Even the big, important questions — the future of New Orleans, the threat of global warming, the paralyzing problems of race and poverty in America — have lost their intellectual appeal. Too many people have died, and too much has been destroyed to try to make sense of it now. And as stupid and obnoxious and insane as the powers that be have been this past week, they don’t seem very funny now ..
Back to Main
September 9, 2005
WB: Hitting the Wall
Comments
These are very dark times in America. We all grieve for New Orleans. So too should we grieve for 8 lost years of Bush. Death, lies, inequities and torture. Theft and graft and influence peddling and fiscal and moral imcompetence on the most massive scale since our founding. All to be followed by an entire generation of the fascist influence of a transformed judiciary. Mussolini’s final hours, dangling from a rope beneath an Esso station’s canopy, would be a too charitable and kind sendoff at Dubya’s eventual departure from this world.
Posted by: steve duncan | Sep 9 2005 12:59 utc | 4
NO!
Now is not the time to look away!
Based on my blog reading today: Blackwater has at least 150 armed “security” troops in the streets of New Orleans, which even the chief of police seemed unaware of. (Only his personnel are allowed to be armed.) Bush has lifted minimum wage requirements. FEMA is being given the billions for *reconstruction* when it is a totally corrupted, incompetently run *emergency* agency.
Bush apparently decided – read the crappily sourced (all gov agency sources) NYT article, Josh Marshall commented on it too – NOT to federalize LA’s national guard – surely that was their dream: total control of LA’s military and total control of all money and contracts. Just too blatant a grab, but look what they WILL get away with.
This is a huge opportunity for the fascists running our country. Urban ethnic and racial cleansing is taking place and these people will not be moved back in, will not be voting in their districts.
I wept for elderly nursing home patients dying in their beds, lying abandoned for days in various washed out places, children screaming to the 911 operators, all the animals trapped and suffering, all of it.
But there HAS to be the greatest effort RIGHT NOW to stand up the dems – Pelosi has made a start – anyone with a voice that can be heard to stop the corrupt corporate incompetent racist bastards. Severeal – Cafferty, Jon Stewart, today’s NYT’s lead editorial, WaPo lead on-line story – are screaming about the incompetent boobs running FEMA. They MUST be forced to resign. They should be charged with criminal negligence. A great shout must go out to replace these people with qualified emergency professionals. There must be oversight and accountability. People’s rights must be protected.
Do not go to sleep! I am trapped in euroland. I send money. I grieve for an America lost, if not truly dead. I want to organize resistance, I want Bush, Cheney, Blackwater, Halliburton, stopped. The blogs are all I have – YOU PEOPLE are all I have to have faith in. There has to be resistance now. Bush and Cheney and Halliburton and Blackwater are not sleeping.
Help me DO something! Do not go to sleep!
Posted by: Hamburger | Sep 9 2005 12:59 utc | 5
Speaking of wall’s, if your planning on taking part in this Sunday’s Freedom Walk? Better register today or you will face arrest on sunday. If you’d rather cheer on the march instead be prepared to peer over a four-foot high “snow fence.” the march instead,
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Sep 9 2005 13:00 utc | 6
Addendum, on my third link above, you have to scroll dowm a bit to get the Freedom Walk Interlopers Threatened With Arrest link.
“You have the right to free speech as long as you are not dumb enough to actually
try it”
The Clash, “Know Your Rights”
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Sep 9 2005 13:05 utc | 7
Armed federal troops in NO. Forced evictions. Taking peoples’ guns and property. Displaced persons being sent to everywhere. Poor response to a bad sitution. Blame game. Excuses and no one takes responsibility. TV media dumbed down and not focusing on the real stories and not asking questions. Massive federal money and no plan on how to spend it. Corporate cronyism. Politicians bought off. America is doomed if this crap does not stop. Maybe too late. God I hope not. This is all too weird. I weep for my country.
Posted by: Dismayed | Sep 9 2005 13:11 utc | 8
zakdaddy from metafilter points out, ” I’m not surprised that an event orchestrated — excuse me, organized by the DoD is so restricted. What does surprise me is what appears to be the severe restrictions placed on members of the press. From WaPo (linked above):
“One restricted group will be the media, whose members will not be allowed to walk along the march route. Reporters and cameras are restricted to three enclosed areas along the route but are not permitted to walk alongside participants walking from the Pentagon, across the Memorial Bridge to the Mall.”
IANAL, but doesn’t the First Amendment outlaw abridging freedom of the press? Why yes, I believe it does.
Obviously, I’m wrong about the legality of the issue because we’re not seeing media in an uproar about said restrictions. Any Constitutional lawyers care to clarify for us?
As a soldier I know how important morale is to effective operations, and I know that flag-waving makes some people feel better. But as an educated adult, I’m inclined to prefer substantive policy reforms like fewer, shorter international deployments for National Guard troops.
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Sep 9 2005 13:15 utc | 9
Billmon, people are reading you now more than ever before.
And you are needed now more than ever before and Uncle $cam too and so many others who post here. Can’t you feel it? I hear what you say in the mouth of Anderson Cooper, writers in the NYT and WaPo – other CNNI commentators. People are beginning to question this horrible regime. People are searching now for voices like yours. Didn’t I just see somewhere on a blog that hits are way up now for all the *good* critical blogs? I am truly desperate and Uncle $cam I would be there if I could – so many demos back in the 60s and 70s I was there. There HAS to be an uprising – a raising of voices – a howl the likes of which would stir L Ferlinghetti.
Oh America, HOWL!
Posted by: Hamburger | Sep 9 2005 13:18 utc | 10
A demonstration of resisters, I meant to indicate. The majority of Americans who now find this admin at fault in their criminally negligent response, Americans who want accountability, transparency, oversight – and an honest social contract – must not only HOWL but must MARCH. Can there be – will there be? A half million – more – in Wash DC demanding a competent FEMA, demanding an independent investigation, demanding accountability, demanding the protection of civil rights.
Posted by: Hamburger | Sep 9 2005 13:29 utc | 11
Well, I heard Emmanuel Todd, that Frenchi guy who wrote After the Empire, about the coming demise of the American global power. He sounded even more pessimistic after this fucked-up catastrophe, apparently not expecting such a high level of incompetence and non-reaction from all the levels of US government and administration. Actually he stated that it was a bad omen showing the US could go down the way USSR went down, with a meltdown of people stopping to take seriously the central govt, complete regions being left down, and the whole system rotting from within.
He didn’t make that comparison, but it’s been made on some Kos threads before. USSR was both faced with a stupid imperialist war of choice in Afghanistan, and the army was bogged down, demoralised and broken down. Then came the icing on the cake with the insane incompetence following Chernobyl, when it took the Soviets several days to actually acknowledge the accident, showing how inept the regime was.
Posted by: CluelessJoe | Sep 9 2005 13:32 utc | 12
I’m torn between the commenters. The expression of outrage does need to continue, because the spinmeisters defending Bush are out in full force.
But one’s first responsibility is to take care of oneself. If you’re burned out, you can’t help anyone. Consider the Louisiana police officers who committed suicide.
Posted by: Raoul Paste | Sep 9 2005 13:33 utc | 13
Get good and drunk, then get back to work.
We have to go down fighting.
Posted by: fellowAmerican | Sep 9 2005 13:35 utc | 14
Ummm, Hamburger, I think we all would like to have 24/7 Billmon. Unfortunately, he is not put together that way, and when he says he needs a break, he means it, so please wish him well and thank him for sharing his inimitable insights, but don’t lay on the guilt trip. There really are one or two other blogs on this thing now.
Posted by: 4-fingers | Sep 9 2005 13:37 utc | 15
Billmon, thanks for your work so far on this. Mourn and recharge: I can only imagine the passion and energy that’s needed to sustain the writing you’ve produced over the last few days.
Hamburger: each of us does what we can with the energy we have. There’s no point people turning themselves into further casualties of this disaster by trying to go past that point. Take your anger and do something with it.
Further, note, In general, First Amendment rights can be restricted in “time, place, and manner” if needed to fulfill an “important government purpose,” as long as those restraints aren’t message-based (i.e., “content neutral”). Some communication channels must remain open, and the restraints must be “narrowly tailored” to the government purpose. Here’s some more info.
Finally, I don’t know all the case law, but perhaps the press could make the case here that the restraints are not narrowly tailored enough. But of course it’s to late.
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Sep 9 2005 13:43 utc | 17
Quote (SBS Australia):
Fears of a massive death toll from Hurricane Katrina have grown with news that 25,000 body bags have been sent to New Orleans. Up until now officials have put estimates only as high as 10,000 but any accurate count seems a long way off. Only a small number of corpses have been recovered and there seems little urgency to recover those that remain on the streets.
America’s a country that will venture to the ends of the Earth to recover the remains of the fallen, so why won’t it just come here – to pick him up? After all, just above, they’re very busy, sweeping the streets in a city that verges on the delusional. It’s now easier to find the local dead than the living. Call me obsessive but these images are puzzling.
REPORTER: You’re not taking the body away?
FIRST OFFICIAL: No, we’re not…
REPORTER: It’s been here for six days now.
FIRST OFFICIAL: I know nothing about it.
SECOND OFFICIAL: We’re not…we just got here. We just got here.
FIRST OFFICIAL: We know nothing about it.
REPORTER: OK, no-one’s taking the body away? Are you taking the body away, sir?
THIRD OFFICIAL: No. We’re not.
REPORTER: Or that one there? Who’s going to take the body away?
THIRD OFFICIAL: I don’t think we’re at that stage of the operation yet.
PARAMEDIC: All I’m saying is, you can’t get any deader, so…I mean, dead’s dead. You can’t help the dead, you have to help the living.
These paramedics from Kentucky would be only too happy to help, but without orders and nothing to do, they’re out collecting memories. One of them is of the black brew that now oozes everywhere. At the famous Lafayette Cemetery they used to build the graves high to prevent the bodies from contaminating the water – a lesson neglected today.
DR JAMES MOISES, HEALTH WORKER: The decomposing bodies that are occurring right now in the water – and there’s thousands of them – the things we worry about is hepatitis A, hepatitis B, other infectious diseases that may be in the water.
**
WTF is wrong with USA?
Posted by: vbo | Sep 9 2005 14:06 utc | 18
Please just rest and recharge yourself.
Heaven knows that we need and the victims need an eloquent voice to speak for them.
Posted by: dv | Sep 9 2005 14:21 utc | 19
We have to go down fighting.
Hmm. Billy Beck has the same attitude about making a stand, knowing that he will probably be crushed like a bug. I admire Billy, but it’s not a sensible strategy.
Standoff weapons are best. Remember? – colonial American freedom fighters hid behind trees. No suicide missions. That’s why I’ve always supported time off for the genius who runs Whiskey Bar.
Posted by: Wolf DeVoon | Sep 9 2005 14:36 utc | 20
No guilt trip intended. Yet this is a turning point in U.S. history. The anger – not just mine, but the majority of Americans – must be channeled. Look at Bush’s poll numbers: 39% approval.
A huge demo is needed – Americans gathered in Wash DC and all over in support of hurricane victims, civil rights, an honest social contract, demanding a functioning FEMA, accountability, transparency, pointing their fingers in silent condemnation. Who can help me organize that? I went to countless demos in the late 60s and 70s – some HUGE in freezing Wash DC. There have been huge anti-war demos re Iraq. They would get press now. We must howl.
Posted by: Hamburger | Sep 9 2005 15:14 utc | 21
Hamburger: So far, I bet most people were like Billmon has been; they don’t realise the extent of the massacre. They expect a couple thousads dead, they remember that the first estimates for WTC were 10.000 and ended up with 2.500. So when Louisiana’s governor said 10.000 dead possibly, it wasn’t that hard to rationalise that only several hundred deads were confirmed.
If it goes close to 30.000, it will turn out as having been the bloodiest days in American history for violent deaths, beating up Civil War, WWII and of course 9/11. I’d even suspect they’re slow to gather corpses because they just hope that enough gators will eat them up so that they don’t have to come up with mass graves and pyres. And frankly I’m not sure it can be avoided with such a death toll. Then, shit will hit the fan that sits between many Americans’ ears, and W will be as toast as these mercenaries in Fallujah’s bridge.
Posted by: CluelessJoe | Sep 9 2005 15:26 utc | 22
Get better, Billmon. we are all numb from the past few days, I suppose. In my case, disbelief has yet to be overtaken by disgust.
The comparison above to Chernobyl seems apt, although the response of the Soviet authorities seems to have been way more competent, if callous (sacrificing a few dozens to save many more). Remember also that it was the first real example of “glasnost” (transparency) then, in 1986, and it helped Gorbatchev consolidate his powers.
Posted by: Jérôme à Paris | Sep 9 2005 15:26 utc | 23
I can certainly understand your sudden reticence. It took me over a week to write a word on this absolutely ineffable tragedy. Unlike you, I have watched the horror on television before, during, and after the storm and, of course, since. There are more issues than can be discussed in one essay, or even a series of essays. However, I would concur with the reader who expresses a need for clear, trenchant writing such as yours as a source of emotional and intellectual comaraderie, information, and comfort. Thanks for your efforts thus far. I hope that your pitcher of libations sits next to your keyboard as you pour out your grief, anger, animus, and perspicacity.
Compassion is the basis of all morality. – Arthur Schopenhauer
While you’re reading Confederacy of Dunces (which I just picked up myself yesterday) might I recommend listening to the September 4 broadcast of Harry Shearer’s Le Show, which was a wonderful tribute to all that was New Orleans.
Thanks again Billmon. Our outrage is stoked by our compassion. I know there are times I would rather go to my isolation tank for a while than to succomb to a hardening of my heart.
Thankfully, more reporters have been able to get the story past their editors and publishers and out to people. More people are actually demanding the facts. Hopefully this momentum will carry forward and spread to other issues. Until it does, perhaps you would consider writing about non-Katrina subjects. I’m sure this Administration will be pushing through all manner or shit behind this disaster.
Posted by: biklett | Sep 9 2005 15:47 utc | 26
Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La
“Ms. Landrieu, a Democrat who was nearly put out of office in 2002 after Mr. Bush campaigned intensely for her Republican opponent, had mostly held her fire against the president in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. But her tone changed markedly on Thursday, with a 20-minute speech that was at turns poignant and defiant.
“We know the president said, quote, ‘I don’t think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees,’ ” Ms. Landrieu said. “Everybody anticipated the breach of the levee, Mr. President, including computer simulations in which this administration participated.”
The senator went on to describe how the creator of Mr. Bill, the clay figurine whose cry of “Ohh noooo!” was long a staple of “Saturday Night Live,” had used the character in public service announcements to warn southern Louisianians of the dangers they would face in an extraordinary storm.
“How can it be,” she asked, “that Mr. Bill was better informed than Mr. Bush?”
When Anderson Cooper chastized Landrieu for “thanking politicians” when he had witnessed rats eating corpses in the streets, I yelled at her. Now Landrieu is in full denunciation mode on the Senate floor and she is going to need our support.
Posted by: Hamburger | Sep 9 2005 16:07 utc | 27
rather than hitting the wall, hit back. your words are weapons & this battle requires everything we’ve got. their atrocities shall not go unanswered. heal yourself though, billmon, and then come out firing.
Posted by: b real | Sep 9 2005 16:14 utc | 28
Soviet Empire: 1) Central control of media, 2) Afghanistan, 3) Chernobyl, and 4) One party rule
American Empire: 1) Elite control of media, 2) Afghanistan & Iraq; 3) 9-11 & New Orleans, and 4) One party rule.
Only wealth and middle class has prevented the break up of the American Empire. With both fast disappearing, don’t count on your government pensions. They will disappear just as fast as when the Soviet Empire broke up.
Posted by: Jim S | Sep 9 2005 16:20 utc | 29
For the record (& better or worse) I’ve been the Cassandra comparing the US to the USSR (including Chernobyl) on the blogs for well over 2 years now.
One of things I told my friends when we decided to leave Los Angeles last November was that, if anything happened (I thought, an attack against the Port of LA), we’d all be royally fucked.
Who knew?
The 38% figure only confirms my opinion that America is truly and well fucked.
It cannot be reformed, no more than Brezhnev’s USSR could be reformed (or any other like state/empire).
It can — and will — crumble and disintegrate, but I think it is beyond reform.
Perestroika was an illusion.
I hope I’m wrong, but I sincerely believe this.
I will continue to help and support (more than ever) those who fight but I don’t think you can turn the tide.
There is only a darker tunnel ahead, until the collapse, and eventually, then, a new regime.
Posted by: Lupin | Sep 9 2005 16:41 utc | 31
Lupin, I feel you are right:
A federal appeals court ruled today that the president can indefinitely detain a U.S. citizen captured on U.S. soil in the absence of criminal charges, holding that such authority is vital to protect the nation from terrorist attacks.
…
The decision by a three-judge panel was written by Judge J. Michael Luttig, who is one of a number of people under consideration by President Bush for nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Posted by: Hamburger | Sep 9 2005 16:55 utc | 32
I said, over a year ago, when Billmon took a mini break before his long hiatus, we all need time to digest, we can’t just eat. It takes its toll. Billmon is a solo operation, for his own good reasons. We are thankful when his important voice can be heard; I know I am grateful for what he has shared in the past months. But he is not a machine. Human resilience has its mirror in fragility, as we have so sadly seen in NO over the past two weeks. Operating at the level Billmon does requires dedication and resources I can only imagine having.
I well and truly hope the Bushies and their scum will reap the whirlwind, and that the republic will take a more honest and sane course though, like others, I’m none too sanguine about the prospects. Each in our own way tries to exert the moral force we believe in.
I wish Billmon well, and will be grateful if and when he publically continues the good fight.
Posted by: DonS | Sep 9 2005 18:53 utc | 34
Your “Hitting the Wall” piece brought me to tears, and not just tears, but sobbing tears. I’ve never commented here before, but wanted to say that your words were eloquent and very personal, and thank you. I also will toast to those we lost, and I know I will never be the same again. Take care of yourself now… we will need your voice later.
Posted by: Chris | Sep 9 2005 19:08 utc | 35
billmon’s been carrying the weight for me, I know — haven’t been able to write much coherent as my outrage-o-meter is pegged — the needle is bent — and my grief and incredulity are stifling. he’s been articulating what I’ve been thinking and feeling. a terrific burst of quality output, no wonder he needs a break.
it strikes me that the Rethug mantra after 911 — “everything has changed” was BS — all it was to them, was the excuse they were looking for to proceed with their long planned invasion of Mesopotamia and their police-state legislation, all oiled and ready to roll. what 911 gave the neocons and oilmen was not disjunction but continuity in a planning process that had only temporarily been derailed by the anaemic Clinton administration.
it is Katrina that has “changed everything” — or has the potential to do so unless all their horses and all of their men can put the cracked imperial Humpty together again with spin, duct tape and spit. the US is running on fumes. oil is the lifeblood of its commerce, and is getting expensive; debt is the lifeblood of its finance and is getting unmanageable; military might is the guarantee of its debts and its military is being humiliated and overstretched in a stupid and illegitimate foreign war; the strength of its culture is openness, individual liberty plus the New Deal safety net, and it is deliberately chewing off its own hands and feet by destroying the safety net, the social fabric, and those individual freedoms simultaneously; technological and scientific leadership was the touchstone of its industrial pre-eminence and it has wrecked its own primary educational system, corrupted its research and professional establishment, and is turning its back on empiricism and science.
what I’m trying to say is that any one of these pillars of prestige and national power can fall so long as the rest remain strong, but the ruling class of the US is chopping away at all of those pillars simultaneously, in a fantastic orgy of national self-mutilation.
Martin Schoenfeld put it somewhat more calmly and mildly than I can at present. my own thoughts are tending towards a secular version of “Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city…”
Lupin I have come around to your PoV and am making specific, concrete plans to leave. maybe I’ve even left it a bit too late? I know — rat, sinking ship, etc. — maybe I should be ashamed. but I don’t plan to wait around for FEMA to turn me into a detainee the next time my area of CA has a major earthquake and some Rethug rich boys want to eminent-domain my home.
Posted by: DeAnander | Sep 9 2005 19:40 utc | 36
I believe the expression “hitting the wall” means… one can go no further…
Rest, grieve Billmon. The words you produced the last few days are more than enough. We will keep going… there will be more than enough to write about when you are ready to return. namaste
Posted by: crone | Sep 9 2005 19:43 utc | 37
I haven’t commented here before, but I sometimes sneak into the WB to listen to the barkeep. Billmon is a rare combination of the intellectual and the intuitive, and he knows what psychic energy and what focus it takes to write so well, and he knows when the soul has to go under the wave.
New Orleans is a city I’ve never been to, yet it maps out a whole space in my mind. The more I think of its history and culture and contribution, the more I see America as a body amputated of a limb. They’ll build their Pentagon-Halliburton-Bechtel citadel and give it the same name, but it won’t be the same, and neither will America. New Orleans gone in this paroxysm of death and decay, and America is not-America.
Billmon, drink the spirits, save a dram to pour out on the altar.
Posted by: afew | Sep 9 2005 20:38 utc | 38
Ah Babylon.
I bought a leaf from a very old bible at auction. I happened to get the passage:
Babylon hath been a golden cup in the hand of the Lord, that made all the earth drunk: the nations have drunk of her wine, and therefore they have staggered.
Babylon is suddenly fallen, and destroyed: howl for her, take balm for her pain, if so she may be healed.
We would have cured Babylon, but she is not healed: let us forsake her, and let us go every man to his own land: because her judgment hath reached even to the heavens, and is lifted up to the clouds.
Posted by: eftsoons | Sep 9 2005 20:40 utc | 39
Look people. They have caved on Michael “you’re doing a great job” Brown.
Stories all over the place this morning on Brown’s faked resume and lack of qualifications have led them to capitulate, to a minor degree. Even Republicans are not satisfied with this guy Brown still on the payroll – back in Washington with *greater* responsibilities. Handling the billions??
THEY ARE VULNERABLE. We must keep up the attack. If not Billmon right at this moment, then everyone else. My dad, a very elderly gentleman, who lay in an Illinois nursing home a year ago had the great good fortune to be tended by people who loved him, whose children he had saved in childbirth, to die then of old age, because his heart simply stopped beating. To read of old people abandoned in their depends in hell holes, in wheel chairs, for days on end with no help, abandoned in their beds to drown with no one coming makes me scream. These criminals are very afraid right now. They are on the run. DeAnander, Uncle $cam, everyone, we have to make sure they do not get away with this. I really think that there is a window of opportunity right now. The fucking Republicans are angry for godssake. Pelosi, Landrieu, other dems in the Senate are denouncing Bush. We must build this. Just look at the print press (on-line is all I have), CNN (inter’l is what I have with frequent cuts to domestic) – even Larry King. Oprah – so I’ve been told. There is a chance now to expose these criminals. We cannnot give up. There needs to be an event – not just letters to the editor, something big. There needs to be an outpouring. I’m in Europe now and I can’t leave. Everyone needs to stand up and point their fingers and accuse. Howl, people, howl. I’m howling. I want Bush to hear me, to hear you, to hear all of us. Howl.
Posted by: Hamburger | Sep 9 2005 20:42 utc | 40
I just want to add my voice to the many who have already spoken. Thanks, Billmon, for your eloquence, your wit, and your intelligence. Thank you for saying so well what I have so often thought, but could never articulate. Thank you for giving the Internet one of its more compelling reasons to exist.
Unlike others, I can’t despair of the US, not when I know that there are so many – perhaps the majority – of us who are as appalled at the wastage of this nation as I am. One day we will defeat Frat Boy in Chief and the Rovians who have propped him up. One day the calm, decent,intelligent, hard-working America of a not-so-distant past will reappear. Perhaps we need this interlude of madness to appreciate what is so fragile, and so worthwhile. Perhaps New Orleans, dreadful though it is, is ultimately the saviour of America’s soul.
Well… one can hope.
Hurry back, Billmon.
Posted by: peartart | Sep 9 2005 20:43 utc | 41
I just want to add my voice to the many who have already spoken. Thanks, Billmon, for your eloquence, your wit, and your intelligence. Thank you for saying so well what I have so often thought, but could never articulate. Thank you for giving the Internet one of its more compelling reasons to exist.
Unlike others, I can’t despair of the US, not when I know that there are so many – perhaps the majority – of us who are as appalled at the wastage of this nation as I am. One day we will defeat Frat Boy in Chief and the Rovians who have propped him up. One day the calm, decent,intelligent, hard-working America of a not-so-distant past will reappear. Perhaps we need this interlude of madness to appreciate what is so fragile, and so worthwhile. Perhaps New Orleans, dreadful though it is, is ultimately the saviour of America’s soul.
Well… one can hope.
Hurry back, Billmon.
Posted by: peartart | Sep 9 2005 20:43 utc | 42
Long time reader, first time poster.
Take all the time you need, Billmon. I selfishly regret that I won’t have your incendiary and insightful posts to read for a while, but they’ll be all the more savory when you return.
To those who plead with you not to go, I say: When Billmon steps down, that means it’s a good time for you to step up. We should all be Billmons-in-training, with an encylopedic memory of politician’s doublespeak from the distant and recent past, ready to call the venal would-be-puppeteers in power on their mendacity.
I don’t know that I have the wherewithal to take my own advice, so I don’t condemn those who plead with him to not take a break. Instead, I invite those of us who perhaps indulge in a little hero-worship to instead take something good away from the philosophy of Neitzsche. Don’t seek out the better person, become the better person. Who knows how much human potential was drowned in New Orleans because that potential was housed in black skin and poor neighborhoods? Stories like that in Billmon’s post of the man who died despite literally clawing and gasping for survival should remind us of the fragile bodies and limited futures that await each of us.
Many self-styled patriots ascribe virtue to their country; they peruade themselves that they can clothe themselves in moral rectitude while manifesting callous indifference for their fellow human being at best, and performing breathtaking atrocities at worst. We’ve had five years of reminders (eleven, really, since the wolves removed the sheepskin of the “Contract with America”) where integrity and morality are nowhere to be found among the malicious worshippers of Supply-Side Jesus. It’s on each of us to show the rest of the world the alternative. That’s the kind of personal responsibility that is worth championing.
Posted by: Branden Robinson | Sep 9 2005 22:55 utc | 43
@Brandon Robinson
I’m so very, very glad you decided to speak up.
Please, if you can, keep posting and keep our spirits up.
Posted by: jm | Sep 9 2005 23:27 utc | 44
Everyone is afraid in the face of this revelation of truth.
It does no good to scream about one’s individual ass being detained in a police state. Not now while there is human tragedy to deal with.
It’s not a time to run scared or inject this fear into others when what we need is courage.
Billmon has done a beautiful, spiritual thing by taking his despair and dealing with it himself in hopes, I’m sure, of rejuvenating for the immense struggle ahead.
We’ve got to stay in the present, mobilize, and defend. Those who are afraid can draw strength right now from the brave. It is self defeating to consider anything but victory.
Posted by: jm | Sep 9 2005 23:41 utc | 45
@jm I was leaving anyway 🙂 this has just pushed me out the door earlier than planned. will continue to raise hell from wherever I end up… there’s plenty of US influence, neo-con-games, secular “religious-rightery” and other hardy weeds being introduced into my new home, for me to struggle with. “ain’t noplace you can run, no no no…”
Posted by: DeAnander | Sep 10 2005 0:04 utc | 46
i think there are many of us here who share the sense of both outrage & melancholy that is evident in billmon’s latest text
i imagine that outside this world we inhabit here at moon – we are involved in our own ways in resisting the waves of indecency; negligence & terror that emanate from this most criminal administration
it is also normal – we are not buddha – to absorb all we have to absorb to fight these battles is sometimes too great – i understand deeply that many people have died because of neglect in new orleans but in iraq & afghanistan they are being murdered with intent & in ways we still not have fully comprehended because in the same way they are hiding the real story of new orleans – they have also hidden their barbaric practices in iraq
& that barbarism – i am sure is something this administration is absolutely responsible & is dong it with great premeditation
we have to understand whoever is being hit today – we will be next – & we should suffer the crack in the face on another by power as if it was our own
the sharing we do here is something that for me is one of its most substantial benefits – even without – the absolutely nnecessary information that is posted here
we are in our ways brothers & sisters of struggle
dare to struggle dare to win – ho chi minh
struglle is one/of most beautiful/wrds in language – me
when we are here – helping the other fight then we are doing good – but whan i read that deanander is getting out of the u s as lupin already has – i do not think of cowardice – i think of people finding the best ways of fighting in this struggle that will not end for some time to come
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Sep 10 2005 0:13 utc | 47
when will these fuckers stop – they are now threatening the nicaraguan people (siurce bbccom) – they cannot will not be stopped other than throuhg defeaéts on the battlefields they themselves have created
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Sep 10 2005 0:33 utc | 48
I was not referring to leaving the country when I said we can’t run in fear. That’s certainly a logical choice.
I mean to say we shouldn’t automatically assume that the political officials will overpower and imprison us. The never have successfully. We have the numbers.
It’s this embracing of fear that disturbs me. There truly is no escape since people who fear now will fear anywhere they are. Until we face and conquer this force we are doomed. It is not the individuals who have the power, it is the collective. And each one’s personal relationship with life and trust in it, is the most important thing.
Posted by: jm | Sep 10 2005 0:35 utc | 49
more murder – planned & premeditated
US Preparing Massive Assault on Tal Afar
Reuters
Thursday 08 September 2005
The United States is considering an all-out military attack in the coming weeks against the town of Tal Afar in northern Iraq, which it sees as a stronghold of rebellion, a US general said on Thursday.
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Sep 10 2005 0:40 utc | 50
That’s part of what this is all about.
A test of our confidence in ourselves, our coping skills in an ever threatening universe no matter where we are, and our faith in a benevolent force as well.
This is what we are up against. How do we manage all of this. Billmon decided to absorb the experience and have a cocktail or two(?). I run to my insistence that nobody controls me ultimately. And I dare anyone who thinks they can. They are small and impotent in my view since I rely on greater forces for power.
This is a moment of truth for all of us and a chance to see our own selves revealed.
Posted by: jm | Sep 10 2005 0:43 utc | 51
I really believe it is time to shift the focus away from the crime family. The war is lost both in Iraq and here.
It is like running to the scene of an accident, remaining paralyzed, and waiting for someone else to handle the emergency.
If we want to we can move right past them, diminish them. It is we who have given them their mythological power. Without our attention they are nothing.
This is not to say that anyone isn’t free to cling to them, fear them, and keep them in their authoritarian parental role. That is up to each individual. But now is the time to absorb confidence as they have shown their weakness in a big way.
Some will continue to hold on to them, some will walk away, and some will fight them. I don’t like them and don’t want them in my government. I love my country and I want a change.
Posted by: jm | Sep 10 2005 0:53 utc | 52
jm
with what mean
a legislature which is completely moribund if not corrupt & bought off
a judiciary that make & mockery even of their own judicial history & finally a mockery & cruel contempt on the notion of justice itself
a media which has been bought lock stock & barrell
& left – which is stuck between a naive optimism in things returning to normal & a very real & concrete fear of the patriot acts
sufficient evidence even for the most moronic of us that criminality on a local national & international scale have gone beyond any normal limit that even the most servile of us would accept as an inducement to comprimise
no, i’m afraid as usual those in the field(the third world) will have to do all the fighting against the city(us imperialism & its compradors). it will be their blood, their sweat & we will share only in the tears
i do no think this current group of criminals are monolithic – – what i am suggesting – is that in their dementia – they are extremely dangerous & have proved to be so
on the ground – as i have noted – i think one & all of us are doing what we can – i take that as implicit – & have scorned those who visit here offering their dull lessons on our inaction
there is a fight & it will be physical between power & the people – it will be violent – that is almost historically determined. when you have corrupted & invalidated the institions that people are supposed to have faith in – the best thing to do is burn them to the ground
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Sep 10 2005 1:19 utc | 53
r’giap,
What you describe is always going on. It makes absolutely no difference to me. I assume I will triumph. If I don’t, I adjust. I can’t help it. I approach each experience in my life believing it will work out for my benefit, even if I only see it in retrospect. I don’t start with a belief in defeat, but I accept it if I must. But it has to be real defeat, and I haven’t experienced that yet.
Posted by: jm | Sep 10 2005 1:29 utc | 54
I’m going out to hit the streets and see what the mood is. I’ll report back later.
Resurrect, Billmon, and grab some pleasure.
Posted by: jm | Sep 10 2005 1:33 utc | 55
See ya on the flip side, Billmon.
…just don’t stay away too long. 🙂
Posted by: fauxreal | Sep 10 2005 1:57 utc | 56
hmmmmm….jm……remember……defeat may mean death or worse…..hard to adjust to.
real opposition is people on the streets. buy from local small business. nothing corporate.
last resort is guerrilla warfare….like the iraqis…..ain’t that ironic.;-)
Posted by: lenin’s ghost | Sep 10 2005 3:33 utc | 57
billmon…..enjoy ‘confederacy of dunces’. i found it rather bizarre, but entertaining……relax dude.:-)
Posted by: lenin’s ghost | Sep 10 2005 3:35 utc | 58
the vacuum is the issue, crisis spells opportunity, union is more powerful than division, and what could and should be born requires letting go of what is past or else it will lose out to not the good but the worse.
Posted by: razor | Sep 10 2005 3:49 utc | 59
Everything has already been writen by others before me, so all I would like to add is: thank you and come back soon.
Posted by: Fran | Sep 10 2005 5:59 utc | 60
Tense and painful out there. Lots of music but loud and aggressive.
Not everywhere, however.
My friends who run a bronze foundary were hanging out, working late, and listening to Frank Sinatra.
The artist next door was working on a portrait of the Greek goddess, Artemis. In silence.
I see Billmon’s up, about, and back. A hearty welcome, my man!
Posted by: jm | Sep 10 2005 6:19 utc | 61
Lest folks get to glum, truly the only thing holding the corrupt two-party system together in this country is cheap gas. If is hits $5.00(?) a gallon the whole country will become New Orleans, and revolution or collapse will be near. Americans have spent their whole life, and had their entire communities, designed around the notion of $1.50 gasoline.
The ruling class knows and fears this, perhaps more than even we know. Hence the obsessive assaults on the oil-producing world, Iraq, Venezuela, Iran. But they are losing. They lost Venezuela, they are losing Iraq, and Americans won’t die for Iran.
The ruling class in this country is weaker, and has a more narrow base, than ever before. This makes them more violent and desperate, but their weakness is still there.
Posted by: folkers | Sep 10 2005 8:22 utc | 62
Thank you for that powerful piece of writing. I don’t have a blog, and am not up on the blogging ethos, but I do have a forum, and posted this stunning entry on my memorial page, with credit and a link back. Let me know if that’s not cool and I’ll delete, no worries.
Robin
aka flawedplan
Posted by: flawedplan | Sep 11 2005 7:22 utc | 64