kathleen Parker, "The Conservative Crackup: The Palin Factor," conservative columnist Kathleen Parker's contribution to a dialogue among conservatives (writers, editors, television pundits) on Slate, posted November 7, 2008:

  Palin covered her inadequacies with folksy charm and by drumming up a class war, turning her audiences not just against elites but against the party's own educated members. The movement created by that superelite, but never elitist, William F. Buckley Jr. was handed over to Joe Six-Pack. Know-nothingness was no longer a stigma, but a badge of honor.

From the Kitchen to the Oval Office

Yesterday's Washington Post has an article about Eugene Allen, an 89-year-old black man who served in the White House for over thirty years, from 1952-1986. He started out washing dishes and shining silverware at $2,400 a year and was promoted over the years to butler and, in 1980, to maitre d'. The reporter interviewed Allen and his wife, Helene, for their observations on the presidential inhabitants of the White House. The article also briefly describes the attitudes toward African-Americans in the White House, including a story of President John Kennedy's distress when Sammy Davis, Jr., who, invited with 800 other blacks to attend a commemoration of the 100th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation, showed up with his white wife, May Britt:

Louis Martin, a Democratic operative who helped plan the function, had placed the names of entertainer Sammy Davis Jr. and his wife, May Britt, on the guest list. The White House scratched it off and Martin would put it back on. According to Martin, Kennedy was aghast when he saw the black and white couple stroll into the White House. His face reddened and he instructed photographers that no pictures of the interracial couple would be taken.

This past week, Eugene Allen cast his vote for Barack Obama, the first black president of the United States.

For the full story, go to: Wil Haygood's "A Butler Well Served by this Election," Washington Post, Friday, November 7, 2008; Page A01. (Hat tip to Scientific's Blog at Talking Points Memo Cafe)

How far we've come in my lifetime: from blacks washing dishes in the kitchen of the White House to a black man in the Oval Office. But we still have quite a ways to go to achieve true equality in this country. The overt reactions of some white people to this election remind us of the racism that remains; our more subtly-expressed attitudes in conversation and everyday choices remind us that we fall short of social equality.