Writers' Cell Block 9

This post was written one hour prior to my incarceration on 10/9/2008
Enjoy being in my head!

Dear me, the day has arrived. With a solid month of meticulous preparation (mental and physical) and a surprisingly heart-healthy appetite, I'm ready for eight more hours of the Travis County penal system and all its tragicomic shortcomings. I can't say that I trained alone. I have many people to thank for their sound advice and barbaric suggestions as to how to assert myself as the alpha male of a solitary jail cell. To Christopher Harold Drew: I appreciate your wisdom, but I feel it imprudent to seek out the largest Aryan member to anally sodomize on such short notice. Thanks, but no thanks. To the general public: life on the inside is hard, but drafting "Just Thinking of You" cards littered with lofty rhetoric and sweet nothings will temper my sanity in between an unnecessarily epic amount of grunt inducing push-ups and sit-ups . So, please provide me with addresses if you wish to hear about the life of a natural born swiller...from the inside! My hope is that I can one day publish these revealing correspondences in a tome entitled, "Shattered Dreams of My Father." Just remember this, if your night takes a nosedive for the worse, at least you're not piddling away on an ejaculate soaked bed of petrified monkey shit. Unless you're a sad, lonely college freshman. In which case, at least your parents aren't completely embarrassed...yet. Goodnight Austin, Texas, and may you hear my shrill scream upon my exit around 2 a.m.!
Mandroid Me

over and out

Things I Find Funny...Like a Clown...

- Despite the uninterrupted election of 43 white-male candidates, the first truly viable African-American candidate is being hamstrung by accusations of racism.

- Education is gradually (or rapidly) becoming synonymous with elitism.

o Elitism, as a quality in a president, is somehow synonymous with snobbery or arrogance. As Jon Stewart aptly inquired recently, “Doesn’t elite mean good...if you don’t think you’re better than us, then what the fuck are you doing?”

- Former President Bill Clinton seems inexorably hell-bent on destroying Hillary’s campaign. (See: “Some of [the candidates], when they’re 60, they’ll forget something when they’re tired at 11 o’clock at night, too.”)

- Cliff Schechter, author of the new book The Real McCain, released an excerpt in which a former McCain staffer related an anecdote in which the Arizona Senator called his wife a “cunt” and a “trollop.” Thanks for injecting those words back into the American lexicon!

- Hillary already endorsed McCain over Obama with the snide “he gave a speech” remark.

- Where’s Vicki Iseman?

- Obama botched an attempt to sympathize with rural Iowans in Adel when he asked, “Anybody gone into a Whole Foods lately and seen what they charge for arugula?” No…and there aren’t any Whole Foods in the entire state of Iowa.

- Most of the media criticism of the candidates stems from haphazard verbal gaffes and whimsical surrogate paroxysms, not so much the issues. And they wonder why we’re such an ill-informed electorate?

- For all the distrust and disdain of entitlements and handouts (“Shouldn’t have bought what you can’t afford”), the Federal Reserve just bailed out Bear Stears with $30 million of taxpayer money. *** I’m aware that this buyout doesn’t mitigate the damage already done to shareholders, and there’s also the “domino effect” argument, but is it not a handout for a clumsy, unrestricted practice?

- Obama supporters post the most vitriolic, ad hominem responses on internet comment tubes. Seriously, check it out. Isn’t it ironic?

Talk about elite!

An Open Letter Prose by Any Other Name...

Dear (Irrationally) Concerned Citizens,

I, George “MY MIDDLE NAME” Durish, denounce and renounce the actions of ANDREW “Dice” Clay. In presiding over my appellation upon birth, I failed to anticipate the controversy and conflict of interest concerning my relationship with the “Bad Boy of Comedy’s” prodigious and calumnious career. For the past 23 years I have remained silent on the issue of his breathtakingly insipid brand of “comedy” and enigmatically smug demeanor. But, today, as I stand/write before you, his words have confounded the masses and called into question my own moral compass. They say, “Why, Andrew, after The Adventures of Ford Fairlane, did you not categorically reject this man?” To these people I say, “Because he is not a jump-shot or a college applicant.” And, though it is true that I once attempted to stomach an HBO stand-up on a really boring day, I assure you that I did not so much as crack a smile.

However, I cannot disown this man, for I never bought the “Dice.” I cannot disown him anymore than I can (and wish) to disown Colin Quinn, Jimmy Fallon, or Doogie Howser’s hit new tragicomedy, weekdays on CBS, because it is these anathemas of funny that breathe life into what needs to be done to restore the grace and civility of the comedy world. Because this is important. This man, aloof to his role in this whole Byzantine shebang, is my surrogate, nonetheless. Andrew “Dice” Clay’s words should be parsed and conflated with my own, even when captured by amateur cell phone footage and posted on YouTube. Because this is important. His first name, in its congruity to my middle, should indicate the verity of our concurrent worldview. Because this is important. And this is how the world works.

So, in closing, I call upon all of you to open a dialogue with your fellow surrogates – every Steve, Tom, Manson, Hussein, Dick, and Harry – and discuss how you speak for all the Steves, Toms, Mansons, Husseins, Dicks, and Harrys of the world. Because, in order to form a more perfect reunion, we all have to think like our nominal kin. Thank you and God Bless the Whole Fucking Universe.

Love and props,

Mandroid Me

Empathize Wide Shut

Last night the local news ran a jackleg report on a therapist who established a practice to rehabilitate convicted sex offenders…and, almost immediately, I envisioned a handful of utterly indignant viewers cursing this man to hell for “emboldening the rapists” or “comforting the enemy.” As I watched, I witnessed a beautiful act of withheld judgment. That’s not to say that convicted sex offenders deserve your stockpiles of pity, but you don’t always know shit about the crime. This therapist understood that these people who underwent the correctional process now bear the indelible stigma of the scarlet “s.” Not the chic Superman chest insignia, but the burden of knowing everyone will judge them by this ostensibly perverted indiscretion. For one, abuse of these laws is common in cases involving consensual sex between two young adults, one 16, one 18. And, naturally, there are those who truly deserve the cold, steel fist-to-the-face of justice to correct a gross aberration. Obviously, violent sex offenders, particularly those who prey on children, deserve nothing but the hardest anal pounding/beating from the baddest life-sentenced Aryan or Panther in Cell Block Nine. But, all of this aside, forgiveness and an anchor are requisite for those humans who earnestly seek rectitude.

There’s a somewhat ironic lesson gleaned from the Errol Morris documentary “The Fog of War,” in which a major architect of the Vietnam War, Robert Strange McNamara, underscores the need to “empathize with your enemy.” This is such a ubiquitously relevant lesson that it pains me to see it so flagrantly ignored. The simple idea is to really, REALLY see your opponents/enemies/pariahs as human beings capable of some iota of rationality. No one ever said it was easy, but neither is learning to use to the can in front of someone. When you understand that there is cause behind effect, you have the insight to more effectively counter the perceived disdain. In the case of the therapist, he chose to treat those most in need to reduce their recidivism rate, because, as history has shown, perpetual excoriation will breed more contempt, and, subsequently, more destruction.

For the man convicted, who desires to put this behind him as he flays himself, how will he find work when his reticence and fear are on full display during the pivotal moment in a job interview? What are his options when he can’t find a home? Suicide, prison, indigence? What good is the correctional process without forgiveness?

My focus on the perpetrator is in no way a denigration of the pain of the victim, but an examination/realization that this world isn’t fucking black-and-white, no matter what the talking head shills and bloviating jackasses spew on their paid programs.

Much the same as Lou Dobbs will always find a story about an illegal immigrant murdering an AMERICAN, there will always be unrepentant deviants, chimeras who, for some reason or another, distorted or discarded the line between right and wrong ages ago; but, we cannot allow these anomalies to usurp our judgment…

…which invariably leads me to our “War on Terror.” Am I allowed to denounce and renounce and reject and eschew and disavow the statement that they “hate our freedom”? Or, if you’re going to describe our enemies with such a banal phrase, at least insert another clause or two: they hate our freedom…because while we’re merrily encouraged to go shopping at home, their country is orbiting the event horizon. Again, to black-and-white-world viewers, I’m not blaming our military. They were given orders and are simply protecting their brothers until they leave this clusterfuck behind, all with the hope of victory. Upper management screwed the pooch on this one by completing ignoring reality, and…[drum roll]… not EMPATHIZING WITH THE ENEMY – thank you, Mr. Strange McNamara. By neglecting or dismissing the root cause of homegrown Iraqi terrorism this administration continues on a warpath bound to create more abject youth who are primed with enough enmity to execute the big boom theory. When their homes, villages, and shops are so depredated, dilapidated, and desecrated where else do they turn? Suicide, indigence, martyrdom? If your family is killed by “collateral damage,” your place of work demolished by a rival suicide bomber, your streets filled with sewage, your electricity available for one hour per day, would you wake up the next morning eager to start the job hunt, or settle for the ounce of familial security offered by martyrdom? These humans are not as “foreign” as they’ve been presented because they have been conflated with those who made the grievous mistake of attacking us at home.

I may have disowned my Christianity, but I cannot abandon the diamond virtues buried in that mountain of coal.

Veto for Vendetta

Commander in Chief George W. Bush just vetoed a bill that would have explicitly banned the use of "enhanced" interrogation techniques, namely waterboarding. In a beautifully eloquent explication, which I'm sure rolled off his tongue with the lithe grace of a drunken ballerina, President Bush said, "The bill Congress sent me would take away one of the most valuable tools in the war on terror." For just one article debunking that specious claim check out Froomkin's column from yesterday's Washington Post.

I can also say, with great assurance, that I (unbelievably enough) completely agree with Mayor Quimby, er uh, Senator Edward Kennedy (D-Massachusetts) on this one, when he condemned Bush’s veto as “one of the most shameful, er uh, acts of his presidency.” [Italics added for New England emphasis]

One thing I can say for certain is this…

Polarize Chaps

Yesterday, John Coleman, founder of The Weather Channel, threatened to chuck a lawsuit at Al Gore to, and I quote, “finally put some light on the fraud of global warming.” At first glance, this guy sounds like a crackpot with a vendetta and a frivolous lawsuit – well, on second and third glance, too. BUT, the lawsuit could help clarify the innards of the carbon offset market – something I don’t care to delve into.

“Then what the hell do you care about,” you might ask.

Polarity. Not north or south polarity, but the stridency of global warmists and skeptics.

Let’s tackle the patchouli-caked global warming alarmists first. This might rub some folks the wrong way, but hear me out. I recently strolled through memory lane and dug up some fodder from Fern Bluff Elementary in Round Rock, Texas - something I’ve generally avoided. I seem to recall the swath of elementary school campaigns imploring youngsters to prevent the eradication of the rainforest – save paper, save wood, kill a beaver, etc. – or else…BAM! Mad Max in 20 years. Ironically, we’ve pretty much eradicated the campaign against the eradication of the rainforest. In due time, people went about, slogging through the minutia of average Joe-ness until the next five-alarm fire.

[Cue daunting crescendo]

Global Warmings. How often do you hear the rainforest siren today? It’s this pinball effect of global catastrophe campaigns that gives rise to skepticism. Ergo, people feel like they’ve been duped by the shrill clarion of the eschaton when the world doesn’t perish, and are less inclined to roll along with the next call to arms. I’m certainly not denying the reality of rainforest dissipation, but alarmism pisses jingoistic Americans off. It’s like saying someone can beat America at the game of war. This is best characterized by Robbie DeNiro’s classic, “Fuck me?! Fuck you!” line. Now you’ve pissed off the people who not only won’t listen, they’ve actively sought to form the opposition voice –

“There’s no such thing as anthropogenic global warming. Climate is cyclical. Your track record of predicting catastrophic events is abysmal.”

Ultimately, this creates an unnecessary war (yes, another one) that altogether misses the point. Conservation and moderation are virtues. Go on and drive your car, but consider a more efficient vehicle or a more efficient route. Recycle, save, moderate, take it easy with the waste you twit. If you’re on board the warming train, your rationale can be the protection of our ample-bosomed Mother Earth. If you’re among the skeptics, your rationale can be the protection of your wallet. Shit. Take simple economics. Very simple economics. Supply and demand. The more gas we consume, the more we need. The more we need, the less available. The less available, the more expensive. The more expensive, the more anger. The more anger, the lower stock market. The lower stock market, the more blowhards.

Which leads me to John Gordon of Round Rock, Texas. Gordon narrowly dropped the contest for state representative on a…wait for it…PRO-GLOBAL WARMING platform. He’s not even debating the merits of each side, he’s fucking pro-global warming, for completely un-superficial reasons: more beaches. I’m serious. Yes, punch yourself to make sure it's real.

So, to hell with the divisive language of the apocalypse, conserve for the sake of the economy, the planet, the beaches, whatever it takes. It’s unnecessary to ram red-hot metal pokers up each other’s asses just so one side can claim symbolic victory.

UPDATE

I just heard a report from Meeechelle (what’s with the enunciation) Norris on NPR concerning the toxicity of China’s air, and the steps going forward to remedy the filth before the Summer Olympics. Essentially, the Chinese subjugate the misnomer of “global warming” in favor of the concept of conservation. It’s a positive approach to a ubiquitous malady.

McCain Times Iseman Equals Maverick and Ice Man

Never one to avoid the hottest new trends, I figure I’ll impose my two cents upon the New York Times’ curiously vapid, anonymously-resourced story detailing (or lack thereof) John McCain’s questionable ties to lobbyists, despite his (really) stiff stance as a “maverick” for ethics reform. In an unnecessary display of etiquette reversal, I chose to peruse the reader comments prior to reading the article, not-so-subtly titled “For McCain, Self-Confidence on Ethics Poses Its Own Risk.” After slugging my way through about 100 comments, I suffered a brief, albeit welcome, blackout. Based on the voracity and outright indignation I assumed the article graphically and gratuitously elucidated the intimate details of septuagenarian-on-young-blond intercourse. So, I scanned the comments of some of the more reactionary opinion sites, and simply could not string together a thread of what the column focused on. Naturally, I decided to the read the bastard, which, at a staggering four internets pages, killed the pre-lunch hour handily.

I walked away scratching my head; not only due to the dandruff factory that is my noggin, but primarily by the article’s ambiguity – why was this on the front page? Who approved of this? For one thing, the possibility of a carnal relationship with the lobbyist in question, Vicki Iseman, based on anonymous former McCain campaign advisers is briefly mentioned in passing. They just toss the bait out there and leave it hanging. I’m afraid that kind of sensationalism does not go unnoticed. Rather, media outlets, and, indeed, bloggers and commenters, tackled the shit out of the baby-making bait and ran with it.

What about the rest of the article? For anyone that read beyond page one, the article morphed into a bit more of a legitimate investigation of a man’s word versus his actions. As a neophyte at political history and punditry, I was unaware of the Keating Five scandal involving the Arizona Senator, which, after digesting, I would say, makes him a conspicuous target for heavy scrutiny when it comes down to ethics. For a man hailing lobbyists and special interests as the scourge of the earth, it’s difficult to understand his decision to appoint two lobbyists as his top campaign advisers. OK, that’s direct, objective news to point out his staff acquisitions. Informative.

Unfortunately, the news itself became the news and called into question the Times’ credibility. Instead of rebuking the more relevant charges of hypocrisy raised by the story, McCain judiciously honed in on the more prurient charges of an alleged affair, and hurled a sticky bun of defamation to the paper, meanwhile ignoring the larger issue of cozying up to lobbyists. Ironically enough, the article and the ensuing reactionary-automaton-a-thon actually boosted McCain’s campaign with an immediate influx of donations. All this hubbub…coming from the newspaper that endorsed McCain for the Republican nomination in December.

Overall, the Times boffed this one. The story certainly was not primed for the front page, and it reeked of lazy journalism. Quite a shame, too, there was an unpolished nugget of valid information in the article that will forever be tied to the rest of the piece’s bodaciously bogus love story.

Currently listening to Bonobo – Dial M for Monkey

Diplomacy Shmaplomacy!

Wouldn’t you know it, interesting shit happened in the world recently! After the relegation of two high-profile political leaders, the United States has a bit of a curious conundrum on its hands. Let’s take a look at tonight’s lineup:

Fidel Castro: 5’11” and a trim 210 lbs; retired, retreating to his now full-time resort in the Poconos; purportedly spending retirement thumbing his nose at the U.S. until final breath

Pervez Musharraf: 5’7” and a feisty 173 lbs; party overwhelmingly trumped in a democratic Pakistani election, yet somehow a vindication of Bush’s “strategically” rabid support for him; purportedly making a list and checking it twice

To my left (and everyone’s left), the diplomatically eschewed, cigar-chomping, socialist beard-monger and longtime festering Cuban hemorrhoid – Fidel “We Hardly Knew Ye” Castro. To my right, the perpetually duplicitous and incompetent Pakistani figurehead – General Pervez “The Pak Rat” Musharraf. Both men refuse to shed their trademark fatigues in the wake of their respective departures. The obvious question on my mind: how do we deal with the successors? Stay the course? Cut and run? Generic three-word slogan them to death?

How a Bill Becomes a Ma

Hey Bill! Ease it up, buddy. Is it not already enough that most lockstep Democrats idolize you like delusional those-were-the-days Republicans fawn at the feet of (the former) Ronald Reagan? In a rather bizarre affront to the necessity of a united Democratic Party in the wake of a crucial election, ex-Prez Clinton is ostensibly attempting to steal the thunder from the possibility of Obama’s being the first African-American president in United States history. Apparently we’re debating the meaning of African-American now. It’s not about race, it’s about attitude…or the ease with which you can kiss black babies on the campaign trail. Or the ability to dance.

I won’t claim to be a Clintonographer, but this just seems so strange to me. Now, I’ve heard/read conservative pundits and bloggers piss and moan about the Clinton Machine, as if it stands on par with Rovian politics, but, really, what’s with the blasé dismissal of Obama as just a “fairy tale”? As if a presidential couple isn’t fairy tale enough.

Bill suddenly took on the role of the overbearing Jewish mother, eschewing any sullen soul who dares question his over-qualified daughter, or wife. Whatever. Honestly, I sympathize with Hilldog on this one. Bill might as well interrupt Hillary mid-speech to wipe some smeared gunk off her cheek with a hanky, then uppishly admonish the audience, or else…

I guess I’ve got some beef with folks who hoist Bill up on a majestic pedestal like good-old-boy Republicans fantasize about breakfast with Reagan. To me, it comes across as another mild form of hypocrisy, because I guarantee that the nostalgic Clintonites are the ones who detest the larger-than-life fiction that is Ronald Reagan. So, they want their own blow-up doll. Hell, things were good when Bill was prez, let’s worship.

Yes, Clinton’s presidency ushered in a newfound prosperity, a truly proud moment for America, but don’t ignore the contretemps (I’m not necessarily referring to the Lewinsky hubbub, that was just ridiculous.) He lied, it was stupid. He lost the public trust. BUT, all I’m saying is, let’s try to do better. It’s a bit trite, but, think progress. Otherwise, you get stuck in the hallucination that everything was better way back when, and I hate that. Let’s keep the wheels turning and move on to something greater, and if Hillary truly is the answer to that cry for help, then so be it. Just don’t bullshit me that the first female U.S. president would be a bigger deal than the first African-American male president. You’re just splitting split ends.

Sean Paul

Every so often (more frequent than not) I find myself ruefully muttering, "I don't think they know what hypocrisy IS." Today, I saw a clip of a giddy, misguided hoard of Ron Paulistas harangue Sean Hannity right out of a restaurant, mid-ingestion, to the Generation-X-defining chant of, "Fox News Sucks!"

Class.

Surprisingly, my first thought was not, "Man, Hannity's a dick. Good for them." Quite the opposite. I could only ruminate on the quirks of this brand of "liberal activism" that fires a slug into its own foot. A shill and a quack though he may be, Hannity is not worth an unpaid tab. These Paulites are apt to cast Hannity as an insidious and deleterious propagandist, but....it's Fox News. Hell! Let's broaden that - it's cable news! Just one step away from MTV, and one channel away from Nancy Grace!

Do you accuse the parrot of echoing the master, or do you go to the source?

I'll answer that. The source. The parrot just needs to be caged in a dark room, aka a blank television screen. You don't take the parrot out back and shoot it. He just wants a cracker. With caviar.

Furthermore, Paul supporters (above all) should recognize that cable news is infotainment, where ratings dictate precedence, and Hannity is just an uber-faux-patriot-pawn on a much grander stage.

Really, have you seen the size of this guy's EGO?! It's bigger than O.J.'s Simpson's debt to society. See for yourself. Just watch the closing segment of Hannity's America on Sunday night. The square-jawed egolomaniac carts a life-size cardboard cutout of himself across the country so that regular cock-eyed Joes can tell him face-to-cardboard-face how much they sing his regular American praises. Seriously, I've never seen a single malicious or remotely caustic remark made by his "random sampling" of good, old-fashioned Americans. (Approach Hannity's America as though it were the Daily Show, and, voila, it becomes hilarious.) G'bless.