A Morning in the Life: John McCain

May 25, 2008 – 4:51 am

In some Best Western on the campaign trail in Red State America, the Republican Standard Bearer awakens.

“Psst,” he says, nudging his wife. “Psst. Cindy? Are you awake?”

“John, it’s 4:30 in the morning. Unless you took that pill and hour ago, there’s no way we can have sex and still be ready for the campaign bus. Remember the last time we tried this and you knocked the donuts off the table? It gave Candy Crowley the wrong idea.”

“No, no, not that,” John says in a huff.

“What is it?”

“Jesus, Cindy, pinch me. Can you believe this?”

“Believe what?”

“I have no right being in this thing. Those right-wing jihadists and their chucklehead cheerleader in the White House screwed things up so badly, I figured I’d be going down to a bigger defeat than Alf Landon against FDR in the middle of the Depression.”

“Why? Were you a staffer on Alf’s campaign?”

“Don’t be a smartass. But how in the hell am I in this thing? We’re losing safe seats in special elections suggesting an ax-handling of epic proportions, yet I am even in the polls with either that latte-drinking dilettante or Madam Defarge and the lounge lizard she married. How can this be when the country hates Republicans?”

“You hate them too, honey.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m a maverick, I get it. But I am still in the party of George Bush, and the only guy happy with him right now is Jimmy Carter because he is finally going to be off the hook. When a president steps on his own dick or her own boob, people will no longer mutter ‘this is the worst president since Jimmy Carter.’ They’ll mutter, ‘this is the worst President since George W. Bush.’ That pompous old coot Carter managed to live long enough to see someone actually raise the bar on presidential incompetence.”

“Aren’t you getting a little confused, like that Sunni, Shia thing Lieberman bailed you out of? Don’t you mean lower the bar?” Read More »

By Feature Writer | Posted in Broken News, Current Affairs, election 08, humor | Comments (0)

The Greatest Hits Of My Greatest Weaknesses

April 18, 2008 – 11:22 am

I want to provide you with a mariner’s chart of my character: the contrasts and topography of my chipped, flawed personality. What the hell, you ask?

Well, this is based on that narcissism that all writers have – or ought to have. Maybe it also has something to do with the fact that I’m besieged by academic deadlines and need something to laugh about.

But the main reason? I’m sitting in a class that I am having trouble caring about (we’re watching a movie on bowel diseases. I just looked up, and was greeted by the sight of a very charming endoscopy).

Some of these tempt me severely, and some of these just make me cry: Read More »

By Joe Hormes | Posted in Columnist, Entertainment, Science & Technology, Society, humor | Comments (1)

Geert Wilders, “Fitna,” and the Last Refuge of the Bigoted

April 14, 2008 – 9:04 am

Fitna (the Arabic word for ‘dissension’), a new film by Geert Wilders, a rightwing Dutch parliamentarian, should not be suppressed.

This isn’t because it has anything valuable or insightful to offer to the debates surrounding Islam, modernity, or the convulsions wracking much of the Middle East. No, it must be seen so that it can be shown up for the insipid propaganda video it is.

To suppress the film in the name of political correctness only underscores the seductive mystery its creators have cultivated. Wilders & Co released snippets of info here and there, whipping up a torrent of anticipation for a film that can only be described as banal.

“Fitna” is a propaganda piece whose ‘aesthetic’ is comparable to those made by radical Islamists. The burning of effigies, extremist placards, and threats to website staff undertaken by Muslim vigilantes as a reaction to this film are themselves myopic and morally bankrupt. When ‘Muslim indignation’ takes a violent turn it merely confirms the claims of provocateurs like Wilders.

The film itself is not a critique of Islamic fundamentalism or even the tribal vestiges of malign practices such as stoning and female circumcision. Wilders’ enterprise is rather the pathetic attempt to salvage a ‘nativist’ conception of Dutch, and, more generally, European identity.

In order to fashion a ‘pristine’ and ‘untarnished’ representation of this idea, Wilders is forced to place it in contradistinction to a clearly defined enemy, represented by the looming threat of a monolithic and omnipresent ‘Islam’. Fitna is therefore yet another variant of the discursively manufactured ‘clash of civilizations’ thesis first argued for by Samuel P. Huntington in the American journal Foreign Affairs over a decade ago.

Wilders’ strategy is simple and crude. He arbitrarily picks out a few decontextualized lines from the Quran, then juxtaposes them with footage of obscene violence committed by Muslim extremists. 9/11, 7/7, and the Madrid Bombings, are paraded across the screen in an orgy of mayhem.

The propaganda videos of al-Qaeda and those inspired by their message equally rely on publicizing violence in order to attract recruits. Read More »

By Feature Writer | Posted in Arts & Literature, Current Affairs, europe, islam | Comments (3)

Heartbreak Hill: Will It Be Clinton or Obama?

March 13, 2008 – 5:53 am

Around mile 20 of the 26 mile Boston Marathon, runners come upon an incline called Heartbreak Hill. They hit a fatigue point at a time when the course calls for some tough slogging before the stretch run to the finish line. Rookie runners are known to pull out in agony at this point in the race.

Has our presidential election cycle reached a Heartbreak Hill of sorts? We have about six weeks before the Pennsylvania primary with nothing major on the horizon after a flurry of primaries in a tightly compressed calendar cycle of about the same duration that was forecasted to settle the issue in both parties.

Instead, the Democratic primary remains very much in doubt, seemingly teetering on the brink of a knock-down, drag-out brawl. Prior to this, there has been commentary talking about all the excitement the Democratic race engendered with the first black man and first female as two viable candidates. It brought a slew of new voters into the process and has been heralded for giving our democracy a badly needed boost of participation after years of declining voter turnouts.

But now these rookie participants have to endure the kind of long, protracted campaign battle that galvanizes voters into opposing camps and disillusions the less zealous among us.

One of the two camps is going to lose. Read More »

By Feature Writer | Posted in Current Affairs, election 08, north america | Comments (2)

Journey to Istanbul

February 29, 2008 – 4:39 am

“Is Turkey a part of Europe or the Middle East?” I asked my fellow passengers as we waited for the plane to Istanbul. Two of them, Turks who graduated from Germany with degrees in Engineering, suggested that Turkey is a part of the West because Turkey needs her wealthy European neighbors for economic exports. They seemed to share the same view of Chris Pattern, then the European Union Commissioner for External Relations, who advocated that Turkey can solve the population problems in Western Europe through mass immigration.

Our flight got new passengers after the stopover in Bangkok. Sitting next to me were two ladies wearing black hijab. One of them told me that she lived in Trabzon, a major city on Black Sea Coast. She was going to return home after finishing her studies as an exchange student in Malaysia. She expressed her disagreement over the proposal for Turkey to join European Union. She said, “ The West and Turkey have different civilizations. Most of our lands are in Asia. But the most important thing is that they are Christians, we are Muslims. There is no way for us to integrate.”

After thirteen hours of journey, the flight finally arrived at Ataturk International Airport, named after Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the first President of the Turkish Republic after the first World War. The new terminal of the airport was gorgeous.

I booked a seat in a new inner-city coach, and, while waiting for its arrival, I raised these questions to myself:

“What kind of people I would meet?”

“What type of dress do most women wear?”

“Will the involvement of Ankara in Brussels be a sensitive topic for religious people? Is it possible to talk about the separation of mosque and state? Finally, will I be accused of insulting Turkishness if I talk about the Armenian massacre?”

On the road to the city center, I smelled dusty air as lots of old buildings in Baroque style were being torn down and replaced by new skyscrapers. In a city envisioning to be a global financial center, the skyscrapers are meant to attract foreign corporations to set up offices, even their Central Asia headquarters. If Istanbul was characteristically reflecting the development of the whole Turkey, it would be right to claim that the country was intending to open to the world through shifting to financial industry, recruiting talents from the West and encouraging its Diaspora to make investments in its motherland.

Yet, with a large population still living in countryside, will it become “the Turkish Shanghai” - where the rich and the expatriates from Western Europe create lively social lives and are willing to pay 100 U.S. dollars for tickets of violinist Itzhak Perlman while workers from Southern and Eastern Part of the country get low-paid jobs and are unable to meet ends meet? Time will tell. Read More »

By Jonathan Mok | Posted in Society, europe, middle east, travel | Comments (1)

Election 2008, From the Mouths of Babes

February 21, 2008 – 10:20 pm

Shockingly, my 15-year old son has recently become interested in politics. We’re not ready to take off the ski hat, cut our hair, pull up our pants, and don a coat and tie like Michael J. Fox in the 1980s sitcom “Family Ties,” but it’s a start.

Indeed, this emerging interest had me channeling Kenneth Branaugh in the remake of the movie Frankenstein, when said creature stirred for the first time and Branagh looked to the heavens and wailed, “It’s A-liiiiivvvvveeeeee!” Productive intellectual inquisitiveness in the teen male must always be encouraged, no matter how flickering the flame. Words must be chosen carefully so as to gently fan that flame, rather than put it out.

On primary nights, the lad has asked me to turn the television onto CNN “so we can watch the scores.” It’s not a logical leap from ESPN, I guess, and politics is the biggest spectator sport in this country, so I do nothing to disabuse him of the notion.

His comments with respect to Mrs. Clinton would sit well with her adversaries. He’s dumbstruck at how she can conceivably be trying to change the rules with respect to Michigan and Florida. “That sucks,” he says, “isn’t that cheating?”

Our discussion about Barack Obama struck me, however. Read More »

By Feature Writer | Posted in Current Affairs, election 08, family, humor, north america | Comments (1)

Disliking the Demi-God: The Dalai Lama and the Cult of Personality

February 17, 2008 – 2:22 am

He’s an informant for the FBI
Whack the Dalai Lama

- The Dickies, “Whack the Dalai Lama”

Okay, I don’t actually advocate harming the Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama, and don’t hold serious animosity towards him; that Dickies lyric merely seemed like a good opener.

I think the Dalai Lama is an alright guy.

I don’t think he’s the re-incarnation of a demi-god though, and I don’t think he’s an infallible sage or “the premiere moral presence of our time” (yes, I have seen this claim in print). And I hate, hate, hate the cult of personality that has surrounded him, and consequently, distorted the terms of debate over the Chinese occupation of Tibet and the issues pertaining to it.

Since I’m an advocate of self-determination (to some degree), I suppose it seems hypocritical to not throw in behind the Tibetan cause to any real extent, but that’s because I’ve done something a lot of the Dalai Lama’s supporters actually have not: I’ve read some Tibetan History. And furthermore, I’ve taken in excess of three seconds to evaluate the Dalai Lama’s wishes for a free Tibet, and realized that he wants a Theocracy that he can be the ruler of. His cause for a free Tibet is not entirely a selfless mission.

My main beef here is that Americans look at Buddhism in general, and its Tibetan subset in particular, through rose-colored glasses. This probably sounds weird coming from someone from an Abrahamic background, when all of the branches have some blood on their hands (yep, Judaism, you too). Yet, the Abrahamic faiths are re-examined all the time, while Buddhism gets a pass. Read More »

By Feature Writer | Posted in Current Affairs, east asia, human rights | Comments (5)

Super Tuesday: A Political Perfect Storm

February 6, 2008 – 5:41 am

As I recall, the term “perfect storm” was coined in New England in October 1991, when several storm fronts merged to spectacularly clobber the coastline.

Now, the American political system this year has a confluence of factors that have made this election cycle the most volatile in recent memory.

For the sake of clarity, here are what I believe to be the main issues (or storm fronts) at play this year:

1. For the first time since 1952 no sitting president or vice president operates as a presumptive nominee.

2. We have the first viable female candidate in the race in Hillary Clinton, whose First Husband would be the indefatigable Bill Clinton, and the first viable black candidate in the race in Barak Obama, who represents a new generation entering politics.

3. We have a compressed primary process manufactured to minimize the impact of first-in-the-nation strongholds Iowa and New Hampshire, creating a semi-national primary last night of 22 of our 50 states holding primary elections at once.

4. As a nation we’re antsy, worrying about the economy, the Iraq War, and the general partisan bickering that has kept our national leaders in the gutter for the better part of sixteen years. In 1994, we booted out seventy three incumbent Democrats, bringing in a freshman class of Republicans called the “Gang of 73.” These people deluded themselves into believing the vote was in favor of “them” rather than a repudiation of the incumbents. Republicans did not get the message, and now we’re ticked off about it.

5. The Hispanic community, soon to become the largest minority, is seriously flexing its political muscle.

OK, so the facts are out on the table, but what the hell does all of this mean? And what happened just now, on Super Tuesday? Read More »

By Feature Writer | Posted in Current Affairs, election 08, north america | Comments (11)

The Clintons Are Graceless. Is It Finally Good Night?

January 31, 2008 – 1:55 am

I sat mesmerized as I watched Caroline and Ted Kennedy symbolically pass the torch of Camelot and all it represents to the loyal opposition, Barak Obama, the other day. I started out as a good Republican would, by looking for ways to blow holes in all of this. Here’s a guy, Obama, trying to get us to look forward by embracing 1962, I thought. Didn’t Reagan do a good job of deconstructing that?

And there was the Ambien-addled third generation scion, Patches, sitting behind the new standard bearer who was assuming what would rightfully had been his, if Patches wasn’t such an inveterate screw up to begin with.

But I couldn’t start blowing holes. I thought back to 1980 working a campaign in Pennsylvania where I would bump into Kennedy staffers. I recalled them telling me the reason why the networks insisted on each having two camera crews following Senator Kennedy around was to be able to have several angles covered in the event of an assassination attempt. How does one seek to serve a country when their life might be on the line? You can’t help but empathize with that.

And, for all of his faults, our Senator has been an active surrogate father in the lives of his many nieces and nephews, those whose fathers’ call to service ended in tragedy. How much was Caroline’s preemptive endorsement a factor in Ted’s decision to get off the fence and enter the fray? Caroline lost her dad at 6.

I lost my dad at 8, and I didn’t have a Zapruder film to haunt me about it. For her to say this man reminds her most of her father must have a profound meaning to her

So there was all that treacly drama of a political movement brutally dashed through assassinations. There was the fatherless child of the movement founder standing beside the aging surrogate, now hunched over and stiff from a bad back ravaged further still by a less than healthy lifestyle, to be kind. He essentially admitted his time had passed with considerable grace and dignity.

And then came Obama. Man-oh-man can that guy give a speech. It was totally devoid of substance, which is OK. Obama understands our national hunger for a new approach to politics. The Rove/Carville strategy has been to divide and conquer. Depress voter turnout by turning off the middle and hope your tin foil clad zealots rule the day. Read More »

By Feature Writer | Posted in Current Affairs, election 08, north america | Comments (4)

Politics and Tragedy

January 13, 2008 – 11:28 am

Wherein lies the tragedy of Benazir Bhutto’s assassination?

Common wisdom holds that the implications surrounding the demise of one of Pakistan’s major democratic leaders are tragic. Others hold that her killing reveals the sinister confluence of wicked forces at work in Pakistan.

Others hold that that the tragedy lies in the fact that she comes from a family that has lost far too many of its sons and daughters. Others hold that the tragedy lies in the loss that will be felt by her young children.

But what if we simply refused to assign any form of tragedy to Bhutto’s killing? What if we said: it is tragic that another human being has been killed, and that is all I have to say.

Why should I exalt the tragedy of Bhutto’s death, when I rarely exalt the tragedy of anyone else’s death? Why does she get this preferential treatment? Simply because she was involved in politics?

Nietzsche said that most ancient Greeks didn’t care about politics. They believed that they were utterly incapable of affecting the decision-making in which the powerful engaged, opting, therefore, to busy themselves with other things: things upon which they could have direct influence, namely art.

Why do we modern people think that politics have changed? Read More »

By Ali Eteraz | Posted in Columnist, Current Affairs, south asia, terrorism | Comments (3)