Mark comments below:
"Still around, guys! We're enjoying married life and calling each other "wife" and "husband." It it starting not to sound so strange to our ears. "Mrs. Morris," when referring to Elly, however, still sounds a bit weird.
"The amazing thing about not blogging: the longer you go without it, the less importance you place on it. I may never blog again, but I still drop by old sites occasionally.
"Elly and I, or as I like to say now, the wife and I, may be moving soon. I'll keep you informed, John."
Up To Town
I guess I won’t be moving into the apartments above the old Mercy Clinic downtown. It sounded right for me, living above The Batman pharmacy and the Peanut Pub, but the kid who owns the pub said the ex-cons are about as thick as the cockroaches. The cons tried to break in here three times this month, so far. The cops are called so often, all the officers have a key to the security doors.
“Rent is weekly. It’s like that, ha-ha, you know?”
Does that include cable?
“Ha-ha.” Friendly kid. It was just him and me at 4 in the afternoon. He asked if I would join his new ‘beer club’ to sample all his 40 dark beer and micro-beer specialties.
That reminds me of my two-beer lunches when I worked at Barnes And Noble. I’d come in the same time everyday and the waiters would remove the paper table covering (it was a theme restaurant…the idea was that you could crayon while you waited, I guess. I didn’t like paper tablecloths.)
First name basis with all the waiters and waitresses. They served me a different, obscure brand of beer everyday and apparently kept records.
Then one day I come in with a co-worker and find my name on a plaque, over the bar. I’d ‘won’. Sampled every damn beer on the menu. Wow.
So I don’t join ‘beer clubs’. (Never did. That at Garfield's was an ambush.)
And it looks like I won’t be moving in either. Too bad.
Long day away from my media annex, which Mom has stopped calling the Sewing Room. I did a lot of walking around downtown, looking in the shop windows to check my reflection. Say, I don’t look half as bad as I should. Nice posture, and more color in my face then you’d expect from an alcoholic, pill-addicted recluse.
All the usual characters on the square. Cops walking their bikes on the sidewalk. “Hellooo, Mr. Jackson. I heard you were back in town. How are you? Living with your folks now?”
“Just visiting for a few months. Maybe a year!”
The Christmas decorations are up on the light poles. The same that made me so happy when I was ten but they’re looking a bit shabby, singed by traffic exhaust. Starting at dawn, December 26th, they all come down.
Christmas music already, playing from the megaphone shaped speakers on the bandstand.
I walked to Shrago’s. Rang the bell to set Leon, the German shepherd, into a frenzy. Shrago opened up and as usual Leon barked at my crotch. RAR!RARRARRRAAR!! Lord Jesus, take my hand.
“Leon, it’s me!”
Five minutes later I say hello to Shrago too. As usual, he’s in his captain’s chair before the bank of monitors, and he’s enjoying a wooden bowl of rice and beans. With chopsticks, no less.
I’m here to announce that I’m ready to rent a room.
“What? No inheritance yet?”
We spend about an hour upstairs. One room is being remodeled. I like this. The thing is, I want an Internet connection, and cable of course. But it isn’t wired yet.
“I can have it done by thanksgiving. I suppose that’s when you want to move in?”
Yeah. And just until January, I say. That’s when Mom abandons the house for Mr. Toad’s.
And I won’t be here all the time. I just want a retreat and to give Mom a break. I’ll pay extra for breakfast lunch and dinner by the way.
It’ll be great. I can use the weight room. There will be lots of visitors, so I can leech off Shrago’s popularity. Maybe sleep with one of his cast-off divorces that come and go...
“Rent is weekly. It’s like that, ha-ha, you know?”
Does that include cable?
“Ha-ha.” Friendly kid. It was just him and me at 4 in the afternoon. He asked if I would join his new ‘beer club’ to sample all his 40 dark beer and micro-beer specialties.
That reminds me of my two-beer lunches when I worked at Barnes And Noble. I’d come in the same time everyday and the waiters would remove the paper table covering (it was a theme restaurant…the idea was that you could crayon while you waited, I guess. I didn’t like paper tablecloths.)
First name basis with all the waiters and waitresses. They served me a different, obscure brand of beer everyday and apparently kept records.
Then one day I come in with a co-worker and find my name on a plaque, over the bar. I’d ‘won’. Sampled every damn beer on the menu. Wow.
So I don’t join ‘beer clubs’. (Never did. That at Garfield's was an ambush.)
And it looks like I won’t be moving in either. Too bad.
Long day away from my media annex, which Mom has stopped calling the Sewing Room. I did a lot of walking around downtown, looking in the shop windows to check my reflection. Say, I don’t look half as bad as I should. Nice posture, and more color in my face then you’d expect from an alcoholic, pill-addicted recluse.
All the usual characters on the square. Cops walking their bikes on the sidewalk. “Hellooo, Mr. Jackson. I heard you were back in town. How are you? Living with your folks now?”
“Just visiting for a few months. Maybe a year!”
The Christmas decorations are up on the light poles. The same that made me so happy when I was ten but they’re looking a bit shabby, singed by traffic exhaust. Starting at dawn, December 26th, they all come down.
Christmas music already, playing from the megaphone shaped speakers on the bandstand.
I walked to Shrago’s. Rang the bell to set Leon, the German shepherd, into a frenzy. Shrago opened up and as usual Leon barked at my crotch. RAR!RARRARRRAAR!! Lord Jesus, take my hand.
“Leon, it’s me!”
Five minutes later I say hello to Shrago too. As usual, he’s in his captain’s chair before the bank of monitors, and he’s enjoying a wooden bowl of rice and beans. With chopsticks, no less.
I’m here to announce that I’m ready to rent a room.
“What? No inheritance yet?”
We spend about an hour upstairs. One room is being remodeled. I like this. The thing is, I want an Internet connection, and cable of course. But it isn’t wired yet.
“I can have it done by thanksgiving. I suppose that’s when you want to move in?”
Yeah. And just until January, I say. That’s when Mom abandons the house for Mr. Toad’s.
And I won’t be here all the time. I just want a retreat and to give Mom a break. I’ll pay extra for breakfast lunch and dinner by the way.
It’ll be great. I can use the weight room. There will be lots of visitors, so I can leech off Shrago’s popularity. Maybe sleep with one of his cast-off divorces that come and go...
Calculated Risk
Michael Moore sat down to discuss his book, 'Dude, Where's My Country?' with Brian Lamb on C-span tonight.
hahahaha.
Yeah, it was great.
_______
I should have been taking notes but then, it wasn't like he was defending a P.H.D.
Man, that's like being called to the Principals office, meeting Brian Lamb. It looked to me like Moore was losing weight the first ten minutes. I about reached out to adjust the color on my set too, because he was so pale. And his throat. Gulp, gulp.
Moore was trying to swallow and relax but he couldn't, at least for the first ten minutes. Then as time went on he relaxed, with a sort of 'never mind that, what about health care?' approach. Lamb is a genius and allowed that that to pass.
___
I'm sure there will be a great deal of commentary in the blogosphere over the next week. Moore squirmed, he lied, he contradicted himself, he was ridiculous. After a half-hour he became more confident and more entertaining as he realized Brian Lamb wasn't going to ride his ass.
When Moore said that Bush had argued that Saddam was partly responsible for 9-11, and that this argument was proven a lie, Lamb didn't bother to ask 'when did President Bush ever say that?'.
Lamb is thorough. He makes you talk. He lets you hang yourself.
_____
Moore became comfortable after he'd established his working-class Flint credentials, but this was with a lot of regrettable insinuations that 'blue collar' people can't be expected to be overly bright.
Once Brian Lamb had him comfortable, and started quoting passages of his book to him, Moore let out several high pitched giggles for the rest of the night:
That's satire, Brian!
Now there I'm serious, Brian!
___
Moore said that before his first movie hit, 'Roger and Me', he'd never made a paycheck over 8000 dollars. In the next breath he said he'd averaged 12,000. Or, well, 17,000.
He was living at his folks. He dropped out of his sophomore year in college for some silly reason. Lack of parking space at the 'commuter college' in Flint...
___
I learned a lot tonight, but nothing to change my mind.
Moore was the first 18 year old to ever be elected to office, back in the early '70s (to a school board? I missed that).
Just a kid with a great love for his country, and an urgent desire to turn it away from Republican Evil. After all, it was Flint, Michigan, so you have to forgive me for being a boob. You don't think I was some sophisticate like the people on the West coast!
___
I wish Brian had asked 'but weren't you the editor of Mother Jones magazine?'
Average Flint my ass.
___
What struck me most during the interview was Moore's declaration that Bush found 911 a 'bonanza' for political gain. I can't quote here before the transcript, but it was noteworthy how many of the old talking points are gone now.
It's tough, after you've opposed the overthrow of the Taliban and Saddam. I mean, what to say?
Bush used 9-11 to support Alaskan oil drilling. And jerryfalwelljohnashcroftetc are evil.
No more 'it's for oil' argument. No more colonialism argument. Moore didn't even try to tie the war to our treatment of American Indians, and he didn't mention Custer.
His thesis makes a hullabaloo about our historic connection/ ties with the Saudis, of course, but that fails as a partisan issue. It fails even more since the Bush Doctrine is precisely addressing that issue.
___
Michael Moore is probably the most hated person on the internet, after Ted Rall.
He had to account for himself. I think that, confronted by the school-master, he revealed himself as a show-man who's dying in some pathetic, Willy Loman/doomed salesman sort of way. If not Huey Long.
What bothers me is that he performs so well, with his book-tours filling stadiums with 10,000 people.
__
That's what bothers Lamb, too. One of his very few confrontational questions was : what will you do with this power?
Moore blanched, and it was a wonderful moment. He seemed to pause and wonder if he wasn't becoming Jim Jones. Or Lenin or Stalin or Hitler. Then suddenly he was yelling that education polls show that youngsters don't even know where Iraq is! "We should make a law! You can't bomb a place if you can't find it on the map!"
Jesus that's pathetic. But mind you, Michael Moore is from Flint Michigan, so forgive him for being an a hole.
___
All in all, I think the charges of plagiarism, fakery, and elitism will stick to Michael Moore. The blogs will prevail.
But natch, it ought to worry us that he's filling stadiums.
It's very difficult pulling down a working class hero who's in favor of peace, love, and a free food and drug administration.
hahahaha.
Yeah, it was great.
_______
I should have been taking notes but then, it wasn't like he was defending a P.H.D.
Man, that's like being called to the Principals office, meeting Brian Lamb. It looked to me like Moore was losing weight the first ten minutes. I about reached out to adjust the color on my set too, because he was so pale. And his throat. Gulp, gulp.
Moore was trying to swallow and relax but he couldn't, at least for the first ten minutes. Then as time went on he relaxed, with a sort of 'never mind that, what about health care?' approach. Lamb is a genius and allowed that that to pass.
___
I'm sure there will be a great deal of commentary in the blogosphere over the next week. Moore squirmed, he lied, he contradicted himself, he was ridiculous. After a half-hour he became more confident and more entertaining as he realized Brian Lamb wasn't going to ride his ass.
When Moore said that Bush had argued that Saddam was partly responsible for 9-11, and that this argument was proven a lie, Lamb didn't bother to ask 'when did President Bush ever say that?'.
Lamb is thorough. He makes you talk. He lets you hang yourself.
_____
Moore became comfortable after he'd established his working-class Flint credentials, but this was with a lot of regrettable insinuations that 'blue collar' people can't be expected to be overly bright.
Once Brian Lamb had him comfortable, and started quoting passages of his book to him, Moore let out several high pitched giggles for the rest of the night:
That's satire, Brian!
Now there I'm serious, Brian!
___
Moore said that before his first movie hit, 'Roger and Me', he'd never made a paycheck over 8000 dollars. In the next breath he said he'd averaged 12,000. Or, well, 17,000.
He was living at his folks. He dropped out of his sophomore year in college for some silly reason. Lack of parking space at the 'commuter college' in Flint...
___
I learned a lot tonight, but nothing to change my mind.
Moore was the first 18 year old to ever be elected to office, back in the early '70s (to a school board? I missed that).
Just a kid with a great love for his country, and an urgent desire to turn it away from Republican Evil. After all, it was Flint, Michigan, so you have to forgive me for being a boob. You don't think I was some sophisticate like the people on the West coast!
___
I wish Brian had asked 'but weren't you the editor of Mother Jones magazine?'
Average Flint my ass.
___
What struck me most during the interview was Moore's declaration that Bush found 911 a 'bonanza' for political gain. I can't quote here before the transcript, but it was noteworthy how many of the old talking points are gone now.
It's tough, after you've opposed the overthrow of the Taliban and Saddam. I mean, what to say?
Bush used 9-11 to support Alaskan oil drilling. And jerryfalwelljohnashcroftetc are evil.
No more 'it's for oil' argument. No more colonialism argument. Moore didn't even try to tie the war to our treatment of American Indians, and he didn't mention Custer.
His thesis makes a hullabaloo about our historic connection/ ties with the Saudis, of course, but that fails as a partisan issue. It fails even more since the Bush Doctrine is precisely addressing that issue.
___
Michael Moore is probably the most hated person on the internet, after Ted Rall.
He had to account for himself. I think that, confronted by the school-master, he revealed himself as a show-man who's dying in some pathetic, Willy Loman/doomed salesman sort of way. If not Huey Long.
What bothers me is that he performs so well, with his book-tours filling stadiums with 10,000 people.
__
That's what bothers Lamb, too. One of his very few confrontational questions was : what will you do with this power?
Moore blanched, and it was a wonderful moment. He seemed to pause and wonder if he wasn't becoming Jim Jones. Or Lenin or Stalin or Hitler. Then suddenly he was yelling that education polls show that youngsters don't even know where Iraq is! "We should make a law! You can't bomb a place if you can't find it on the map!"
Jesus that's pathetic. But mind you, Michael Moore is from Flint Michigan, so forgive him for being an a hole.
___
All in all, I think the charges of plagiarism, fakery, and elitism will stick to Michael Moore. The blogs will prevail.
But natch, it ought to worry us that he's filling stadiums.
It's very difficult pulling down a working class hero who's in favor of peace, love, and a free food and drug administration.
Just a question
Everyone from the New York Times to National Review agrees that we f*cked up in Afghanistan during the 1980's.
We abandoned Afghanistan then, according to the conventional wisdom.
My question is, how exactly do people figure that after bank-rolling their liberation, we're somehow all the more responsible to babysit them and see them through to a civil society? Yes, I understand that would have been best, but at the time, how does this moral arithmetic work?
We didn't trick or fool the Afghans into resisting Soviet oppression. Their resistance was natural, and we helped them drive the Soviets out.
Why apologize? The U.S.A. is not imperial. We usually itch to get out of foreign entanglements, not to stay.
___
I think the loyal opposition here actually regrets that we sent aid to defeat the communists. That naive humanitarianism which buttressed genocidal communism is alive and well. Their argument now is sort of childish, like "ha! look what you got in the Soviet's place." But this loyal opposition is the same that would cry bloody murder if we'd tried to interfere in Afghanistan's politics after that war.
It's probably true that our politicians could never have persuaded the voting populace to keep pouring money into that rubble-strewn, ancient land anyway. It would take 911 to persuade us that Islamo-fascism was uniquely dangerous.
Still, my question: why, after helping the Afghans win their war against the Soviets, should we have felt more obliged to that country?
Yes, the latent effect was marvelous. Eastern Europe and all the countries of the Soviet Union were liberated (to some degree).
That doesn't mean we didn't do the Afghans a great favor.
I don't see that we let them down. On the contrary: by some twisted fundamentalist zealotry didn't they declare war on us?
We abandoned Afghanistan then, according to the conventional wisdom.
My question is, how exactly do people figure that after bank-rolling their liberation, we're somehow all the more responsible to babysit them and see them through to a civil society? Yes, I understand that would have been best, but at the time, how does this moral arithmetic work?
We didn't trick or fool the Afghans into resisting Soviet oppression. Their resistance was natural, and we helped them drive the Soviets out.
Why apologize? The U.S.A. is not imperial. We usually itch to get out of foreign entanglements, not to stay.
___
I think the loyal opposition here actually regrets that we sent aid to defeat the communists. That naive humanitarianism which buttressed genocidal communism is alive and well. Their argument now is sort of childish, like "ha! look what you got in the Soviet's place." But this loyal opposition is the same that would cry bloody murder if we'd tried to interfere in Afghanistan's politics after that war.
It's probably true that our politicians could never have persuaded the voting populace to keep pouring money into that rubble-strewn, ancient land anyway. It would take 911 to persuade us that Islamo-fascism was uniquely dangerous.
Still, my question: why, after helping the Afghans win their war against the Soviets, should we have felt more obliged to that country?
Yes, the latent effect was marvelous. Eastern Europe and all the countries of the Soviet Union were liberated (to some degree).
That doesn't mean we didn't do the Afghans a great favor.
I don't see that we let them down. On the contrary: by some twisted fundamentalist zealotry didn't they declare war on us?
Moog writes on her blog:
"well, what are we doing to welcome Bush into our lovely anti war country?
i have Saturday morning free, so i could throw something then...like a petrol bomb....
are the CIA letting people near him, or do we have to use remote control missiles?"
I know this is tongue in cheek, but the sentiment isn't. I don't understand how youthful idealism could go so completely astray. What happened to courage in the defense of liberty? How can you lament the leadership that over-threw the Taliban?
What do these modern-day Yippies stand for, anyway? Legalized drugs? Abortion? Free health care?
Those are all 'liberation' issues for spoiled brats. To many of them, liberty means free services. (No, I don't mean to put words in your mouth, J.T., this is a rant in general). Those regimes which used to require women to stay indoors are sacred, though, because they're from a different culture. Fundamentalism is fine in Afghanistan, but in the West even a sermon against partial-birth abortion gets you a life-sentence in Lefty ridicule. Never mind that our Billy Grahams would never dream of challenging our Bill Of Rights.
I know this is a simplistic analysis, but I think I'm dealing with simplistic people. I think this all has a lot to do with rock and roll and hip - hop. I think it's about the need to be popular, and that ignorance and emotionalism wins you a first-down.
A few years ago, I couldn't get enough, reading about the total humiliation of the posers who ignored the evils of Nazism and Stalinism because they were 'anti-war'. Some politicians simply died of shame after Churchill was proved correct. I wanted to read more and more about this aftermath because I have a cruel streak a mile wide and reaches across the Atlantic.
It's no fun watching a re-run, though. I prefer instead to go back and read those polls which show that 60% of college age kids support Bush.
"well, what are we doing to welcome Bush into our lovely anti war country?
i have Saturday morning free, so i could throw something then...like a petrol bomb....
are the CIA letting people near him, or do we have to use remote control missiles?"
I know this is tongue in cheek, but the sentiment isn't. I don't understand how youthful idealism could go so completely astray. What happened to courage in the defense of liberty? How can you lament the leadership that over-threw the Taliban?
What do these modern-day Yippies stand for, anyway? Legalized drugs? Abortion? Free health care?
Those are all 'liberation' issues for spoiled brats. To many of them, liberty means free services. (No, I don't mean to put words in your mouth, J.T., this is a rant in general). Those regimes which used to require women to stay indoors are sacred, though, because they're from a different culture. Fundamentalism is fine in Afghanistan, but in the West even a sermon against partial-birth abortion gets you a life-sentence in Lefty ridicule. Never mind that our Billy Grahams would never dream of challenging our Bill Of Rights.
I know this is a simplistic analysis, but I think I'm dealing with simplistic people. I think this all has a lot to do with rock and roll and hip - hop. I think it's about the need to be popular, and that ignorance and emotionalism wins you a first-down.
A few years ago, I couldn't get enough, reading about the total humiliation of the posers who ignored the evils of Nazism and Stalinism because they were 'anti-war'. Some politicians simply died of shame after Churchill was proved correct. I wanted to read more and more about this aftermath because I have a cruel streak a mile wide and reaches across the Atlantic.
It's no fun watching a re-run, though. I prefer instead to go back and read those polls which show that 60% of college age kids support Bush.
I deleted a ugly political post yesterday. Probably not soon enough. I should know better than to spew like that.
Still an impulse here, though. Bush's trip to London tomorrow is worrisome. The reports I hear make it sound like the Brits will stage 1968 style riots.
It's natural to be 'anti-war'. The passion is understandable. But so are the passions behind the overthrow of a murderous dictator.
I don't think most Iraqis are very fond of the people who sent human shields in an effort to prevent the war.
I visit some British blogs. Everyone seems in a competition to express their contempt for Bush, and their enthusiasm for the protests.
I know all the arguments from the left. I hear them all on C-span and as they list their points, I'm saying 'wrong on the facts', 'illogical'. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. You've struck out. Try again.
The only compelling arguments I've ever heard against the war were of the nervous, fearful variety: that the WMDs would be used, (or smuggled out of the country) and that terrorism would increase. The oil wells would be set ablaze, Israel would be attacked, there would be civil war. Thankfully we were courageous. There is a small insurgency, and of course it isn't directed only at soldiers: they attack the Red Cross and the U.N. aid workers too. But we know Islamic terrorists had a blood lust long before Bush was in office, and before the war. Appeasement doesn't work.
Among the most ridiculous anti-war arguments is the claim that Bush 'changes his story' about why we went to war. As if having several reasons showed some inconsistency. As if Bush didn't marshal them all during the pre-war debate, and his pro-democracy idealism was only set forth last week as a last resort. (In June of 2002 I posted many times about his speech outlining this grand vision).
Last night at the Jefferson/Jackson event in Des Moines, the lies and rhetorical sleights of hand were painfully obvious. I'm convinced the candidates don't believe their own words. I wonder if the cheering DNC audience were also deluding themselves. For instance, this complaint that we haven't caught bin Laden or Saddam. How ludicrous! As if this war is about catching a couple of fugitives. Saddam's regime and the Taliban are no more, but Gerhardt calls our president 'a miserable failure'. Who actually believes that? Anyone?? Really???
My deleted post basically came to this: 'anti-war' protesters are for the most part childish phonies. There may be a few genuine pacifists among them, but pacifists do not crank up the level of hatred in the world like these people do.
I think this goes back to a stylish '60s romanticism, and that a pied-piper-lemming phenomen is at work here.
I'm tempted to counter this with a screed in favor of the Vietnam and Korean Wars. Or to post something mocking John Lennon's 'Imagine'. ...
I like Al Sharpton's old chant now: "No justice, no peace".
I should start calling myself a liberal now. Our current crop of anti-war protesters are certainly not liberal.
Still an impulse here, though. Bush's trip to London tomorrow is worrisome. The reports I hear make it sound like the Brits will stage 1968 style riots.
It's natural to be 'anti-war'. The passion is understandable. But so are the passions behind the overthrow of a murderous dictator.
I don't think most Iraqis are very fond of the people who sent human shields in an effort to prevent the war.
I visit some British blogs. Everyone seems in a competition to express their contempt for Bush, and their enthusiasm for the protests.
I know all the arguments from the left. I hear them all on C-span and as they list their points, I'm saying 'wrong on the facts', 'illogical'. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. You've struck out. Try again.
The only compelling arguments I've ever heard against the war were of the nervous, fearful variety: that the WMDs would be used, (or smuggled out of the country) and that terrorism would increase. The oil wells would be set ablaze, Israel would be attacked, there would be civil war. Thankfully we were courageous. There is a small insurgency, and of course it isn't directed only at soldiers: they attack the Red Cross and the U.N. aid workers too. But we know Islamic terrorists had a blood lust long before Bush was in office, and before the war. Appeasement doesn't work.
Among the most ridiculous anti-war arguments is the claim that Bush 'changes his story' about why we went to war. As if having several reasons showed some inconsistency. As if Bush didn't marshal them all during the pre-war debate, and his pro-democracy idealism was only set forth last week as a last resort. (In June of 2002 I posted many times about his speech outlining this grand vision).
Last night at the Jefferson/Jackson event in Des Moines, the lies and rhetorical sleights of hand were painfully obvious. I'm convinced the candidates don't believe their own words. I wonder if the cheering DNC audience were also deluding themselves. For instance, this complaint that we haven't caught bin Laden or Saddam. How ludicrous! As if this war is about catching a couple of fugitives. Saddam's regime and the Taliban are no more, but Gerhardt calls our president 'a miserable failure'. Who actually believes that? Anyone?? Really???
My deleted post basically came to this: 'anti-war' protesters are for the most part childish phonies. There may be a few genuine pacifists among them, but pacifists do not crank up the level of hatred in the world like these people do.
I think this goes back to a stylish '60s romanticism, and that a pied-piper-lemming phenomen is at work here.
I'm tempted to counter this with a screed in favor of the Vietnam and Korean Wars. Or to post something mocking John Lennon's 'Imagine'. ...
I like Al Sharpton's old chant now: "No justice, no peace".
I should start calling myself a liberal now. Our current crop of anti-war protesters are certainly not liberal.
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