Freakshows and Circuses

So, it's the Fourth-uh-July, once again, and I've made the hideous mistake of having the "news" on. I see that it's still wall-to-wall Jacko, along with a little miscellaneous trivia having to do with the resignation of the governor of Alaska (but not much of that latter, really). Meanwhile, official unemployment's going through ten per cent -- you can safely figure that real unemployment is more, by at least half again -- and our futile attempts to put down unrest in our recently-acquired southwest Asian provinces continue. The corporate/government criminals' club continue to create pseudo-money in order to steal it, since there's already nothing but debt in the "treasury" (maybe we should call it the "debtery?").

It seems to me that the misdirection ploy will work only so long. When people are actually hungry, they aren't going to be diverted by dead celebrities, and it's not even going to be easy to convince them that they need to be all wound up about the Iranians getting nukes and inconveniencing the Israelis. Not that they're suddenly going to become principled revolutionaries or anything; mobs are notoriously unthoughtful. All in all, we may be seeing some highly interesting times in the months and years to come.

Mirror, Mirror, On the Wall

I shoplifted this from Grace Nearing. It's excerpted from the work of James Kunstler.

Like the United States, Michael Jackson was spectacularly bankrupt, reportedly in the range of $800-million, which is rather a lot for an individual. Had he lived on a few more years, he might have qualified for his own TARP program -- another piece of expensive dead-weight down in the economy's bilges -- since it is our established policy now to throw immense sums of so-called "money" at gigantic failing enterprises (while millions of ordinary citizens wash overboard, without so much as a life-preserver). Anyway, Michael Jackson was on the receiving end of one huge bank loan after another long after his pattern of profligacy was set and obvious. They threw money at him for the same reason that the federal government throws money at entities like CitiBank: the desperate hope that some miracle will allow debt servicing to resume. Michael could burn through $50-million in half a year. It didn't seem to affect his credibility as a borrower. When his heart stopped last week, he was living in a Hollywood mansion that rented for several hundred thousand dollars a month. You wonder how the landlord cashed those checks.

Like the USA, Michael Jackson was a has-been. He hadn't recorded a song worth listening to in over two decades. He had done almost nothing but spin his wheels, hop around the globe from one place to another at enormous expense, and make himself available for award ceremonies to stoke his ego (and give advertisers a reason to promote some televised award show). He existed strictly on image, an anorectic figure nourished by moonbeams of attention, famous for saying that he loved his worshippers when the truth was he merely sucked the life out of them. In his last years, he even looked a bit like Nosferatu, the personification of the un-dead, and his fascination with ghouls was the basis for his biggest hit way back in the last century. A zombie nation deserves a zombie mascot.

I'm thinking it's too late for the USA -- that our vampirism/lycanthropy is beyond curing. If anyone wants to try, though ... now's the time.

The Word for Wednesday, July 1 Edition

And it is still Wednesday -- just barely. I was going to go online a couple of hours ago, but I made the mistake of sitting down in the Evil Blue Chair for "just a few minutes." Oh, sure, just a few minutes. Well, the Evil Blue Chair had its way with me. Fortunately, it wasn't an all-nighter. Actually, I'm sure my wife would eventually have become curious and would have hunted me down and awakened me. But, anyway ...

Isaiah chapter 28:

Woe to the proud crown of the drunkards of Ephraim,
And to the fading flower of its glorious beauty,
Which is at the head of the fertile valley
Of those who are overcome with strong wine!
Behold, the Lord has a strong and mighty agent;
As a storm of hail, a tempest of destruction,
Like a storm of mighty overflowing waters,
He has cast it down to earth with His hand.
The proud crown of the drunkards of Ephraim is trodden under foot.
And the fading flower of its glorious beauty,
Which is at the head of the fertile valley,
Will be like the first-ripe fig prior to summer;
Which one sees,
And as soon as it is in his hand,
He swallows it.
In that day the Lord of hosts will become a beautiful crown
And a glorious diadem to the remnant of His people;
A spirit of justice for him who sits in judgment,
A strength to those who repel the onslaught at the gate.
And these also reel with wine and stagger from strong drink:
The priest and the prophet reel with strong drink,
They are confused by wine, they stagger from strong drink;
They reel while having visions,
They totter when rendering judgment.
For all the tables are full of filthy vomit, without a single clean space.

"To whom would He teach knowledge?
And to whom would he interpret the message?
Those just weaned from milk?
Those just taken from the breast?
For He says,
'Order on order, order on order,
Line on line, line on line,
A little here, a little there.' "
Indeed, He will speak to this people
Through stammering lips and a foreign tongue,
He who said to them, "Here is rest, give rest to the weary,"
And "Here is repose," but they would not listen.
So the word of the Lord to them will be,
"Order on order, order on order,
Line on line, line on line,
A little here, a little there."
That they may go and stumble backward, be broken, snared, and taken captive.
Therefore, hear the word of the Lord, O scoffers,
Who rule this people who are in Jerusalem,
Because you have said, "We have made a covenant with death,
And with Sheol we have made a pact.
The overwhelming scourge will not reach us when it passes by,
For we have made falsehood our refuge and we have concealed ourselves with deception."
Therefore thus says the Lord God,
"Behold, I am laying in Zion a stone, a tested stone,
A costly cornerstone for the foundation, firmly placed.
He who believes in it will not be disturbed.
And I will make justice the measuring line,
And righteousness the level;
Then hail shall sweep away the refuge of lies,
And the waters shall overflow the secret place.
And your covenant with death shall be canceled,
And your pact with Sheol shall not stand;
When the overwhelming scourge passes through,
Then you become its trampling place.
As often as it passes through, it will seize you.
For morning after morning it will pass through, anytime during the day or night.
And it will be sheer terror to understand what it means."
The bed is too short on which to stretch out,
And the blanket is too small to wrap oneself in.
For the Lord will rise up as at Mount Perazim, He will be stirred up as in the valley of Gibeon;
To do His task, His unusual task,
And to do His work, His extraordinary work.
And now do not carry on as scoffers,
Lest your fetters be made stronger;
For I have heard from the Lord God of hosts,
Of decisive destruction on all the earth.

Give ear and hear my voice,
Listen and hear my words.
Does the farmer plow continually to plant seed?
Does he continually turn and harrow the ground?
Does he not level its surface,
And sow dill and scatter cummin,
And plant wheat in rows,
Barley in its place, and rye within its area?
For his God instructs and teaches him properly.
For dill is not threshed with a threshing sledge,
Nor is the cart wheel driven over cummin;
But dill is beaten out with a rod, and cummin with a club.
Grain for bread is crushed,
Indeed, he does not continue to thresh it forever.
Because the wheel of his cart and his horses eventually damage it,
He does not thresh it longer.
This also comes from the Lord of hosts,
Who has made His counsel wonderful and His wisdom great.

Okay, first thing: I've got to quit quoting whole chapters, because that's a lot of typing. But as the idea is developed and explained, where is one to cut it off? Or maybe I should ask, who am I to cut it off?

As seems to be a pattern with Isaiah, we get a description of the problem, and a warning about what God's going to do about it; and in between, we get a prophecy of something quite wonderful. In the first part, everybody's (symbolically) drunk, notably the priest and the prophet, who are so far gone they can't do their jobs, and there's puke all over the place. The human way of dealing with this is through lies and self-deception, and accommodations with that which should simply be fought. God's way of dealing with this is the costly foundation cornerstone that He places in Zion; this stone is referred to multiple times in the New Testament. Peter identifies the stone with Jesus (Acts 4), and also with the believers who make up the Church (1 Peter 2); Paul identifies it with faith in Jesus (Romans 9 and 10), and with Jesus Himself (Ephesians 2); and, most importantly, Jesus also made the identification with Himself (Matthew 21, Mark 12, Luke 20). Justice is to be the measuring line, righteousness the level, lies and shameful secrets are to be revealed, and agreements with evil are to be swept away.

As a critic of American mores and governance, I am of course tempted to grab this chapter and particularize it; it seems natural, when contemplating our whorish supervisors as they grub through the ruins of a formerly wealthy and productive country, seeking a decaying scrap on which to feed, to appropriate the image from verse 8 (For all the tables are full of filthy vomit, without a single clean space.) It does indeed, I think, apply quite well to America 2009; but equally well to many other places and times. It's fallen human-ness in a fallen world. And I exult in one thing: my Lord and God has paid the price for the cleanup, and -- while I don't and can't know the schedule -- it's on that schedule. I know that my Redeemer lives. It stinks badly around here at present; but let's keep the smell in perspective. Ultimately and eternally, it's not very important. It will pass, and is passing.

As always, check here for more Words for Wednesday.

"Read His Lips ..."

No doubt about it: Barack Obama's a versatile man. Besides his masterful channeling of George W. Slow-puppy, he also does a great Richard Nixon:

President Obama's top political adviser declined yesterday to rule out the possibility that the White House would agree to a tax hike on health insurance plans that would hit middle-income Americans.

Speaking on ABC's "This Week," David Axelrod declined to repeat Obama's "firm pledge" during the campaign that families making under $250,000 would not see "any form of tax increase, not your income tax, not your payroll tax, not your capital gains taxes, not any of your taxes."

Instead, Axelrod said the president has no interest in "drawing lines in the sand" on the issue of how to pay for the costly health reform plan making its way through Congress.

"One of the problems we've had in this town is that people draw lines in the sand and they stop talking to each other. And you don't get anything done," Axelrod said. "That's not the way the president approaches this."

What was it Tricky Dick's press secretary said, during the Watergate scandal, back in the days when there was some semblance of an adversary, watchdog relationship between the press and the gummint? After some lie or other came to light, press secretary Ron Nessen said, "That statement is no longer operative." Now Mr. Axelrod has a new one: to keep one's word is "drawing a line in the sand," and that's very bad because "you don't get anything done." Well, there's another couple of folks who look very good up against the wall, wearing blindfolds, in my "After the Revo" fantasy.

G. W. Obama on Torture

President Change We Can Believe In™ has delivered himself of some no-doubt-ghostwritten remarks in dishonor of "United Nations International Day in Support of Torture Victims:"

Twenty-five years ago, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Convention Against Torture, and twenty-two years ago this very day, the Convention entered into force. The United States’ leading role in the negotiation of the Convention and its subsequent ratification and implementation enjoyed strong bipartisan support. Today, we join the international community in reaffirming unequivocally the principles behind that Convention, including the core principle that torture is never justified.

Torture violates United States and international law as well as human dignity. Torture is contrary to the founding documents of our country, and the fundamental values of our people. It diminishes the security of those who carry it out, and surrenders the moral authority that must form the basis for just leadership. That is why the United States must never engage in torture, and must stand against torture wherever it takes place.

My administration is committed to taking concrete actions against torture and to address the needs of its victims. On my third day in office, I issued an executive order that prohibits torture by the United States. My budget request for fiscal year 2010 includes continued support for international and domestic groups working to rehabilitate torture victims.

The United States will continue to cooperate with governments and civil society organizations throughout the international community in the fight to end torture. To this end, I have requested today that the Department of State solicit information from all of our diplomatic missions around the world about effective policies and programs for stopping torture and assisting its victims so that we and our civil society partners can learn from what others have done. I applaud the courage, compassion and commitment of the many people and organizations doing this vitally important work.

So what's David Frum up to? From the way the above reads, I have to think Rainbow Brite has simply retained at least one of Dubya's speechwriters. The remarks are incomplete, though. I shall do my duty as a good citizen and assist Da Prez, gratis:

The United States will also continue to spare no effort in covering up its recent history of torture, and to make certain that no torturers are investigated, prosecuted, or even fired. And, however difficult it may be, I will absolutely stifle my giggles when issuing this annual boilerplate denunciation of torture. I'm the Chosen One, and I will meet the challenge.

(Thanks to James Bovard for linking to the Obama statement.)

Counterproductive

Imperial America is Kim Jong-il's indispensable ally:

North Korean media said the North would never give up its “nuclear deterrent” but instead would strengthen it because of what the media called an American plot to invade the North. Rodong Sinmun, the North’s main newspaper, said that the United States’ recent pledge to defend South Korea was tantamount to “asking for the calamitous situation of having a fire shower of nuclear retaliation all over South Korea.”

International sanctions could further isolate the already impoverished North. But the government appears to be using them to stoke anti-American anger and consolidate its power at home at a time when the North’s leader, Kim Jong-il, is seeking to bequeath his power to one of his sons, according to officials and private analysts in South Korea.

Mr. Kim, 67, reportedly had a stroke last August.

No, I don't think there's going to be an American invasion of North Korea -- surely, God-Emperor Obama's not that stupid -- although I'm sure there are many American "plots to invade North Korea," which our tech-speaking warmasters would call "contingency plans." Given our history, though, how is anyone, even the Dear Editors of Rodong Sinmun, going to sound too silly by referring to such invasion plots? I mean, name a place we haven't invaded, and it either has nukes, or we just haven't gotten around to it yet: be patient, Lower Slobbovians, your turn's coming. But an interventionist, world-managing, overbearing, condemning, sanctions-dispensing, self-parodying U.S. has to be a great boon to a little tin-plated maniac like Dear Leader Kim, as he seeks to perpetuate his misrule even after his overdue death. If our supervisors: (1) had any brains; and (2) actually wanted to hurt the NoKo regime, they'd get the U.S. armed forces out of Korea instantly, and they'd then proceed to studiously ignore North Korea: do nothing, and say nothing. But our supervisors are malevolent pinheads. So it goes.