Thank You, Britney Spears

Dear Britney: Thank you for demonstrating the sanctity of heterosexual marriage, and for finally making me realize how allowing me to marry my same-sex partner would threaten an institution you, and so many other heterosexuals, hold in such high, sacred regard:

Source: Britney to Annul Vegas Wedding. LAS VEGAS - Pop star Britney Spears married a childhood friend from Louisiana in an early morning ceremony, but quickly arranged to have it annulled, people close to the entertainer said Sunday. The 22-year-old Spears and Jason Allen Alexander of Kentwood, La., "took a joke too far by getting married" Saturday, her record label, Jive Records, said in a statement released to "Entertainment Tonight." "Ms. Spears and Mr. Alexander have filed for an annulment which will become official on Monday," read the statement by Sonia Muckle, Jive's vice president of publicity. ... The two arranged an annulment Saturday afternoon in the presence of several people, including a Las Vegas lawyer, said a source close to Spears who spoke on condition of anonymity. The signed annulment will be filed when the courts open Monday morning, the source said. Spears and Alexander journeyed by limousine to the Little White Wedding Chapel on the Strip after a stop at the Ghostbar, a club in the Palms Casino Hotel. The chapel staff told the couple they couldn't get married without a license, so they were taken to get a license and driven back to the chapel, where they were married. ... [George Maloof Jr., owner and operator of the Palms Casino Hotel] denied rumors that Spears was drunk and had to be carried out of the Rain nightclub inside the Palms on New Year's Eve. "I was with her the whole night," he said. "None of those reports were accurate. She was just having a good time." ... [Adam Goldman, Associated Press, January 4, 2003]

"Just having a good time."

Hey, Britney, guess what? I just spent another Christmas and New Year's away from the woman I love, because we can't get married in this country you and I share.

Funny, that: We're citizens of the same country, you and I, supposedly born with the same inalienable rights... but I'm not having a very "good time" at all.

Related article:

The Sanctity of Marriage. Yes, Rick Whatshisname and Darva Conger (the pair that started it all) can meet and marry within 45 minutes of first laying eyes on one another, admit it's all a sham, and, without so much as consummating their unholy union, get lots of publicity and money for splitting up -- but I can't marry the woman I've been building a life with for the past three and a half years. ... [Richard Ramirez], California's "Night Stalker" -- the self-proclaimed satanist who raped and murdered a whole bunch of folks, from kids all the way up to grandmas sleeping in bed, and then drank their blood ... got married on Death Row a few years back. It was his right. But it's not my right. ... [doublethink, December 8, 2003]

Thank You, Britney Spears 10:42:37 PM
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Told You So: Unemployment Closer to 10% Than 6%

Out Of Work, Out Of Sight. A falling unemployment rate may be spurring President Bush's prospects for reelection, but it is masking millions of Americans who do not have full time jobs, a newspaper reports. The Los Angeles Times reports that while the nation's unemployment rate of 5.9 percent is relatively low, it fails to include the 4.9 million people who want full-time positions but are working part-time jobs. The figure also omits 1.5 million people who have stopped looking for work. Taken together, the total number of jobless reaches 15.1 million -- or 9.7 percent, up from 9.4 percent a year ago ... [CBS/Associated Press, December 29, 2003]

Told You So: Unemployment Closer to 10% Than 6% 10:38:45 PM
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More Republican Crooked Dealings

Hatch sues New Access Communications. New Access Communications, the Minneapolis telephone company that has had business ties to some of the state's most prominent Republicans, is facing more trouble with state regulators. Minnesota Attorney General Mike Hatch sued the company Monday for allegedly violating civil fraud and consumer protection laws. ... The Pioneer Press reported in July that New Access, which had business ties to Gov. Tim Pawlenty, state auditor Patricia Awada and other top GOP figures, had been accused of cheating consumers in seven states. It paid $222,000 to settle charges with Oregon, Washington and Indiana. The three states concluded that New Access wronged more than 5,600 people in 2001, either through overcharging or slamming. ... Hatch, however, alleges that New Access has never stopped breaking the rules. ... Pawlenty was one of three directors and an investor in New Access' parent company, Minneapolis-based NewTel Holdings, until the end of 2001. Gov. Pawlenty's office on Monday reiterated the governor's position that while he had served as a NewTel board member, he "was not involved in the day-to-day operations" of New Access. ... [Tim Huber and Rick Linsk, Pioneer Press, December 30, 2003]

Yeah, and didn't Dick Cheney say he was completely removed from the day-to-day operations of Halliburton's interactions with corporate book-cooker Arthur Andersen... just before a 1996 testimonial video turned up with Cheney praising Andersen for all the "good advice" the company gave him?

The article above, by the way, mentions these "other prominent political figures with connections to New Access" (watch for them in future scandals!):

- Elam Baer, a Minneapolis attorney, chairman of the New Access board and chief executive of NewTel Holdings. A GOP strategist, Baer also was an unofficial adviser to Pawlenty's transition team.

- Victoria Grunseth, veteran political fund-raiser, former wife of 1990 Republican gubernatorial nominee Jon Grunseth and New Access' chief information officer, a job she said had nothing to do with the company's sales practices. Pawlenty appointed her to head the Metropolitan Airports Commission.

- Timothy Commers, who started a phone company with Baer that New Access acquired a year ago and was a NewTel investor until this year. Commers, who also worked at one of Baer's earlier phone companies, was Pawlenty's campaign manager last year. He resigned from a top-ranking job at the Commerce Department after the Pioneer Press reports.

More Republican Crooked Dealings 10:27:00 PM
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Good for Brazil

Brazil Starts Fingerprinting U.S. Travelers. Brazilian police on Thursday began fingerprinting and photographing U.S. visitors on orders of a judge who compared planned U.S. security controls on travelers from Brazil and other nations to Nazi horrors. Federal Judge Julier Sebastiao da Silva, furious at U.S. plans to fingerprint and photograph millions of visitors on entering the United States, ordered Brazil's authorities do the same to U.S. citizens starting on Thursday. ... [Reuters, January 1, 2004]

You know what Brazil ought to do next, don't you? Round up all Americans currently living and working in Brazil -- especially U.S. government workers, starting with those at the U.S. Embassy -- for retroactive mug shots and fingerprinting. Why not? As long as they're going to fight back against draconian U.S. law, they may as well do to us what we did to all male foreigners over 16, from all those "suspect" Middle eastern countries. They'll no doubt find a few out-of-status visas, and start deporting American asses back to the fruited plains.

Fair's fair. And the ongoing -- and increasing -- crap we're pulling on international travelers is going to blow up in our big, fat, collective American face. Somebody's got to say, "Enough is enough." Good for Brazil for taking the first step.

Now, for the Moron of the Moment:

U.S. Arrivals Fingerprinted in Brazil. SAO PAULO, Brazil -- Gerald Lewis emerged from the international airport on Saturday curiously looking at his hands. "My first time being fingerprinted," said Lewis, 40, an electronics salesman from Houston. "You don't expect that kind of thing to happen when you step off a plane in Brazil. Maybe Eastern Europe during the Cold War." [Jon Jeter, Washington Post, January 4, 2004]

Hey, Lewis, you dumbass-- Oh, forget it. There's just no explaining it to some idiots.

Related articles:

Dear Foreigners: Euro Disney Is Looking a Lot Better Now, Isn't It?. "'Paranoid' US security push threatens future of transatlantic flights" ... [doublethink, November 17, 2003]

Another Foreign Journalist Busted, Stripped, Grilled, Humiliated, Denied Entry, Sent Home. Yet another rude awakening for a foreign journalist -- this time Sue Smethurst, associate editor for the Australian women's magazine New Idea ... [doublethink, December 28, 2003]

Good for Brazil 10:12:20 PM
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Turning Tides

While on vacation in Crawford, Texas, Commander-in-Chief George W. Bush must have been drinking from the same well as Lyndon B. Johnson when LBJ got American boots stuck in Southeast Asia's unforgiving swamps. ... LBJ consequently lost his job and caused millions of American and Vietnamese casualties. Let's hope that GWB isn't leading us down another rocky road.

Col. David Hackworth

US sees tide turn on Iraq insurgents. Violence is down in the Tikrit region, the heartland of the insurgency. Yet further south a bomb killed 13 on Saturday. ... America's military commanders are convinced they've finally turned the corner against the insurgency in the former dictator's home base. Attacks on soldiers have dropped steeply in the Tikrit area over the past month. After more than six months of intensive raids, foot patrols, and intelligence gathering, commanders believe they have tapped into the rhythm of the insurgency. "We're making steady, [unstoppable] progress," says Lt. Col. Steve Russell,^* who commands the 1st Battalion of the 22nd Infantry. Yet despite recent successes in Tikrit, the war being fought is not the kind to be won with a single, crushing blow. The picture pieced together by troops and intelligence officers across Iraq is one of a fractured, decentralized insurgency. There is no single Professor Moriarty masterminding the violence against coalition troops -- and so no silver bullet. ... [Dan Murphy, Christian Science Monitor, December 29, 2003]

Gee, I thought they already captured their Professor Moriarty, down in that spider-hole. [/sarcasm off]

Does this "tide is turning" rhetoric ever ring hollow. Even those of us too young to cross the street by ourselves in the 1960s remember endless empty promises of a "turning tide." And those of us who have been paying attention to the words of our current leaders, versus the reality of the situation, understand that this is just how the Bush administration works: Dangle a carrot, promise all, and when you can't deliver, find another carrot.

Isn't this the same song we've heard about the economy? The tide is turning! The economy is saved! Ask about jobs, however, and suddenly our attention is diverted by self-congratutatory speeches about how much safer America is now that Saddam is in custody. Ask why, then, we're suddenly on orange alert, and the topic turns to "those angry Democrats."

"The tide is turning." Perhaps it is, but not necessarily in the direction Bush & Co. wish.

I'll tell you when the tide really turned during the Vietnam War: With the Tet Offensive, the effect of which was summed up thusly by iconic CBS anchorman Walter Cronkite:

We have been too often disappointed by the optimism of the American leaders, both in Vietnam and Washington, to have faith any longer in the silver linings they find in the darkest clouds. ...

For it seems now more certain than ever that the bloody experience of Vietnam is to end in a stalemate. This summer's almost certain standoff will either end in real give-and-take negotiations or terrible escalation; and for every means we have to escalate, the enemy can match us, and that applies to invasion of the North, the use of nuclear weapons, or the mere commitment of one hundred, or two hundred, or three hundred thousand more American troops to the battle. And with each escalation, the world comes closer to the brink of cosmic disaster.

To say that we are closer to victory today is to believe, in the face of the evidence, the optimists who have been wrong in the past. To suggest we are on the edge of defeat is to yield to unreasonable pessimism. To say that we are mired in stalemate seems the only realistic, yet unsatisfactory, conclusion. On the off chance that military and political analysts are right, in the next few months we must test the enemy's intentions, in case this is indeed his last big gasp before negotiations. But it is increasingly clear to this reporter that the only rational way out then will be to negotiate, not as victors, but as an honorable people who lived up to their pledge to defend democracy, and did the best they could.

To listen to President Lyndon Johnson, it would seem as if Cronkite himself had "lost" domestic support for the Vietnam War singlehandedly: "If I've lost Cronkite, I've lost middle America." And in a sense, LBJ was right: Uncle Walter's conclusion was the pin-prick that woke middle America to the futility -- and brutality -- of Vietnam. That the Communists had been considerably weakened in the Tet battles paled significantly next to the sobering image of a bound and helpless Viet Cong officer shot point-blank through the head by his captor, South Vietnamese General Nguyen Ngoc Loan -- one of the "good guys" we were fighting for.

More than that, however, was our repeated disappointment in "the optimism of the American leaders" that made it impossible for us "to have faith any longer in the silver linings they find in the darkest clouds." In reality, the U.S. had prevailed in the Tet Offensive -- but we had been lied to so many times about the "turning tide" in Vietnam that it was too late; the one time the U.S. did experience a "victory," the American public was too jaded to believe it -- and much too far gone to care whether or not the Pentagon was telling the truth this time.

Don't be misled, however, by the idea that beating back the VC during Tet meant that we were "winning" the war; we weren't. What really convinced middle America that Vietnam was unwinnable was the final realization that Communist forces were much larger and more formidable -- and determined -- than we had been led to believe.

Is there anyone who still doesn't see the parallels to Iraq?

We have American journalists of a bygone era to thank for awakening us to the realities of Vietnam. Unfortunately for the America of the early twenty-first century, our government realizes the crucial role of the press in politics better than we ourselves do, which is why the Bush administration controls every aspect of the mainstream media. Little does Mr. or Ms. Middle America realize that the vestiges of honest reporting still exists -- but only outside American borders. Within, we are left to our own devices, and those of us who see the parallels and understand the urgency of the situation make full use of the best device available to us: the Internet -- the latter-day form of "underground newspapers."

The greatest fear of gonzo bloggers (like yours truly) is that BushCo will finally clamp down on us too. I think we are safe until the 2004 elections; censoring the Net and dragging digital dissenters away from their keyboards in handcuffs would be too great a violation of our civil rights for the majority of even the most diehard Bush supporters to ignore, especially so close to the election. Too, the Bush administration has its hands full keeping a lid on the mainstream media, which reaches more eyes and ears than all the MoveOns and truthouts and Eschatons combined.

But I am no psychic, and just when I think the Bush administration cannot venture any further out on a limb than it already has, its hubris surprises me once more.

The urgency, then, is two-fold: To disseminate, far and wide, the truth about Bush, and to do it before all independent voices are silenced, permanently.

What are you doing to get the word out today?

Related articles:

The Striking Similarities Between Vietnam and Iraq: Can You Say Quagmire?. Despite the culture in which I lived and the values I'd taken on, it quickly became obvious to me that something was amiss. Politicians' promises of a limited conflict morphed into a huge military build up. While some military leaders claimed we were making Vietnam safe for democracy, a U.S. officer proclaimed that "it became necessary to destroy the town to save it." We heard reports of atrocities committed against civilians by the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong soldiers, but there were also reports of Lt. Calley's massacre of unarmed civilians at My Lai. Our nation's leaders predicted "light at the end of the tunnel," yet the war drug on. ... The phrase "credibility gap" entered the lexicon. I was dismayed, saddened, ashamed and, finally, angry as hell. All my life I'd thought my country could do no wrong. We were, after all, supposed to be the good guys. ... [Bruce Mulkey, Common Dreams, September 19, 2003]

Bush is ignoring the political lesson of Vietnam. This year will be the year of all the answers. We will learn whether George W. Bush remains president of the United States. ... We will know who has won in Iraq. ... The possibility that the United States might lose the Iraq war has yet to be seriously discussed at the level of national politics and policy. There is an all but universal assumption that American power will in the end crush anything that resists it. ... The Vietnam analogy is wrong in military terms. ... The relevant analogy of Vietnam with Iraq is political. The Bush administration's ambition in Iraq is identical to that of the Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon administrations in Vietnam. ... The Bush administration, in Iraq, is still looking for its Ngo Dinh Diem. It ignores the political lesson of Vietnam, which is that no leader in Iraq will be capable of rallying the country, or its major religious or ethic components (except the minority Kurds), whose program is not national sovereignty, an end to American occupation, and national renewal on Iraq's own terms. That means an Iraq in full control of its resources, its security, and its foreign policy. This is not what the Bush administration wants. ... If the administration's Iraq policy fails, not only the Bush presidency will be in jeopardy in 2004. So will this complacent cross-party assumption that Pax Americana is America's new destiny. That, in itself, would not be a bad thing. [William Pfaff, IHT, January 3, 2004]

The Pentagon and the Press. Tight control of the media by the US Defence Department began in the wake of Vietnam. ... For the first time, television brought war to the living room of average Americans, and the military found it difficult to win the war on the home front. ... Many military leaders began to believe that the press played a role in the US defeat in Vietnam and vowed to exercise tighter control of information. When the US invaded the tiny island of Grenada in 1983, the press was shut out. ... The media felt the control was so tight during the Gulf War that the Washington bureau chiefs of some of the largest media organisations in the US wrote to then Secretary of Defence Dick Cheney to complain. They said, "The combination of security review and the use of the pool system as a form of censorship made the Gulf War the most under covered major conflict in modern American history." ... [Said Michael Getler, ombudsman for the Washington Post] "So as the nation prepares for war, the press is probably about to face the most severe and confounding test of its mission in a free society" ... [BBC News, September 26, 2001]

The Tet Offensive and its Aftermath. The Tet Offensive was militarily a defeat for the Communists; it had weakened them very substantially. However, in public relations it was a Communist victory. There were several reasons for this. ... [Edwin E. Moïse, The Vietnam Wars, 1998]

Three Images: The Effects of Photojournalism on the Protest Movement during the Vietnam War. By most accounts, the Tet Offensive of 1968 was the beginning of the end of America's positive outlook on Vietnam; not because American soldiers were defeated, rather, because of the way that Tet was portrayed by the press. ... The American people were taken aback by the sheer number of deaths on both sides- 9,000 American and South Vietnamese soldiers, 14,300 South Vietnamese civilians, and 58,000 North Vietnamese troops ... but the most damaging piece of news to emerge from Tet was Eddie Adams' photograph ... of the imposing, militarily-clad General Loan shooting a young, smallish Vietnamese suspect in the head ... It is not surprising that this photograph dominated the American media for weeks, and even months after it was taken, as it became a symbol for everything that was going wrong in the Vietnam War. The photo personified for many the idea that the South Vietnamese, the very people that Americans were sacrificing their lives for, were not the helpless victims of a communist onslaught that the government would have had them believe ... By 1970, the war was no longer only being fought in Vietnam; it was also being fought on the mainland of America. ... [Brady Priest]

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^* Make a mental note of the name "Lt. Col. Steve Russell" -- he's one scary guy. If you don't feel like Googling himself yourself right now, I'll give you a hint: Think of the original Major Frank Burns (Robert Duvall, not Larry Linville) in MASH (the movie, not the TV series) -- and then add equal parts Robert Mitchum in Night of the Hunter and Marlon Brando as Col. Kurtz in Apocalypse Now.

We will be talking about Lt. Col. Russell later.

Turning Tides 3:07:50 PM
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