Moon of Alabama Brecht quote
September 17, 2004
Ready, Aim, Focus

by koreyel

Bob Herbert of the NYT continues to smash the Bush Administration with nearly divine inspiration.

His latest seems almost like an artful montage of paragraphs borrowed from the Moon of Alabama.

It is rare to see a columnist be so deadly blunt:

Although he died bravely, Lieutenant VandeGeer’s death was as senseless as those of the 58,000 who died before him in the fool’s errand known as Vietnam.

And then this:

Since we learned nothing from Vietnam, we are doomed to repeat its agony, this time in horrifying slow-motion in Iraq.

Fool’s errand… We learned nothing… we are doomed to repeat its agony.

Wow. Herbert’s pen is as far from elite as it is from effete. He can flat out write when he gets irked up.

Along these lines I sense that the rage at Bush’s Iraq-mess is regaining traction. The reality that the war is going badly is leaking with a steady hiss into the mainstream. Anger is redoubling. People are wearing red on Fridays because they are seething red everyday of the week.

Anger is a powerful human force. It can move elections.

Think of it this way: there are probably at least 3 billion people who wake up everyday damning the very names of Bush and Cheney. That’s a lot of semi-focused consciousness.

Would that we could all coordinate our thoughts at one chosen time and chant a select group of powerful mantras. I suspect… Bush-Cheney would break out in hives, if not shrivel up and blow away. As it is, our semi-focused rage may be enough to sweep these criminals into history’s ashcan.

So keep on keeping on. Wear red. Feel red. You have the right and the duty to be enraged. Focus your anger like a laser beam on the right foreheads. They’ve earned your wrath, your disgust, and your condemnation.

Be beautifully furious. Justice may depend upon your rage.

Comments

I sense that the rage at Bush’s Iraq-mess is regaining traction
Hopefully the media will exoand what they started over the last few days. Next week Allawi will be in town to address Congress and the UN. That´s a mistake Rove made – it will keep the attention on Iraq and with the speed of operation the various insurgencies are using like today the headlines may not be pretty.
It´s so have to “wish” for bad headlines with all these people dying.

Posted by: b | Sep 17 2004 13:36 utc | 1

Prince Allawi is coming to America?
Hasn’t the “Prince” lost his star power? Perhaps it is time for him to do a name change. How about: The Thug (formerly known as Prince)? That might capture a few hearts and minds in Washington.
Or for that matter, given the news today,

U.S. troops were also caught in gunbattles with militants on a main Baghdad thoroughfare, Haifa Street, after U.S. and Iraqi forces carries out raids on suspected insurgent hideouts there.

how about we refer reverentially to him as: “The major of the Green zone”?

Posted by: koreyel | Sep 17 2004 14:20 utc | 2

Thanks for the link to wearing red. I just changed my outfit.
Directing anger toward a positive action, like wearign red or registering voters, is good. It is also important to remember that the mind is very powerful. When we send hateful thoughts [laser beams on the foreheads]it makes things worse. In this way, what you resist persists.
Vote them out of office if we can. Rather than send them hateful thoughts which magnify their impairment, send them healing thoughts which is what they desperately need. It is what we desperately need to happen to them, especially if they remain in office after November 2nd.

Posted by: gylangirl | Sep 17 2004 14:51 utc | 3

Think of it this way: there are probably at least 3 billion people who wake up everyday damning the very names of Bush and Cheney.
That’s a lot of semi-focused consciousness.
Would that we could all coordinate our thoughts at one chosen time and chant a select group of powerful mantras.

for example:
“I now imagine Dick Cheney surrounded by divine healing and light, creating in his heart a sense of profound joy and contentment and peacefulness. All fear and want are washed away by the healing light brining a realization of oneness with the universe. No need to take, to hide, or injure. No desire for more power, more money, more anything. Only divine peace and understanding that all his needs are always met, that he is profoundly loved, and that he no longer needs to struggle for those things. Fear is gone, leaving only profound love passing around and through him to others. And so it is. Amen.”
Now, if three million people focused their consciousness on Cheney in this way, what result of such a profound change of heart would that bring to the world?

Posted by: Anonymous | Sep 17 2004 15:15 utc | 4

sorry, forgot to add my name that time, wish there was an edit function

Posted by: gylangirl | Sep 17 2004 15:18 utc | 5

I say sic ’em with the Turkey Curse:
TO PERFORM THE TURKEY CURSE–
Take a foot stance as if you were John L. Sullivan preparing for fisticuffs. Face the particular grey-face you wish to
short-circuit (e.g. a street preacher), or towards the direction of the negative aneristic vibration that you wish to neutralize
(e.g. the White House). Begin waving your arms in any elaborate manner and make motions with your hands as though you were Mandrake feeling up a sexy giantess (Dr. Strange imitations are fine). Chant, loudly and clearly:
GOBBLE, GOBBLE, GOBBLE, GOBBLE, GOBBLE!!
The results will be instantly apparent

Importantly, I advise cursing both Bush and Kerry in this way.

Posted by: æ | Sep 17 2004 16:12 utc | 6

err… Cheney would have you deported after a while? Bush would make sure that you go through the rapture with him? Halliburton would use the energy your body produces to make a profit? 😉

Posted by: teuton | Sep 17 2004 16:15 utc | 7

Halliburton would use the energy your body produces to make a profit? 😉
ROFL! After they get their hands on water, our own personal energy is next, no doubt. I imagine a Matrix-esque scenario here, hundreds of thousands of bodies hooked up and running giant computers &c.
Actually, that’s not very funny, is it?

Posted by: æ | Sep 17 2004 16:28 utc | 8

“Herbert’s pen is as far from elite as it is from effete.”
Hey Koryel, your pen if pretty damn sharp as well….keep up the posts!

Posted by: RossK | Sep 17 2004 16:41 utc | 9

@koreyel and ae:
Wow, I can wear red and perform the Turkey Curse, all on the holy Discordian Friday.
Hail Eris! All Hail Discordia! Her work in the world is most apparent and growing day by day. Let us sing for the chaos that leads us to a state of greater complexity and organization.
What will you tell your children
Why is there war?
What will you tell your children
when they ask you
Why do people go to war?
What will you tell your precious children
When they ask you
Why mama, why daddy, why must there be war?
(Child of mine, that’s a hard, hard question.)
How will you know
What to tell them
When you hear so many different stories
From so many different sources?
(Oh my little ones, how can I help you
Understand this hard world?)
What will you tell your children
when they ask you
Why do people go to war?
What will you tell your children
when they ask you
Why mama, why daddy, why must there be war?
Will you tell them war is fought for freedom
Will you tell them war is fought for security
Is war a battle between good and evil
Or a power play to boost the economy
Should they risk their lives for liberation
Do they owe their duty to God and nation
Or to the profiteers and corporations
Should they avenge the ones who bleed
Should they trust the men who lead
Will you tell them people fight to save their lives
Will you tell them people are fighting
for brazen lies, fear and misunderstanding
Or will you tell your children
when they ask you why
People go to die
What will you tell your children
when they ask you
Why do people go to war?
(There must be a better way…)
You’ve got to:
Talk to the people
Reach out to the people
Work with the people
With your heart wide open
Dance with the people
Listen to the people
Share all you’ve got
With the people
With your heart wide open
And then we’ll tell our children
With our hearts wide open:
We won’t study war no more.

Posted by: catlady | Sep 17 2004 16:59 utc | 10

finally, a good reason to go shopping for your country
and also, i have, in conversation with friends, who would love to see things in iraq go horrorably wrong, so bush’s policy(s) would become discredited, have often asserted to them; in the end, it does not matter so much what we think, in terms of wishing for bad news — on the outcome of the iraqi project.
it is true and good to point out the mental wrongheadedness of the project of the war, morally, ethically, and pragmatically –as a means to an end.
it is right to show and emphasize the utter failure of how that project has and is carried out.
and it is noteworthy to recall that all bushes people pushing this project have no history, or self evident inclination in achieving success in such a project.
i for one, would gladly eat crow (under glass even) if by my own missunderstanding and resistance to this project is (was) shown to be wrong — if by some miracle this whole thing were to be embraced and absorbed by the iraqis themselves — that they, the iraqis would come to see in parallel, bushes vision as there own.
in other words, a hard look all the facts would show the project doomed without any wishing and hoping that it would do so — no need hoping a cut tree will fall.

Posted by: anna missed | Sep 17 2004 18:04 utc | 11

thank you koreyel & agree with rossk – yr not a bad hand yrself – one link like that cleans at least some of the shit out of the system
still steel

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Sep 17 2004 18:46 utc | 12

Quote:
I’m really certain that we’ll see that lots of us wearing red for freedom – because we are the majority.
Whoa, let me restate this: one group of people wants to show the rest that they are overwhelming them in numbers? Like, maybe to intimidate them?
I have two words for ya: brown shirts.
You should know that wearing gang colors is a really bad idea. Unless you really want to see all republicans reply with their own colored gear.
What about the independents? They will be the loosers in any such scheme. Can you imagine what it is like to be the only person in a crowd of red or blue wearing people? They would have to conform to one of the sides.
Billmon already discussed this:

it’s easy to imagine some creative GOP hack developing a standard t-shirt (let’s say with a red, white and blue color design) for those troops to wear.
If the t-shirt design catches on, then some other party hack might well develop a proprietary patriotic logo – something distinctly identifiable as a Republican Party symbol – to go on those t-shirts.

Posted by: MarcinGomulka | Sep 18 2004 11:06 utc | 13

In Los Angeles that’s called showing “gang colors”. I find this almost too ironic to keep from smirking.

Posted by: Kate_Storm | Sep 18 2004 21:00 utc | 14