For a few years, I've felt a certain strange affection for Susan Sontag that has a lot to do with a simple travel accident: we were both in Berlin on September 11, 2001 (consider your question answered, Alan Jackson), and based on an interview she later gave to Salon, I know she had the same experience I did: bleary, jetlagged hours watching CNN and BBC Worldnews. There was nothing else TO do; everything anyone might have done for distraction had been closed. And so once the panicked phone calls to loved ones had gotten through, and with no flights home to jump on because nothing was moving, all that was left were equally dazed companions and CNN. So as small a thing as it is, and as many NY area folk are in Berlin at any one time, I felt that strange click of a common experience (I do like to think that Susan Sontag didn't find out about the attacks on the goddamn UBahn, though). But the reason that translated into admiration is that her response was so much more clear-sighted, more intelligent, and more demanding of our leaders, our media, and us as a people than mine was.

Yes, I'm talking about the brief New Yorker piece for which she was excoriated and branded a fifth columnist--this is what made me love this woman, rather than the work of hers I'd read in the course of my studies. Her demand was a simple one: treat Americans like adults.

A lot of thinking needs to be done, and perhaps is being done in Washington and elsewhere, about the ineptitude of American intelligence and counter-intelligence, about options available to American foreign policy, particularly in the Middle East, and about what constitutes a smart program of military defense. But the public is not being asked to bear much of the burden of reality. The unanimously applauded, self-congratulatory bromides of a Soviet Party Congress seemed contemptible. The unanimity of the sanctimonious, reality-concealing rhetoric spouted by American officials and media commentators in recent days seems, well, unworthy of a mature democracy.

I can't recall any other figure of her cultural weight referring to America as a "mature democracy", and I certainly can't remember any cable news pundit using the phrase. Maybe they're afraid; if they repeated it too often, Americans might actually come to believe it and to demand a fourth estate worthy of it.

A man admitted to the White House press corps was not only

a. not really part of the press
b. not using his real name
c. possibly an actual prostitute,

but

d. it's not all over the news.

This guy says it best.

I thought the Plame affair was the ultimate If Clinton Had Pulled Anything LIKE This . . . sort of scandal. What with, you know, it meeting general if possibly not legal standards for treason. But there's nothing quite like the whiff of gaiety to make a story really rev on cable news, and if that gaiety is actually illegal, well, so much the better. I think the prostitute thing is a lot more important than the gay thing, but mostly, I just can't believe how much this is being let alone. One would think that good journalists would be offended on a professional level by something like this, and bad ones would at least work the scandal angle. The NY Post would have sacrificed a thousand puppies for this kind of headline fodder in the Clinton years. I mean, MANWHORE PRESS CORPS kinda has a ring to it, no?

But anything goes if you're on Team Bush.

The next person who uses the phrase "liberal media" and means it should be kneecapped.

. . . of the students at my alma mater.

It's been over three days, and they're still filibustering Frist!

Reprinted from a ranting email I sent last week (to a friend, not the borough prez):

Dear Marty Markowitz,

Congratulations on your shit-for-brains hard-fought victory. You've got your sign. Way to go! Now, if you could devote some attention to the ongoing campaign to destroy your borough by one hideous, ill conceived and wrought boondoggle after another, that would be nice.

Cordially,

Adair Iacono

Target.

My email rant to them:

I have written before, once via the Planned Parenthood website and once in response to the defensive auto-reply I received in return. I'm writing now through your site, in my own words, in an attempt to communicate the seriousness of my sentiments.

I have been a loyal Target customer and had hoped to be one for a good while longer; your Flatbush Ave/Atlantic Terminal store is blocks from my home and I enjoy your selection. But until Target reverses its stance regarding dispensation of emergeny contraception, your company will not get a cent from me.

To be clear: I do not in any way regard as valid your contention that employees' civil rights are at stake. Would a muslim cashier at a Target with groceries be allowed not to scan bacon? That, after all, conflicts with Islam. But I seriously doubt you would send away a customer, or refer him or her to another store or butcher, in the event your employee's sincerely held religious beliefs were at risk. Or what if an employee's religious beliefs encourage homophobia? Would you allow gay customers to be turned away? And, would you allow pharmacists to refuse to fill prescriptions for Viagra, or to sell condoms, to unwed men on the grounds that sex outside of marriage violates their beliefs?

Of course not. Because for one thing, you're a business and that counters profits. And for another thing, you're probably not interested in being sued.

Well, guess what? Singling out contraception as the one area where you will allow employees to impose themselves on customers shreds your wafer-thin civil rights argument. Whether the remaining reason is sexism on your part or mere cowardice, it ain't pretty. And I will not spend my money in a store that does not respect women's rights to have prescriptions filled immediately, without comment, intercession, deferral, relocation, or any other importunance. Pharmacists fill prescriptions. That is their function. Unless my prescriptions have contraindications, I expect the pharmacist to fill the prescription without any comment except a "Thank you and have a nice day" as I leave. Period.

Whatever the sex of the pharmacists involved, the only customers being punished for having the gall to fill a prescription are sexually active or raped women. That makes your policy, in operation, transparently sexist. All the hip multiculti ads in the world won't make up for that, and I'm sure you'll find that feeling is shared by a very large, very unhappy chunk of your customer base.

I have a jelly cabinet, bookshelves, some dvds, kitchen wares, a few birthday presents, and many Christmas gifts to buy. And I won't be buying any of them at Target until you reverse this ridiculous and unjust policy. To be clear: I haven't shopped at Best Buy in three years, and that was just because a single shipping clerk was rude. Your actual company is being absurd. That buys you decades of avoidance and bad word of mouth unless you set things right.

I hope you come to your senses and fix this.

. . . and I'll use small words so that even Candy Crowley can understand:

Losing control of the House and possibly the Senate is not a victory for Republicans, conservatism, or Bush.

Winning elections is empirically a victory for Democrats, people along the liberal/progressive/moderate continuum, and sanity.

The eagerness with which the 24/7 newsers ate up this ridiculous line is as disappointing as it is unsurprising.

(And yes, I get the whole "only true conservatives remain" argument, like how the most hardy roaches survive an extermination. That doesn't mean the vermin are happy to see the pesticide tank.)

International Herald Tribune - Israeli-Palestinian solution is a top priority for Bush, Rice says

No! No! Back away! Anything you make your top priority becomes worse in ways theretofore unimaginable! Go take a nap!

You don't know why New Hampshire voters chose Hillary Clinton.

You do not know that it had ANYTHING to do with the one, single, solitary time she approached tears.

You do not know that if it DID have anything to do with that moment, it was because of the emotion and not because of what she was actually saying at the time.

All you really know is that people voted in a way you didn't expect. Or, more precisely, women voters voted for a woman candidate in a way you didn't expect. And so you have to dismiss it as an act of irrational solidarity with Hillary Clinton's irrational moment. Because women are stupid! And emotionally overwrought! And probably shouldn't be allowed to vote at all!

And so, at the risk of sounding too emotional, I have to say: you pack of misogynist assholes**, could you stop parodying yourselves and do your fucking jobs for once? You know, pretend that the leadership of the free world is being decided and try to pay some attention to an issue or two?

** I'm including Judith Warner and Maureen Dowd in this. No links; you can dig up their cringe-inducing idiocy on your own if you hate your brain that much.

I had this whole thing I wanted to write relating my horror at this New York lottery commercial with a case we read in Con Law where the court was so offended at the mere notion of gambling and lotteries that it could not shut up. Instead, I will apply a principle from Torts: res ipsa loquitur. (The thing speaks for itself.)

New York Lottery's latest ad:

Now that it has spoken for itself, I would like to reply, "FUCK YOU VERY MUCH." I can't even decide to whom it is most offensive, but really, there are no winners here.

Paul Krugman articulates clearly that which I've mangled in my own conversations:

Clinton, Obama, Healthcare

Specifically, new estimates say that a plan resembling Mrs. Clinton’s would cover almost twice as many of those now uninsured as a plan resembling Mr. Obama’s — at only slightly higher cost.

With it being understood that I don't actually dislike Obama, and will campaign for him if he wins the nomination . . .

There are a few major reasons I cast my vote for Hillary Clinton on Tuesday. The first is that I think her healthcare proposal is a lot better--that Obama starts at the compromise position and thus will get creamed on the issue if elected. Following from that is the fact that whenever I hear the candidates speak, Hillary Clinton is so much better able to discuss policy in depth, to drill down and explain her position with a clear understanding of how different agencies, economic forces, and people interact.

So my support is much more about what's right with Clinton than what's wrong with Obama.

But.

There are two reservations I have, one more to do with some of his supporters, one to do with his own choice.

To illustrate the first: Near my school's subway on Tuesday, there were Clinton and Obama supporters passing out flyers and urging people to support their candidate. I was trying to make a call and watched for a few minutes. Both supporters had mostly the same tack: yelling "Support ____!" But when the Clinton supporter was questioned about education policy, she actually answered the question. When the Obama supporter was questioned, she referred the person to Obama's website and then kept yelling, "The audacity of hope! The audacity of hope!" as the potential voter went down the subway stairs.

To that I have to say: what the fuck?

This was one incident, but it illustrated the weird cult of personality surrounding Obama that I flat-out don't get. There are a lot--a lot--of very intelligent reasons to support Barack Obama for president. This wishy-washy ideology of hope crap isn't one of them; it's a way for people to believe that if only we elect this one man, a new era will begin, America will be AMERICA! again--and they won't have to think about politics anymore.

Well, it isn't going to be that way. If he's elected, he'll do his best, and that will mean a much better job than the shmuck in office now. But politics is messy, and ugly, and he's going to have to compromise, make decisions people hate, and problems are not going to disappear magically.

A recession is kicking in and he is going to inherit it. The war in Afghanistan is falling apart and he's going to have to fix it. The war in Iraq--whether or not he would have voted for it, which we don't truly know (it's a lot easier to say outside of the Senate what you'd do if in it)--can't be miracled away; withdrawal is going to be difficult, dangerous, and costly. And every step toward progress on these fronts will be opposed by a movement for which George W. Bush was a figurehead, but by no means the only source of power. This is the American reality, this is the price we pay for having allowed these interests to ascend, and nothing but continued and active engagement by people who actually care can possibly change it.

So this new era, shiny hope bullcrap gives me pause. Not exactly about him--he's a politician, and "We May Be Fucked" is not a good campaign slogan. But about how much of his support comes from people who believe he is a leader who can join us in solving our problems, versus how much comes from people who think he can make them just disappear.

The second issue can be summed up in one word (and then discussed in many more!): McClurkin.

I'm singularly unimpressed by his embrace of McClurkin and subsequent framing of that embrace as a free speech issue. It isn't, really. I think McClurkin can be as homophobic as he likes, can shout it from rooftops, print banners, whatever. Go enjoy your free speech, asshole! I just expect any candidate--any person!--claiming to be in any way ethical/moral/intelligent not to have any part of it. It's really not a lot to ask. It seems to me that Obama made a calculation that McClurkin could get him more evangelical votes than he would lose by offending people who actually give a crap about the way LGBT people and interests are treated in discourse (not just in votes). That's the deal he made. He deserves to pay the cost of his bargain. Since I actually DO care when candidates give tacit approval to homophobia, part of the cost he pays is my vote.

Is it the worst bargain a candidate has ever made at the expense of the LGBT community? Nah. This is what they always do, though it's usually in general elections when they know there's nowhere else to go--what are LGBT voters going to do, support Huckabee? But it's a tired, cynical, calculating political move all the same. It's what almost all politicians do at one point or another. It's why I don't expect anything new from Barack Obama.

As a general rule, I cannot fathom the hullabaloo surrounding a visiting pontiff; popes are not my particular interest.

But what I really don't get is the credulity with which various press folk have bought the notion that the visit has included apologies for the Church's role in abetting the molestation and rape (let's use the right words, shall we?) of children.

Apologies have a basic framework: "I did ____; I was wrong; I am sorry." In the best instances, that statement would be followed by, "And I will do everything in my power to make right what I did wrong."

An apology does not involve having an underling (in this case, a cardinal) busily disclaiming on your behalf any responsibility:

“I personally do not accept that there is a broad base of bishops who are guilty of aiding and abetting pedophiles, and if I thought there were, or knew of them, I would certainly talk to the pope about what could be done about it,” the cardinal said.

“I am aware of bishops who have admitted to making mistakes, but those seem to be mistakes grounded in taking counsel that didn’t turn out to be good advice,” he said, explaining that he was referring to reports from psychologists and therapists.

To quote a great American playwright, MENDACITY!

1. Some members of the Church claim, and some people actually buy, that the abuse is in any way related to homosexuality.
2. The suffering of molested/raped girls is ignored.

In this "I'm not a feminist, I'm an equalist" era, I know what I'm about to say will make me sound shrewish and vile and--nightmare of nightmares!--not "sex-positive", but I have to say it anyway:

Could we please stop pretending prostitution is glamorous? Or that a woman who becomes a prostitute is "making it"? (Yes, ha ha, I get the pun.)

Even if we were magically transported to a patriarchy- and misogyny-free land where sex work was just like any other kind of work, it would top out at just that: work. Drudgery. As it is, the prostitution industry is linked with a lot of violence, exploitation, addiction, human trafficking, and pretty much every other shittastic idea the human race has ever thought up, including the Port Authority Bus Terminal. Reasonable people can disagree about whether the solution is to "écrasez l'infame!" or to fight for the dignity of sex work--to try to make it so that the high-priced call girl with full agency and excellent medical care is not the Sasquatch-rare exception but the rule. But in neither case should pin-up glamorization play a part.

My hatred, it bubbles over**. And this clinches it: I am never subscribing to Showtime.

** Except at whichever of my neighbors did this to the poster in my subway station. To that person, shiny unicorn rainbows forever!

And yes, I am a white person and have done and said my share of dumb things. But no, I am not stupid enough to think that blacks have as good a shot or better as whites at getting ahead.