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| Fifth Column |
| Please Help The War Effort |
| 2002-10-20 |
| Andrea Harris points to this fellow, the very same one Mike at Cold Fury slapped so satisfyingly yesterday... Wind as emitted by Mark Morford, San Francisco Comical It is a time of great need. It is a time of national teeth-gritting and resigned fortitude and wine-infused bouts of very heavy collective sighing. "It was a dark and stormy night. Rain fell. The wind blew. Suddenly a shot rang out. A scream!..." It is a time when one single false war against an already decimated ragtag terrorist opponent is not nearly enough to satiate the delirious military-industrial complex and arouse Cheney's defibrillator and hence we must launch another one. "Dick, I'm really getting bored with pounding Afghans into paste. What say we decimate some Iraqis?" "Hokay, boss..." That's right, two full ostensible wars, Osama and Saddam, simultaneously, though thanks to sinister White House PR everyone seems to think they're basically the same war, even though they're almost completely unrelated, but hey, why split hairs. "I mean, what the hey? They both want to kill Merkins, and they both want world domination, and they both like the sight of blood, but other than that they're different. I mean one bunch wears turbans, and the other wears nifty uniforms, with berets and medals and stuff, so how could they be alike?" Many ask what they can do. How they can contribute, how they can best aid the faux-war effort and support our troops in a whole new way, never mind how we've suffered almost zero casualties in Afghanistan and there is negligible chance we'll suffer much of a scratch in Iraq, given our massive multibillion-dollar budget-crushing macho superiority. Maybe by showing some faux support? But maybe you'll be lucky, Morford. Maybe the Iraqis will get in a lick or two and you'll get to see some body bags. Keep hoping... And given how it's all for oil and power anyway, and it has almost nothing to do with Saddam being all evil and brutal, even though he is, which is certainly as convenient an excuse as any. Well, if he's evil and brutal, why not go along with the gag? I have compiled this short list. Things you can do, right now, this minute, to feel more connected and support the nation sans money or blood or prefabricated force-fed rage, and more fully lick the fingertips of your fervent unrequited patriotism in this time of need. Call it a checklist. Call it a spiritual perspective frappé. SUV antenna flags not included: Call it drool... 1. Choose not to believe much of the disinformation spinning forth from the White House at this time. Look at Donald Rumsfeld's shockingly beady and pitch-black eyes and realize this man, these people, they are deeply convoluted and power blinded and do not have your best interests at heart. Look deep into the rheumy, vacant eyes of people like Mark Morford and realize that this man, these people, are deeply convoluted in their reasoning, if any, and can't in their hearts believe that Islamist maniacs want our children to grow up wearing turbans and burkas, and that tin hat dictators would love nothing better than to have 60-foot portraits of themselves hanging from public buildings in Columbus, Ohio — and even in San Francisco, California... 2. Choose, furthermore, not to believe the world is really full of these vile power-mad slugs and lizards and prevaricators and fools and Rumsfelds. Stop thinking this is all there is, war and suffering and apparently very pale and egomaniacal and spiritless men running the world into the ground. Choose not to believe the world is really full of crazed killers. Choose not to believe that anyone really wants to kill you. Go ahead. It's better when it's a surprise... Realize that for every ongoing war and religious outrage and environmental devastation and bogus Iraqi attack plan, there are a thousand counterbalancing acts of staggering generosity and humanity and art and beauty happening all over the world, right now, on a breathtaking scale, from flower box to cathedral. They're just not happening where Islamists and tin-hat dictators are in power... 3. Resist the great surges toward nihilism about the media, in seeing them all as either a bunch of depressing snickering pansy-assed gol-dang liberal scum or corporate-controlled sensationalistic J-school lackeys all parroting the same old pro-Shrub war stories and beating the same thudding pro-violence drum. Regard them instead as thoughtful, educated men and women who are just... well... foolish. Seek out nuance and counterargument and subtle irony and contrarianism and balance and perspective. Realize it's never as one-sided as they want you to believe. Read more outside your normal box of viewpoints and interests. Find out for yourself. Sit in your garden and gaze into your navel. Go ahead. Have a long look... Is that lint. Ucky. That's better... Read more outside your normal box of viewpoints and interests: Byron, Shakespear, Spenser, maybe a biography of Nelson or Wellington or Lincoln... 4. Remember the world does not consist of simpleminded and reductive good/evil polarities, but, rather, is a living organism, interconnected and breathing and dying and renewing in constant flux, religions interflowing, beliefs inbreeding, crammed full of ecstatically bejeweled people who are just as contradictory and confused and gorgeous and kaleidoscopic and baffled and sleepy and horny and lost and desperately craving of juicy unfiltered spiritual nourishment as you are, in this very moment, as you read these words. Whew! The world also seems to consist of wordy, kaleidoscopic blather in places. In others, it consists of simple-minded, reductive good/evil polarities: Islam on one side, the degenerate rest of the world on the other, with a single-minded dedication to killing everyone who doesn't Believe... 5. Resist the temptation to drown in fatalism, to shake your head and sigh and just throw in the karmic towel and head for the mountains with a case of Grey Goose and a box of Scharffenberger chocolates and the entire DeLillo collection and "Baraka" on DVD. Not that that's necessarily a bad thing. In that case, why no just go do it? And take a .38 along... And instead you can more fully engage, openly celebrate and share the items you happen to love — vodka, chocolate or otherwise — as tools of knowledge and power and luscious imbibing of life, throw them right smack in the face of all the Ashcroftian scowling and limpness, upping the vibration instead of merely enduring it, thus countering the urgent federal mandate to please live in a constant state of shuddering obedient paranoia and fear. There's no reason to live in a constant state of shuddering paranoia and fear, unless one is thinking hard on the subject of John Ashcroft, after all. Pay not attention to that man with the scimitar, standing next to the chopping block... 6. Realize the divine is not quite what you think it might be, that old methods of imploring, say, a cantankerous bearded patriarchal figure to please please please let you win the lottery and help you have better orgasms and oh yes smite your enemies might be a bit antiquated and prohibitive and just slightly lacking in vital ancient sordid chthonic feminine power. Boy, I can agree with that, by golly! When it comes to smiting enemies, I'll take a B52 over heartfelt prayers any day... So what's yer point? Realize, further, that it is just these very outmoded and fervid mind-sets that are fueling a great many current hatreds and arming a great many warheads, and that maybe, just maybe, blind devouring adherence to any narrow doctrine — Christian, Muslim, Jew — is potentially fatal to the soul, bad for the skin and also just no fun at all. Especially if howling hordes of indignant Muslims with turbans and automatic weapons are just waiting to blow things up all around you... 7. Change the way you pray. Choose to believe in true orgiastic, energetic, self-realized divinity inside the self and emanating out, as opposed to an angry vengeful righteous God out there, one who demands that everyone must pay and suffer and kill and die, in His name, same as it ever was. Ummm... We're not the ones pushing God in these wars. The Bad Guys are the ones waging jihad. We're the ones trying to make them stop. Y'see, when you tango by yourself, it's not as satisfying... After all, it is your intention that sends the energy into play, that directly affects the world, every single person and every single soul, and your hate and fear and self-righteous belief does nothing to up the patriotism not just for country but for the entire planet. You have so much power. More than you know. Would you like a bullet for that .38? Are you gonna start plagiarizing Jabberwocky next? It really was brillig like crazy, and those daggone slithy troves just outgrabe the mome raths before they know what was happening... 8. Realize that this is the perfect moment to change the energy of the world, to step right up and crank your personal volume, right when it all seems dark and bitter and offensive and acrimonious and conflicted and bilious, right when the snakes and pit vipers and squinting finger-pointing cowboy wanna-bes are all distracted — there's your opening. You really should stop smoking that stuff, fellow. It breaks your genes. Your offspring are all gonna have gill slits and nine fingers and stuff... 9. Remember magic. Oh. I forgot. 10. And, finally, believe you are a part of a groundswell, a resistance, a seemingly small but actually very, very large impending karmic overhaul, a great shift, the beginning of something important and potent and unstoppable. You can breathe like this is the most lucid thing there is to believe. You can walk down the street like you are full of divine free wet secrets. "Wet" secrets? That sounds kind of carnal, doesn't it? Kozmic! But this is a family blog... We don't say that sort of thing in family publications here in 1968... And in San Francisco? Shouldn't you be using a rubber? The nation needs your help. This is a time of warmongering and bitterness and semi-literate Texas cowboy wanna-bes who want nothing more than to careen us down the path of perpetual violence and isolationism and dread. Or to keep hordes of screaming Islamists from making our children into turban-wearers. Take your pick. Obviously this guy did. You can do something. You are being implored. Now is your chance. Please help keep America free. Please show your love for your country. This is just the beginning. Thank you and Shivaspeed. "Shivaspeed"? |
| Posted by:Fred Pruitt |
| #5 Yikes! This verbose, pompous, authoritarian moonbat is an even bigger freak than I thought, so far up the tree that other idiotarians and batshit appeasers should be mortified to share their cause with him. If I were Noam Chomsky, I would e-mail him, try to persuade him that Bush is God and Baghdad should be flattened. Mark would probably buy it and switch sides, coming as it would from an Ultimate Authority, and if Gnome threw in enough florid cosmic bullshit. Good thing Chimpsky is too busy kissing Fisk's ass. Shiva speed you to hell, Mark. |
| Posted by: Atomic Conspiracy 2002-10-20 21:32:59 |
| #4 Good Golly, Miss Kali! |
| Posted by: Pink & Fluffy 2002-10-20 19:28:51 |
| #3 Being a female, I'll send that writer a very hearty Kali-speed in return. May she give him everything he so richly deserves. |
| Posted by: Kathy K 2002-10-20 17:38:42 |
| #2 Stupid Idiot. Shiva is the Hindu God of destruction, death, and war. |
| Posted by: G 2002-10-20 16:56:29 |
| #1 Hahahahahaha. Is this real or an episode of Dharma and Greg? Shivaspeed? I haven't laughed this hard since, well, the last time I laughed this hard. Yes, by all means, let's not think of the world in terms of black and white. Let's instead think of it as a karmic orgasm. |
| Posted by: Sam 2002-10-20 15:24:38 |