Reminiscing

I spent a couple hours last night, and a few more this morning, thumbing through old notebooks and journals. I doubt anyone who writes can resist an occasional glance back at accumulated material; I can’t. The catch is, three things can happen when you do, and only one of them is good.

Getting the bad ones out of the way:

• You find stuff so bad you don’t want to admit it’s your own. “Me? Write that crap? No, I couldn’t have. Must have copied it out as an example of what not to do….” Yet there it is, and your deep dark perversely honest inner self says, “Yup. It’s yours.”

• While that is vexing, or embarrassing, it’s less frustrating than this: you find stuff whose provenance remains a mystery. There are two sub-categories here.

  • One, it’s good, but you’re not sure whether you wrote it, or copied it and neglected to cite the source. Result: you have a good piece you’d like to tell someone about, but you can’t be absolutely positively confident your wrote it yourself. (If you’ve not written a lot of different stuff, or if you have a strong clear style from which you never stray, you might not believe this.)

  • Two, it’s good, and you know you didn’t write it, but you’ve no idea who did, or how to track it down.

And the one good possibility? It does happen, though not as often as you’d like, that you find stuff so good you actually smile, or sigh, or otherwise tell yourself that, even had someone else written it, you’d have to say it was good.

Arms and the blog

Chris Hedges — the other Christopher H, the rational one, not the mercurial one — has been deploring, among other things, the disarray and near dismemberment of liberal politics. And by “liberal,” he does not mean the Far Left. He does not even mean the Near Left. He means more or less the middle ground, or what would be the middle ground had not the two extremes been hurling bilge and lies at one another all these years.

The middle ground, from where one might be able to see both sides. However, with bilge accumulating at historic rates recently, it is difficult now for any viewer at any point on the spectrum to make sense of what is happening more than a few yards away.

A determined band still makes the effort, to point to the sane and the insane on either side of some arbitrary middle ground.

• [DISCLAIMER: As a long-time pseudo-Democrat, I may fairly be accused of standing somewhat closer to the Left than to the Right. I will argue, however, that of late, excesses of the Left -- lies, hectoring, and half a dozen assorted -isms -- pale beside those of the Right.]

All that to lure you once more to TomGram, one of those brave isles of sanity. The current topic is the arms race. Be sure to note the background of this issue’s writer.

Even now, in the toughest of tough times and despite the headlines about gigantic Defense Department spending cuts, President Obama recently reassured arms-makers (and the rest of us) that the Pentagon budget would, in his words, “still grow, because we have global responsibilities that demand our leadership. In fact, the defense budget will still be larger than it was toward the end of the Bush administration.” In response, his Republican opponents lambasted him as weak on defense for promising so little. Which tells you just who the winners of the last decade were and who the winners of the next one are likely to be.

Look at the top, not at the bottom

[Opening salvo in what will likely be an op-ed for the local paper.]

A lot of roaring and bleating locally — across the state, perhaps across the nation — about teacher evaluation. Should it be done, how, by whom, using what standards, etc. The (ostensible) goal in all this is to guarantee children are getting a good education, which means as good as circumstances allow.

Generally misunderstood in all the arguing is that, in these capitalism-centered times, good education requires community and government support, meaning money and attention and skill. The tenor of current public school discussions suggests that less rather than more money is an answer, that attention has been replaced by political posturing, and that skill is somehow a simple item to be measured in the short term.

Sound familiar so far? See, we just test the kids and that tells us how good the teachers are. Low test scores, fire the teacher. High test scores, keep her/him another year. Sort of the way a large corporation works, isn’t it. Workers produce, they stay on; workers don’t produce, they’re let go.

But wait a minute. That isn’t really the way successful companies operate. If a single worker slacks off, dump him, right. But if production altogether is off, it’s middle management that gets pruned. Things get worse, and the board of directors has a serious sit-down with the CEO.

Now look at the schools again, those which don’t seem to produce good scores. It’s teachers who are blamed: it never seems to reach the point of evaluating management — principals and superintendents and — gasp — boards of education.

Odd, how the evaluation up-flow always stops at teachers.

Further on up the road

Jesus (image of convenience; substitute savior of your choice) is not coming this year. He will not be on the ballot in November, and neither will Ralph Nader. Odds of a tolerable outsider making the cut are infinitesimal; ignore that. We will, therefore, have to vote — if we vote at all — either for Obama or for whichever GOP clown prevails. In brief, the lesser of two evils. There is comfort here: we can safely ignore all mass media political vomitus for the next 7+ months. Plenty of time to read a few good books, play with the kids, walk in the woods, write poetry, tend the garden.

And then, when November comes, what are we to do? All the fumbling and disappointments and bullshit aside, there’s only one realistic course of action. If for no other reason, think about who might be appointed next to the Supreme Court — a thing which surely will happen — if someone like Gingrich or Romney becomes the Decider-in-Chief.

For the real story…

Twice already today, I burst into uncontrollable laughter. First time was at a New Yorker cartoon, an art form which had seemed tired and feeble, but now seems again live and lively. I’ll detail that later. And yes, I am planning to come back here to drone and carp and whine and cavil some more, if only because of the second thing which broke me up today.

This.

Don’t bother with TV or other mass media… US mass media, that is. If you want to find out what is happening to the Republican Presidential Primary (good old RPP, let’s say) there’s only one place to check. In fact, for a hell of a lot of what’s really going on in this country, along with occasional smart-ass commentary to go with it, what you want is The Guardian. No, really. Check it out.

And please note that I said was is happening “to” RPP, not what is happening “with” it. Any rational observer — and those Guardian reporters and editors, barely stifled laughter notwithstanding, are rational observers — can see that the wheels, already off the chassis, are liable to inflict a whole shitload of collateral damage before long.

I ought not to laugh, but it is goddam funny, this RPP. If only there weren’t a genuine possibility that one of those bottom-feeding weasels could get elected. If that happens… well, I’m too old to emigrate, and don’t know who’d have me anyway.

In case you haven’t noticed, and still haven’t checked The Guardian, here’s part of the story:

• Romney did NOT win Iowa; a recount gives Iowa to Santorum.
• Perry has withdrawn, throwing his support to Gingrich.
• Palin supports Gingrich.
• Bachman says Gingrich “lacks the poise, experience and moral fiber to represent our principles and values.”
• Gingrich says, as President, he would ignore the Supreme Court.

It isn’t just the story. The Guardian’s commentary along the way is just as funny as the politicians.

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[ADD]

That cartoon I mentioned above. It’s right here. Don’t click on this link with a mouthful of milk, or beer, or anything else which will embarrass you when it splootches all over the room.

Professor Mike

What we talk about when we don’t want to talk about Zombie waste

They have to go. All they do is sleep and eat. Doesn’t matter where we start.

Scene 27: Some unwary living thing enters the frame, as a boarded-up window is breached; fetid forearms, all pustules and bubonic-ghastly surf inside. A feeding frenzy begins.

Scene 28: Hunger slaked, the undead then settle in for a bit of inactivity: Zombie siesta, if you will.

Scene 29: A cereal bowl full of human brains: the perfect midnight snack. This will start the process all over again.

I have never seen a culture — if it can be called that — so obsessed with massive consumption of raw flesh followed by hibernation. And what’s missing from this picture? I’ll tell you, because you’re wondering too. They have to “go,” right? And yet, this simple and basic biological need is handled the same way Hollywood handles the indelicacies of many human bodily functions: Just ignore it.

Well I for one will not. I have a serious problem with that. When I gotta go, everyone knows it. I make no excuses, nor do I consider the faint of heart. Make way everybody — Papa’s gotta move. It’s nothing to be ashamed of. More to the point: it is inaccurate reporting from the field. We should be knee-deep in zombie shit as the camera pans the horizon. Seriously.

First, some fact-like statements:

• There are no morbidly obese zombies. Go ahead, try and find one. This is a killer self-enabling combination of feast and sloth, with no discernibly healthy exercise in between, save the skulking and shuffling about they seem to be famous for. And yet, only wraith-like zombie skeletors seem to stalk the landscape, hollow-cheeked, slack-jawed and svelte as crayons.
• It’s just not plausible to suggest someone or something so slender of shape could ingest so much and not be violently discharging copious amounts of waste. C’mon, writers, throw me a bone here — metaphorically.
• The zombie lifestyle is three equal shares: foraging/feasting, repose (sloth), and evacuation of bowels.

Okay, here’s my point: Given this — albeit sketchy — data, we are forced to assume the zombie metabolic process infinitely more efficient than our own. So, where is the waste? If zombie activity number one is feasting on raw flesh, zombie defecation cannot be very far behind on the charts, in particular when you suppose zombie activity two to be sloth. In other words, my theory is sound — and difficult to disregard.

And it doesn’t have to be “gross.” That misses the point, I think. We are missing some huge opportunities for zombie comedy here. Imagine the hilarity of one of our would-be heroes in an escape attempt, slipping on a fresh load of zombie leavings. What an insult! As a mile marker for scale of suffering a human indignity, this is off the charts. But, this portrayal of “reality” will be seen by those weaker-stomached of you (prudes, I say) as unconscionable. “Gross,” you will say, and leave me to wage this fight alone. Fine. I am up to the task.

Really — how much more disgusting would it be for us to see a zombie unbuckle, squat and push a big loaf out? Minimally, I say. But I am railing against a big machine, culturally, anyway. American audiences will have no truck with zombie taking a leak. Decapitation, ingestion of entrails, yes, O-K. But an undead ghoul, standing behind a tree, watering the lawn? No thank you, friend. Why not? It’d be far more realistic, at least; presuming zombies eat and drink to sustain a biologically functioning carbon based, quasi-life form. Let them piss or take a dump in the street. What do we care? It’s a filthy mess down there anyway, and you know that’s what they’d want to be doing, really.

Scene 29, (rev.1): See the staggering, shuffling undead ghoul suddenly stop by a telephone pole. He looks around, (or not, really) unzips and whizzes his heart out. (Director: okay to interpret literally.) He shudders, zips back up, looks into the camera and shrugs as if to say, “Hey, that’s how I roll.”

It’s realism, plus a bit of levity. Something lacking, and sorely needed in all these zombie epics. So here, we kill two birds with one stone. And maybe eat one ravenously afterward, should we so choose.

It says much about our American culture that we are all too happy to consume until we are undead, sleep fiendishly, and never have to worry about, and deal with, our waste matter. It’s always comfortably outside the frame. Tell that to the sanitation workers at the city dump; at the sewage treatment plants; at the 50 story incinerators which choke the urban sky with acrid clouds. Go and tell them about your reluctance to acknowledge our waste removal process. I’ll let you in on a little secret. You won’t be able to reach them for comment: They are all on an extended lunch break. This, to be followed by a nice, suspiciously long nap.

I think we would like to fancy ourselves the John Wayne/Clint Eastwood type of character in these stories. We ride into town and lo, the righteous zombie slaughter begins. Feasting on human flesh, brother? No, no, not on my watch – And so the judgment day hatchet cleaves the zombie melon neatly in two. Mmmmm, so tasty. The problem with associating ourselves with this mythical hero is simple. We just aren’t that. We’d like to believe it, but unfortunately we are more likely to be the one with a halved melon on both sides of our necks wondering what just went down.

A de Vere vaccine

Oxfordians of the world, unite! You have nothing to lose but your wits. Or perhaps one ought to say, half-wits. The movie Anonymous is out, bound and determined, one might infer, to blast that maundering imposter Shakespeare back to much-deserved oblivion and raise the poor misunderstood de Vere to his rightful place in the pantheon of literary greats.

Do I overwrite? Very well then. I am overwrought. Also disappointed that Eric Idle — or Michael Palin, it’s not clear which — has beaten me to the punchline. It’s all there in the latest New Yorker. Here are a few lines to give you the flavor. Go read the whole thing.

While it is perfectly obvious to everyone that Ben Jonson wrote all of Shakespeare’s plays, it is less known that Ben Jonson’s plays were written by a teen-age girl in Sunderland, who mysteriously disappeared, leaving no trace of her existence, which is clear proof that she wrote them… Queen Elizabeth, who was obviously a man, conspired to have Shakespeare named as the author of his plays, because how could a man who had only a grammar-school education and spoke Latin and a little Greek possibly have written something as bad as “All’s Well That Ends Well”? It makes no sense. It was obviously an upper-class twit who wished to disguise his identity so that Vanessa Redgrave could get a job in her old age.

….

Thomas Jefferson produced the Declaration with the aid of a ghostwriter, a woman of color named Betty Mae, who was a non-voluntary worker. “Moby-Dick” was written not by Herman Melville but by Herman Melbrooks, who wrote most of it in Yiddish on the boat over from Coney Island… Henry James did write all of his own works, because nobody else could be that boring, and, more significant, no one else has ever bothered to claim them.

You can save yourself the trouble of seeing the movie by reading A O Scott’s review.

Thankful for…

Juan Cole — whose website, Informed Comment, is a regular check-in for me — posted a list: Ten Top Things Americans can be Thankful for. Here are the items; I suggest you visit his latest posting for the details.

1. The Iraq War is finally over.
2. Al-Qaeda… is within two arrests of being more or less rolled up.
3. The United States lost no troops in the Libya War.
4. There is now an unambiguous Arab democracy, Tunisia.
5. Violent crime continues to decline in the United States.
6. American democracy remains vital at the grass roots level.
7. American innovation and ingenuity remain strong.
8. India and Pakistan are taking serious steps to normalize their trade relations.
9. Rates of heart disease in the US have fallen significantly since 2005.
10. American scientific and medical research is still world class.

I read the news today. Oh boy…

[Nostalgia alert]

Sixty years ago, Judy Holliday won a bunch of awards — including an Oscar — for her performance in Born Yesterday. (The movie’s still around, and far better than the 1993 remake with Melanie Griffith.)

Reason I mention it, a line from that movie has been bouncing around in my head lately, and recent news items keep it going.

Billie Dawn (Holliday) is the bright-but-unlettered girl-friend of a sleazy businessman. While in DC to buy a few congressmen, he hires a guy to upgrade Billie. In the process, Billie mentions that her father told her never to do anything she wouldn’t want printed on the front page of The New York Times.

With that in mind, I urge you to glance at the front page of the Times, or just about any newspaper.

I ought to warn you, though, that immediately after quoting her father’s admonition, Billie says that now her father is afraid to read the morning paper.

Despair

The title is not mine; it’s what Billy Collins wrote at the top of this collection of words, a collection which some of you may recognize as a poem. The rest of you can go sit on a tack.

So much gloom and doubt in our poetry -
flowers wilting on the table,
the self regarding itself in a watery mirror.
Dead leaves cover the ground,
the wind moans in the chimney,
and the tendrils of the yew tree inch toward the coffin.
I wonder what the ancient Chinese poets
would make of all this,
the shadows and empty cupboards?
Today, with the sun blazing in the trees,
my thoughts turn to the great
tenth-century celebrators of experience,
Wa-Hoo, whose delight in the smallest things
could hardly be restrained,
and to his joyous counterpart in the western provinces,
Ye-Hah.