Thursday, October 20, 2005
Making sense out of senselessnessI think I'm finally getting a handle on my house situation, this place
that has left me tired and obsessed for weeks. Today a contractor who
worked for my mom and her neighbor came by and he can do both of my
projects, hopefully for a reasonable price. What a relief. I can't
wait. Meanwhile, I talked to my neighbor last night and she made an
effort this morning to shuffle instead of stomp, to turn the television
down to a low murmur instead of the usual carry-through-the-house
volume. I still woke up when she did, but I was able to fall asleep for
stretches which helped a lot. I'm really tired of being tired. It's
hard to write when my mind is soggy with sleep. 2:39:41 PM | Since it is Thursday, there are outrages and outrages though they could have come yesterday and more could come tomorrow since that is the state of things right now. Crooks and Liars has video from Keith Olbermann/NBC about a FEMA whistleblower who was inside the Superdome during the Katrina debacle. He blackberried our despot Mike Brown about the growing desperation of the situation only to receive a brief email from Brown's press secretary saying how important it was for Brown to get a good dinner and how the restaurants in Baton Rouge were packed with all the New Orleanians swirling about. So why exactly hasn't he been criminally charged and why hasn't Chertoff been fired? And why oh why hasn't Bush been impeached? I know. Stupid, living-in-a-dreamworld questions. On Bill Maher's show last night Larry Miller (who was hilarious) wondered why anyone has been surprised by the corruption in New Orleans that Katrina exposed because "the concept of corruption is part of the fabric of the city." He said visitors weren't offered keys to the city because "it's always open," and so it is. Now we know it's not just New Orleans that is open to thieves and plunderers, but the federal government as well. Even open to horse and pony show operators aching for a pot of gumbo and a whiskey-sauced bread pudding for dessert on a steamy August evening in Baton Rouge. Last night I watched Voices in Wartime, a documentary about poetry of war and the Poets Against the War movement prompted by an invitation Sam Hamill received from Laura Bush. I wonder if Laura knows how much she's helped the world of poetry in the United States by being such a dolt. She asked poets to join her for a symposium about Emily Dickinson, Walt Whitman, and Langston Hughes on the eve of the invasion of Iraq. What the hell did she expect? Apparently she hadn't actually read any of their work. If she had, she'd have noticed that they were rather progressively political poets, even Emily, and that if they were alive today they would have refused her invitation too. The documentary isn't the best, but it is something. Later this month Occupation: Dreamland is playing at Facets Media Center. It sounds similar to Gunner Palace, though perhaps with more insight. The New York Times said it is"a compelling study of composure and decency in the midst of overwhelming pointlessness," which could describe so much of the absurdity this administration has produced as good-hearted, everyday Americans try to make sense out of senselessness in our wars abroad and here at home. Clif Hicks, Op Truth's newest Vet of the Week, tells his story of absurdity, and is it ever absurd: My squadron lost three soldiers, one killed by an EID, the other two in
a vehicle accident. They were riding in a humvee and a tank was coming
down the road. Each vehicle had a headlight out and in the darkness
they couldn't tell where the edge of the tank was. The two vehicles
went right into each other and the tank killed them both...One of the duties my platoon was tasked with was to go around
collective all sorts of information from local officials. We went to
schools, water plants, gas stations, local police, etc. and had them
fill out surveys and tell us what was going on and how we could help.
Well, during this time we were supposed to go around interviewing imams at all the local mosques. An 'imam' being the muslim equivalent of a christian preacher. The first imam we spoke to was murdered the next day. There had been a large crowd watching the whole thing as we did not enter the mosque for the interview. Well we went out the next day and interviewed two more imams in the same manner. They too were murdered the next day. I realized what was happening and told everyone what I thought. These men were being murdered by the insurgents for collaborating. I couldn't realize why, none of them were particularly cooperative, they were blatantly not happy about us being around their mosques, but they were killed just for speaking to us. We went out again several times that week with same results. Finally my lieutenant (a fresh fish butter bar just out of OBC) decided to tell our CO about this and these missions were put to a stop. The fifth imam was murdered that night. Occasionally we would knock down a gate
with a Bradley and raid a house, usually the wrong house, and when it
was the right house the bad guys would already have caught wind of us
and be long gone most of the time.
His story is a litany of pointless actions and an indictment of incompetence and foolish military hierarchy. He and his unit weren't allowed to eat in the KBR compound and were threatened with article 15s if they did, among other insanities. It is a really, really long list. On a completely random note, Paula Zahn and CNN have just now discovered "cage fighting," the promoters' newest name for Mixed Martial Arts. When I first started kickboxing in the early 90s, an even younger kid at my gym who rode his skateboard everywhere and listened to Pink Floyd before every fight built an octagon in his mom's basement to grapple with friends. They used to compete in these "cage" matches held in bars and Catholic school gymnasiums. So Paula, "cage fighting" is nothing new. 
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Last update: 11/14/05; 12:03:24 AM .
