ANDEAN DANCE I
Raven is dicing
the Quito afternoon in
pieces of sunlight,
chasing clouds across the sky
and over the bold mountains,
and opening his
greedy beak in the doorway
of the Syrian
restaurant. His eyes follow
the movements of the waiter
serving spicy plates
of eggplant and zucchini,
and he makes his move:
diving into the kitchen,
snatching a whole pita bread
with the expertise
he used to steal the sun and
put it in the sky.
Raven flies fast on his own
broken road to Damascus,
never falling from
his speed to be converted.
Raven's religion
is his belief in a full
belly and a cloudless sky.
Sunday, April 03, 2005
Saturday, February 26, 2005
RAVEN AT PEZ MAYA
I.
At the water’s edge,
Raven, breathing in and out,
watches the sun rise
like a carnelian stone
over the violet waves.
On the beach silence
rivals the breeze, and rustling
palm trees sweep the sky
free of sleep, dust the cobwebs
from the back of Raven’s brain
as he greets the day,
meets his hunger on the sand.
A vague memory
of fish causes him to lift
his wings in expectation
as a boat passes
between Raven and the sun;
fishermen carving
the now radiant surface
of morning in Pez Maya.
II.
The sky is clear as
an eye, as Raven walking
slowly in the sand;
a morning rain that washed down
the turquoise stone of the sea
left him shivering
in feathers like the petals
of a deep black rose.
Raven is not a swimmer;
he skims the waves looking for
white bellies of fish
driven toward dunes by the moon’s
clockwork synergy,
swoops—beak poised to pinch a tail
of liquid silver and pitch
his salted treasure
on the sand. His appetite
opens like the mouth
of Whale, his pale comrade, as
Raven swallows his own life.
III.
Raven is waiting
on the top of a temple—
one more stone in this
archaeological site.
We have come in a boat through
the mangroves to see
this castle and that temple
left by the Mayans
to remind us that the end
of the game is drawing near.
Only Raven knows
the precise moment when he
will take down the sun,
the moon and the Stars, one by
one, put them back in the box
just like he found them,
and return to being white
as these limestone rocks.
His resignation rises
in the light of the full moon.
I.
At the water’s edge,
Raven, breathing in and out,
watches the sun rise
like a carnelian stone
over the violet waves.
On the beach silence
rivals the breeze, and rustling
palm trees sweep the sky
free of sleep, dust the cobwebs
from the back of Raven’s brain
as he greets the day,
meets his hunger on the sand.
A vague memory
of fish causes him to lift
his wings in expectation
as a boat passes
between Raven and the sun;
fishermen carving
the now radiant surface
of morning in Pez Maya.
II.
The sky is clear as
an eye, as Raven walking
slowly in the sand;
a morning rain that washed down
the turquoise stone of the sea
left him shivering
in feathers like the petals
of a deep black rose.
Raven is not a swimmer;
he skims the waves looking for
white bellies of fish
driven toward dunes by the moon’s
clockwork synergy,
swoops—beak poised to pinch a tail
of liquid silver and pitch
his salted treasure
on the sand. His appetite
opens like the mouth
of Whale, his pale comrade, as
Raven swallows his own life.
III.
Raven is waiting
on the top of a temple—
one more stone in this
archaeological site.
We have come in a boat through
the mangroves to see
this castle and that temple
left by the Mayans
to remind us that the end
of the game is drawing near.
Only Raven knows
the precise moment when he
will take down the sun,
the moon and the Stars, one by
one, put them back in the box
just like he found them,
and return to being white
as these limestone rocks.
His resignation rises
in the light of the full moon.
Saturday, February 05, 2005
POR AHORA….
Rave, why are you picking at those scrambled eggs? Too dry for you?
“Not at all. They’re nice and soft. Actually, I am tempted to smear them on the computer screen. Reading these news bits is like watching a soap opera called ‘As the Stomach Turns’.”
Anything in particular turning yours today?
“The twin towers of belligerence and cowardice. here we have Condolences Rice in Germany exercising her ‘diplomatic language’, saying that the US has no plans to attack Iran FOR NOW.”
For now…por ahora. Interesting that she used that phrase on the anniversary of Chavez using it in 1992 after his failed coup in Caracas.
“Hadn’t thought about that. Well, Here’s Chavez meditating with some of his coup associates.”
Meditating?
“That’s what the headline says. And speaking of stomachs turning, Colombia’s president Uribe is apparently turning his in a naval hospital in Cartageña, instead of meeting with Chavez about the Granda kidnapping in Caracas.”
I read several stories about that. First he said an ear condition had caused his stomach problems. Then they said it was food poisoning and that he needed at least 4 days of bedrest.
“The leg bone is connected to the collarbone? His grasp of anatomy is pretty fluid, isn’t it? He just didn’t have the nerve to meet one-on-one behind closed doors with Chavez. A fine example of cowardice.”
You have a point, Rave. When the kidnapping caper blew up in his face, he wanted to have a summit of presidents discuss the incident. But Chavez said it was a bilateral matter, and that he would only deal with it one-on-one.
“Then Lula got in the act. And somebody from Peru prevailed upon Fidel to mediate the crisis—whatever that means.”
The long and the short of it is that Uribe is a pip squeak and a US puppet—the Bush Gang will try anything to get Chavez.
“I just read an interview with a CIA-DISIP agent who said that the CIA started scheming against Chavez in 1994 when he got out of prison. Interesting interview—the woman talked about brainstorming sessions to determine Chavez’ weakness.”
What did they come up with?
“Nothing. She said he was ‘invulnerable’. That he was completely congruent from when he got out of prison until now.”
That IS interesting. In 1999 Gabriel Garcia Marquez wrote an article called “The Enigma of Hugo Chavez”, in which he said that what first struck him about Chavez was his “body of reinforced concrete”.
“This CIA woman wasn’t talking about him in physical terms.”
I understood that. But the physical appears to be congruent with the psychological and political.
“No wonder Uribe doesn’t want to meet up with him in a dark office in Miraflores.”
Well, I wouldn’t mind meeting up with him there….
“Oh oh. I think we’ve entered waters that are over my head.”
Sorry Rave, but we don’t all have the same reaction to the crisis of conscience in the world. Some of us smear eggs on their computer screens. And some of us indulge in moments of fantasy.
“Yeah. And some blow themselves—or others—up with car bombs. And others blow women and children to bits in Iraq.”
And others have to resign their department chair positions in universities in Colorado because the US had 9/11 coming to it for its policies of genocide and interventionism. Which is what I said on Mexican t.v. on 9/11, come to think of it.
“And others snarl in their Senate confirmation hearings, and sneer hypocritically about using diplomacy.”
While others are cashing in on being ethnic minorities who conveniently don’t remember recommending 150 plus lethal injections in Texas and God only knows how many broom handles up the butt in Baghdad prisons. We could continue with this litany till the end of the Thirteenth Baktun, Rave. Right now I prefer my moments of fantasy.
Raven rolls his eyes and pours himself an espresso.
“Women!”
Rave, why are you picking at those scrambled eggs? Too dry for you?
“Not at all. They’re nice and soft. Actually, I am tempted to smear them on the computer screen. Reading these news bits is like watching a soap opera called ‘As the Stomach Turns’.”
Anything in particular turning yours today?
“The twin towers of belligerence and cowardice. here we have Condolences Rice in Germany exercising her ‘diplomatic language’, saying that the US has no plans to attack Iran FOR NOW.”
For now…por ahora. Interesting that she used that phrase on the anniversary of Chavez using it in 1992 after his failed coup in Caracas.
“Hadn’t thought about that. Well, Here’s Chavez meditating with some of his coup associates.”
Meditating?
“That’s what the headline says. And speaking of stomachs turning, Colombia’s president Uribe is apparently turning his in a naval hospital in Cartageña, instead of meeting with Chavez about the Granda kidnapping in Caracas.”
I read several stories about that. First he said an ear condition had caused his stomach problems. Then they said it was food poisoning and that he needed at least 4 days of bedrest.
“The leg bone is connected to the collarbone? His grasp of anatomy is pretty fluid, isn’t it? He just didn’t have the nerve to meet one-on-one behind closed doors with Chavez. A fine example of cowardice.”
You have a point, Rave. When the kidnapping caper blew up in his face, he wanted to have a summit of presidents discuss the incident. But Chavez said it was a bilateral matter, and that he would only deal with it one-on-one.
“Then Lula got in the act. And somebody from Peru prevailed upon Fidel to mediate the crisis—whatever that means.”
The long and the short of it is that Uribe is a pip squeak and a US puppet—the Bush Gang will try anything to get Chavez.
“I just read an interview with a CIA-DISIP agent who said that the CIA started scheming against Chavez in 1994 when he got out of prison. Interesting interview—the woman talked about brainstorming sessions to determine Chavez’ weakness.”
What did they come up with?
“Nothing. She said he was ‘invulnerable’. That he was completely congruent from when he got out of prison until now.”
That IS interesting. In 1999 Gabriel Garcia Marquez wrote an article called “The Enigma of Hugo Chavez”, in which he said that what first struck him about Chavez was his “body of reinforced concrete”.
“This CIA woman wasn’t talking about him in physical terms.”
I understood that. But the physical appears to be congruent with the psychological and political.
“No wonder Uribe doesn’t want to meet up with him in a dark office in Miraflores.”
Well, I wouldn’t mind meeting up with him there….
“Oh oh. I think we’ve entered waters that are over my head.”
Sorry Rave, but we don’t all have the same reaction to the crisis of conscience in the world. Some of us smear eggs on their computer screens. And some of us indulge in moments of fantasy.
“Yeah. And some blow themselves—or others—up with car bombs. And others blow women and children to bits in Iraq.”
And others have to resign their department chair positions in universities in Colorado because the US had 9/11 coming to it for its policies of genocide and interventionism. Which is what I said on Mexican t.v. on 9/11, come to think of it.
“And others snarl in their Senate confirmation hearings, and sneer hypocritically about using diplomacy.”
While others are cashing in on being ethnic minorities who conveniently don’t remember recommending 150 plus lethal injections in Texas and God only knows how many broom handles up the butt in Baghdad prisons. We could continue with this litany till the end of the Thirteenth Baktun, Rave. Right now I prefer my moments of fantasy.
Raven rolls his eyes and pours himself an espresso.
“Women!”
Thursday, February 03, 2005
ERROR OF CREATION
Raven is dancing on the keyboard.
Writing something, are we?
"Translating a poem--or maybe it's part of a poem, as I found it in the introduction to a Rabindranath Tagore novel and it doesn't have a title."
You're translating from which language--Sanskrit?
"It's in Spanish translation and I am hacking it into English."
Let's hear it.
"Okay:
Now they are there--
new times in which the weak
will dare, impassibly,
to confront armies.
That day's victory
will not belong to the one who kills,
but to the one who accepts death.
The one who causes suffering will disappear.
The one who knows how to suffer
will gain the final victory.
The force of the spirit will collide
one day with the brute force,
and only then will man be able to say
that he is not an error of Creation."
When was that written, Rave?
It doesn't say. He died in 1941 at 80--after receiving the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913.
It could have been written tomorrow.
Raven is dancing on the keyboard.
Writing something, are we?
"Translating a poem--or maybe it's part of a poem, as I found it in the introduction to a Rabindranath Tagore novel and it doesn't have a title."
You're translating from which language--Sanskrit?
"It's in Spanish translation and I am hacking it into English."
Let's hear it.
"Okay:
Now they are there--
new times in which the weak
will dare, impassibly,
to confront armies.
That day's victory
will not belong to the one who kills,
but to the one who accepts death.
The one who causes suffering will disappear.
The one who knows how to suffer
will gain the final victory.
The force of the spirit will collide
one day with the brute force,
and only then will man be able to say
that he is not an error of Creation."
When was that written, Rave?
It doesn't say. He died in 1941 at 80--after receiving the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913.
It could have been written tomorrow.
Tuesday, February 01, 2005
VOTING FOR WAR?
Raven is scratching his head, which entails standing on one foot and balancing precariously on top on the newspaper.
Something puzzling you, Rave?
“Yeah. The headline of this article. Supposedly 72% of registered voters voted in Iraq. Are they implying that the high turnout means that democracy is settling down on its haunches in Iraq, or what?”
You got me. I vote for “or what”. The Sunnites boycotted the election, and since they are 20% of the population….
“That means that 92% of Shiite and Kurd voters voted. And 0% of Sunnites. Now, unless I miss my guess, that also means that the Sunnites will not be represented in the National Assembly, nor included in the drawing up of a constitution. Which means that democracy is NOT settling down on its haunches in Iraq.”
It seems not. Maybe they should have headlined the article: 20% of Iraqi Voters in Favor of Civil War?
Raven starts pulling apart a chocolate donut.
“Considering that most of the resisting folks are Sunnites, that sounds about right.”
Well, the Bush Gang can pat themselves on the back—not because they brought democracy to the Cradle of Civilization, but because they stirred up the political tectonics and created another “tsunami”. Apparently the natural one in Indonesia wasn’t enough. You know, after the earthquake and subsequent “tsunami” in Lisbon in November of 1755—well, they didn’t call it a tsunami, but it was the same deal—Voltaire published a long poem, of which probably nothing remains in historical/literary consciousness except his comment: “While Lisbon lies in ruins, we are dancing in Paris.”
“Dancing on someone’s grave has apparently passed into the confines of acceptability. Bush never considered cancelling even one of his inaugural balls.”
I suspect those are the only kind he has, Rave.
“Ouch. Glad you aimed that low blow at him, and not at me.”
Do birds have balls, Rave?
“Is that a rhetorical question? Let’s put it this way: this bird doesn’t have to stuff a sweat sock under his tailfeathers.”
Kind of a peculiar image, that.
“Not nearly as peculiar as that of Alfred E. Newman on an aircraft carrier wearing a strategically stuffed flight suit and holding a plastic turkey.”
The turkey came later, Rave.
Raven mashes the donut crumbs together and pops them in his beak.
“The turkey always comes later.”
Sort of like backdraft. Or civil war.
“Or radioactive fallout.”
Right. The things we can feel thankful for next November.
Raven is scratching his head, which entails standing on one foot and balancing precariously on top on the newspaper.
Something puzzling you, Rave?
“Yeah. The headline of this article. Supposedly 72% of registered voters voted in Iraq. Are they implying that the high turnout means that democracy is settling down on its haunches in Iraq, or what?”
You got me. I vote for “or what”. The Sunnites boycotted the election, and since they are 20% of the population….
“That means that 92% of Shiite and Kurd voters voted. And 0% of Sunnites. Now, unless I miss my guess, that also means that the Sunnites will not be represented in the National Assembly, nor included in the drawing up of a constitution. Which means that democracy is NOT settling down on its haunches in Iraq.”
It seems not. Maybe they should have headlined the article: 20% of Iraqi Voters in Favor of Civil War?
Raven starts pulling apart a chocolate donut.
“Considering that most of the resisting folks are Sunnites, that sounds about right.”
Well, the Bush Gang can pat themselves on the back—not because they brought democracy to the Cradle of Civilization, but because they stirred up the political tectonics and created another “tsunami”. Apparently the natural one in Indonesia wasn’t enough. You know, after the earthquake and subsequent “tsunami” in Lisbon in November of 1755—well, they didn’t call it a tsunami, but it was the same deal—Voltaire published a long poem, of which probably nothing remains in historical/literary consciousness except his comment: “While Lisbon lies in ruins, we are dancing in Paris.”
“Dancing on someone’s grave has apparently passed into the confines of acceptability. Bush never considered cancelling even one of his inaugural balls.”
I suspect those are the only kind he has, Rave.
“Ouch. Glad you aimed that low blow at him, and not at me.”
Do birds have balls, Rave?
“Is that a rhetorical question? Let’s put it this way: this bird doesn’t have to stuff a sweat sock under his tailfeathers.”
Kind of a peculiar image, that.
“Not nearly as peculiar as that of Alfred E. Newman on an aircraft carrier wearing a strategically stuffed flight suit and holding a plastic turkey.”
The turkey came later, Rave.
Raven mashes the donut crumbs together and pops them in his beak.
“The turkey always comes later.”
Sort of like backdraft. Or civil war.
“Or radioactive fallout.”
Right. The things we can feel thankful for next November.
Saturday, January 08, 2005
A COUGH FROM THE WINGS
Raven is peering at the map of the World on the wall.
“Have you noticed that even the respective size of the land masses in the northern hemisphere has been distorted to appear larger in comparison to those in the southern hemisphere?”
I suppose it reflects the north’s self-aggrandizement and its depreciation of the south.
“It also reminds me of Che Guevara’s description of subdesarrollo—underdevelopment: A dwarf with an enormous head and thorax, underdeveloped in its weak legs and its short arms don’t articulate with the rest of its body.”
Raven pours himself another espresso.
Coffee and geopolitical analysis. Is this post-tsunami depression, Rave?
“Maybe. Scientists said that the earthquake caused the earth’s axis to shift. If it could do that, it could certainly bring down my spirits a notch or two.”
I suspect it has had that effect on the survivors in Southeast Asia, too. No food, no water, no home, no family—that would get to most people. And I was thinking about making meatballs, a creamy tomato sauce and red chile spaghetti. Now I feel guilty.
“Sort of like fiddling while Rome burns?”
Maybe not quite THAT callous. For that we’ll have to look to the US Usurper—who was fiddling, or doing SOMETHING frivolous, on his Texas ranch when the disaster struck—and who had to be scolded and humiliated into pledging more than chickenfeed in aid.
“The chickens—and some of us other species of aves—do pretty well in these natural disasters. I suppose you know why.”
Not at all sure that I do, Rave.
“It’s because just about everything becomes chickenfeed. Or Ravenfeed. Or buzzard bait.”
Kind of a grim image.
“Sorry. But when the so-called higher species take it in the shorts for their lack of connection to Nature, that turns them into victims and the normal hierarchy of the food chain is reversed. Literally.”
Turned upside down. Like the planet. Or part of it.
“The question is: If the earth’s axis continues to shift as a result of the earthquakes as we get closer to the end of the “baktun”, do you think the land masses in the north will end up being in the south?”
I don’t know. That would probably presuppose that the shifts are always in the same direction. I suppose it could happen.
“And if it does, will the maps show the land masses that used to be in the southern hemisphere disproportionately larger than those that used to be in the northern?”
If the conventional explanations—which say that in the Mercator projection the distortions increase as you move away from the equator, but clearly doesn’t reflect only that—turn out to be right—or at least consistent, then yes. If not, the distortion will continue only with the now southern land masses being bigger.
“I think it’ll all depend on who makes the maps. Just like History is relative to who writes the history books.”
We’ll just have to wait and see.
“Yeah. In the meantime, you were talking about meatballs. And spaghetti?”
Don’t you feel guilty?
“All the time. But thinking about all those hungry people….”
I know—now you’re hungry. You sound a little bit like the US Usurper, I have to say.
“We birds at the beggars’ banquet have been accused of callousness before. What can I say? Hey, the planet acting up like this is like a cough from the wings
in the middle of the last act to remind SOME of us to say our lines right. And I have a feeling that the species for whom the cougher coughed wasn’t mine.”
Nor for whom that bell is tolling, either.
Raven is peering at the map of the World on the wall.
“Have you noticed that even the respective size of the land masses in the northern hemisphere has been distorted to appear larger in comparison to those in the southern hemisphere?”
I suppose it reflects the north’s self-aggrandizement and its depreciation of the south.
“It also reminds me of Che Guevara’s description of subdesarrollo—underdevelopment: A dwarf with an enormous head and thorax, underdeveloped in its weak legs and its short arms don’t articulate with the rest of its body.”
Raven pours himself another espresso.
Coffee and geopolitical analysis. Is this post-tsunami depression, Rave?
“Maybe. Scientists said that the earthquake caused the earth’s axis to shift. If it could do that, it could certainly bring down my spirits a notch or two.”
I suspect it has had that effect on the survivors in Southeast Asia, too. No food, no water, no home, no family—that would get to most people. And I was thinking about making meatballs, a creamy tomato sauce and red chile spaghetti. Now I feel guilty.
“Sort of like fiddling while Rome burns?”
Maybe not quite THAT callous. For that we’ll have to look to the US Usurper—who was fiddling, or doing SOMETHING frivolous, on his Texas ranch when the disaster struck—and who had to be scolded and humiliated into pledging more than chickenfeed in aid.
“The chickens—and some of us other species of aves—do pretty well in these natural disasters. I suppose you know why.”
Not at all sure that I do, Rave.
“It’s because just about everything becomes chickenfeed. Or Ravenfeed. Or buzzard bait.”
Kind of a grim image.
“Sorry. But when the so-called higher species take it in the shorts for their lack of connection to Nature, that turns them into victims and the normal hierarchy of the food chain is reversed. Literally.”
Turned upside down. Like the planet. Or part of it.
“The question is: If the earth’s axis continues to shift as a result of the earthquakes as we get closer to the end of the “baktun”, do you think the land masses in the north will end up being in the south?”
I don’t know. That would probably presuppose that the shifts are always in the same direction. I suppose it could happen.
“And if it does, will the maps show the land masses that used to be in the southern hemisphere disproportionately larger than those that used to be in the northern?”
If the conventional explanations—which say that in the Mercator projection the distortions increase as you move away from the equator, but clearly doesn’t reflect only that—turn out to be right—or at least consistent, then yes. If not, the distortion will continue only with the now southern land masses being bigger.
“I think it’ll all depend on who makes the maps. Just like History is relative to who writes the history books.”
We’ll just have to wait and see.
“Yeah. In the meantime, you were talking about meatballs. And spaghetti?”
Don’t you feel guilty?
“All the time. But thinking about all those hungry people….”
I know—now you’re hungry. You sound a little bit like the US Usurper, I have to say.
“We birds at the beggars’ banquet have been accused of callousness before. What can I say? Hey, the planet acting up like this is like a cough from the wings
in the middle of the last act to remind SOME of us to say our lines right. And I have a feeling that the species for whom the cougher coughed wasn’t mine.”
Nor for whom that bell is tolling, either.
Tuesday, January 04, 2005
NEW YEARS DAY 2005
The road to the ranch:
Tunnel of dusty branches
and afternoon air
puddling above clumps of cows,
closing the dark eyes of mares
dreaming of spring foals,
sucked dry in whoops by the kids
in the pickup’s back.
The truck hops from one pothole
to another, flushes snakes
from the underbrush,
rattles across dry washboards,
and waits for the boy
to open the barbed wire gate.
Escorted by young plum trees
that may bloom this spring,
we rumble toward the corral
riding the waves of
hummocks, and stop to dump corn-
stalk fodder for the horses.
Yellow bees drinking
from the water tank attract
the kids like magnets;
silent in a small tree: twelve
impeccable white herons.
(Rancho “Las Pericas”, Villa de Ayala, Morelos)
The road to the ranch:
Tunnel of dusty branches
and afternoon air
puddling above clumps of cows,
closing the dark eyes of mares
dreaming of spring foals,
sucked dry in whoops by the kids
in the pickup’s back.
The truck hops from one pothole
to another, flushes snakes
from the underbrush,
rattles across dry washboards,
and waits for the boy
to open the barbed wire gate.
Escorted by young plum trees
that may bloom this spring,
we rumble toward the corral
riding the waves of
hummocks, and stop to dump corn-
stalk fodder for the horses.
Yellow bees drinking
from the water tank attract
the kids like magnets;
silent in a small tree: twelve
impeccable white herons.
(Rancho “Las Pericas”, Villa de Ayala, Morelos)
Tuesday, December 14, 2004
CRUSADES, CLASS WAR AND THE FOOD CHAIN
Rave, don’t you ever get fed up with reading political commentary?
“I get fed up with politicians and their self-serving stupidity and greed.”
That wasn’t what I was referring to.
Raven disdainfully spoons instant coffee into his cup.
“I am fed up with having to recur to Nestle, too. It’s globalized garbage. Wonder what they do with the perfectly good coffee they buy from the Third World?”
Pervert it into bat guano, apparently.
“Anything to make a buck. I don’t know about bat shit, but bird shit gave a big shot in the arm to some South American country’s economy at some point. Chile’s, I think.”
Yeah, but the birds couldn’t keep up with the demand, and somebody invented a chemical fertilizer that put them out of business.
“Sigh. Back to politics—or maybe we never left it—but I don’t like to think of birds being forced to shit their brains out to forge an economy. I just read a good piece in this week’s PROCESO—in English, Beyond Tlahuac. The author, Enrique Maza, is trying to fit the lynching of the policemen into a global context.”
As in the globalization of violence?
“As in the prevalence of violence everywhere in the globe, at least. He starts by saying that Judaism, Islam and Christianity are 3 religions which promote love and peace, but they’ve sowed violence in the world. He mentions that Hitler also justified the mass murder of Jews in the name of God.”
Another slick parallel with George W. Bush.
“The piece is really about the dangers of mass thinking and action. He quotes from Gustave Le Bon’s Psychology of the Masses: ‘The mass barely distinguishes between subjective and objective. He who can offer illusions is converted in its leader; but whoever tries to destroy those illusions is always its enemy.’”
Good point. And a perfect description of the mass thinking—or mass hysteria—that created those “red states” in the last US election.
“Those red states, demographically speaking, tend toward lower educational and income levels. In this article he talks about the results of a German study which concluded that personality type and economic position distort people’s thinking, that an economic status of poverty implies a lower threshold for anger (but not for cruelty) and is related to activities charged with prejudice. He says: ‘Obviously, the marginal population has less access to education, a healthy diet, and satisfactory levels of information and culture. And this deterioration makes it more susceptible to group thinking and internal group pressures, as well as less inclined to the verification of moral judgments.”
More support for why the red states were created.
Rave dumps his coffee in the sink.
“It’s all about creating an enemy—and making that enemy appear as odious as possible.”
Like Bush did with Saddam Hussein.
“Precisely. And then in most countries—here in Mexico, for instance—there is hate directed downward. From the ‘owners’ of the country to the lower classes. Maza talks about an exchange of letters between Einstein and Freud. Einstein wrote:
The dominant sector’s need for power in all countries resists limitations to its sovereign rights. Said need for power is frequently fed by greed for
economic power. A minority of the dominant class has control of all the
schools, the press, the media and almost always the religious organizations. The question is: Is it possible to resist the psychosis of hate and destruction?”
And what did Freud write as an answer to that?
“Freud said:
The laws will be made by the dominant class and it will concede few rights to the lower classes. If the rules of power are displaced in the community, the dominant class will refuse to recognize that transformation and will initiate a rebellion that suspends law and order and proceeds to violence.”
Freud sure hit that nail square on, Rave. That’s a description of exactly what happened in Venezuela when Hugo Chavez became president. The dominant class simply refused to accept that the rules of the game were changing. So they called for strikes, promoted the April 2002 coup that suspended the Constitution and abolished the institutions, then the lock-out with its 10 billion dollars of damage to the national economy. And then their refusal to accept the results of the August 15 referendum—when Chavez won with 60% of the vote—and immediately responded by calling at the top of their lungs for his assassination. Chavez is right to describe it as a mass psychosis. I felt it so intensely in Caracas last January and February that it made me physically ill.
“Not to mention the car bomb that blew up the prosecutor that was handling the 2002 coup cases.”
It’s like being in Beirut. Only instead of religious hatred, it’s class and racial hatred.
“You know, we could look at this phenomenon from the perspective of spurious species hierarchy—or perhaps calling it, more realistically, the food chain totem pole. Your species wants to run the rest of us off the planet—even if it means blowing up the planet to do that. Just this humble bird’s opinion.”
It’s a very humbling opinion, Rave.
Rave, don’t you ever get fed up with reading political commentary?
“I get fed up with politicians and their self-serving stupidity and greed.”
That wasn’t what I was referring to.
Raven disdainfully spoons instant coffee into his cup.
“I am fed up with having to recur to Nestle, too. It’s globalized garbage. Wonder what they do with the perfectly good coffee they buy from the Third World?”
Pervert it into bat guano, apparently.
“Anything to make a buck. I don’t know about bat shit, but bird shit gave a big shot in the arm to some South American country’s economy at some point. Chile’s, I think.”
Yeah, but the birds couldn’t keep up with the demand, and somebody invented a chemical fertilizer that put them out of business.
“Sigh. Back to politics—or maybe we never left it—but I don’t like to think of birds being forced to shit their brains out to forge an economy. I just read a good piece in this week’s PROCESO—in English, Beyond Tlahuac. The author, Enrique Maza, is trying to fit the lynching of the policemen into a global context.”
As in the globalization of violence?
“As in the prevalence of violence everywhere in the globe, at least. He starts by saying that Judaism, Islam and Christianity are 3 religions which promote love and peace, but they’ve sowed violence in the world. He mentions that Hitler also justified the mass murder of Jews in the name of God.”
Another slick parallel with George W. Bush.
“The piece is really about the dangers of mass thinking and action. He quotes from Gustave Le Bon’s Psychology of the Masses: ‘The mass barely distinguishes between subjective and objective. He who can offer illusions is converted in its leader; but whoever tries to destroy those illusions is always its enemy.’”
Good point. And a perfect description of the mass thinking—or mass hysteria—that created those “red states” in the last US election.
“Those red states, demographically speaking, tend toward lower educational and income levels. In this article he talks about the results of a German study which concluded that personality type and economic position distort people’s thinking, that an economic status of poverty implies a lower threshold for anger (but not for cruelty) and is related to activities charged with prejudice. He says: ‘Obviously, the marginal population has less access to education, a healthy diet, and satisfactory levels of information and culture. And this deterioration makes it more susceptible to group thinking and internal group pressures, as well as less inclined to the verification of moral judgments.”
More support for why the red states were created.
Rave dumps his coffee in the sink.
“It’s all about creating an enemy—and making that enemy appear as odious as possible.”
Like Bush did with Saddam Hussein.
“Precisely. And then in most countries—here in Mexico, for instance—there is hate directed downward. From the ‘owners’ of the country to the lower classes. Maza talks about an exchange of letters between Einstein and Freud. Einstein wrote:
The dominant sector’s need for power in all countries resists limitations to its sovereign rights. Said need for power is frequently fed by greed for
economic power. A minority of the dominant class has control of all the
schools, the press, the media and almost always the religious organizations. The question is: Is it possible to resist the psychosis of hate and destruction?”
And what did Freud write as an answer to that?
“Freud said:
The laws will be made by the dominant class and it will concede few rights to the lower classes. If the rules of power are displaced in the community, the dominant class will refuse to recognize that transformation and will initiate a rebellion that suspends law and order and proceeds to violence.”
Freud sure hit that nail square on, Rave. That’s a description of exactly what happened in Venezuela when Hugo Chavez became president. The dominant class simply refused to accept that the rules of the game were changing. So they called for strikes, promoted the April 2002 coup that suspended the Constitution and abolished the institutions, then the lock-out with its 10 billion dollars of damage to the national economy. And then their refusal to accept the results of the August 15 referendum—when Chavez won with 60% of the vote—and immediately responded by calling at the top of their lungs for his assassination. Chavez is right to describe it as a mass psychosis. I felt it so intensely in Caracas last January and February that it made me physically ill.
“Not to mention the car bomb that blew up the prosecutor that was handling the 2002 coup cases.”
It’s like being in Beirut. Only instead of religious hatred, it’s class and racial hatred.
“You know, we could look at this phenomenon from the perspective of spurious species hierarchy—or perhaps calling it, more realistically, the food chain totem pole. Your species wants to run the rest of us off the planet—even if it means blowing up the planet to do that. Just this humble bird’s opinion.”
It’s a very humbling opinion, Rave.
Monday, December 06, 2004
Raven has been busy translating an article for me from yesterday's (Sunday) paper:
From La Jornada, December 5, 2004 (www.jornada.unam.mx)
SOME DAY MEXICO WILL RETURN TO LATIN AMERICA
Caracas. “Some day Mexico will return to Latin America”, said the President of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez, during the event “In Defense of Humanity”, and added: “Any government that represents its people’s interests is going to be strongly pressured.” The head of state declared himself villista and Zapatista, and exclaimed “Viva Mexico!”
Responding to questions from Mexican participant Gerardo Fernandez Casanova, the leader of the Bolivarian Revolution indicated that Mexico is very important in the construction of a Latin American community, and that Mexico has looked more toward the north and must look, sooner or later, toward the Southern Cone because of its culture and history.
--The Empire Strikes Back—
The most serious threat to humanity and the well-being of the world today is the immense power of the United States to destroy the planet with the huge quantity of nuclear arms it has accumulated, affirmed Ramsey Clark, US attorney general during the governments of Kennedy and Johnson. Clark added that the problem is a military power superior to that of the rest of the nations put together.
The second speaker designated to present in the workshop of the “Gathering of Intellectuals and Artists in Defense of Humanity”, the lawyer spoke “from the belly of the beast”, assuring the participants that the world would be much better if the people of the US had better criteria at the moment of choosing their leaders.
Remembering Martin Luther King, he indicated that the principal purveyors of violence in the world is “my country·, and added that the man with a dream never imagined how violence was going to increase in his country in the years after his death.
The former cabinet member recounted a long list of aggressions by the Bush administration against other nations as well as against US citizens. Other nations, he said, have the right to be free of the threat of invasion by the US.
Clark indicated in detail how the decisions of the UN are not respected by the US government and how they wanted to avoid the creation of the International Criminal Court, but because they couldn’t they refused to accept its jurisdiction.
He spoke very dramatically about the situation in which prisoners are living in Guantanamo. According to him, the message which the superpower is sending to the world is unequivocal: “He who dares to challenge us, just see what we are doing in the military base.”
He denounced that the bellicose offensive of Bush has provoked crimes against humanity, both by the use of “intelligent” bombs and the use of depleted uranium. It has also caused the celebration of torture.
Clark referred to the invasion and devastation of Iraq, and the terrible and emblematic destruction of the city of Fallujah, converted into a tragic symbol of this moment in history.
Presenting himself as “a lawyer who is not distanced from crime and delinquency”, he profoundly lamented the invasion in Haiti, just after the country had celebrated 200 years since the abolition of slavery, and the replacement of an elected government by a puppet regime. “The Haitian people”, he remarked, “are those who have suffered the most.”
From his point of view, the difference between what happened in Haiti in 2004 and what happened in Venezuela in 2002—year of the coup against Hugo Chavez—“is that in 2002 what the US wanted to happen didn’t work.”
Finally, he described the president of Venezuela as a good man, an effective leader very difficult to find in other governments and who is able to give his people well-being, health and education.
--The Chicken and the Cook—
The goal of the workshop was to establish a dialog the participants in the event and the President of Venezuela. It was kicked off by the writer Luis Brito Garcia, holder of the National Award for Literature, who gave a detailed account of the tasks necessary to defend humanity today: stop the horror of financial capitalism, recognize the right of countries to decide their destiny, resist the imposition of one form of thinking, stimulate a liberating economy, insure knowledge for everyone, vindicate the principle of people’s sovereignty, avoid that the monopoly of information be converted into the monopoly of political power and defend memory. He concluded his presentation by reminding the participants that the nightmare lasts only as long as they want it to.
Brito Garcia also read a letter that Eduardo Galeano sent to the meeting, in which the Uruguayan writer wrote: “the culture of dignity is the answer to the culture of fear dominant in the world today.”
Galeano was also remembered by Adolfo Perez Esquivel (Nobel Peace Prize recipient), another of the speakers in the workshop. As an example of the situation in which humanity is living, the Argentinian defender of human rights recounted a story to the author of The Open Veins of Latin America during a trip to Italy: “a cook called a chicken, some ducks and some piglets to a meeting in the kitchen. The Cook told them:
“I have called you together to ask you a question—with which sauce do you want to be cooked?”
The poor animals were stupefied. Finally, the chicken responded:
“I don’t want to be cooked.”
“No, no”, the cook replied. “That’s out of the question. The only thing you can choose is the sauce in which you want to be cooked.”
What can prevent all of us being cooked, added Perez Esquivel, is resistance in order to construct another possible world, the building of a project of life instead of death and the construction of new spaces for freedom.
Faithful to the narrative style he chose for his presentation, the Nobel remembered the recommendation of a council of elders of an African nation: If you don’t know where you’re going, go back to try to find where you came from. He concluded by asking the participants, “Do we know where we’re going? What are our roots?”
The last person to speak before Hugo Chavez Argentinian journalist and congressperson Miguel Bonaso made some practical proposals to follow up the event.
He suggested globalizing the resistance in defense of humanity, creating a networking group under the host’s responsibility, creating a foundation to produce informative and pedagogical materials, publishing a weekly newsletter, naming an advisory committee and encouraging the formation of national capitals for the network.
He repeated an issue that was discussed in various roundtables during the event: breaking the information hold of CNN in the region, confronting the media monopolies and creating a Latin American television network.
--The Truncated Insurgency—
To reiterate his call for mounting an offensive in defense of humanity, President Chavez gave a recount of some recent actions of his government. He proudly told the participants about a scholarship program which awards the equivalent of 100 dollars a month to half a million students.
Wearing a military shirt, he announced that poverty and misery are the biggest problems in the world, and in order to combat them “we must give power to the poor people. They are their own emancipators.”
He read and analyzed in detail the most recent survey by Latinobarometro in regard to support for democracy in Latin America. The results showed an ample support for the Venezuelan government and for democracy in the country, as well as the rejection of the use of military solutions. Chavez abstained from making commentaries about the figures he read which showed different attitudes and opinions from those documented in other nations of the region.
As is his custom in public presentations, he referred amply to the life and struggle of Simon Bolivar to point out a moral: the revolution which Bolivar headed almost 200 years ago is still unfinished. What is being lived today in Venezuela and other countries of the region is the backlash of this truncated insurgency.
To close the workshop, dozens of participants from the 52 countries represented gave speeches, in many cases to express their solidarity with the Venezuelan revolution.
At that point, in the name of 39 US citizens present in the event, a delegate read a document in which they demanded an end to the aggressions by the US government against the democratically elected government of this South American nation and expressed their solidarity with the Bolivarian Revolution.
A big part of the community of progressive intellectuals has declared its love for a process with which only a few months ago they marked a distance. The honeymoon has begun.
Postscript by the translator: In order to begin funding the Network in Defense of Humanity, President Chavez has donated the Kadhafi Prize for Human Rights of 225.000 dollars which he recently received in Libya.
From La Jornada, December 5, 2004 (www.jornada.unam.mx)
SOME DAY MEXICO WILL RETURN TO LATIN AMERICA
Caracas. “Some day Mexico will return to Latin America”, said the President of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez, during the event “In Defense of Humanity”, and added: “Any government that represents its people’s interests is going to be strongly pressured.” The head of state declared himself villista and Zapatista, and exclaimed “Viva Mexico!”
Responding to questions from Mexican participant Gerardo Fernandez Casanova, the leader of the Bolivarian Revolution indicated that Mexico is very important in the construction of a Latin American community, and that Mexico has looked more toward the north and must look, sooner or later, toward the Southern Cone because of its culture and history.
--The Empire Strikes Back—
The most serious threat to humanity and the well-being of the world today is the immense power of the United States to destroy the planet with the huge quantity of nuclear arms it has accumulated, affirmed Ramsey Clark, US attorney general during the governments of Kennedy and Johnson. Clark added that the problem is a military power superior to that of the rest of the nations put together.
The second speaker designated to present in the workshop of the “Gathering of Intellectuals and Artists in Defense of Humanity”, the lawyer spoke “from the belly of the beast”, assuring the participants that the world would be much better if the people of the US had better criteria at the moment of choosing their leaders.
Remembering Martin Luther King, he indicated that the principal purveyors of violence in the world is “my country·, and added that the man with a dream never imagined how violence was going to increase in his country in the years after his death.
The former cabinet member recounted a long list of aggressions by the Bush administration against other nations as well as against US citizens. Other nations, he said, have the right to be free of the threat of invasion by the US.
Clark indicated in detail how the decisions of the UN are not respected by the US government and how they wanted to avoid the creation of the International Criminal Court, but because they couldn’t they refused to accept its jurisdiction.
He spoke very dramatically about the situation in which prisoners are living in Guantanamo. According to him, the message which the superpower is sending to the world is unequivocal: “He who dares to challenge us, just see what we are doing in the military base.”
He denounced that the bellicose offensive of Bush has provoked crimes against humanity, both by the use of “intelligent” bombs and the use of depleted uranium. It has also caused the celebration of torture.
Clark referred to the invasion and devastation of Iraq, and the terrible and emblematic destruction of the city of Fallujah, converted into a tragic symbol of this moment in history.
Presenting himself as “a lawyer who is not distanced from crime and delinquency”, he profoundly lamented the invasion in Haiti, just after the country had celebrated 200 years since the abolition of slavery, and the replacement of an elected government by a puppet regime. “The Haitian people”, he remarked, “are those who have suffered the most.”
From his point of view, the difference between what happened in Haiti in 2004 and what happened in Venezuela in 2002—year of the coup against Hugo Chavez—“is that in 2002 what the US wanted to happen didn’t work.”
Finally, he described the president of Venezuela as a good man, an effective leader very difficult to find in other governments and who is able to give his people well-being, health and education.
--The Chicken and the Cook—
The goal of the workshop was to establish a dialog the participants in the event and the President of Venezuela. It was kicked off by the writer Luis Brito Garcia, holder of the National Award for Literature, who gave a detailed account of the tasks necessary to defend humanity today: stop the horror of financial capitalism, recognize the right of countries to decide their destiny, resist the imposition of one form of thinking, stimulate a liberating economy, insure knowledge for everyone, vindicate the principle of people’s sovereignty, avoid that the monopoly of information be converted into the monopoly of political power and defend memory. He concluded his presentation by reminding the participants that the nightmare lasts only as long as they want it to.
Brito Garcia also read a letter that Eduardo Galeano sent to the meeting, in which the Uruguayan writer wrote: “the culture of dignity is the answer to the culture of fear dominant in the world today.”
Galeano was also remembered by Adolfo Perez Esquivel (Nobel Peace Prize recipient), another of the speakers in the workshop. As an example of the situation in which humanity is living, the Argentinian defender of human rights recounted a story to the author of The Open Veins of Latin America during a trip to Italy: “a cook called a chicken, some ducks and some piglets to a meeting in the kitchen. The Cook told them:
“I have called you together to ask you a question—with which sauce do you want to be cooked?”
The poor animals were stupefied. Finally, the chicken responded:
“I don’t want to be cooked.”
“No, no”, the cook replied. “That’s out of the question. The only thing you can choose is the sauce in which you want to be cooked.”
What can prevent all of us being cooked, added Perez Esquivel, is resistance in order to construct another possible world, the building of a project of life instead of death and the construction of new spaces for freedom.
Faithful to the narrative style he chose for his presentation, the Nobel remembered the recommendation of a council of elders of an African nation: If you don’t know where you’re going, go back to try to find where you came from. He concluded by asking the participants, “Do we know where we’re going? What are our roots?”
The last person to speak before Hugo Chavez Argentinian journalist and congressperson Miguel Bonaso made some practical proposals to follow up the event.
He suggested globalizing the resistance in defense of humanity, creating a networking group under the host’s responsibility, creating a foundation to produce informative and pedagogical materials, publishing a weekly newsletter, naming an advisory committee and encouraging the formation of national capitals for the network.
He repeated an issue that was discussed in various roundtables during the event: breaking the information hold of CNN in the region, confronting the media monopolies and creating a Latin American television network.
--The Truncated Insurgency—
To reiterate his call for mounting an offensive in defense of humanity, President Chavez gave a recount of some recent actions of his government. He proudly told the participants about a scholarship program which awards the equivalent of 100 dollars a month to half a million students.
Wearing a military shirt, he announced that poverty and misery are the biggest problems in the world, and in order to combat them “we must give power to the poor people. They are their own emancipators.”
He read and analyzed in detail the most recent survey by Latinobarometro in regard to support for democracy in Latin America. The results showed an ample support for the Venezuelan government and for democracy in the country, as well as the rejection of the use of military solutions. Chavez abstained from making commentaries about the figures he read which showed different attitudes and opinions from those documented in other nations of the region.
As is his custom in public presentations, he referred amply to the life and struggle of Simon Bolivar to point out a moral: the revolution which Bolivar headed almost 200 years ago is still unfinished. What is being lived today in Venezuela and other countries of the region is the backlash of this truncated insurgency.
To close the workshop, dozens of participants from the 52 countries represented gave speeches, in many cases to express their solidarity with the Venezuelan revolution.
At that point, in the name of 39 US citizens present in the event, a delegate read a document in which they demanded an end to the aggressions by the US government against the democratically elected government of this South American nation and expressed their solidarity with the Bolivarian Revolution.
A big part of the community of progressive intellectuals has declared its love for a process with which only a few months ago they marked a distance. The honeymoon has begun.
Postscript by the translator: In order to begin funding the Network in Defense of Humanity, President Chavez has donated the Kadhafi Prize for Human Rights of 225.000 dollars which he recently received in Libya.
Monday, November 22, 2004
RAVEN’S SEASON OF DISCONTENT
An empty blue scrim
of sky loops over Spokane.
Raven slices it
with his wing, scouting for clouds.
Frost falling on car windshields.
An early squirrel
darts up and down the oak’s bark,
runs to store his prize.
Raven dives, snatching the nut,
drops it in a garbage can.
Stalking a Greyhound
to Moses Lake, Raven laughs
at the three freezing
Panamanians in shorts
boarding the bus with backpacks.
At the Ellensburg
Subway, Raven turns up his
beak at the dumpster.
An old chinese man chasing
him away from his steamed bun.
In the abandoned
picnic ground near Lake Kachess,
Raven smells snow just
around the corner, and heads
over the pass to North Bend.
From Mount Si into
Seattle he beats his wings
through a storm, wishing
Ravens were migratory
and he had kept the acorn.
An empty blue scrim
of sky loops over Spokane.
Raven slices it
with his wing, scouting for clouds.
Frost falling on car windshields.
An early squirrel
darts up and down the oak’s bark,
runs to store his prize.
Raven dives, snatching the nut,
drops it in a garbage can.
Stalking a Greyhound
to Moses Lake, Raven laughs
at the three freezing
Panamanians in shorts
boarding the bus with backpacks.
At the Ellensburg
Subway, Raven turns up his
beak at the dumpster.
An old chinese man chasing
him away from his steamed bun.
In the abandoned
picnic ground near Lake Kachess,
Raven smells snow just
around the corner, and heads
over the pass to North Bend.
From Mount Si into
Seattle he beats his wings
through a storm, wishing
Ravens were migratory
and he had kept the acorn.
Tuesday, November 16, 2004
A DIET OF WORMS II
Raven is poring over some papers he printed out from the Internet.
A peso for your thoughts, guy.
“They may not be worth much more than that. On the other hand—the more I read about the fraud in the US election, the more I’m convinced that it wasn’t just some bloggers’ pipe-dream.”
Probably not. There HAD to be fraud. That’s why I had to go to the Venezuela news site http://www.aporrea.org/ to find out about the exit polls that showed Kerry winning in Ohio and Florida. Wall Street brokers had access to those polls beginning in the morning of November 2nd, but the public at large didn’t. The problem is going to be proving the fraud, because I am sure it was done inconsistently.
“Remember the enormous stink that the Bush Gang raised about fraud in the August 15th Venezuelan referendum on Hugo Chavez? Even after the Carter Center folks did an audit that showed that the vote was clean, they were still insisting that there had been a massive fraud.”
In Venezuela they were ABLE to do an audit—easily and quickly—because all they had to do was compare the voting machine printout totals with the paper ballots that were printed out and deposited in the ballot boxes. In the US election the Bush Gang made damn sure that there were not 2 parts to be compared in an audit. Moreover, they deliberately created chaos.
“Apparently the Libertarians and Greens have called for a recount in Ohio.”
Good for them! So long as they can raise the money for it, they are surely entitled. Even though they have no chance of winning anything.
“It all smells of something really rotten.” Raven peers at the chunk of cheese he’s been pecking. “Or maybe it’s this ersatz camembert. How long have we had it?”
I’m not sure. While you were having your masochistic romance with the Worms Diet, a lot of food was just cooling its heels in the refri.
“Maybe it’s time to toss some of it. Beginning with the cheese. I don’t mind a strong flavor, but....”
You got spoiled eating live worms, I think.
“I can think of several live worms I wouldn’t mind pecking at right now, but they aren’t in our garden.”
They wouldn’t happen to be in close proximity to the White House rose garden, would they?
“Given that Bush ordered a purge of the CIA, they might very well be in those environs, yes.”
Why is he purging the CIA?
“I guess he decided that some of the agents weren’t blindly loyal.”
How can you tell if they are blindly loyal, or only blind, Rave?
“Is that a joke or a riddle?”
Actually, it was more or less a straightforward question.
“Right. My only hope is that the new bunch is just as inept as the previous ones. Otherwise, there will be a new proliferation of assassination plots against Hugo Chavez—ones that are maybe less goofy than the capers they’ve cooked up in the past.”
Bite your tongue, boy! Figuratively speaking, of course. The proper target of assassination plots in drooling on the desk in the Oval Office.
“Yeah, but life is not fair—a bitter recognition that led me to the ill-fated, though mercifully brief, Diet of Worms. And to the spoiling of perfectly good cheese.”
For want of a horse, the kingdom was lost?
“That needs updating: because of a horse’s ass, the planet faces extinction.”
Raven heads for the door.
“And in the spirit of Raven Ritual, I’m going to bury this cheese in the garden.”
Good idea. Let the worms have a go at it.
Raven is poring over some papers he printed out from the Internet.
A peso for your thoughts, guy.
“They may not be worth much more than that. On the other hand—the more I read about the fraud in the US election, the more I’m convinced that it wasn’t just some bloggers’ pipe-dream.”
Probably not. There HAD to be fraud. That’s why I had to go to the Venezuela news site http://www.aporrea.org/ to find out about the exit polls that showed Kerry winning in Ohio and Florida. Wall Street brokers had access to those polls beginning in the morning of November 2nd, but the public at large didn’t. The problem is going to be proving the fraud, because I am sure it was done inconsistently.
“Remember the enormous stink that the Bush Gang raised about fraud in the August 15th Venezuelan referendum on Hugo Chavez? Even after the Carter Center folks did an audit that showed that the vote was clean, they were still insisting that there had been a massive fraud.”
In Venezuela they were ABLE to do an audit—easily and quickly—because all they had to do was compare the voting machine printout totals with the paper ballots that were printed out and deposited in the ballot boxes. In the US election the Bush Gang made damn sure that there were not 2 parts to be compared in an audit. Moreover, they deliberately created chaos.
“Apparently the Libertarians and Greens have called for a recount in Ohio.”
Good for them! So long as they can raise the money for it, they are surely entitled. Even though they have no chance of winning anything.
“It all smells of something really rotten.” Raven peers at the chunk of cheese he’s been pecking. “Or maybe it’s this ersatz camembert. How long have we had it?”
I’m not sure. While you were having your masochistic romance with the Worms Diet, a lot of food was just cooling its heels in the refri.
“Maybe it’s time to toss some of it. Beginning with the cheese. I don’t mind a strong flavor, but....”
You got spoiled eating live worms, I think.
“I can think of several live worms I wouldn’t mind pecking at right now, but they aren’t in our garden.”
They wouldn’t happen to be in close proximity to the White House rose garden, would they?
“Given that Bush ordered a purge of the CIA, they might very well be in those environs, yes.”
Why is he purging the CIA?
“I guess he decided that some of the agents weren’t blindly loyal.”
How can you tell if they are blindly loyal, or only blind, Rave?
“Is that a joke or a riddle?”
Actually, it was more or less a straightforward question.
“Right. My only hope is that the new bunch is just as inept as the previous ones. Otherwise, there will be a new proliferation of assassination plots against Hugo Chavez—ones that are maybe less goofy than the capers they’ve cooked up in the past.”
Bite your tongue, boy! Figuratively speaking, of course. The proper target of assassination plots in drooling on the desk in the Oval Office.
“Yeah, but life is not fair—a bitter recognition that led me to the ill-fated, though mercifully brief, Diet of Worms. And to the spoiling of perfectly good cheese.”
For want of a horse, the kingdom was lost?
“That needs updating: because of a horse’s ass, the planet faces extinction.”
Raven heads for the door.
“And in the spirit of Raven Ritual, I’m going to bury this cheese in the garden.”
Good idea. Let the worms have a go at it.
Friday, November 12, 2004
A DIET OF WORMS
Raven is down in the dumps, again. I had thought he would be glad to see me, but he is immeasurably glum.
“Even cinnamon rolls have lost their charm.” He pecks listlessly at one.
I brought you cinnamon BEARS and atomic fireballs from the States. Maybe those will perk you up.
“I doubt it. Nothing you could bring me from the States would be welcome. Four more years of the Cross-Eyed Cretin is too heavy a cross to bear.”
Four more years of the MEANSPIRITED Cross-Eyed Cretin. I told you not to underestimate the ignorance and stupidity of the US electorate.
“Yeah. Yeah. How could you stand to rub elbows with that ilk?”
Actually, I kept my elbows at a good distance from most of them. Which wasn’t too difficult since there is no street life in Seattle or Spokane.
“What was it that Hendrix said: ‘There ain’t no life nowhere?’”
He checked out early. During Nixon, in fact. He missed the coup against Allende, Operation Condor, Iran-Contra, the death squads financed by the US in El Salvador and Guatemala, the bombing of Libya, the invasions of Grenada and Panama, the Gulf War and all the more recent atrocities.
“Smart guy. Saw the handwriting on the wall and it turned his stomach.”
Literally. So what do you want to do, Rave? Waste away to a shadow of your former self?
“The whole world is going to continue suffering because of your wrong-headed compatriots. How many other countries will they invade now? I suppose Iran: lots of luck. Venezuela: ditto. North Korea: they’ll need a lot more than luck. Cuba: who knows what surprises Fidel will hand them?”
It was Black Tuesday, allright. In Seattle it was raining like hell. Juana and I hid out for the last two hours of voting at the Goodwill store.
“Ironic, don’t you think? The day itself should have been called Ill Will.”
Raven pours his mostly un-drunk coffee down the drain.
Rave, you can’t just turn up your toes because of this. After all, we ARE in Mexico: Sun. Street life. Tacos al pastor....
“And the audible sound of president Fox kissing Bush’s butt. Great. Now, if Ravens had a more southerly habitat—say, as far south as Caracas....”
Well, they don’t. We found that out already. You were socially deprived. And I was wasting away on my Saturn line. Despite the presence of The Leo of My Dreams, Hugo Chavez.
You know, I’m not asking for a perfect world. Just for a small appearance of reason—the faculty your species claims to have and shows no evidence of having.”
I agree with you; we’re living in a completely senseless time.
“So, what are YOU going to do about it?”
What do you WANT me to do? Tear out my hair? It’s already too short. Rend my garments? I am grinding away trying to write a play about the Nez Perce War of 1877. It’s called “Smoke and Mirrors”—sort of like the US Defense Department’s “Shock and Awe”—only in an earlier century when it was called, more honestly, the War Department.
“Sounds like escapism to me.”
Well, it does have masks, and it isn’t strictly realistic.
“I didn’t mean the play—I meant your writing it sounds like escapism.”
Sigh. Listen, Rave—it’s either that or working. I’m not ready for suicide.
“I might be. In the meantime, I’m going to eschew the atomic fireballs and go out in the garden to eat worms.”
Raven leaves, droopily, through the kitchen window.
(Who can blame him? The fireballs aren’t all that satisfying, anyway.)
Raven is down in the dumps, again. I had thought he would be glad to see me, but he is immeasurably glum.
“Even cinnamon rolls have lost their charm.” He pecks listlessly at one.
I brought you cinnamon BEARS and atomic fireballs from the States. Maybe those will perk you up.
“I doubt it. Nothing you could bring me from the States would be welcome. Four more years of the Cross-Eyed Cretin is too heavy a cross to bear.”
Four more years of the MEANSPIRITED Cross-Eyed Cretin. I told you not to underestimate the ignorance and stupidity of the US electorate.
“Yeah. Yeah. How could you stand to rub elbows with that ilk?”
Actually, I kept my elbows at a good distance from most of them. Which wasn’t too difficult since there is no street life in Seattle or Spokane.
“What was it that Hendrix said: ‘There ain’t no life nowhere?’”
He checked out early. During Nixon, in fact. He missed the coup against Allende, Operation Condor, Iran-Contra, the death squads financed by the US in El Salvador and Guatemala, the bombing of Libya, the invasions of Grenada and Panama, the Gulf War and all the more recent atrocities.
“Smart guy. Saw the handwriting on the wall and it turned his stomach.”
Literally. So what do you want to do, Rave? Waste away to a shadow of your former self?
“The whole world is going to continue suffering because of your wrong-headed compatriots. How many other countries will they invade now? I suppose Iran: lots of luck. Venezuela: ditto. North Korea: they’ll need a lot more than luck. Cuba: who knows what surprises Fidel will hand them?”
It was Black Tuesday, allright. In Seattle it was raining like hell. Juana and I hid out for the last two hours of voting at the Goodwill store.
“Ironic, don’t you think? The day itself should have been called Ill Will.”
Raven pours his mostly un-drunk coffee down the drain.
Rave, you can’t just turn up your toes because of this. After all, we ARE in Mexico: Sun. Street life. Tacos al pastor....
“And the audible sound of president Fox kissing Bush’s butt. Great. Now, if Ravens had a more southerly habitat—say, as far south as Caracas....”
Well, they don’t. We found that out already. You were socially deprived. And I was wasting away on my Saturn line. Despite the presence of The Leo of My Dreams, Hugo Chavez.
You know, I’m not asking for a perfect world. Just for a small appearance of reason—the faculty your species claims to have and shows no evidence of having.”
I agree with you; we’re living in a completely senseless time.
“So, what are YOU going to do about it?”
What do you WANT me to do? Tear out my hair? It’s already too short. Rend my garments? I am grinding away trying to write a play about the Nez Perce War of 1877. It’s called “Smoke and Mirrors”—sort of like the US Defense Department’s “Shock and Awe”—only in an earlier century when it was called, more honestly, the War Department.
“Sounds like escapism to me.”
Well, it does have masks, and it isn’t strictly realistic.
“I didn’t mean the play—I meant your writing it sounds like escapism.”
Sigh. Listen, Rave—it’s either that or working. I’m not ready for suicide.
“I might be. In the meantime, I’m going to eschew the atomic fireballs and go out in the garden to eat worms.”
Raven leaves, droopily, through the kitchen window.
(Who can blame him? The fireballs aren’t all that satisfying, anyway.)
Thursday, September 23, 2004
DAYS OF WRATH
Raven is outraged.
“Look at this asshole, Bush, defending his illegal war in the UN! Doesn’t that guy ever feel shame?”
I don’t know, Rave. Shame is one of the principal roots of alcoholism, so he must have felt it at one time or other.
“He must have drowned it in alcohol, you mean. And here he is again, refusing to contribute to the fun to eliminate world hunger. Chirac says 110 countries are party to the program, and that soon there may be 150. Only the US is against it. Another shameful posture.”
Rave, don’t drink anymore coffee this morning. You’re at risk for a strroke.
“If I weren’t a bird I’d be smoking cigarettes, too. What the hell!”
I see: birds can do coffee, but doing cigarettes is shameful.
“Something like that, yes. Another US hostage was beheaded in Iraq. A British hostage is begging for his life in a video. But for Bush, everything is hunky dory.”
That’s a term I haven’t heard in awhile. What else is new and exciting in the world?
Raven changes pages in Internet.
“Hugo Chavez didn’t go the new York City to give his speech at the UN because something was wrong with one of his plane’s engines. Here he is in fatigues on the Colombian border. Don’t worry, I’ll print out the photo for you. And La Jornada says the world will explode if Bush is elected, perdon—re-elected.”
Close, but no cigar. The Mayan prophecies say that the world won’t explode for another 7 or 8 years.
“Maybe the calendrical correlations from the Mayan to the Gregorian calendar are off by just a feather—that could easily create a 3 or 4 year difference.”
You might be right, my fine feathered friend. I was reading something about the End of the World—or the Coming of the Messiah—being behind the Israeli’s mad campaign to blow up the Middle East.
“We need to put on that CD that has the ‘Dies Irae’, don’t you think? Remember when the people were all biting the dust from the Black Plague in that Bergmann film, ‘The Seventh Seal’, and they paraded around in the towns scourging themselves and singing the ‘Dies Irae’?
I remember that very well, Rave. The knight returning from battling Arabs in the Crusades was playing chess with Death. That film is in my Top Ten. I also remember all too well singing the ‘Dies Irae’ in the hot, stinky choir loft of St. Andrew’s church every time somebody paid for a Requiem mass. Days of wrath. You’ve got something. They are here. A Requiem for the planet is in order.
“Days of Wrath are a logical reaction to the action of ‘Shock and Awe’. Or whatever the Pentagon called the Iraq invasion. The whole thing sticks in my craw like a piece of rotten meat.”
Nice breakfast imagery. Is that a plot to get your beak around the last of my hash-browned potatoes?
“Never even crossed my mind.”
I’ll bet. At least you have a mind TO cross. Crossing Bush’s mind would be like setting off across the Sahara—with no camel, and no oasis in sight.
“Since you brought it up, I wouldn’t mind taking just a peck or two at those potatoes. After all, the world could explode any minute.”
I give up. Peck all of them.
“You’re a peach.”
Don’t push it. This could be MY day of wrath.
Raven is outraged.
“Look at this asshole, Bush, defending his illegal war in the UN! Doesn’t that guy ever feel shame?”
I don’t know, Rave. Shame is one of the principal roots of alcoholism, so he must have felt it at one time or other.
“He must have drowned it in alcohol, you mean. And here he is again, refusing to contribute to the fun to eliminate world hunger. Chirac says 110 countries are party to the program, and that soon there may be 150. Only the US is against it. Another shameful posture.”
Rave, don’t drink anymore coffee this morning. You’re at risk for a strroke.
“If I weren’t a bird I’d be smoking cigarettes, too. What the hell!”
I see: birds can do coffee, but doing cigarettes is shameful.
“Something like that, yes. Another US hostage was beheaded in Iraq. A British hostage is begging for his life in a video. But for Bush, everything is hunky dory.”
That’s a term I haven’t heard in awhile. What else is new and exciting in the world?
Raven changes pages in Internet.
“Hugo Chavez didn’t go the new York City to give his speech at the UN because something was wrong with one of his plane’s engines. Here he is in fatigues on the Colombian border. Don’t worry, I’ll print out the photo for you. And La Jornada says the world will explode if Bush is elected, perdon—re-elected.”
Close, but no cigar. The Mayan prophecies say that the world won’t explode for another 7 or 8 years.
“Maybe the calendrical correlations from the Mayan to the Gregorian calendar are off by just a feather—that could easily create a 3 or 4 year difference.”
You might be right, my fine feathered friend. I was reading something about the End of the World—or the Coming of the Messiah—being behind the Israeli’s mad campaign to blow up the Middle East.
“We need to put on that CD that has the ‘Dies Irae’, don’t you think? Remember when the people were all biting the dust from the Black Plague in that Bergmann film, ‘The Seventh Seal’, and they paraded around in the towns scourging themselves and singing the ‘Dies Irae’?
I remember that very well, Rave. The knight returning from battling Arabs in the Crusades was playing chess with Death. That film is in my Top Ten. I also remember all too well singing the ‘Dies Irae’ in the hot, stinky choir loft of St. Andrew’s church every time somebody paid for a Requiem mass. Days of wrath. You’ve got something. They are here. A Requiem for the planet is in order.
“Days of Wrath are a logical reaction to the action of ‘Shock and Awe’. Or whatever the Pentagon called the Iraq invasion. The whole thing sticks in my craw like a piece of rotten meat.”
Nice breakfast imagery. Is that a plot to get your beak around the last of my hash-browned potatoes?
“Never even crossed my mind.”
I’ll bet. At least you have a mind TO cross. Crossing Bush’s mind would be like setting off across the Sahara—with no camel, and no oasis in sight.
“Since you brought it up, I wouldn’t mind taking just a peck or two at those potatoes. After all, the world could explode any minute.”
I give up. Peck all of them.
“You’re a peach.”
Don’t push it. This could be MY day of wrath.
Tuesday, August 31, 2004
IDLE (CLASS) SPECULATION?
Raven is pleased with his toast. It’s got just enough charring to make his tiny carbonized eyes gleam.
“Are we going back to Venezuela soon?”
First we have to go to the States, Rave. Remember? The election and all that.
“Yeah, sadly, I do remember. Tweedledee and Tweedledumb. But Chavez is all over the news because he’s going to go full bore now with the agrarian reform.”
It’s time. All he has distributed so far has been land owned by the government. It’s the moment to go after idle land—of which there is plenty in Venezuela, as the big landholders have been living off the ill-gotten oil gains for close to 50 years. Venezuela has had the highest ratio of imported food products in the hemisphere—with 70%.
“Well, Chavez is ready to turn that around now. He says here that not only will the country use every available piece of arable land to produce food, that they will export food.”
Heap big change, guy. I’ll bet the opposition will be cooking up all kinds of capers to try to beat back any radical advance in the reform process.
“They already are—on aporrea.org they have reported that 5 of Chavez’ military escorts are in the hospital. Seems they were driving to Caracas very early in the morning when a vehicle came up behind theirs and hit it, forcing it off the road. It apparently rolled over, and that’s how the guys were injured.”
Amazing how the opposition—because of its status as representing the idle class—has all kinds of time available for pulling dirty tricks.
“I don’t know about this class stuff. I consider myself to be part of the idle class, since you’re the one who works to put food on the table—not food on your family, at least---and my dirty tricking has trickled down to almost nothing.”
Rave, I am not going to touch that line. I can understand that you want to be the Lone Raven in Venezuela—again—but you need to pack your ear-muffs, because we are heading North.
“I don’t really have ears, but nice furry earmuffs could be nice. Then I won’t have to listen to anybody.”
You and George W. Bush—his muffs are built-in. They cost more, because of genetic engineering, but he can afford them because he represents the idle class—and they are more effective at shutting out other folks’ opinions, ideas, points of view.
“Guess I’ll pass on the muffs—and anything else that would relate me to Bush.”
Does that mean you are swearing off pretzels?
“I’ll have to think about that tomorrow.” He scrapes the last bits of toast crumbs into the garbage.
Raven, a bird to make Margaret Mitchell proud.
Raven is pleased with his toast. It’s got just enough charring to make his tiny carbonized eyes gleam.
“Are we going back to Venezuela soon?”
First we have to go to the States, Rave. Remember? The election and all that.
“Yeah, sadly, I do remember. Tweedledee and Tweedledumb. But Chavez is all over the news because he’s going to go full bore now with the agrarian reform.”
It’s time. All he has distributed so far has been land owned by the government. It’s the moment to go after idle land—of which there is plenty in Venezuela, as the big landholders have been living off the ill-gotten oil gains for close to 50 years. Venezuela has had the highest ratio of imported food products in the hemisphere—with 70%.
“Well, Chavez is ready to turn that around now. He says here that not only will the country use every available piece of arable land to produce food, that they will export food.”
Heap big change, guy. I’ll bet the opposition will be cooking up all kinds of capers to try to beat back any radical advance in the reform process.
“They already are—on aporrea.org they have reported that 5 of Chavez’ military escorts are in the hospital. Seems they were driving to Caracas very early in the morning when a vehicle came up behind theirs and hit it, forcing it off the road. It apparently rolled over, and that’s how the guys were injured.”
Amazing how the opposition—because of its status as representing the idle class—has all kinds of time available for pulling dirty tricks.
“I don’t know about this class stuff. I consider myself to be part of the idle class, since you’re the one who works to put food on the table—not food on your family, at least---and my dirty tricking has trickled down to almost nothing.”
Rave, I am not going to touch that line. I can understand that you want to be the Lone Raven in Venezuela—again—but you need to pack your ear-muffs, because we are heading North.
“I don’t really have ears, but nice furry earmuffs could be nice. Then I won’t have to listen to anybody.”
You and George W. Bush—his muffs are built-in. They cost more, because of genetic engineering, but he can afford them because he represents the idle class—and they are more effective at shutting out other folks’ opinions, ideas, points of view.
“Guess I’ll pass on the muffs—and anything else that would relate me to Bush.”
Does that mean you are swearing off pretzels?
“I’ll have to think about that tomorrow.” He scrapes the last bits of toast crumbs into the garbage.
Raven, a bird to make Margaret Mitchell proud.
Thursday, August 26, 2004
RUBBER BULLETS
Raven is pecking half-heartedly at a granola bar.
“This tastes like sand. Don’t we have anything tasty around here?”
We ate the last cinnamon roll last night. Can’t you distract yourself in Internet or something?
“The news just gets more and more depressing. Have you been following the Rubber Bullet story?”
You mean the agreement the Mexican government made—on its knees—to permit US Border Patrol cops to shoot rubber bullets filled with chile at Mexican “indocumentados”?
“Precisely that, yes. Derbez, the chancellor, went before the legislature and said that there had only been 234 incidents of what he called “plastic” bullets, and that nobody had complained.”
Just what were they supposed to do—sue the Border Patrol? Reminds me of the time when that terrible restaurant in Cuautla gave me spoiled orange juice for breakfast. When I took it back to complain to the cook she informed me that yes, she had squeezed some spoiled oranges when she was making the juice, but that I was the only person who had complained!
“Anyway, he mumbled something about looking over the agreement, but basically said that it would remain in place. I can’t imagine anything more shameful than a country’s government maintaining and promoting an agreement that lets the US Border Patrol shoot at its citizens—regardless of whether the bullets are lead or rubber—or plastic!”
I can think of something more shameful: the very real possibility that US citizens—despite all the lying and the pandering to petroleum and the sadism and the wanton disregard for other people’s rights that the Bush Gang has demonstrated—vote to re-elect George W.
Raven shoves aside the remains of the granola bar.
“That does it for me. As a stomach-turner, the Cross-eyed Cretin has no peer.”
Raven is pecking half-heartedly at a granola bar.
“This tastes like sand. Don’t we have anything tasty around here?”
We ate the last cinnamon roll last night. Can’t you distract yourself in Internet or something?
“The news just gets more and more depressing. Have you been following the Rubber Bullet story?”
You mean the agreement the Mexican government made—on its knees—to permit US Border Patrol cops to shoot rubber bullets filled with chile at Mexican “indocumentados”?
“Precisely that, yes. Derbez, the chancellor, went before the legislature and said that there had only been 234 incidents of what he called “plastic” bullets, and that nobody had complained.”
Just what were they supposed to do—sue the Border Patrol? Reminds me of the time when that terrible restaurant in Cuautla gave me spoiled orange juice for breakfast. When I took it back to complain to the cook she informed me that yes, she had squeezed some spoiled oranges when she was making the juice, but that I was the only person who had complained!
“Anyway, he mumbled something about looking over the agreement, but basically said that it would remain in place. I can’t imagine anything more shameful than a country’s government maintaining and promoting an agreement that lets the US Border Patrol shoot at its citizens—regardless of whether the bullets are lead or rubber—or plastic!”
I can think of something more shameful: the very real possibility that US citizens—despite all the lying and the pandering to petroleum and the sadism and the wanton disregard for other people’s rights that the Bush Gang has demonstrated—vote to re-elect George W.
Raven shoves aside the remains of the granola bar.
“That does it for me. As a stomach-turner, the Cross-eyed Cretin has no peer.”
Tuesday, August 17, 2004
A BEAM OF LIGHT
So, Raven, are your eyes fried from reading the news?
“They are at the point of over-easy. I have used both sides of them reading about the overwhelming Chavez victory in the Venezuela referendum. Looks as if he did hit the home run into the White House like he said he was going to.”
He’s a big talker, but he puts his money where his mouth is.
“Meanwhile the CIA has been hatching assassination plots during the past week in Santiago, Chile. Operation Allende II seems to be moving into the desperate end phase.”
I hope not, Rave. Venezuela is a beam of light in an otherwise dark planet.
“Yeah, when I put the sun and moon and stars up there”—Raven peers skyward—I thought they would shine forever. I was pretty ingenuous back in those days.”
We all were.
So, Raven, are your eyes fried from reading the news?
“They are at the point of over-easy. I have used both sides of them reading about the overwhelming Chavez victory in the Venezuela referendum. Looks as if he did hit the home run into the White House like he said he was going to.”
He’s a big talker, but he puts his money where his mouth is.
“Meanwhile the CIA has been hatching assassination plots during the past week in Santiago, Chile. Operation Allende II seems to be moving into the desperate end phase.”
I hope not, Rave. Venezuela is a beam of light in an otherwise dark planet.
“Yeah, when I put the sun and moon and stars up there”—Raven peers skyward—I thought they would shine forever. I was pretty ingenuous back in those days.”
We all were.
Friday, July 09, 2004
THE SOAP AMENDMENT
Raven is dunking a piece of cinnamon bark in his coffee.
Didn’t I put a big enough piece of bark in the pot when I made the coffee?
“You did fine. I am thinking about eating some of this, so I’m softening it up.”
May I ask why you’re going to eat it?
“I was reading that cinnamon is a hot food that stimulates the body’s energy and recuperative powers. So I thought I’d give it a try.”
I see. Have you read anything else interesting this morning?
“Actually, yeah.” Raven turns to look at the computer screen. “Turns out the Soap Amendment passed in the US House of Representatives.”
What is the Soap Amendment?
“That’s not its real name. That’s my name for it. It was an amendment proposed to rescind a part of the Bush Gang’s latest abusive measures against Cuba. So that Cubans in the island could continue to receive packages from family members in the States with so-called first priority articles, such as food, toothpaste and soap.”
So now they’ll be able to receive the soap, right?
“Uh huh. Only once a month, though.”
They need to send a lot, then. Cubans, like other Latin Americans, are conspicuously cleaner than folks from the States. Well, just a minute. There are exceptions—yesterday in the taxi I had to roll down the window even though it was raining because the taxista stank to….
“I get the picture. Let me eat my cinnamon bark without vomiting, okay?”
I can’t imagine you vomiting, Rave. I thought Ravens were omnivorous.
“Theoretically, that’s true. But we do vomit. Vultures vomit a lot more, though, and their vomit is a staple of Eagle’s diet.”
You’re pulling my leg.
“Would I do that? No need to answer. I don’t think the cinnamon bark is working. I am still nauseated thinking about Bush rubbing his grubby hands together and thinking that Cuban people won’t be able to bathe or brush their teeth.”
Or EAT! Didn’t you say that food was the other first priority item he was trying to head off at the pass?
“Yep” Raven looks very sly. “Eagle would say….”
Rave, don’t go there. Go for a flight, please.
Raven flies out the window with the piece of cinnamon bark in his claw, and drops it in the neighbor’s garbage can.
Raven is dunking a piece of cinnamon bark in his coffee.
Didn’t I put a big enough piece of bark in the pot when I made the coffee?
“You did fine. I am thinking about eating some of this, so I’m softening it up.”
May I ask why you’re going to eat it?
“I was reading that cinnamon is a hot food that stimulates the body’s energy and recuperative powers. So I thought I’d give it a try.”
I see. Have you read anything else interesting this morning?
“Actually, yeah.” Raven turns to look at the computer screen. “Turns out the Soap Amendment passed in the US House of Representatives.”
What is the Soap Amendment?
“That’s not its real name. That’s my name for it. It was an amendment proposed to rescind a part of the Bush Gang’s latest abusive measures against Cuba. So that Cubans in the island could continue to receive packages from family members in the States with so-called first priority articles, such as food, toothpaste and soap.”
So now they’ll be able to receive the soap, right?
“Uh huh. Only once a month, though.”
They need to send a lot, then. Cubans, like other Latin Americans, are conspicuously cleaner than folks from the States. Well, just a minute. There are exceptions—yesterday in the taxi I had to roll down the window even though it was raining because the taxista stank to….
“I get the picture. Let me eat my cinnamon bark without vomiting, okay?”
I can’t imagine you vomiting, Rave. I thought Ravens were omnivorous.
“Theoretically, that’s true. But we do vomit. Vultures vomit a lot more, though, and their vomit is a staple of Eagle’s diet.”
You’re pulling my leg.
“Would I do that? No need to answer. I don’t think the cinnamon bark is working. I am still nauseated thinking about Bush rubbing his grubby hands together and thinking that Cuban people won’t be able to bathe or brush their teeth.”
Or EAT! Didn’t you say that food was the other first priority item he was trying to head off at the pass?
“Yep” Raven looks very sly. “Eagle would say….”
Rave, don’t go there. Go for a flight, please.
Raven flies out the window with the piece of cinnamon bark in his claw, and drops it in the neighbor’s garbage can.
Thursday, July 08, 2004
KENNY BOY IN HANDCUFFS
Raven is lying on his back on the table with his tiny feet in the air.
What’s going on, guy? Are you sick?
“I’m fantasizing.”
Should I ask what about? Or are these fantasies that I shouldn’t know about?
“No. They’re pretty harmless, actually. The first one is about quesadillas with sautéed onions and habanero chiles. You could probably even make that into a reality, if you wanted to. The second is about ‘Kenny Boy’, Bush’s energy gangster buddy, rotting in jail.”
Do you really think he’ll be rotting? I don’t think so. They always put the high-roller crooks in very cushy country club-type prisons. If Kenny Boy does get popped into the slammer, he’ll be teeing off every morning at 11 somewhere in Connecticut.
“I told you it was a fantasy. But wouldn’t it be great to see the Bush Gang’s house of cards start checking in behind bars?”
Of course it would. I’ll get right on those quesadillas. Geez, I sound like Martha Stewart—another potential jailbird—oops, sorry, Rave.
“You’ll be forgiven if you add some sliced avocadoes.”
Raven is lying on his back on the table with his tiny feet in the air.
What’s going on, guy? Are you sick?
“I’m fantasizing.”
Should I ask what about? Or are these fantasies that I shouldn’t know about?
“No. They’re pretty harmless, actually. The first one is about quesadillas with sautéed onions and habanero chiles. You could probably even make that into a reality, if you wanted to. The second is about ‘Kenny Boy’, Bush’s energy gangster buddy, rotting in jail.”
Do you really think he’ll be rotting? I don’t think so. They always put the high-roller crooks in very cushy country club-type prisons. If Kenny Boy does get popped into the slammer, he’ll be teeing off every morning at 11 somewhere in Connecticut.
“I told you it was a fantasy. But wouldn’t it be great to see the Bush Gang’s house of cards start checking in behind bars?”
Of course it would. I’ll get right on those quesadillas. Geez, I sound like Martha Stewart—another potential jailbird—oops, sorry, Rave.
“You’ll be forgiven if you add some sliced avocadoes.”
SOCKS UP, BOSS!
“You know, we haven’t said anything about the passing of Marlon Brando to another plane of existence.” Raven smears butter on the top of his cinnamon roll, and nudges it into the toaster oven.
Another plane, huh? It’s true, the last time I saw him he could’ve filled most of the seats on a 727.
“This is not the moment for word games and sarcasm. He was a great actor, and I will miss him.” Raven is watching the butter melt on the roll and run down into the pan and burn.
I hope you’re planning on cleaning the drip pan, Rave. I hate those little burnt butter crusts.
“Not sure I see an apron in my future, but I thank you for buying the toaster. Now I can dunk fresher breads in my coffee.”
Where were you when I was lugging it back from Tuxtepec on the bus—it and a morral full of groceries—with a religious fanatic shouting in my ear?
“I was grieving the passing of an almost immortal actor. With candles. Who could ever forget, ‘Cha-ly, Cha-ly, I coulda bin a contenda’ in the back of that old car with Rod Steiger in ON THE WATERFRONT?”
Okay. I’ll get in the spirit. I will personally never forget “You scum-suckin’ pig” from ONE EYED JACKS, Brando’s one directorial effort. “Gob of spit” was pretty good, too. I had a very offbeat boyfriend from Walnut Grove, Mississippi, when I was at university—J.L. and I used to go to the drive-ins in the Seattle area whenever they showed ONE EYED JACKS, with a jug of vodka and a box of antibiotic lozenges, and wait to say those famous lines along with Brando.
“Geez, nothing like trivializing a great star. Some of these coconut threads on the top of the roll burned. Think I’ll use the lower rack position next time.”
Trivial! Your food obsession isn’t trivial?
“I’m sorry. I really am. Remember ‘What are you rebelling against, Johnny?’ And Brando says, ‘Whadda ya got?’ in THE WILD ONE.”
That was what we call a cheap shot. A good cheap shot. What he did with his eyes in VIVA ZAPATA was really silly, though. He was always up to some gimmick like that, or the chewed-up paper in his jaws in THE GODFATHER.
“He did something funny with his eyes in TEAHOUSE OF THE AUGUST MOON, too, as I remember.”
That turkey! Excuse me, guy, I know I am not suppose to call things turkeys or say that people are crazy as loons, but sometimes they just slip out. TEAHOUSE had to be one of the worst pictures he ever made. Worse than THE APALOOSA—which at least had nice camera work.
“Well, he did start telling everybody he was only making movies for the money right about that time.”
And talk about silly lines and racist caricatures! When he gave that idiotic grin and said “Socks up, boss”. What an insult to Japanese people!
“I see your point. It was maybe a little too soon after Hiroshima and Nagasaki to be in impeccably good taste, but I sort of liked his Sakini character. There was something about him that was, I don’t know….”
Tricky. That’s what he was. And that’s why you liked him in the part. Because he was like you when you’re up to something devious.
“Maybe. But you could never top that scene in LAST TANGO IN PARIS where he talks to his dead wife in the casket in that cheap hotel with all those flowers around her.”
Probably not. No one but Brando could eat that many hortensias and survive to dance the tango with Maria Schneider.
“Are you saying he over-acted that scene?”
Let’s just say that one of the things Brando did exceptionally well was to chew scenery. He could do that Method Mumble to perfection—the high point probably coming in APOCALYPSE NOW. Don’t get me wrong, Rave—Brando was great. Two of his films are in my all-time Top Ten list. But with that Socks up, Boss routine he went way beyond over-acting into just plain mugging. And he was almost always on the edge of doing that. That was another unique aspect of Brando—he could distance himself from the character he was playing—even poke fun at the character he was playing-- and still convince us of his acting skill.
“As if he was both actor and film critic?”
Raven doesn’t look too convinced.
Maybe. Let’s put it this way—John Ford and Marlon Brando fascinated me in the 50s, inclined me to think about film and its relationship to reality. That’s one of the things film criticism does—sometimes. They did not incline me to be a director or an actor, however.
“Geez, that was pompous. Is that your final word?”
No. My final words are: WASH THE DRIP PAN, RAVE!
“And mine are: Socks WAY WAY up for Marlon Brando, THE actor of the 20th century.”
“You know, we haven’t said anything about the passing of Marlon Brando to another plane of existence.” Raven smears butter on the top of his cinnamon roll, and nudges it into the toaster oven.
Another plane, huh? It’s true, the last time I saw him he could’ve filled most of the seats on a 727.
“This is not the moment for word games and sarcasm. He was a great actor, and I will miss him.” Raven is watching the butter melt on the roll and run down into the pan and burn.
I hope you’re planning on cleaning the drip pan, Rave. I hate those little burnt butter crusts.
“Not sure I see an apron in my future, but I thank you for buying the toaster. Now I can dunk fresher breads in my coffee.”
Where were you when I was lugging it back from Tuxtepec on the bus—it and a morral full of groceries—with a religious fanatic shouting in my ear?
“I was grieving the passing of an almost immortal actor. With candles. Who could ever forget, ‘Cha-ly, Cha-ly, I coulda bin a contenda’ in the back of that old car with Rod Steiger in ON THE WATERFRONT?”
Okay. I’ll get in the spirit. I will personally never forget “You scum-suckin’ pig” from ONE EYED JACKS, Brando’s one directorial effort. “Gob of spit” was pretty good, too. I had a very offbeat boyfriend from Walnut Grove, Mississippi, when I was at university—J.L. and I used to go to the drive-ins in the Seattle area whenever they showed ONE EYED JACKS, with a jug of vodka and a box of antibiotic lozenges, and wait to say those famous lines along with Brando.
“Geez, nothing like trivializing a great star. Some of these coconut threads on the top of the roll burned. Think I’ll use the lower rack position next time.”
Trivial! Your food obsession isn’t trivial?
“I’m sorry. I really am. Remember ‘What are you rebelling against, Johnny?’ And Brando says, ‘Whadda ya got?’ in THE WILD ONE.”
That was what we call a cheap shot. A good cheap shot. What he did with his eyes in VIVA ZAPATA was really silly, though. He was always up to some gimmick like that, or the chewed-up paper in his jaws in THE GODFATHER.
“He did something funny with his eyes in TEAHOUSE OF THE AUGUST MOON, too, as I remember.”
That turkey! Excuse me, guy, I know I am not suppose to call things turkeys or say that people are crazy as loons, but sometimes they just slip out. TEAHOUSE had to be one of the worst pictures he ever made. Worse than THE APALOOSA—which at least had nice camera work.
“Well, he did start telling everybody he was only making movies for the money right about that time.”
And talk about silly lines and racist caricatures! When he gave that idiotic grin and said “Socks up, boss”. What an insult to Japanese people!
“I see your point. It was maybe a little too soon after Hiroshima and Nagasaki to be in impeccably good taste, but I sort of liked his Sakini character. There was something about him that was, I don’t know….”
Tricky. That’s what he was. And that’s why you liked him in the part. Because he was like you when you’re up to something devious.
“Maybe. But you could never top that scene in LAST TANGO IN PARIS where he talks to his dead wife in the casket in that cheap hotel with all those flowers around her.”
Probably not. No one but Brando could eat that many hortensias and survive to dance the tango with Maria Schneider.
“Are you saying he over-acted that scene?”
Let’s just say that one of the things Brando did exceptionally well was to chew scenery. He could do that Method Mumble to perfection—the high point probably coming in APOCALYPSE NOW. Don’t get me wrong, Rave—Brando was great. Two of his films are in my all-time Top Ten list. But with that Socks up, Boss routine he went way beyond over-acting into just plain mugging. And he was almost always on the edge of doing that. That was another unique aspect of Brando—he could distance himself from the character he was playing—even poke fun at the character he was playing-- and still convince us of his acting skill.
“As if he was both actor and film critic?”
Raven doesn’t look too convinced.
Maybe. Let’s put it this way—John Ford and Marlon Brando fascinated me in the 50s, inclined me to think about film and its relationship to reality. That’s one of the things film criticism does—sometimes. They did not incline me to be a director or an actor, however.
“Geez, that was pompous. Is that your final word?”
No. My final words are: WASH THE DRIP PAN, RAVE!
“And mine are: Socks WAY WAY up for Marlon Brando, THE actor of the 20th century.”
Friday, July 02, 2004
WILL THE REAL CRIMINAL PLEASE STAND UP?
Ah, Rave, it’s finally Friday!
“Does that mean that you’re going to make coffee?” Raven looks a little down in the feathers this morning.
What were you up to all night that you’re dragging your tail today?
“Trust me, you don’t want to know.” Raven pecks at a dish of granola.
Okay. When you’re ready to join the living again, can we talk about Saddam Hussein?
“If you make me coffee. Wait a minute, I thought that guy was yesterday’s newspapers. What’s he up to now?”
The Bush Gang turned him over to the Iraqis. Well, to the quote Iraqis end quote.
“So?”
He had to be arraigned before an Iraqi judge, apparently. And during that process he identified himself as the President of Iraq, and said that the whole thing was pure theater, that Bush was the real criminal.
“Hmmm. What is this, What’s My Line? But you know, he may have a point there. Part of a point, anyway.”
How’s that?
“Part of a point in that it’s a question of scale. There seems to be little doubt that Hussein peed in the Iraqi sandbox for quite a few years. However….I think I smell coffee with cinnamon!”
Your olfactories are working just fine, guy. So he peed in the sandbox, and….?
“So far as I know, the difference appears to be one of scale. O sea, that he peed in a relatively small sandbox, compared to the planetary sandbox that Bush continues to pee in. Taking into consideration that Hussein was in power for 35 years….”
I get the picture, Rave. He was fouling his nest, and Bush is fouling everyone else’s nest.
“You’re sure you’re not a bird? Interesting bird behavior analogy there.”
Thanks, Rave. I am one of the lower-flying species, unfortunately. I think you were right when you said this is What’s My Line? as there are people out there who have trouble picking Bush out of the lineup.
“Then they need to ask the question that the guy on the program always asked.”
Will the real criminal please stand up?
“Exactly. Since Bush believes he’s the only person on the planet who matters, he will undoubtedly stand up. A clear confession of both stupidity and guilt.”
Gee, guy, for the shape you were in a few minutes ago, you’re bouncing back very fast.
“Me, and Wile E. Coyote. It’s the coffee, stupid.”
Ah, Rave, it’s finally Friday!
“Does that mean that you’re going to make coffee?” Raven looks a little down in the feathers this morning.
What were you up to all night that you’re dragging your tail today?
“Trust me, you don’t want to know.” Raven pecks at a dish of granola.
Okay. When you’re ready to join the living again, can we talk about Saddam Hussein?
“If you make me coffee. Wait a minute, I thought that guy was yesterday’s newspapers. What’s he up to now?”
The Bush Gang turned him over to the Iraqis. Well, to the quote Iraqis end quote.
“So?”
He had to be arraigned before an Iraqi judge, apparently. And during that process he identified himself as the President of Iraq, and said that the whole thing was pure theater, that Bush was the real criminal.
“Hmmm. What is this, What’s My Line? But you know, he may have a point there. Part of a point, anyway.”
How’s that?
“Part of a point in that it’s a question of scale. There seems to be little doubt that Hussein peed in the Iraqi sandbox for quite a few years. However….I think I smell coffee with cinnamon!”
Your olfactories are working just fine, guy. So he peed in the sandbox, and….?
“So far as I know, the difference appears to be one of scale. O sea, that he peed in a relatively small sandbox, compared to the planetary sandbox that Bush continues to pee in. Taking into consideration that Hussein was in power for 35 years….”
I get the picture, Rave. He was fouling his nest, and Bush is fouling everyone else’s nest.
“You’re sure you’re not a bird? Interesting bird behavior analogy there.”
Thanks, Rave. I am one of the lower-flying species, unfortunately. I think you were right when you said this is What’s My Line? as there are people out there who have trouble picking Bush out of the lineup.
“Then they need to ask the question that the guy on the program always asked.”
Will the real criminal please stand up?
“Exactly. Since Bush believes he’s the only person on the planet who matters, he will undoubtedly stand up. A clear confession of both stupidity and guilt.”
Gee, guy, for the shape you were in a few minutes ago, you’re bouncing back very fast.
“Me, and Wile E. Coyote. It’s the coffee, stupid.”
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
