making america stupid

if you haven't read it yet, here's thomas friedman's latest article.

Imagine for a minute that attending the Republican convention in St. Paul, sitting in a skybox overlooking the convention floor, were observers from Russia, Iran and Venezuela. And imagine for a minute what these observers would have been doing when Rudy Giuliani led the delegates in a chant of “drill, baby, drill!”

I’ll tell you what they would have been doing: the Russian, Iranian and Venezuelan observers would have been up out of their seats, exchanging high-fives and joining in the chant louder than anyone in the hall — “Yes! Yes! Drill, America, drill!” — because an America that is focused first and foremost on drilling for oil is an America more focused on feeding its oil habit than kicking it.

Why would Republicans, the party of business, want to focus our country on breathing life into a 19th-century technology — fossil fuels — rather than giving birth to a 21st-century technology — renewable energy? As I have argued before, it reminds me of someone who, on the eve of the I.T. revolution — on the eve of PCs and the Internet — is pounding the table for America to make more I.B.M. typewriters and carbon paper. “Typewriters, baby, typewriters.”

Of course, we’re going to need oil for many years, but instead of exalting that — with “drill, baby, drill” — why not throw all our energy into innovating a whole new industry of clean power with the mantra “invent, baby, invent?” That is what a party committed to “change” would really be doing. As they say in Texas: “If all you ever do is all you’ve ever done, then all you’ll ever get is all you ever got.”

I dwell on this issue because it is symbolic of the campaign that John McCain has decided to run. It’s a campaign now built on turning everything possible into a cultural wedge issue — including even energy policy, no matter how stupid it makes the voters and no matter how much it might weaken America.

I respected McCain’s willingness to support the troop surge in Iraq, even if it was going to cost him the Republican nomination. Now the same guy, who would not sell his soul to win his party’s nomination, is ready to sell every piece of his soul to win the presidency.

In order to disguise the fact that the core of his campaign is to continue the same Bush policies that have led 80 percent of the country to conclude we’re on the wrong track, McCain has decided to play the culture-war card. Obama may be a bit professorial, but at least he is trying to unite the country to face the real issues rather than divide us over cultural differences.

A Washington Post editorial on Thursday put it well: “On a day when the Congressional Budget Office warned of looming deficits and a grim economic outlook, when the stock market faltered even in the wake of the government’s rescue of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, when President Bush discussed the road ahead in Iraq and Afghanistan, on what did the campaign of Senator John McCain spend its energy? A conference call to denounce Senator Barack Obama for using the phrase ‘lipstick on a pig’ and a new television ad accusing the Democrat of wanting to teach kindergartners about sex before they learn to read.”

Some McCain supporters criticize Obama for not having the steel in his belly to use force in the dangerous world we live in today. Well I know this: In order to use force, you have to have force. In order to exercise leverage, you have to have leverage.

I don’t know how much steel is in Obama’s belly, but I do know that the issues he is focusing on in this campaign — improving education and health care, dealing with the deficit and forging a real energy policy based on building a whole new energy infrastructure — are the only way we can put steel back into America’s spine. McCain, alas, has abandoned those issues for the culture-war strategy.

Who cares how much steel John McCain has in his gut when the steel that today holds up our bridges, railroads, nuclear reactors and other infrastructure is rusting? McCain talks about how he would build dozens of nuclear power plants. Oh, really? They go for $10 billion a pop. Where is the money going to come from? From lowering taxes? From banning abortions? From borrowing more from China? From having Sarah Palin “reform” Washington — as if she has any more clue how to do that than the first 100 names in the D.C. phonebook?

Sorry, but there is no sustainable political/military power without economic power, and talking about one without the other is nonsense. Unless we make America the country most able to innovate, compete and win in the age of globalization, our leverage in the world will continue to slowly erode. Those are the issues this election needs to be about, because that is what the next four years need to be about.

There is no strong leader without a strong country. And posing as one, to use the current vernacular, is nothing more than putting lipstick on a pig.

dear dad

dear dad,

please watch this for thoughts on the rnc:

any questions?

i think this should clear up any lingering questions or concerns any of you may still have.



in other news, i'm completely, head over heels in love with campbell brown of cnn.

signs signs everywhere there's signs

my spam inbox from yesterday. creepy, right?



secondly, love him or hate him, john kerry gave a pretty good speech at the convention yesterday. take 13 minutes and watch it, if you dare.

kucinich: one crazy [insert word here]

if you missed this from the denver convention, then you must watch it right now. kucinich is crazy and i think i might be in love with him. i'm not quite sure how to define what i'm feeling all over my body when he speaks like this. see if you feel it too and you can tell me if it's normal or not.

exculpate

several important things to note:

first, i was up at the time barack texted me to let me know about joe biden. i think that most likely makes me one of the first in america to get the big news. hooray. although i have to say that the texts and emails they keep sending me are getting cheesier and cheesier, which is a problem.



second, this new tattoo proves that my life is nearly complete. one thing about three fours that is particularly auspicious is that they sometimes look like three crosses. coney Island was the place of tattoo application. I don't believe there is a better place on earth than coney island. we attended the coney island circus sideshow and saw a nail driven into a nasal cavity, a lady walk on glass, another lady swallow swords, and the ganja queen (my personal name for her) breathe fire.



maybe you want a closer look? Fine, fine.



lastly, i don't know why, but i went to six flags great adventure on saturday. i believe this place is the downfall of america. although we did ride the tallest and fastest roller coaster in the world. but was it worth the wait?

extermi-bots

ever since james kearl showed me this, I can't stop thinking that it won't be long until hal and his associates take over.

elect this guy, please

square-jawed electrodes

our man mitt romney tells lies. Not only that, but the way he lies reminds me of my little brother lafe claiming he wasn't scared by the not-scary movie signs and then spending three weeks straight sleeping with his door open, the light on, and his room strewn with cups half full of water.

of films and encapsulations

the best movie i have seen in recent history. please watch it if possible.

like a rolling stone

the album cover that proves mr. olson knew the meaning of those visions of johanna.

it's all over now, baby blue.

it turns out this web log has somehow found its way onto a list of blogs authored by my fellow 1999 graduates of spanish fork high school, which is weird. something else triggered my memory of high school last week. my junior year, i was privileged to be a part of the 'golden dawn,' a group headed by mr. michael olson, whose only aim, it seemed, was the downfall of tony johns (this was in retaliation to his constant assailing of Nathan Rees, or NR, in Mr. Clark's 7th (or was it sixth?) grade class). mr. olson was obsessed with the number 44. were he to ever encounter triple fours, it would be as if the oracle at delphi (a constant theme in his classroom) were calling down to give guidance and blessing. obviously then, it would make sense that almost all of mr. olson's essays were 444 words long. to be different, and to show my dedication to jesus, i would write essays 333 words in length. but, when a member of the g.d. showed me the fourth verse of this fourth chapter, i wrote all subsequent essays 444 words long. my high school email address quickly became landslide44@webtv.com. landslide in honor of the smashing pumpkins' cover of fleetwood mac, and the 44 in honor of the naturally-occurring portentousness of the golden number. i think the only person i ever emailed from that account was the pig steve forsey.

what does this all matter? i came to understand the deepness of the universe, and my small, electron-like nature within it, when i saw this sign on broome street last week. mind you, i walked by this place every day for the past year. but it wasn't until last week, until the class of sfhs1999 came back to haunt me, that i realized the address was the only thing that really mattered anymore. and what was $10 to know what the rest of my life would bring me? tell me please, oracle of broome street, am i a pair of ragged claws? do i have a bald spot in the middle of my hair?

it's funny. get over it.

a classy volume concerning class

required reading to further comment on this web log concerning healthcare, education, poverty, welfare reform, etc.

in other news, peter emily and i went to boston over the weekend. peter, the master blogger that he is, posted on his family's password-protected web log concerning our adventures. my favorite part was tea-bagging boston harbor. hope petey doesn't mind, but ima plagiarize his web-logging skills and include it here. enjoy:

what better place than the birth of a revolution than bean town (which nick told me is now referred to as title town) to memorialize our freedoms? emily hadn't been to Boston since she was little and stevey and i haven't been in awhile. so thanks to the meticulously organized fung wah bussing business, we made a weekend out of our freedoms.

we took the morning bus up there on friday and had most of the day left to explore a little bit. we walked through the boston common, where stephen spotted a pond that reminded him of ducks from some children’s book that landed there or something. i was chastised for being the son of a elementary school teacher and not know the name of the book.



after some putzing around newbury street for shopping and dinner, we followed the crowds to the charles river. we found a spot on mass. ave bridge and listened to the worst public program ever for a couple of hours before the fireworks started. it was pretty sweet, cause people could take their boats (motor, canoes, or row) right out to the barge from where they launched the fireworks. it was a pretty rad show.



the next day, we endulged emily and walked the freedom trail. stephen was jealous of the dude with the tights and the three-cornered hats everywhere. but we didn’t need them. with a few keystokes on the (almost obsolete) iPhone, we pulled up a wikipedia fountain of knowledge on any/every building or site that piqued our collective curiosities. along the way, we even commemorated our despision of king george III by throwing our own british tea bags in the boston harbor. all in all it a was a pretty good day, capped off with maybe the best ice cream i have ever had in my life at this place in cambridge that one of stevey’s photo friends took us.



if you look closely, those are actually english tea bags we're about to cast into the sea for taxation without representation...



this morning we went to church at Park Street Church right between the boston common and the cemetery that graves benjamin franklin, paul revere, samuel adams, and the more important john adams, where we sang “My Country ‘Tis of Thee,” 177 years and 2 days after the public debut in the very chapel of said debut. on the program insert, it was written that 24 year old samuel F. smith, an Harvard (of course) alumnus, wrote this “unofficial national anthem” on a scrap of paper in less than 30 minutes and debuted on July 4, 1831 in Park Street Church.



the sermon was pretty interesting (at least for the first 25 or so minutes). he talked about how old testament prophets had to be counter-culture and against the grain to prevailing opinions that were contrary to their beliefs just like us today in an increasingly secularizing society. at the end he gave some “witnessing” (protestant talk for testifying or missionary work) take-home tips, not too unfamiliar to what you might hear in sacrament meeting or sunday school on missionary work.

1) keep a bible on your desk at work, as a symbol/reminder of God’s work and also as a conversation starter.

2) when you write cards (sympathy or whatever) to coworkers, add a verse of scripture and mention that this verse helped you during a hard time.

3) when people are having a difficult time, ask permission to pray for help for them with your friends at your church.

simple enough.


all in all in was a pretty good independent weekend.

oh yeah. and did i mention that i can hold emily in the palm of my hand... err. i mean, the top of my thumb.

revelations of officialdom

peter, emily, and i took a trip to boston this weekend to celebrate the birth of our now-imperialistic country. we found this:



a general hooker exit may be somewhat more advantageous?



it also turns out we make pretty good evangelical christians.

amazing

i really don't know what to say. see more here, where the subtitle is "Hillary Voters for McCain, not Hussein."

mormons. mormons. mormons.

um...haven't you ever heard of the mormons? apparently, a little organization called The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life has. they just completed a little survey of the u.s. religious landscape and they have some tasty little delights about the mormons. so, with no further introuduction, ima give you my favorite sections.

the first section shows how ridiculously conservative mormons are. we aren't even close to any other religious group when it comes to how conservative we are.




the second section, i guess, also has to do with the mormons' conservative principles: views on homosexuality and abortion. the one thing that is troubling for me, is that the question had to do with society accepting homosexuality, not just gay marriage. only 24% of mormons think that we should accept homosexuality? i could (almost) understand that point of view when it comes to gay marriage, but just accepting homosexuality? not very tolerant of us, i think.




the next section shows that the mormons are, next to the JWs only, the most dogmatic about their religion. i was somewhat surprised that only 58% of mormons thought that their religion was not the only way to eternal life.



and lastly, we see that besides hindus, the mormons are the group with the highest percentage married. no wonder so many singles in the church feel marginalized.



so...your thoughts? surprised by anything? happy about anything? saddened by anything?

and, if you made it to the end of this post, then i leave you with a photograph of petey and me keeping it real at the pride parade in the village this past sunday....

exponential is her name

*update* barbara ehrenreich, the author of nickel and dimed, has a new book out and was on wnyc today. listen to the show, and then join me as we finally get libby in on the debate...



i guess since all the cool kids are doing it, i too will give you a little something something about the latest book i read. back when i taught for america, i worked with this person named liz vandlick. i guess she won't care about me using her name, seeing as how she never reads web logs, and every time we talk, she makes fun of me for updating mine. whatever.

she suggested that i read this book called Nickel and Dimed. so, i did it. the author went under cover in florida, maine, and minnesota as a homemaker re-entering the workforce. her goal was to see if it is possible to live on wages from places like wal-mart, nursing homes, and restaurants while searching out a housing, etc.

i'd write more about it, but to tell you the truth, i don't really have much to say. the book was eye-opening, but her style of writing was annoying and she spent half the time telling how she had to find a way to flush the marijuana out of her system in order to pass the multiple drug tests that were requisite to get a low-wage job in minnesota.

the main thing i found interesting was the outdated method the government uses to define the poverty level. they haven't changed the system since 1955, and it's based on the price of food tripled (assuming, then, that 1/3 of all expenditures goes toward food). this isn't the case anymore, and really doesn't make any sense. there's a bunch of other stuff too, but why don't you just go read it? mostly i'm just putting up a web log post because uncle ron requested it via peter.


i guess, though, i do have one thing to say. paul called me last nite and asked me my thoughts about barack dropping public financing. i do have to say i'm disappointed. this does hurt barack's brand that he is different than your regular politician. i, of course, saw it coming and knew he would do it--he would be stupid not to with the amount of money he is raising from small donors. but still, in the back of my mind, i was holding out hope barack would come through.

this is not to say i am disillusioned about barack. he is still the best-qualified for the job, etc. he is still far better than john mccain in many (if not all) ways. and his fund-raising apparatus is impressive and (perhaps) represents a sort of public financing hitherto unattainable by conventional politicians. perhaps this is excuse enough for him to drop the public financing? i know peter would say it is.

so there you go, paul. now you know that while barack is still the one, i will not defend his every move regardless. now i turn the ball to you to list some of john mccain's many faults....

i previsioned it

remember this? it looks like my man thomas friedman (who is never wrong about anything) is backing me up.

bekah the niece