The politics of fear and numbers

Polls show American's support for President Bush somewhere in the toilet. I realize first lady Laura Bush says she disbelieves the polls, and I don't blame her for standing behind her man, if that is what she is doing. Still, if Laura Bush really disbelieves how Americans feel about her husband then she ought to get out more often. By out, I mean in the real world as opposed to a rally where the tickets are given out to carefully screened individuals.

We have been hearing a lot about how "9-11 changed everything" and how we have to think differently. We are in a war on terrorism. Don't misunderstand me, I understand the threat of terrorists is real. It existed long before 9-11 for that matter.

When the President went on TV last night, he did so simply for the opportunity to soften up the negative numbers against him. Right now, Americans favor building a high wall around us and throwing the keys to the gate away.
Yes, some seventy percent of the American people want to close down the boarders. They want to close it down out of fear.

Some people are truly afraid of a terrorist walking across the boarder and it could happen. That is not how any of the 9-11 conspirators came in, but it is possible. There are a lot of other people who also want it closed out of fear, but that fear is not about terrorism but what they see as the assimilation of our American culture into large segments of diversified nationalities. They are fearful of the erosion of American job markets, and they are fearful of having to provide benefits and services to new people entering this country.

In fact, while the driving force in all of this is fear, it is really more the latter that the President is pandering to. Yes, I said pandering. Now, I'll tell you why. First of all, if the President was so all fire concerned abut the boarders, he would have ordered this done right away after 9-11. He has ordered wiretaps without court approval. He has ordered the collection of billions of people's phone records. None of those has he sought authority for, he just did it, in spite of existing laws that provide protections and oversight to such intrusions. He could have just signed an executive order and poof- put troops along the Mexican and Canadian boarders.

The only known terrorist entry attempt through the American boarders was the millennium bomber who used Canada, not Mexico for entry and was caught. But the President is focusing on the Mexican boarder not Canada. That is where people fear the greatest threat to American culture and jobs.

So the President now wants to send 6,000 National Guard troops to the Mexican boarder. I feel safer already! Don't you? Actually the Posse Comitatus Act would prevent these troops from making arrests of illegal aliens. They can only stand by and watch. Or call the actual boarder patrol and provide information to help them take the people into custody. So really this is not an addition of a big layer of added security. This is smoke and mirrors. The President has fallen on hard times with even his most conservative base. Plus, he wants to try and make his "guest worker" program for non-citizens more palatable with the conservative right. This is just the cod liver oil to help make it go down a little smoother.

tags: border Illegal immigration Bush Immigration national guard

Poet Stanley Kunitz Dies at 100 - Los Angeles Times

Poet Stanley Kunitz Dies at 100 - Los Angeles Times

Stanley Kunitz, the elegant centenarian of American poetry, whose musings about life, death, love and memory brought him a Pulitzer Prize, a National Book Award and two terms as U.S. poet laureate, died Sunday at his home in New York City. He was 100.



tag: poet

Monday ugh!

Monday is not my favorite day of the week anyway, and it seemed this weekend went way to fast for my liking.

Saturday, my daughter Meghan and I did a bike ride. It was not a competitive one and I, unlike her, am not particularly experienced in any rides of great length. In fact, I have not really ridden in years.

This was a 16 mile ride and I bailed at 11 miles. Admittedly I was having problems with the lower gears on the bike, but still, I pushed myself to get to 11 miles. I don't think this is the end of riding for me, but the gear issue is going to have to be dealt with or switch out the bike for another one.

Sunday we celebrated mother's day. I think we all agreed that we ate too much, but otherwise had a good day. It was a long one for my wife, but I think she have a good day otherwise.

I did a wee bit of writing over the weekend, but really not enough make any fuss over here. Read a few poems, but again I was mostly busy with other stuff.

Since it was mother's day I actually spent a fair amount of time thinking about relationships with mothers. I think this was helped by reading the poem "Drowning" by Sharon Olds, in which she describes all of these grown daughters together discussing their fears for their children, all the while each has a mother (their own) bearing down on their neck as they are submerged.

I think mother-daughter relationships are most intricate. Perhaps I am coming from a skewed view - my own relationship with my father was non-existent so I suppose it is not fair for me to judge mother-daughter relationships as any more of less of anything by comparison to father-son. Still, I think they seem more complex than a mother-son relationship.

Kahil Gibran Quotations

Poet, philosopher, and artist, Kahil Gibran was born in Lebanon, though he made the United States his home for the last twenty years of his life. He has been highly read in both Arab speaking countries and the United States.

I came upon two quotes from him which I feel say so much about poets and their craft.

"A poet is a bird of unearthly excellence, who escapes from his celestial realm arrives in this world warbling. If we do not cherish him, he spreads his wings and flies back into his homeland."

It is true that I sometimes read the work of this poet or that and feel quite as though they are from some other, perhaps celestial realm. However, I'm sorry to say that I believe people as a whole do not often cherish them or their works. I suspect a lot of them must be making their way back home.

The second quote I absolutely love. "All our words are but crumbs that fall down from the feast of the mind." Yes! Our words are but a tiny fraction of all that goes on upstairs and yet in many respects, that is all we have to go one when assessing one another. It makes me realize how important each word is because put together with others they represent the visible sum of all our thoughts.

Tags: Poetry poets Writing words

What Is Your Phone Company Up To?

If you us one of these phone services:

AT&T Inc., BellSouth Corp. and Verizon Communications Inc.

You should know that they have been voluntarily handing over the phone calling record of tens of millions of customers to the government as part of Bush's post 9-11 surveillance of phone calls. [source 1] [source 2] [source 3]

You should also know that President Bush's nominee for CIA director, Air Force Gen. Michael Hayden, was head of the NSA from 1999 to 2005, would have overseen the call-tracking program. [source]

This information has been collected with out probable cause, without warrant, and represents an illegal intrusion into the lives of private citizen.

I am calling my Senators and asking them to oppose Michael Hayden's nomination and to fully investigate this activity Bush has authorized. I suggest others do the same.

Birthplace of poetry and voice

" I grew up in this town, my poetry was born between the hill and the river, it took its voice from the rain, and like the timber, it steeped itself in the forests. " ~ Pablo Neruda

Where was my poetry born and from where did my voice originate? This is something I have not really openly explored. I don't believe the answer is an easy one to either question. I could easily dodge it, or dismiss it with a simple answer that fails to do the question justice. Still, I think Neruda asks that which every poet ought to consider within their own personal context.

As to the birth place of my poetry, I have lived my whole life in the same state. Most of it in an urban setting. I suppose that I could argue that my poetry was born in at the shadow of a downtown city that has over the years been in decay. Declining in prominence. I big city, with big city problem, but one in which the migration of it's citizens has been away from, at least until recently.

I have traveled to other cities and states, but this has been my home since a very small child. I have moved within the last few years to a more suburban setting, but one that is not far from all the commercial amenities you normally have being in a big city.

My poetry voice has come from several places. I don't really write so much of regional "place" - for example, Kansas City is known as the city of fountains. I don't recall ever going there with a poem. Nor poetry about the Oregon and Santa Fe trails. Rarely have I mentioned the might Missouri river which has a bend here in the KC area.

What I have found is that my poetry often has been a voice of despair like the urban core. The violence of war perhaps has come from the inner-city violence that never seemed very far away. Hopelessness and despair have often been a part of my work and that perhaps has had some origin in my job with deals daily with mental illness. My voice perhaps also has been drawn from my own personal life, growing up was not easy and although in many respects I had it so much better than some, it was at times painful none the less.

There is an under current of relationship impact upon my writing. Some of it from my family of origin. And I see and feel a tug of influence in relationship poems that are rooted in nearly 32 year of marriage. Love poetry is not something that comes easy for me. There is the ever present fear of writing stuff that is too sappy. But when I can, I do enjoy capturing that moment that says something about love.

The 32 years of marriage have not been without their share of problems and downhill runs, but they are in fact the most significant aspect of my life and for all the mistakes I have made along the way, it is in that relationship with my wife that I have the greatest value of life at all.

I do so often write from a dark perspective. Death is not particularly a fascination with me as perhaps it is of some, but rather a fact of our being and it is at the opposite end of the spectrum of life, I suppose that contrast and the desire to live as opposed to die that pulls me to the subject. It is something I cannot ignore.

So there you are. My poetry was born in a city that knows adversity. Gleaned its voice from everyday trials, from a fight for survival and a search for hope, all the while recognizing the pain and suffering of street people, victims of drive-by shootings, families that try to cling together in these difficult times and that one thing that is so precious that money cannot buy.

Non-Verbal Skills

My hand,
a secret decoder
felt her      silent message
up and down the length
of her body,        and
in translation,          found
we were saying the same thing.

Tag: poem