In “Good Faith” With Telecom Companies and Lawless Bush Administration, Senate Passes FISA:

A message to Senate supporters of HR 6304

To Pro-HR 6304 Senators:

      Today, with the passage of HR 6304, I mourned the death of the 4th Amendment to our Constitution, and I grieved for the loss of any conviction that I am a citizen of a democratic republic, governed and secured by the principle of the rule of law. Today you forced me to realize, once and for all, that I am not free, not a citizen with inalienable rights; today you disabused me of any trust I had in my government, by showing me this: whatever an administration and corporations want to do to me will be supported by you, as long as they act in “good faith” with each other, as opposed to acting in good faith with the American people and the Constitution of the United States.
      Today I grieve over your abandonment of the notion of government of, by and for the people, in favor of government of, by and for criminal corporations.
      Watching you over the past two days, as you defended your position in support of HR 6304, I grieved as your hearts bled for the telecom companies; as you pretended 9-11 was a legitimate and factual excuse for the President’s warrantless surveillance program, even though you knew he had begun the program immediately after his first month in office; as you granted unprecedented legal authority to the executive branch to violate the 4th Amendment to the Constitution, fixing the executive branch as the sole judge of its own behavior and removing the judicial branch as a check on executive power; as you sided with the likes of Kit Bond (R. Missouri), who framed telecom immunity as “liability protection” and bemoaned the possibility of holding to the rule of law as “penalizing the companies” with “frivolous lawsuits.” What is the matter with you that you approved such garbage?
      I grieved, and my stomach turned, as the bill passed, with only twenty-eight good Senators voting against and holding fast to the Constitution and the rule of law, a mere twenty-eight true patriots, compared to sixty-nine lumps of Senatorial cowardice and shame.
      I have to ask of Barack Obama and his Democratic comrades who voted for the Feingold-Dodd Amendment, which would have removed telecom immunity from the bill, but failed, and then went ahead and voted for the bill itself, which contained telecom immunity —a profound contradiction— why would you do that? So, your distaste for telecom immunity was a whim of the moment, which changed for the final vote? Or, was it the other way around? No. You knew what you were doing. Clearly, you wanted to have it both ways, so that you could say, “Well, it’s too bad about immunity, but I want conservative voters to know I’m tough on terrorists.” Sir, you have no moral compass, no profound or ethical position to offer as reason to vote for you. You are lost. I, for one, will never forgive you, never vote for you again.
      The most frightening aspect of this dark moment is that of precedence—you, Senators, have set the stage for what? What’s next after this? You have now established that a mere executive-branch say-so can be sufficient justification for lawbreaking on the part of a company, so, why should not the Bush administration, or any other administration, use other private companies to do further harm to our liberty, our privacy, our fundamental human rights? Now that you have given Bush, as well, license to gather up whole masses of communications between Americans without warrants, in violation of the 4th Amendment, why should he not go whole hog with his vile intentions against freedom, democracy and the rule of law and break more laws than he already has?
      Today you have done what Al Queda could not have done with all their miserable, ragged might, without your help—you have taken the essence of American freedom and liberty and subtracted it from the body politic; you have injured the soul of America.
      Shame on you!!!

—LM

ACLU on this subject

Judge Walker

Comic relief: Mark Fiore on the subject

Obama's "Change" Offers No Hope for Civil Liberty

His new position on FISA, in effect: as long as we are safe, we don’t need to be free.

      Yesterday, June 28, Barack Obama spoke before the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials. Referring to the immigration issue, Obama made the point that McCain “deserves credit” for the work he did alongside Obama on behalf of comprehensive immigration reform. There was a problem, however, according to the Democratic candidate: “When he [McCain] was running for his party’s nomination, he walked away from that commitment. He said he wouldn’t even support his own legislation, if it came up for a vote. Now, if we’re going to solve the challenges we face, we can’t vacillate; we can’t shift, depending on our politics. You need a president who will pursue genuine solutions, day in and day out, in a consistent way. And that’s my commitment to you.”

      Beautiful. Apparently unhampered by self-examination, he stood there, making a promise not to vacillate, not to shift, but instead to be consistent with his commitments—this, while my built-in crap detector clanged over the contrast between what he had just said and the fact of his newly adjusted position on telecom immunity.
      I guess we were supposed to forget his previous position on telecom immunity, his earlier stated commitment to the rule of law, as well as the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution. To wit:

Then:—Barack Obama, February 26, 2008: “The American people must be able to trust that their president values principle over politics, and justice over unchecked power. I’ve been proud to stand with Senator Dodd in his fight against retroactive immunity for the telecommunications industry. Secrecy and special interests must not trump accountability. We must show our citizens – and set an example to the world – that laws cannot be ignored when it is inconvenient. Because in America – no one is above the law.”

Now: Barack Obama, June 26, 2008: “...the issue of the phone companies, per se, is not one that overrides the security interests of the American people.”

      That was in answer to the question as to why he was going to support the FISA bill that will be voted on in the Senate after the July 4th holiday, the bill that grants retroactive immunity to the telecoms.
      So, sometimes it is okay to vacillate? Sometimes it’s okay to shift your commitment?
      Certainly, when it comes to one challenge, the one where he expressed, in January and February, a strong commitment to the ability of the American people to “trust their president to value principle over politics” and justice over “unchecked power,” then it’s perfectly okay to turn tail and make a beeline for political expediency.
      The challenge of the rule of law, and the basic civil liberties of the American people, is not important; it does not override security. Hello? As long as we are “safe,” we don’t need to be free?
      So what else is new? Did you expect a politician to stick to his stated principles?

      It is interesting to watch the struggles with cognitive dissonance now being experienced by the Obama faithful—poor Keith Olbermann, for one. He thinks everything’s going to be okay, since John Dean said the bill didn’t preclude prosecution of telecom companies by the Justice Department, after Bush leaves office. Obama has a secret plan...
      Oh brother.
      Plus, Olbermann thinks Obama did himself proud by not “cowering to” the Left, a retreat from Olbermann’s own powerful statements against granting telecom immunity. As if the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and the rule of law were left-wing issues and not values all Americans should hold dear. No. What we’re seeing is how people go into denial to be able to accept the shameful behavior of someone they wish desperately to admire.
      C’mon, Obama has not done himself proud, and neither has Olbermann, for that matter; after all, to betray one’s own principles is about as shameful thing a person can do.

      Whatever protections for our civil liberties are granted in the FISA bill, they become meaningless, as long as telecom immunity is granted as well. After all, the original FISA legislation had those protections, but the Bush Administration ignored them, with the help of the telecom companies. The bottom line is that the telecom companies broke the law; to grant them immunity from civil suits now is an invitation to this lawless administration, and the next, to ignore the law again. WHAT CONSEQUENCES FOR LAW-BREAKING DOES AN ADMINISTRATION FACE, IF CONGRESS GRANTS IMMUNITY TO LAWBREAKERS? The message becomes this: as long as the government gives a company a piece of paper, with instructions to break the law, warrantless spying on Americans can go on as before. Congress will always grant immunity.
      Wishing and waiting for prosecutions by the Justice Department is naive, a self-delusion. It won’t happen. It’s a “war on terror” without end; we can kiss our civil liberty good-bye, without hope for its return, ever.
      To vote for this FISA bill, with immunity granted, is a betrayal of the American people. And I am far more threatened by lawless executive and legislative branches of our government than by al queda, by far.
      I doubt Obama would abandon his corporate friends or the ruling class once in the White House. It would not fit his pattern: when courting the Democratic electorate for his Party’s nomination, he spoke like a civil libertarian; once secure as the nominee, he abandoned the civil liberty stance and caved to the fear factor. This is not behavior that deserves an optimistic, hopeful, trusting response from us. It is "change," alright, but not change I can believe in.

—L.M.

UPDATE: My comment to Keith Olbermann's Special Comment of June 30th: Sorry, there's a problem with Keith's logic: Obama's voting against the FISA bill would not preclude his also prosecuting the criminals, once he gets into office. We should have both—civil AND criminal litigation.

There's NO excuse whatsoever for Obama to vote for the bill, and no solace whatsoever in the distant and doubtful promise of Obama-presidency prosecutions. And who is to say Obama is going to win the presidency, anyway? Think about the fix we'll be in then, when McCain is in office, and we don't even have the option of civil litigations!

Tonight's Special Comment failed—too much bending over backward to make an Obama betrayal of the Constitution and the rule of law okay. It's not okay. Civil litigations are how ordinary people hold corporations and the government accountable. For the Federal government to remove them as an option is a hideous act of betrayal against one democratic means of redress.

Shame on Obama, if he doesn't vote against the bill; shame on Keith Olbermann for making excuses for him.


PREVIOUS POST ON THIS SUBJECT: If Obama Votes Yes

The Human Bond of Duh

And how I miss George Carlin

      Arrogance is the first form of stupidity. I love to say that.
      But, hold on. I also have a distaste for hierarchy—so, can we say one form of stupidity should out rank any other? Aren’t all of us equally stupid, in our own, special way? After all, whether you like it or not, everybody, each frail and faulty human, has moments of duh, where the duh factor engages despite all our pathetic efforts to the contrary. But I promise you, your moments of duh are no worse than mine, and vice versa. This is the human bond of duh.
      I won’t mention my most egregious acts of duh, the disastrous ones. Those, I call deep duh. The relatively harmless ones have to do with math and technical stuff. I mean, forget it. I’m never there, when I’m there. Those fall into the category of congenitally ill-equipped duh—it can’t be helped. And then there’s the inevitable daily duh, like walking down the street to pick up my mail, then remembering it’s Sunday.
      George Carlin would have appreciated this. In one of his stand-up routines he said, “You ever notice how all day Wednesday, you keep thinking it’s Thursday?” He had led up to this comment with an introduction that began, “I’d like to talk about some things that bring us together, things that point out our similarities, instead of our differences...but I also like to know I can come back to these little things we have in common, little universal moments that we share separately, but things that make us the same. They’re so small we hardly ever talk about them.
      Do you ever look at your watch, and then you don’t know what time it is? And then you have to look again, and you still don’t know the time. So you look a third time, and somebody says, 'What time is it,' and you say, 'I don’t know?'"
      Our human bond of duh—right, George? Are you with me here?

      The big problem is that as a species our collective duh is coming close to ending us. Our world is in such a fearsome condition we’re finding our very futures in jeopardy; more and more, each day that the powerful among us ignore the signs—after all, those guys deny the duh that compels them— things fail to work on our behalf, and on behalf of the planet.

      It’s like this:
      What values best support us?
      Duh...those of laissez-faire capitalism?
      Duh...masculinist values?
      Duh...authoritarian values?

      What is our hierarchy of values?
      Duh...profit first, before anything else?
      Duh...whatever my authority says?
      Duh...me first?

      How do we fix what is broken?
      Duh...privatize everything?
      Duh...de-regulate?
      Duh...drill, blast, bomb, torture, deny?

What a loss George Carlin isn’t here to make us laugh about it all, to get things straight and clear, to distill sanity from the fruity din—if you will pardon my duh.

—L.M.

If Obama Votes Yes on FISA Bill

Tell me why I should vote for him and not Ralph Nader?

      The Blue Dog Democrats have done their hangdog business in the House again this week, cowering on the floor to hand over yet another wet-dream of a bill into Republican hands. ( Greenwald )
      To sum it up, my understanding is that if the Senate passes the bill, the telecom companies will receive immunity for their law-breaking, which essentially means the rule of law in America is meaningless. The excuse the hangdog Dems are giving, such as Diane Feinstein, is that in the hysteria of 9-11, it was understandable for the telecom companies to want to help the government. Isn't that so generous to the telecoms! What these Democrats are ignoring is that the spying went on for years; the companies have massive legal budgets and plenty of lawyers who could have explained the law; and at least one company, Quest, managed to reject the Administration's attempts to seduce them into breaking the law—they said NO!
      The Republicans refer to the law-breaking companies as "patriotic." Somehow they've forgotten what it is to be patriotic—that is, to protect and defend the constitution of the United States, as they pledged to do.
      All this is happening against a background, where the government can name any citizen whatsoever as an “enemy combatant,” detain any citizen whatsoever, and render —disappear— any citizen whatsoever to Syria to be tortured.
      To give the telecom's immunity, is to give it to the Administration as well, as far as future prosecutions against the Administration are concerned. And, how the Administration will be cautioned against breaking this new FISA law, to again conduct warrantless spying, is beyond me. Where's the downside for them?
      Amazingly enough, Barack Obama might vote for this FISA bill. So much for his background in Constitutional law.
      Thus, I see no reason whatsoever, if Obama goes ahead and votes for this bill, or doesn’t try to stop it, why I should not go ahead and vote for Ralph Nader, who is closest to my heart, anyway.

—L.M.

UPDATE: June 29 post

Conventional Wisdom, Common Sense, Uncommon Patriotism

In gratitude for Dennis Kucinich and Robert Wexler’s defense of democracy

      The Florida Sun-Sentinel recently posted an editorial criticizing Representatives Dennis Kucinich and Robert Wexler for their calls to impeach G.W. Bush. The editorial began with an enumeration of our current national ills —wars, unemployment, Americans going without health insurance, gas prices— and then somehow failed to connect any dots whatsoever as to who is responsible for our sorry situation and how crimes were committed to get us here.
      The editorial would be laughable, if so many innocent lives and national treasure had not been criminally wasted by the very hand of the person the editorial board defends in its opinion.
      This is the Pelosi-inspired, denial-based, conventional wisdom now: calls for accountability for the most egregious, obvious and blatant crimes by officials of the government in American history are to be treated as if they are tantamount to the hysterical and whiney demands of toddlers. “You don’t like Mommy and Daddy’s rules? You want to make noise? You are grounded for wasting our time.” Or, more to the point, it is as if Daddy has been sneaking into bedrooms at night to molest his children, Mommy knows it, but stopping him is off the table—Sh-h-h-h-h!.
      We are supposed to think that it’s only common sense to dismiss impeachment as an option— “it’s too late; it’s a distraction from important issues; we don’t have enough votes, etc.” But it isn’t common sense; it is common campaign strategy. Underneath the excuses is this truth: the Democratic leadership thinks impeachment hearings will alienate the electorate —they are wrong!— and so they want to play a waiting game. And conservatives love it. Their guy is getting away with it.
       I am thinking of another kind of common sense, the kind of common sense that built this nation, the common sense of Thomas Paine and Thomas Jefferson, the common sense that created a great Constitution, where the exact remedy for the sort of crimes George W. Bush has committed was put there, so that America could breathe free of would-be tyrants and empire-builders like George W. Bush. I have to wonder what happened to this kind of patriotism. Is it tucked away inside the namby-pamby back pockets of editors and journalists, pundits and politicos across the nation, where it is sat upon and smothered to death beneath their lackadaisical butts?
      Reps. Wexler and Kucinich have accomplished an uncommon thing: they have managed to retain their patriotic common sense. It is the shame and tragedy of this nation that such patriotism is so rare, now that we need it so badly. We are in jeopardy of enabling a tyrannical epoch in American history, but we are surrounded by fools and cowards.
      Albert Einstein's familiar quote, "Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds," comes to mind here. Wexler and Kucinich are great spirits, and they will be remembered in history as such; as for the editorial board of the Florida Sun-Sentinel—their opposition to such greatness is apparently all they can manage, given who they are.

      Personally, I think impeachment is not nearly enough; the thugs should be prosecuted for murder. Apparently, I am not the only one who thinks this.

—L.M.

Torture by Photo Op

Say No to Four More Years of It


      Among the worst lies George W. Bush has told is the one where he insists, “we do not torture.” That was a doozy.
      I don’t know where he gets that. I mean, he tortures me every time his goofy self appears on television. All it takes is the sight of his bow-legged cock-strut across the White House lawn, and my face goes twitchy, just like Clouseau’s torture victim, Chief Inspector Dreyfus. Then, as soon as he opens his mouth, and his words wrangle their way toward my ears, hinting of a sloppy, sottish past (is it past?) —”Thish is an impresshhive crowd -- the havezsh and the have morezsh. Shome people call ya th’ elite -- Ah call you mah bayshe.”— well, I’m in agony. It is so-o-o painful.
      I don’t know if I can make it to January 20, 2009, without some kind of intervention. Like impeachment.

      Help. Please, all you voters out there, bring us a President who at least honors the office of the Presidency —for a change— with eloquence, a resonant voice, and, even if he isn’t going to bring us Medicare for all, even if he supports “clean” coal and “free” trade, at least he has the ability to think on his feet and speak coherently.
      I think you know who that is. It is NOT John McCain.
      McCain. Think about that. It’s bad enough that he is painfully uncomfortable in his own skin, that is, physically and metaphorically, meaning his ethics, values and opinions, but the spector of McCain in the Presidency is nearly as horrifying as that which resides there now; we’re talking asymmetrical, puddin’ face, stiff-joints, a nasal tonality and an inspirational deficiency that simply will not improve with time. It’s only gonna get worse, Folks. You vote for McCain, and it will be nothing but four more years of Bush crimes against our aesthetic sensibilities. Don’t do it.

      What it boils down to is this: do you want four years of goose bumps, or facial tics? The choice is clear.

JOHN MCCAIN MEDICAL RECORDS REVEAL EMBARRASSING DETAIL

by Mistee Laurie, C.P.I.

Questions about McCain’s suitability for the Presidency surfaced again today, after it was revealed during a cursory look at his medical records that he still wets his bed.

A.P.’s Jeff Mungo verified the story, saying, “Despite my having only three hours to fan through 400 pages of his medical records, and not being allowed to photocopy anything, I did see urologist Leikkur’s note of December 14, 2004, which stated, ‘John complains about incontinence, especially while sleeping...wets bed on a regular basis.’”

Although McCain scoffed at the story and wheeled out his 96-year-old mother to back him up, he bristled when Hillary Clinton threatened to fuel speculation, with the claim McCain had revealed to her at a dinner party that he laughed so hard “he nearly peed his pants!”

McCain’s bed-wetting habit continued to reverberate in the latest news cycle. A spokesman for the campaign accused the “liberal media” of “trying to stigmatize a condition which millions of Americans suffer from and making John McCain the poster-boy for Depends.”

Thus, the slow-motion scandal of McCain’s secrecy over his medical records fast-forwards, as his campaign continues to withhold documentary evidence of his ability to bomb Iran without wetting his pants.

Dr. Leikkur was unavailable for comment.

American Burqa

Thoughts on the hiding of American womankind, behind the veil of uniformity

     A family member once told me his wife “is going to need a face lift soon.” I had responded, “No she isn’t.” But he was adamant.

     I happened to come across a B movie the other day, one starring Melissa Gilbert in a role requiring her to speak in a foreign accent. Melissa, to my fascination, was nearly as unidentifiable in this movie as the accent she used. In fact, I am not exactly sure how I managed to recognize her, given how drastically some porcine-pawed plastic surgeon had transformed her face since the last time I saw her. This was not the Melissa Gilbert I knew, whose thick eyebrows and quirky, unique features had distinguished her from the pack. Instead, here was a generic female type, pretty, but somehow reduced, somehow absent.
     Here was a nose I call snout-nose, eyebrows reduced to near-nothings, and lips some critics of plastic surgery have described as “trout pout.”
     Trout is not the fish metaphor I would choose. But this one, to the right, whatever it is, seems an apt choice.
     To you plastic surgeons: this is NOT the look you want to give your patients.
     But they do. One web site advertises the lip-job their plastic surgeon performs as “Paris Lips!” “You can “plump up thin lips for as little as $475!” On the same website, we are treated to a before and after, where a middle-aged, intelligent-looking woman has been transformed into a middle-aged, startled-looking dim-wit.

     These are anecdotal examples, but they speak to something I have noticed in many different places. Something is happening to the image of womankind, as it is portrayed in the media, and it reflects the entire culture, even while it infects it.
     Consider an example from Fox’s House, M.D., where Hugh Laurie plays a genius diagnostician in a hospital, among a mixed cast of characters, both men and women. Well, it’s a good show. But that doesn’t keep me from noticing the something I am thinking of, which is revealed in the difference between the male characters and the female characters, that is, between the male doctors and the female doctors. Here is the difference: the males are interesting actors whose looks vary from bordering on ugly —Dr. House, in particular— to decidedly unattractive but intelligent looking, to one young doctor who is nearly pretty, he is so cute; but the female characters are ALL pretty, in conventional ways —you won’t see an Ava Gardener or a Meryl Streep there— and, if they weren’t cast as doctors, you wouldn’t think of them as especially intelligent ladies. They’re just pretty women, lacking any particular uniqueness or variety in their looks. That is, they are uniform in their bland, ordinary prettiness.
     What’s up with that? Why are the men allowed to be ugly, to be different, to be intelligent and interesting —to be free?— but the women are not? Why do the female characters seem so generic and without character?

     Leaving the complex analysis to those who enjoy such activities, I will sum it up this way: what we’re dealing with is the American burqa.

     American culture did not need a bearded patriarch to come at women with a stick, to enforce our second class status on us. No Taliban mantra was inflicted on us, to berate us, our nature, our unique selves. Physical bullying, corporal punishment—none of it was necessary to beat us into submission. Only a sexist reality was required, though a less stupidly expressed one than that in Taliban society, where the value of a woman is found only in her appearance, an appearance that must conform to a standard, a male-defined idea of feminine beauty, or she is without value. The eyes should be just so far apart; the nose just such a shape and size, within strictly defined parameters; the mouth must be “full,” “sensual;” the chin this and not that; forehead so high, so wide. She must be only so old, and no older. Should she stray outside this contemporary, American standard of beauty, she will not only be rejected in certain areas of life, but she will gradually learn to hate the way she looks and want to change, to hide, to become someone, anyone other than herself, even if it means becoming a nobody with an anybody face, a generic American female.
     Our culture did not require celebrity women to wear cloth burqas to hide themselves. Instead, culture provided casting directors who only cast according to the standard; then came the plastic surgeons to fix the errant, lidded eye, or the rebellious, fierce nose, those fully trained and conditioned doctors who would find the Barbie in the face and body of every patient, those who could render them invisible, behind the American burqa, a face and body distinguished only for its lack of individuality and uniqueness.
     The sickness is not restricted to celebrities. Somehow my family member experienced no shame in declaring his wife to be in need of lifting up, while gravity would be allowed to have its way with him all the way to his grave. It was the culturally acceptable thing for a husband to require, in fact. Apparently, he should not have to endure life married to a woman who looked her age; but he could look as old as he liked, and did.
     Another guy I know said he decided to marry the woman who eventually became his wife, because he could see all she needed was a make-over and new clothes. I guess she was a sort of fixer-upper.

     Once, while waiting in the doctor’s office, I heard two little boys talking about the details of a poster they were standing near. The poster contained photographs of boys and girls. Pointing to a child in a photograph, one boy said to the other, “Is this one human, or a girl?”
     Is it possible a boy could grow up in our society, believing that males are human, but females are not, that females are another thing outside the notion of humanity, like animals?
     Does a woman acquiesce to such a belief, when she decides to have a facelift?

—L.M.

Love Your Mother—Earth

Killing the lawn and other Earth-loving endeavors.

      I grew up in the 50’s in the suburban neighborhoods of the San Fernando Valley —North Hollywood, Van Nuys, Panorama City, Woodland Hills— where lawns were as ubiquitous as the tract homes they adorned, or the dog poop in the clover. Something like that.
      Anyway, the fact of lawns was not something I questioned as a kid, except to grumble when it was my turn to mow the grass—pushing and pulling our reluctant, rusty lawn mower over stubborn, overgrown clumps of grass was not something I wanted to do on a Saturday, and neither was scraping dog poop off the wheels. That lawns were everywhere, like clean air and plentiful water, made them invisible as issues, as concerns. We never gave it a thought; we played on our lawns, that’s all, trading cards, playing Simon Says, cowboys and Indians, or horsie, rearing, bucking, grazing green grass like real horses.
      Everything happened on the lawn: our male dog, Buck the Airdale, got stuck for an hour in my uncle’s female dog, Leesha the Boxer, while she investigated the lawn, nose in the grass, oblivious of her panting caboose, while I ran to the adults, sounding the alarm about Buck’s predicament, and while the adults worked hard at ignoring me; Buck —there’s so much Bucklore— raised his leg behind my girlfriend’s clueless brother and took a piss on his pants (now a real-estate attorney), while we sat in the grass and giggled; I smoked a cigar I found there, a cigar my step-father had lost during one of his meandering, upside-down treks across the lawn on his hands, and I smoked it until nausea put a stop to my smoking days, once and for all.
      Still, as I remember one neighborhood in Van Nuys, our lawns were never kid heaven, compared to the vacant lot down the street. Well, it wasn’t really vacant; in fact it was overgrown with tall trees, bushes, and, best of all, hip-high (on a kid) grass, which we yanked up and out of the ground for our dirt-clod wars and for weaving into the sides and tops of our forts, for privacy. Of course, this was before home-owner associations, when nobody cared if there was a neglected plot in the neighborhood; it was also before the current days of paranoia, TV addiction and video games, when children could disappear for hours and nobody worried, when children actually played outside. (In my neighborhood now, I rarely see children playing outside, though children do live here.) It was the vacant lot, with its nooks and crannies, paths, jungle terrain, forts and faraway feeling that did the trick, allowing for stories to emerge—plot, character, adventure, places for childhood imagination, where all things were possible.
      The point is this: children and other living things do not need lawns.

      Now, here comes today. The air is unclean; water is now a finite, contaminated resource. Gasoline is finite too, as it is dirty, as we have come to understand; we are shocked, and some are ruined, by the price of gasoline. We buy our produce from super markets, or small, family-owned markets, or even local farmer’s markets, but many of us haven’t tasted a real, home-grown tomato in years, if ever; we are shocked at the price of organic produce. But lawns are as ubiquitous as ever, regardless—no matter the upkeep, no matter they require an egregious amount of water, gasoline to run power mowers, Round-up to kill the weeds and other unwanted things like birds, insects and human beings (cancer), fertilizers, so the green grass can grow all around, all around, so the green grass can grow all around. No matter that this miraculous soil is capable of growing everything, but it is allowed to grow only one thing—grass.

      I am certainly not the first to write about this. Far better thinkers than I have discussed how we are going to have to change to love our mother, Earth (links, below); but many of us are doing what we can for the sake of the environment: minds are changing, and habits are changing; some of us, those who can afford it, are going cold turkey, ending bad habits and “going green” in various ways; others are moving incrementally, while some still drag their feet, in denial but finding less and less support for such folly.
      As for me, I try, though I cannot afford to put solar panels on the roof or buy a hybrid car, and I haven’t much room on my little lot for growing vegetables. I do have two large pine trees —oxygen makers, carbon holders— and a variety of plants, mostly overgrown, a garden with indigenous plants, succulents, ice plant—but, no lawn. Some might say my pond is a problem, that is, running a pump constantly; I say I make up for it, not driving much and planning my errands and visits with conservation in mind, being a vegetarian, and recycling practically everything, etc.
      Lucky for me, my son and daughter-in-law in Normal Heights (we call them “the Normals”) in San Diego County, have decided to kill their lawn. Well, decided might be the wrong word. They have toddlers, and keeping the lawn watered was not a priority in the past few years; let’s put it that way. Let’s say the lawn died a slow, natural death, and the soil is in the process of returning to its original state, as you can see. But, the beautiful part is that they have decided to turn their substantial yard into a vegetable garden, not one with rows and regimented sections, like Puritans, but one with meandering paths and “rooms,” one with an organic design and shape, and one where there will also be space for the children to play.
      I say “lucky for me,” because, you know, they’ll probably produce more than they can eat, and that’s where I’ll step in...but then, they’ll probably have more work to do too, more than they can possibly manage, and, no doubt, that’s also where I’ll have to step in, which is fine by me, since I won’t have to mow the lawn.

      Happy Mother’s day.

—L.M.

Edible Gardening
Waste
Energy
Transport
Water
Shopping
Edible Estate
Michael Pollan

On the Limits of Toleration

Ayaan Hirsi Ali and the struggle for enlightenment

      I am reminded of a public service ad I saw awhile back. I’ll call it the El Wheato Ad, because those were the offending words spoken in it by the lead character in the ad, a bigoted white guy, to the hapless Latino who was serving him.
      Mr. Bigot, frustrated by having received something other than the wheat bread he had asked for, and mocking what he thought must be the waiter’s ethnicity, said, to clarify as to the kind of bread he wanted, “You know, el wheato?” Then, noticing that the other diners were looking his way, he said something to the effect that if these people want to work here they should learn the language, adding, “You know?” So the diner he addressed responded, “No Sir, I don’t know,” with an unsympathetic look on his face.
      On one level, I liked the ad. It reinforced the notion that one should not give positive reinforcement to bigots. When you witness bigotry, you should do something, say something. The values of toleration and respect should be exercised whenever possible.
      On another level, however, I am not so sure. How much toleration should we extend, where those with different cultural values disrespect and even violate, for example, our core values of secularism, human rights, animal rights, equality and individual liberty? Does not toleration, a profound liberal value, sometimes go too far? Shouldn’t the case for education and cultural assimilation be made, on behalf of core American democratic values and the rule of law? Not that the bigot in the ad was correct to be rude to the waiter for not having learned to speak English yet. But, what is to be done in another situation, where, for example, a doctor finds that a female child has been “circumcised,” her genitals mutilated by way of traditional Islamic cultural practice? Is it bigoted to oppose the ways of religious and cultural communities, when human rights within those communities are being violated?
      Is it bigoted to require immigrant cultures to assimilate, to require a broad education of their members in the values of the enlightenment, rather than allowing communities to perpetuate crimped, backward and ignorant values, where children are hidden away in private religious schools, never to know human liberty, never to make progress in their lives toward civilization? Would it be bigoted to expect citizens to come out of the dark ages and comprehend the notion of freedom?

      Have I taken a wrong turn to the right? I don’t think so. I am making a case for progress, a case for balance, actually. Excessive toleration is an out-of-balance path away from progress, in support of all sorts of evils—oppression, ignorance, abuse.

      I am encouraged in these thoughts by Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the author of the memoir, Infidel. Despite her having gone over to the mad-capitalist side in her fellowship with the American Enterprise Institute (sad, but I understand, now that I have read Infidel. She was vulnerable and frightened, when the Institute came to her “rescue.” It seemed like her only option, if she wanted to stay alive, to live and work in Holland. Perhaps someday she will see what they’re all about and find the courage to leave them), she remains an authentic voice for the enlightenment of Islam, for freedom and the emancipation of women, children, and even men within the Muslim community. She understands the necessity of confrontation and resistance to the oppression inherent in the religion; she objects to the role of tolerance by governments and Western culture in the horrific violations of human rights, of women’s rights, that Islam commits in the name of Allah.
      It is tolerance that tolerates the crimes of this religion; without tolerance, progress could be made toward freeing millions of women, children and free thinkers from the burdens they bear, within a culture that does not value freedom, equality, education, individual rights, or the pursuit of happiness here in this life.
      I do not mean to say I approve of intolerance, of violent, cruel or hateful behavior toward Muslims. I do not mean to say I approve of the Iraq war, or the “war on terrorism,” as it is being waged thus far. I do not mean to say I am in favor of obliterating Islam.
      I do mean to say Islam needs to have a mirror held up to it, so that it can see itself and recognize the truth; it must begin a questioning of its ways, to initiate its own enlightenment. Islam, after all, has never had one, an Enlightenment. Ayaan Hirsi Ali has lived within the confines of Islam, has studied it, and she knows— the religion is stuck in backwardness. According to her, this infant must not be coddled. It has become a tyrannical, tantrum-throwing brat. We need to tell it, as we would a misbehaving child, “I understand: you want to do these things; but you cannot do them, because you are hurting people.”

      The same thing needs to be said and done with the Bush Administration, which is another tyrannical brat. Toleration of their crimes by Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats, who keep insisting impeachment is impractical, is a kind of permissiveness that can only lead to abuse and the entrenchment of anti-democratic rule.

      Infidel, by Ayaan Hirsi Ali is a great read. You won’t be able to put it down.

—L.M.