Where the Bodies are Buried

9:39 PM. News-weary this spring night. Troubled, wondering who will be a speaker for the dead.

I reckon this time I might irritate some folks, with the thoughts I can't help but spill. Spill I must, or burst. Or perhaps just toss and turn trying to shake off dreams that make me ill at ease. I listened overly much to the news today, in servitude to its terrible fascination with the burial ground of Tamerlan Tsarnaev. No one in this country wants the body, and the ones who claim him at all cannot and will not travel here to get him.

Not that I recommend they try it, unless they travel under heavy escort, in unmarked vehicles, in the small hours of the morning.

I do not say that because I bear any hatred towards the parents of the bombing suspect. Whatever their respective characters may be---and the news is not favorable---they were not the ones who made the bombs or set them off. So I have no room for hatred of them in my heart. Pity, maybe.

I say it because of what it seems the majority of society feels towards their children, and how society is looking not just for someone to hate, but to hate with savagery. The collective conscience is howling for blood, any blood, as the only justice for the horrific crimes committed by the brothers Tsarnaev.

I understand that rage, intertwined with the need for revenge. Speaking for myself, however, I do not want it to consume me or my life. I want justice, make no mistake about that. But I have a very hard time convincing myself that justice, in some fashion, has not already been served on the dead brother. Being shot multiple times and then having a relative run over you with a car is in many ways worse than a state-sponsored execution.

Which brings me back to the news today, and its talk of where Tamerlan will be buried. Or rather, not buried. So far no cemetery in Massachusetts has agreed to accept the body. Those cemeteries have, I am sure, well-founded concerns about having such a notorious person buried there.

Because the living, or some of the living, would never be satisfied to let the body alone. This desire for revenge or "eye for an eye" says more about the living, however, than it does about the dead. The living sometimes have what seems to be an insatiable desire for hatred and revenge.

The thing is, if Tamerlan had survived, he would be in custody now along with his brother. They both would be awaiting trial and whatever punishment society saw fit to levy against them. And I cannot say I am immune to the notion that they both deserve to die for what they did.

What I do not want to partake of is the savagery that I suspect many want to inflict not just on the younger brother, but on a corpse. A savagery we decry in others, I will add, and one not entirely square with our ideals of due process and decency.

Before you scream and howl at me, thinking me soft and not living in the real world, know this: I do want justice here. I do not defend or excuse anything the brothers did, because there is no excuse or justification. Due process has to be observed if we are to claim we support the system that allows justice to be served without mob rules...because this is a nation of laws.

I also believe that, like it or not, the disposition of the body is the province of the family, not the state, nor the madding crowd. And if we allow ourselves to get knotted up in revenge and hatred then we have given up on living good lives in spite of the awfulness that our fellow men have cast upon us.

I heard a report that an uncle, the one living in Maryland, had traveled to Massachusetts to prepare the body for a traditional Muslim funeral. He said something to the effect that "Everyone deserves to be buried. Only God can judge the dead." I suppose for those who have a belief in a higher power who judges all, that belief will let you imagine any fate you care to conjure up. Some folks might believe he is a martyr, others will see nothing but eternal damnation as reward for such atrocity. Maybe both sides are right, or neither.

Ultimately, it does not matter. If only God (assuming God exists) can judge, then that judgement will be beyond the knowledge of mere humans. If there is nothing beyond this mortal coil, then maybe most of society can rest assured the murderer has no chance at reward, just annihilation.

What matters is what we, the living, can do with the measure of our days. Why do we need to care where a criminal (or monster, by some lights) is buried? Timothy McVeigh, Adam Lanza and even Osama Bin Laden all received burials, of sorts. Does anyone spend their time trying to track those ashes? Does anyone really want to spend their days spitting on the graves of criminals? If so, perhaps those people should step back and decide whose life are they really living.

I personally do not care where the remains of Tamerlan Tsarnaev end up, as I have no plans to visit for any purpose. I understand that many people won't feel the same about the issue; the desire for revenge and catharsis is ingrained in the tribal psyche of us all. My heart aches for the victims of any such tragedy as what happened in Boston, and that will always be true. But as for myself, I'll let the damned lie where they may without wasting precious time and energy on them. I will not allow myself to be pinned to the strange attractor of unrequited hatred.

Broken Voids

December 14th, 10:27 PM. Vile headache from parsing news of the latest horrific gun violence tragedy. Rain falls, and thoughts of bed beckon me.

---

There comes a time where the left and the right, the liberal and the conservative, the 'must-control' and the 'cowboy militia' crowd simply must cease to talk, blather and yell.

They simply must be silent...unless they want to join us devastated human beings in a scream of volcanic anguish that surely could be heard at the edges of the universe.

Now is not the time to squabble about the deadly tools that usurp our hearts with broken voids. Now is the time for considered reflection, to fill those voids with love.

That Old Time Religion

It's Sunday, and you know what that means. It's time for guns and Jesus!

...

Sounds ridiculous, doesn't it? I thought so, too, when the tagline first crossed my mind on Saturday. I tried to set it aside in favor of something else. As the day wore on, and the more I read in the news, I realized I wouldn't be able to drop it.

I was meditating on the awfulness of the shootings and killings that occurred in Aurora, trying to gain some understanding. It saddened me deeply to think that yet again something like this happened, yet again we will go through the cycle of shock, outrage and collective forgetting of the random, sudden violence that seems to be an unfortunate, horrifying earmark of life in the modern United States.

I told myself to send up a prayer that such a horror never happens to me, my friends and my family. I told myself to send up prayers for the victims and their loved ones. In many ways that is all we can do when faced with tragedies which have their only connection to ourselves through the medium of modern telecommunications technology.

I also hoped that outsiders with an agenda would exercise some tact and common sense, and refrain from using the tragedy as a sounding board for all manner of fear-mongering or idiocy.  Way too optimistic on my part, I know. Sadly, that lasted all of no time.

That some commentators on ABC News got way ahead of themselves by trying too hard to make a link between the alleged gunman and the Tea Party, based on very sketchy and unsubstantiated information, was bad enough. I'm no fan of the Tea Party, but the link between the perpetrator and them was so tenuous at that stage (and I don't think it has been substantiated even now) these veterans of the reporting trade should definitely have known better than to put it out there.

Trying to be the first to report, okay, I get that. Want to be cutting edge "on the scene", okay fine, just do a better job of fact-checking before trying to trump the competition. Really, it was way to early and so little facts were known that it ends up making them look stupid.

What really made me sick, and feeling so fed up with the culture of violence in this country, was one particular set of statements made by U.S. Representative from Texas Louie Gohmert. In a truly breathtaking leap of logic (or illogic, depending on how you look at it) that strains the bounds reasonable thought, he made the following remarks in a radio interview broadcast by the Heritage Foundation:

"You know what really gets me, as a Christian, is to see the ongoing attacks on Judeo-Christian beliefs, and then some senseless crazy act of terror like this takes place."

"Some of us happen to believe that when our founders talked about guarding our virtue and freedom, that that was important...Whether it's John Adams saying our Constitution was made only for moral and religious people ... Ben Franklin, only a virtuous people are capable of freedom, as nations become corrupt and vicious they have more need of masters ... We have been at war with the very pillars, the very foundation of this country."

"People say ... where was God in all of this?...We've threatened high school graduation participations, if they use God's name, they're going to be jailed ... I mean that kind of stuff. Where was God? What have we done with God? We don't want him around. I kind of like his protective hand being present."

So he thinks that there is a link between random, mass violence and lack of religion. Furthermore, he seems to think it is specifically due to lack of Christianity. What is truly breathtaking in its willful irrationality is the connection he tries to make between supposed 'ongoing attacks on Judeo-Christian beliefs' and the psychopathic actions of a single mass murderer.

Say what? How in the world does that even make sense? My guess is the perpetrator is a deeply troubled individual whose mind went places most of us cannot even imagine. I truly do not believe that it was a lack of Christianity that led to this; it was a pathological lack of reason and empathy. It speaks to narrowness of mind and arrogance of belief to claim this random act of violence as an attack on ones' belief system. Frankly, if Gohmert and folks like him are making Christianity look bad by claiming their religion had something to do with this crime.

But that's not all. It gets worse. He went on to speculate that the tragedy could have been lessened or stopped if only (you guessed it) more people in the theater had been carrying guns, and thereby could have taken down the shooter:

"It does make me wonder, with all those people in the theater, was there nobody that was carrying a gun that could have stopped this guy more quickly?"

Oh, for the love of humanity, really? A crowded theater full of people carrying guns? Is this man a complete moron? People who were in the theater have been quoted as saying they thought the commotion was part of the movie. And do I really have to point out that it is generally DARK in movie theaters, so between that and the confusion, the soundtrack with special effects a generally untrained population...how would anyone have been able to take down the gunman without hurting and killing even more bystanders? Does he not understand the concepts of "fog of war" and "crossfire"?

Not long after I read the above remarks, I saw that old worn-out platitude "Guns don't kill people, people kill people" making the rounds in the media and on Facebook. Oh, it made my head hurt and my heart sick. There is nothing that pisses me off more every time something like this happens, when the gun nuts and NRA puppets start squawking about not taking away their weapons or controlling them. It completely misses the point, and in no way is an excuse to NOT do something about guns and their potential for crimes like the one in Aurora.


What really galls me, makes me sick and angry, is that too often Mr. Gohmert and many like him seem to think it was a lack of guns and God that lead to these tragedies. There I must emphatically disagree; sometimes I think this country suffers from a surfeit of both.

But he and many others are willfully missing the point. It is neither Christian belief or the right to bear arms that matters here. The most important thing, what we should all remember, is that someone went berserk and yet again the blood of innocents is on the ground. Pray that it doesn't happen again. Pray that we all may find peace.

There Is Hate In This World, And We Must Oppose It

I am fully aware that the Internet, like any medium of expression, is a place where the good, the bad and the downright ugly all bump against each other.  It is not a medium in which the easily offended should spend a great deal of time.  I am am not among the easily offended, but occasionally I come across something that disturbs me, especially because of the depths of its banality.  Consider the following image which I clipped from a screen shot of an effbook post I read.  The image has been redacted to remove names:

Note the headline at the top.  Also note that at the time of the screenshot, five people had already liked it.  What is worse, this was posted by someone whom I know to be a retired police officer who now works in a security or law enforcement capacity, dealing with the public at large.  Someone who should know better than most of us the consequences that can arise from implied violence.

This turned my stomach.  The casualness of it, the 'inside joke' joviality of it.  I find it repugnant to the point of near incomprehensibility that someone could feel good about displaying that to the world, and expect us to respect it as an "opinion".  It boggles the mind and sickens the heart.

This is a free country, yes, built on democratic principles.  People are allowed to have viewpoints.  I understand many feel concern, even anger and resentment towards foreigners and immigrants, both legal and illegal.  But the above message is disturbing and loathsome, not only in its presentation but in its message. It insults human beings based on their supposed literacy, although the ignorance of the creator of this sign shows in the statement about not being able to read English.  If a person can't read English, how are they supposed to know what the sign says at all?  

Much worse than alleged illiteracy, however, is the implication that outsiders who attempt entry into this country will be met with violence.  Not just random violence, but premeditated, firearm violence.  That is no rubber bullet gun, that's a rifle with a scope.  A rifle like that has only one purpose: killing people at long range.  And wouldn't the premeditated shooting of a person who has given no offense (the sign does not say that stepping over the border is illegal) considered by the courts to be homicide or attempted homicide?

I am having a hard time deciding what upsets me more, that it was posted by someone who had and has ethical and professional obligations to protect and serve the public or that other people liked it.  And on a highly public social media site, no less!

Is this what America is really about, xenophobia, paranoia and violence?  How someone could believe that the image is simply harmless fun is beyond me.  There is nothing funny about it.  It speaks to me of bigotry, pathological violence, hatred and ignorance.  If it speaks to me of such stains on the soul of America, then it speaks to the world of the same.  People who propagate such vileness have no right to be surprised that the world begins to meet them with disrespect, hatred, and violence of its own.  If the creators and admirers of such a sentiment want to live in a country of violence and hatred, they are free to do so but it will hopefully be a tiny country with only room for them.  I will not be within its borders.

The Tallest Building In The World Is A Pile Of Boring

Okay, time for a rant.  An architectural rant, perhaps the first one on the Gumbo, evah, which is surprising considering that I play an architect in real life.  Have for 22 years now.  Yikes.

What got all up in my grill, gave me a snootful of pepper spray, was this notion of building the tallest building in  the world, and how ridiculous it all seems.  Its been years since the Sears Tower in Chicago was the champ, and right now I couldn't tell you where the tallest building is or who built it.  Probably financed by oil money in a part of the world where it doesn't make sense to build really tall buildings anyway, but that's what happens when you've got more money and ego than common sense.

I couldn't tell you where or what the tallest building is anymore, because I stopped caring long ago.  I don't care how tall the building is, its not a matter of national pride for me, it does not have a truly beneficial effect on my life or the people I know. i don't ever plan on working on it or in it.  I don't want to work 75 stories or more off the ground.  Hell, I don't even want to go higher than say 10, at most.  Because. I. Don't. Care.

The competition to build the tallest building in the world is no longer about architecture.  In some ways, it isn't even about engineering anymore.  It's about ego and arrogance.  Sure, the designers will tell you they are "maximizing density" and "minimizing footprints" but really what happens is they are trying to maximize dollars per square foot and show the world who has the biggest penis.  Some will even claim they are designing eco-sensitive buildings, they are "being green", but that mainly applies to the surface.  To build a monstrously tall building is to take horizontal sprawl and make it vertical, thereby making it more difficult in may ways to manage, and consuming just as much resources, if not more, than a much more sensibly planned low to mid rise development.  Don't believe me?  Just take a look at how much power it takes to heat, cool and move people in a building that is 150 stories (or whatever the current record is) tall and is full of businesses.

I know, I can hear some of you sigh and say "Yo, Gumbo, we appreciate your vibe, but you seem to be a little lazy in your research.  How about some examples?".  Fair enough...

Here's my research for you:  google it.

Because. I. Don't. Care.  I absorbed most of what I really needed to write this post from the regular parade of articles I had been seeing in the trade rags I read as part of my information intake.  I reached a point where I just got tired of reading yet again about the new record for tallest building and how one even taller was being planned, and really, it has nothing in common with the kind of architecture I'd like to practice, the kind that gets me really excited about why I wanted to be an architect in the first place.

So to all those who think it is so god-awful important to build monuments to the man-junk you probably don't have, but that your egos have convinced you that you need...stop it.  Just stop it.  I have to believe that the majority of the folks in the world don't care how tall a building if they don't have a decent built environment of their own.

Besides, skyscrapers are fascist.  Worse...they are boring.  Please stop boring me to tears.

Here endeth the rant.

Extreme Translucency

I just learned the secret of invisibility,
its a lot easier than you think
even if the cost is something
you cannot afford, do not want to afford

All it takes is bad luck, a sunny day,
and a simple inability to run fast,
to duck the path of evil hurtling along
faster than the speed of sound

Put yourself in the center of that vortex,
walk close to someone more famous than you
wait for Lucifer's hammer to fall, hard,
then listen to the voices make you an "Other"

wearing your cloak of extreme translucency.

Weapons Grade Stupidity

---

I apologize for the following post. I'm sailing another sea of unbloggableness, and the political slant is something that won't leave me alone, so I must purge. Like kidney stones and bad dreams, this too shall pass. Thank you for your patience...

---

There is a bit of conventional wisdom that goes something like this:

If the person you are having dinner with is nice to you but rude to the waiter, that person is not a nice person.  Avoid that person.

I think there is a corollary to that advice, and it goes something like this:

If a public figure emphatically claims something to be that which it never was, and their claim can easily be refuted, they are insulting the intelligence of the listener.  And that figure is not a nice person.

On January 8th, Rebecca Mansour, an official for the Sarah Palin PAC, appeared on the Tammy Bruce* radio show, claiming that the symbols on that infamous map of theirs were never intended to be gun sights.  Laughably, at Tammy Bruce's suggestion, Ms. Mansour agreed that they weren't gun sights, they were "surveyor's marks".

Surveyor's marks.   Really.  And I suppose "Don't retreat, RELOAD!" really meant "Don't back up the minivan, just rearrange the luggage!"

I really cannot fathom why so many people seem to think that Sarah Palin and others of the same mindset are worthy of our votes for public office.  Not only are they blind to their own shortcomings, they expect us to be blind as well.  

These people aren't exhibiting much intelligence of their own, and they are blatantly insulting our collective intelligence.  Would you really want them in positions of power?


They are not nice people.  Don't have dinner with them.


*To be fair, I was only vaguely familiar with Tammy Bruce before this past weekend.  The miracle of the Interwebs made it easy to rectify that, although now I'm ambivalent about the knowledge.  Ms. Bruce has described herself as "a gay, pro-choice, gun owning, pro-death penalty, Tea Party Independent Conservative", with her show promoted as "a chick with a gun and a microphone."  That kind of glib, moronic attempt at a 'ballsy' persona is just as unimpressive coming from a woman as it is coming from a man.  Too bad she doesn't take that gun and shoot her microphone, thus sparing us all the irritation of another oxygen thief befouling the airwaves.

---

To those who left comments on my "Politics and Violence" post of January 9th, thank you. It's nice to know I was not alone.

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Sick Of Politics and Violence

I am aghast at the latest violent tragedy bleed all over our collective consciousness: the shooting of those unfortunates in Tucson last Saturday.  So many victims, so much pain and trauma.  Already the jackals of the left and the right have started to mine it for political gain, or just plain 'spreading the hate'.

It's probably safe to say that no one in their right mind would agree that the shootings were justifiable or explainable in the context of political beliefs.  This horrible crime was most likely perpetrated by someone who truly had lost their mental bearings, their ability to understand the difference between right and wrong.  Suggesting or implying violence against others to resolve political differences would never occur to someone in their right mind to begin with, would it?  Sadly, no:

"Don't retreat, reload!"
- Sarah Palin, former Governor of Alaska

"If this Congress keeps going the way it is, people are really looking toward those Second Amendment remedies."
- Sharron Angle, former member of the Nevada State Assembly

"If ballots don't work, bullets will."
- Joyce Kaufman, Radio host, Tea Party activist

"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants."
- Currently serving United States Congresswoman from Minnesota, leader of the Tea Party Caucus, paraphrasing Thomas Jefferson

"Sarah Palin has the crosshairs of a gun sight over our district and when people do that, they've gotta realize there are consequences to that action."
- Currently serving Congresswoman from Arizona Gabrielle Giffords

I know, I know, it's just words and they really didn't have anything to do with the shootings.  But it does make one wonder when bloviating hate-mongers like Sarah Palin start backpedaling so fast (like removing this map from her PAC website) it is amazing they haven't broken their ankles.

But I'm digressing from my point.  The fact remains that people got killed (including a 9-year old girl) for no good reason, and no matter where you stand in the political spectrum, this is a horrible, horrible crime.  I can only hope that, in your prayers tonight, you pray for everyone involved.

Crocodile

---

Image of Mr. Boehner from the LA Times Opinion pages. 

Farging Bastiches Friday: The Curmudgeon Files

Apologies, dear readers, as I must indulge myself a rant, in bullet point form:

THINGS WHAT HAVE BEEN BUGGING ME LATELY:

•  Being possessed of a pulse, a uniform and a job does not make one a hero.  Being 'heroic' (i.e. showing great courage, exhibiting noble qualities, and great achievements) makes one a hero.  Calling someone a hero because they got out of bed and put on their pants only cheapens the ideal, and means that if everyone is a "hero", no one is a hero.  You want to be a hero? Then do something truly heroic.
• Being possessed of great religious conviction does not equate with being possessed of superior morals or ideas.  If you ask a stranger what faith they profess, ostensibly to have a polite discussion about belief, only to quickly turn it into a thinly veiled lecture on why their relationship with God isn't the "right" relationship, and that yours is, then you have disqualified yourself from being a truly humble practitioner of faith.  No one can truly know the mind of God, so don't even try, you hypocrites.  Corollary:  When the party you have just insulted and patronized by denying the legitimacy of their belief system reacts by disagreeing with you, said disagreement does not constitute persecution of you as a believer of a different faith, nor does it constitute an insult to your faith.  The person simply does not believe what you believe.  Different belief is just that; different, not wrong.  So get over yourselves, you tinpot martyrs.  Cry your crocodile tears somewhere else.
• Being a newly elected Republicanfacisticteabaggernutjob U.S. Representative or Senator does NOT mean you are possessed of a God-given, "will-o-the-people" mandate to enact every ill-thought out piece of legislation in your Big Box of Crazy Ideas.  You won that seat because people wanted to change things, and because this supposed democracy is heavily weighted to the two-party system, the people who wanted to change things voted for you because YOU WEREN'T THE GUY/GAL ALREADY IN OFFICE, not because your stupid ideas and close-minded thinking were so attractive.  There were no real, viable third-party alternatives.  So get your heads out of your own asses, and stop looking in the mirror so damn much.
• Being excited about getting up at 3:00 a.m. on Black Friday does not make you the envy of the neighborhood, or an example to be imitated.  It does not make you worthy of respect, and it does not make you nearly as cool and fascinating as you think you are.  What it does do is make you a tool.  A Pavlovian, programmed consumerist tool, beholden to whatever megacorporations have hoodwinked you into believing that the latest/greatest app/gadget/machine/toy is the only way to show how much you care for the people you want to give gifts to.  Good thing the product life cycles are so short, that way you can do it all again next year!  Seriously, though?  Do you really want to be at the end of your days, thinking "Wow, it was so cool that I was the first one with an xBox 3000, way back in '10!"  Hate to break it to you, Sparky: NO ONE CARES.
• F-book (or any other Internet-intensive New Economy company) announcing it will be "making a play" for the market by offering services that other companies already offer...is not news.  So, all you local news anchors hawking thinly veiled ads for said companies under the aegis of "Consumer Watch" human interest stories? Shut up.  Just shut up.  I. Don't. Care.  Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.
• Putting any humble food (like french fries) on a pretty plate, and taking a glossy picture of it, and adding the word "GOURMET" to the description, does not make automatically that food "gourmet".  If you want to make french fries "gourmet",  let's see them fresh-cut to order, twice-fried, properly drained and served with side of say, chipotle aioli or homemade mushroom ketchup.  Plus, a waiter should bring them to the table.  DO NOT let some bored high school kid dump a block of batter-coated frozen fries into stale grease, oversalt them and dump them (undrained) into what will become a grease-soaked recycled paper boat, accompanied by a fistful of 'ketchup' packets.  Really, if you want to impress people, just make them hot, crispy and with the right amount of salt.  If you can do that simple thing well, you will go far in life.

Here endeth the rant.


All of then above items I have recently heard or seen in person or through various forms of media, and the irritation factor reached critical mass, hence this post.  It may be a long winter, folks...maybe I'll just put my fingers in my ears and shout "La, la, la..."

The New Scars

I read the news today, oh god...another litany of death and mayhem and personal tragedy because for some reason someone else took their own life rather than face the personal humiliation forced upon them by some uncaring, emotionally stunted pricks who thought it would be funny to violate someone's privacy for a laugh,

violate someone's life in a way most hateful
violate them as a human being

Seeming to forget that they are human too or at least they look human.  But its hard to tell based on their twisted sense of entitlement to appropriate another's private life

tell me asshole

if we were to film your private life, would you want the world to see your "dirty" secrets?  Or do you not understand what dirty means?

god help you if you lived in a world where lack of emotional intelligence made you the new ethnic joke.

"Different" behavior does not automatically translate into "wrong" behavior.  Or maybe we should haul your ass into court and put you on trial for all  those wings you ripped off of flies as a kid...

Getting enough sleep, jerks?

I Didn't Get No Cheese

Tony Hayward.

Joe Barton.

John Boehner.

(sigh)

I held out as long as I could. But this did me in:

Sharron, I must be fresh as a daisy, because I'm not feeling rotten.
At least, not in the way you said it.

(sigh.)

I leave them with this little ditty, circa 1983:

Block of cheese, anyone? Quick, before it spoils!

Tears for the Tools

The news on the radio said that at least 38 people were dead and more wounded from two suicide bombings in Moscow. 38 families left to mourn, and many more to deal with the aftermath of another senseless act of violence. I swallowed the lump in my throat, sent up a prayer for the victims, and wondered who would shed tears for the suicide bombers.

I would have cried for the victims, I think, if I was less fatigued from these sort of events. I am hard pressed to recall a week in the years since the invasion of Afghanistan, that has been without a car bomb, suicide bomb, IED...always something exploding, always someone getting maimed or killed...This does not mean I have no sympathy, anymore, it means I have no more to give.

That the bombers were allegedly women made no difference to me. It is no more tragic because the supposedly gentler sex perpetrated these crimes. If history has shown us anything about men and women, it is that one gender is no less capable of savagery than the other. So I do not feel sadness for the bombers simply because they are women. Double X on the spiral does not mean 'exempt from human frailties'.

That the bombers were a nationality other than American made no difference to me. It is no more tragic for a horrible crime to be committed, no more indicative of a intrinsic 'bad' or 'good' national character trait, for these events to have occurred in Russia. Nationality and citizenship are no more guarantees of rationality or compassion than skin color or native language. People like Timothy McVeigh are proof that Americans are just as capable of heinous acts on a grand scale as any group on the face of the planet.

Strangely, or so I thought at first, I felt greater sadness that two people had killed themselves to kill others, perhaps, with a twisted notion that they were furthering some greater ideal. Whether religion or politics, the most likely suspects, I do not know but either is highly probable, and equally odious, should they be shown to be the 'why' behind what happened. Those reasons are enough to be upset and angry, but I was beyond them as I wondered at my own feelings on the matter. 

I felt sad because I know that many people will curse the bombers for their lunacy, their terrible actions, their inversion of the natural order by dashing our collective expectations. I felt sad because many will look upon the perpetrators as the worst of the worst...but that is missing the point. What matters more is that someone was led astray. Someone was coaxed into believing that the Cause was more important than respect, compassion and understanding for your fellow human beings.

They were led to think that politics or religion or both were more important than human lives. The bombers were tools, tools used by evil mechanics to build soft engines of destruction and misery.

I do not absolve the bombers of responsibility. It is highly improbable that they were ignorant of the ramifications of their actions. But I have heard so much, seen so much violence perpetrated in the name of Higher Ideals that I feel less anger towards the tools and more towards the mechanics who use them. I do not despise the bomb so much as the person who activates it, and regrettably nowadays there seems to be little difference between a suicide bomber and the explosives he or she carries.

We should feel sadness for the victims, I agree, and anger at the criminals. But if we are to be serious about compassion and understanding, sadness for the perpetrators is not out of the question. I do not mean the bloody crocodile tears that some will shed for "martyrs to the cause", for what they did has no justifiable reasons to support such heinous acts.

If any tear should be shed for the bombers it is for their humanity and their reason lost, knowing that someone led them astray, and as a consequence innocent human beings lost their lives. They were tools in the wrong hands.

Don't Let The Terrorists Win: A Capitalist Theory of Same-Sex Marriage

"MARRIAGE WORKS."

"MARRIED PEOPLE MAKE MORE MONEY."

So say the billboards that loom over part of my daily commute into and out of Mobtown. The words jump out, brightly illuminated by the sun or floodlights, depending on the time of day. These trite phrases are accompanied by huge, full-color photos of a beautiful couple smiling bovinely into the camera as if wedding clothes and a cameraman hovering over them were the neatest thing since being told now they could have sex since they were married.

Couple in this context meaning man and woman. The billboards are sponsored by some sort of 'Save The Family and/or Marriage' type outfit, who believe that marriage can only mean God-approved gender relations.

Yes, the traditional (which in this country means "Western/European/American/Christian") definition is a union between a man and a woman*. But the definition of marriage varies quite a bit, through time and across cultures. Some of those definitions include same sex marriages, some say nothing of procreation. With that in mind, I noted to myself the first time I saw those billboards did not say "Marriage between a man and a woman Works" or "Married men and women Make More Money."

The first billboard doesn't mention human beings at all. The second says "PEOPLE".

Married PEOPLE Make More Money. Hmm.

I think that is probably true. But gender roles are not essential to making money. Making money depends on skill and training and character and environment and sometimes luck. My theory is that married people make more money** because they are more likely to be in a stable relationship with shared interests, coupled with a desire to be together out of love.

Stable, loving relationships are also not defined solely by gender roles. They are defined by the character and interests and abilities of the people involved to make them work.

So let me get this straight: 

Marriage works, and married people make more money.

Married people make more money because they are in a stable loving relationship.

Those relationships are not solely defined by gender roles, but by the character of the people involved.

SO...Married people = more earned money = bigger tax base + discretionary income.

Thus, same-sex marriage could be a much needed boost to the economy. Talk about a stimulus plan, look at the potential gains to be had in granting equal rights to a huge untapped demographic!

Gee whiz, with all the economic woes facing the country, you'd think the 'pro-business, less government' conservative *coughRepublicancough* folks would be all over this, wouldn't you? Especially since if more people had more money to spend on consumption, the terrorists have even less of a chance to win!

*It bears pointing out that in much of Western history, marriage was more about solidifying economic and political ties than it was about a romantic notion of "Three-makes-family". So spare me the platitudes about fulfilling God's design...unless you mean that design was for the greedy and manipulative to force their worldview on everyone else for the sake of gain.

**Assuming that is really true. I'm very skeptical of the methodology and criteria that the advertising organization used to make that claim. Statistics and data can be bent in many ways.

From The STFU Files: Tiger Woods Edition

Alright, folks, time for a short rant:

Tiger Woods doesn't need to apologize to his 'fans'. He doesn't need to call a press conference to tell the world that not keeping his dog in the right yard is "unacceptable". In fact, apologizing in such a manner doesn't seem much like an apology at all. It just seems like a page torn from the Plastic Persona Media Guide to Reputation Damage Control: Spin. The apology reeks of nothing more than a transparent attempt to avoid losing the endorsement deals because of public 'outrage'. That is obscene, just like the sickening amounts of money that companies dole out to "superstars". As if blinding talent and ability in an extremely specific skill set automatically translates into good judgment and discerning intellect when it comes to choice of soft drink, fast food, wristwatch, cell phone, or any other ephemera of modern life.

It's a sham, it's arrogant and it makes me want to invoke the Right To Privacy From Celebrities Personal Lives. Frankly, this falls in the category of things I don't want or need to know. Another incredibly talented athlete, awash in money and adulation, free from the daily grind of having to truly work for a living* gets found out on his infidelity?

Someone needs to explain to me why this is important.

Mr. Woods is correct in that what he did was unacceptable. What he did, however, is not new or different. It has been going on since men and women have been men and women. That he did it makes it no worse and no different than any other schmuck who committed adultery. It certainly does not make it more interesting.

How many people really know Tiger Woods? How many people are really his friends? You can be a fan, you can be interested in what he does as a golfer** but if you let it influence your life to the point where you feel you need an apology because of his bad behavior, it is time to reconsider your own values. Why are you looking to Tiger to be your moral compass?

The only people Tiger should be apologizing to is the wife, the friends and the family. In  private. Press conferences do not count. 

Go home, Mr. Woods, sit down and STFU for a while. Then look your loved ones in the eye and tell them you are sorry. That is the only way it will truly be meaningful.

*Please, spare me the crap about how much practice and travel and oh how hard it is to get that ball in the little cup. Boo hoo. Golf is not hard work, no matter how much time you spend in the sun. My father was an auto mechanic for 45 years, and a good one. Did he get a multi-million dollar endorsement deal because he could change a head gasket? No. That's difficult and dirty work, to do it every day for that long. Dad had the calluses and the grime under the nails to prove it. No one carried my father's tool chest for him.

**For the record, I think Tiger Woods is astounding at what he does. So is Michael Phelps. I can't do what they do, nor do I judge my self-worth by what others are good at doing. However, I don't know them, I'm not their family or friends. Whether dipping a wick or taking ill-advised hits from a bong, it really has no bearing on how I live my life. I don't look to them for validation or support. Why would I? That is what friends and family do. Friends and family also call you on your bad behavior, and forgive you if you sincerely admit to your transgressions.

Hey, GOP: Demand Your Money Back. Seriously.

A big ol' bowl of stupid:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqZJ7v4XIFk

I don't know where to begin. I am at a loss for words. Almost.

Is Andrea Tantaros expecting us to take this seriously? Evincing "outrage" over a non-issue, breathtaking in its vapidity, so monumentally STUPID?

One thing that was a little unclear: Andrea's title says "Republican Media Consultant". Does that mean she is a consultant working for Republicans, or a consultant that happens to be a Republican?

She could not even stick to a point, assuming she had one. Pissed off because the photo was unretouched? Or a supposedly unflattering headline? Pissed because she secretly wants to be on the cover? A true WTF moment.

Let's deconstruct a little: It's a slap in the face because...

"The photo was unretouched." So Newsweek should do the 'right' thing and purposefully alter the truth? Wouldn't that make them...Republicans? The assertion that Newsweek should have done it because other magazines always do it for fashion models "to cover up the lines, pores, etc." indicates a level of absurdity approaching the toxic. This is a presidential election, not a photo shoot for Elle.

"Sarah Palin is a gorgeous woman." If that is true, then why does her photo need retouching?

"Sarah Palin is a gorgeous woman." And gorgeous women couldn't possibly have pores.

(Paraphrase) "They put a halo on Barack" No they didn't. Please, get your head out of your ass.

Getting all hot and bothered, by claiming the "one of us, that's the problem" as an insult to us 'folks' out here, is stunning in its inanity. The McCain-Palin ticket has been pushing the hockey mom-regular person angle since day one of this debacle. So which is it? Is Sarah Palin an average person who can understand 'Joe Six-Pack'? If she is, then shut the hell up. The headline wasn't an insult in that case, YOU MISSED THE POINT.

If Palin is not the 'average' person we have been told she is, then the GOP has been deliberately misleading us 'folks'. In which case I am even less inclined to believe them, much less vote for the ticket. I am saddened and furious by such an insulting, patronizing treatment of us as citizens. How can the Republicans say with a straight face that Sarah Palin is qualified, that we can trust Senator McCain's judgement, that they really can lead effectively? With the debacle in Iraq, the worsening situation in Afghanistan, Iran and Russia increasingly belligerent, and an economic situation that looks like the Titanic, I expect better than what we are getting. No, I DEMAND better. If your house is on fire, don't stand in your front yard complaining about the dandelions in mine. Complaining so vociferously about a magazine cover shows just how out of touch and desperate SOME Republicans have become.

Overblown "outrage" like that witnessed on Fox is like fake crying from children: Annoying at best. But REALLY annoying and offensive when it is coming from someone who knows better and does it anyway. If I hired a media consultant for political coverage, and this is what I got in return, I would demand my money back, I suggest to whoever hired Ms. Tantaros that they do the same.