unintended consequences December 31, 2007
Last night, I saw “Charlie Wilson’s War.” I thought it was fascinating. B knows a lot about this stuff, and he said, “it didn’t happen like that, nothing happens like that,” but he loved the movie, too. It’s a Mike Nichols movie, so the production values are high and there are movie stars all over the place. Tom Hanks plays Texas playboy-congressman Charlie Wilson and Julia Roberts is an idealistic right-wing Texas socialite. Philip Seymour Hoffman, who should be arrested for grand theft, steals the show as the CIA agent. The movie takes place in the 80s, and I got that same embarassing cringe that I always feel these days when I see the hair styles and clothes of that era.
This is sort of a “feel good and then feel bad” movie about America. I’m a very left-wing, liberal person, and I don’t usually find myself cheering on people who arrange clandestine arms sales and covert wars in foreign countries. But this movie shows you how long and how badly the people of Afghanistan have been fucked. At the time that the Julia Roberts character was doing her real-life moving and shaking, the Afghans were being slaughtered by Russians. It seemed only right that she and Charlie Wilson wanted to give them something to fight back with.
The end of the movie, however, is a great example of mushrooming unintended consequences. In addition to Americans, there were a lot of other people who wanted to help the Afghans fight the Russians. One of those people was an idealistic Saudi Arabian rich boy named Osama Bin Laden. In the movie, Wilson tried to get the congress to fund schools in Afghanistan after the war. They were not interested. After appropriating a billion dollars for guns and bombs in Afghanistan, they declined to send a couple of million to the bombed-out country to build schools. Of course, another group of people took up the slack. They were the Taliban, whose name means “students.” They were eager to undertake the education of the children of Afghanistan. If you’ve been following the news, you’ll note that they are still around, and they don’t appear to be suffering from a shortage of weapons.
closed primaries December 30, 2007
Here is an interesting article about the advent of closed primaries in Louisiana, for the first time since the 1970s. The law goes into effect Jan. 1. The article goes into the history of it all, and guess which two people end up being at the center? Edwin Edwards was the mover behind opening the primaries, and Cleo Fields is the mover behind the closing. I have no idea what it all means, I just think it’s interesting.
Ultimately, I think closed primaries benefit the two major parties to the detriment of the others. I have recently taken an interest in Democratic party politics, so that’s OK by me. I have friends, though, who will probably not think this is a good development.
As far as parties go, I think the Democratic party, minus the corruption that goes along with certain personalities involved, represents me. I was very disappointed in John Breaux and, of course, I can’t stand Edwin Edwards. My feelings about The Jeffersons are well known, and I’m very unimpressed by the family’s latest move to put Renee Gill-Pratt back on our payroll. But Mary Landrieu has done more for Louisiana than either Bobby Jindal or David Vitter ever thought about. Sometimes Vitter seems to be actively working against the interests of Louisianians, as was written about in a recent NYT editorial.
deputize the homeless December 29, 2007
A young woman was beaten to death and left under a French Quarter wharf, and the NOPD has already nabbed a suspect, thanks to the homeless. This is working out great. We have so many homeless people living under wharves and I-10 that it’s like an underground army of detectives. When they hear something suspicious at night, they don’t have to open the door and go outside and check it out, there’s no door! They’re already outside! I’m sleeping a lot better at night, knowing the homeless are out there.
i don’t want to know anything December 28, 2007
Now that I have some time to catch up on the news, I find myself skipping over most of the articles about the people who are running for president. Well, except for Rudy and Judy. It doesn’t matter what I think, any way, because my vote doesn’t matter. By the time Louisiana votes, the candidates have already been chosen by other people in other states. I will cast my vote in the general election for whoever is running against the Republican, whoever it is. And then my vote won’t matter again because all of Louisiana’s nine electoral votes will go to the Republican.
the race card: don’t leave home without it
I was going to write a post about disgraced judge C. Hunter King having his record expunged, but Do Not Pass Geaux has done it for me. Judge Julian Parker thinks white people moved the goal post again. Excuse me if I don’t get all worked up over the unfairness of it all. Dangerblond sends her regrets that she cannot attend the pity party for a privileged black man with a law degree who became a judge and then extorted his courtroom employees to raise $5,000 each for his re-election campaign. Just imagine a young black man in Judge Parker’s courtroom, accused of theft or drug possession, explaining to His Honor that “white people do it, too.” That would go over like a lead balloon. If white judges are doing it, then let’s get them off the bench as well. The color of the skin is not important, it’s the black robe they are wearing.
all i want for christmas is egg foo young December 26, 2007
B was sick over Christmas with some kind of flu that is going around. All the people who get it seem to be males, so I guess it’s Swine Flu. TOTALLY kidding, guys, relax. Dangerblond loves the menfolks, and loves to take care of them when they are sick. He didn’t have his kids on Christmas Eve either, and a sick man without his kids on Christmas Eve - well, that would melt even a heart of stone. I threw him in the car with Jackson and me and kidnapped him to Lafayette.
We checked in to a hotel and went over to Maxine’s for gumbo and reindeer games. They had a fire going outside and the moon was brilliant. Jackson was the youngest kid, and he loves playing with the big kids. One six-year-old boy brought his “light saber,” and Jackson kept asking to play with the “light saver.” The White Elephant gift exchange was rigged so that he would get the Shrek puzzle and no one would steal it.
Some time in the middle of the night, I woke up hearing the phone ringing. Not my cell phone, but the hotel phone.
“Hello?”
“Kim?”
“Uuhh, yyyes.”
“Hey, it’s Pat, from the bar. I’m coming up there to see you.”
I was thinking, how in the HELL does Patrick Armstrong know where I am?
“Uh, is this a joke?”
“No. I’m coming up there, Mrs. Robinson.”
“Uh, I think you have the wrong number. It’s weird because my name is Kim, but I didn’t meet you in the bar. Sorry.”
“Oh. OK.” Click.
B pipes up from his 104-degree cocoon: “Jesus Christ, I can’t leave you alone long enough to sleep.”
Hah! I thought it was hilarious at first, then I felt bad for this poor guy, spending Christmas Eve going around picking up older women in bars, and getting the run-around at that! Mrs. Robinson, shame on you, wherever you are.
On Christmas morning, we opened gifts with Jackson, Amy and Laurence. Jackson got a new bike with training wheels from Santa, and the usual splurge of loot from Grandma (all purchased at Le Jouet toy store on Airline Hwy, by the way, which has all the stuff you need and none of the cacophony). They are going up to Amy’s family’s this weekend because one of their relatives had to spend Christmas recovering from surgery and Amy’s mom was helping out.
After that, B and I drove back to New Orleans. I took a nap wherein I dreamed about young men calling me from hotel bars, and they all looked like Patrick Swayzie in “Ghost,” and none of them could find the elevator.
I met B and the kids for Christmas dinner at Five Happiness (hot and sour soup for B) and later we all exchanged gifts. His daughter was all excited and looking adorable in her Christmas dress. His little baby boy had really caught on to the present-opening thing and was sputtering with delight, trying so hard to talk. Christmas is so much fun with little kids around. The more, the better; babies if possible.
This morning, I opened my Christmas gift from the city of New Orleans. My property tax bill is, um, very reasonable. It’s way lower than I was expecting. I take back all the terrible things I said, if any, about Henry Heaton. I mailed the check out right away in case they change their mind.
why i prefer shopping online
Read this horrifying story from Digby: Torture Me Elmo
Actually, I didn’t do any online shopping this year, but I stayed away from big-box stores except for one trip to Target. I already hate going into those places for my own quirky reasons. Does anyone else’s holiday shopping mood take a dive when you enter a store and all of a sudden the security equipment is screeching at you? I mean, I haven’t been in your store yet, how could I steal anything? And if it’s going to screech at everyone who enters, what is the freakin’ point? Can’t we just go back to greeting the customers with the Johnny Mathis Christmas Song? So, anyway, it’s not hard to lure me to any place else. I ended up buying most of my gifts at the Freret Street art market that is held every Saturday.
In reference to the link above, I’m getting a very creepy feeling about all the people who are getting tasered. Having recently seen it done to people, let me tell you that is a very serious remedy for a police officer to inflict on someone who “disrupted business.” I thought these tasers were supposed to be reserved for occasions when police reasonably felt in fear for their lives or safety.Â
The parameters for the use of tasers have obviously been expanded to include occasions when people are simply not cooperating with police commands. Can I just say that if I ever fail to cooperate with the police for whatever my nutty, misguided, senile reasons might be, I would much, much rather be thrown face down on the ground, handcuffed and taken to jail than to be shot with 30,000 volts of electricity? They can even rough me up with the nightstick, I’m sure the pain can’t compare to the taser.
I have no doubt that there are cowboy (and cowgirl) cops out there who are taser-happy, and I hope they are being properly disciplined when they taser someone who is obviously not a threat. But disciplining the police after the fact does little to help a person who has been hit with 30,000 volts. I wonder if enough cops realize the pain they are inflicting on people? Should police training include a “mild” jolt from a taser, so that they can feel the kind of pain they are administering? Would that help them to remember to hold their fire until they are absolutely sure the person in front of them is dangerous?
starbuckster December 23, 2007
Jackson has been here since Friday. We went to the carnival at City Park and a Christmas party last night. He has met a bunch of new kids and is taking it all in stride. It’s so funny to look at life from the viewpoint of age 3.5.
The streetcar is now running all the way up and down St. Charles Avenue. We took the kids for a ride down to Audubon Park and back. Today, the weather was crisp and cold.
At City Park on Friday night, it was very dark, which makes Jackson both thrilled and scared. We were lined up to put the kids on the airplane ride and there was a black woman in front of us with her son or grandson. She was wearing a black hajib, black coat and long black dress. She was very friendly, but Jackson stared up at her with a frown. I happened to glance down and watch him whisper to B’s daughter, “she’s a munster.” Thank god, the woman had no clue, but I couldn’t correct him about it because then she would have known.
He has apparently never seen a two-door car. Every time I get him out of his car seat, he tells me there is supposed to be another door there. Finally, I told him I would get one.
He has Blockbuster and Starbucks mixed up. He thinks we rented Christmas movies from Starbucks.
When we pass by the Elks tomb on City Park Avenue, he says, “there’s Rudolph!”
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fill this stocking in remembrance of me December 22, 2007
In my father’s house, there are many stockings…
I was talking with a Jewish friend tonight and he seemed to think the Christmas stocking was a Christian symbol. Hold the phone. There is no need to fear the armies of the ACLU marching into American kindergartens and confiscating all the children’s decorated stockings.
The tradition of the Christmas stocking is supposed to have begun in the 16th century, with little Dutch children leaving their wooden shoes in front of the hearth to be filled with treats from ”Sinterclass.” In England, it morphed into stockings being hung by the chimney with care in hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there, because, y’ know, English children don’t wear wooden shoes.
Bottom line, everybody relax. There are no stockings in the New Testament. Jesus turned water into wine, healed the sick, raised the dead, walked on the sea, and told people to love one another. The son of God did not fill all the stockings, then turn with a jerk.
Here’s an amusing article from the 1883 NY Times, written by someone who has had it with Christmas trees and wants to bring back the stocking. I’ve always like stockings, too.
wishing you a white christmas December 21, 2007
You know, I’m kind of glad New Orleans is getting rid of all our black people. I really prefer Hispanics when it comes to menials. Have you noticed how they behave? They try as hard as they can to melt into the background and be invisible. This is preferable to the attitude of our former uppity negroes, who simply insist on being noticed and recognized as people. Let them assert their personhood somewhere else!
I appreciate the way the little brown people keep their eyes on the ground when they talk to me. It’s as though they instinctively recognize my blond superiority. Each time I interact with them, I am reminded of the movie “Mrs. Brown,” about Queen Victoria. In that movie, when the queen suddenly appears in the hallway, any servants who happen to be passing through there stop in their tracks and turn immediately to the wall. They stand there silently looking at the wall until the queen is well past them. This keeps the queen from having suffer the indignity of having a low class chamber maid look at her, or, god forbid, smile at her. This movie is a model of how the servant class should behave in the presence of their betters, and more people ought to do themselves the favor of watching it.
It’s also a very nice feature that the new Hispanic lower class does not speak much English. I speak a little Spanish, but I pretend not to, because one doesn’t like to waste one’s time conversing with the help. I don’t like to be bothered with tales of woe, of which poor people seem to have an endless supply. How tiresome. “Sorry, Emelda. No comprende!”
The new Latin servant class is not only properly humble, but they bow and scrape with appreciation for every crumb you throw their way. It truly makes my heart feel grand. I’ve seen them living in gutted out buildings with no electricity, driving cars that shouldn’t even be allowed on the road, and wearing absolute rags. Naturally, they don’t ask for much. All it takes to make them happy is some rice and beans, and what could be healthier than rice and beans?
With their frugal living habits and distaste for luxuries, you can get a Mexican for half what it costs to hire an African-American. Most of them are working in this country illegally anyway, so who are they going to complain to? Ha! It’s so nice for the rest of us when lower class people have no options.
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