Lasciate Ogne Speranza, Voi Ch’intrate, Yo!

There is an interesting little bit in The New Yorker this week about a group of Ayn Rand devotees who have a monthly lunch and meeting in Midtown. Here is the choice quote:

I learned from Ayn Rand many years ago that contradictions do not exist in reality.

Wow. That’s a hell of a way to go through life, determined to believe that nothing will contradict the belief system you have adoped.

At least Objectivists tend to be harmless eccentrics, like those bushy bearded guys who hand out Xeroxed socialist newsletters on street corners. It’s not like one of Rand’s inner-circle actually got his hands on the levers of the economy…

Err. Well, no wonder we’re all boned.

~ Shawn O’Donoghue

Alas, Poor Editor – The Times Hardly Knew Ye

Subcomandante Marcos, seen here conveniently not existing.

[Mexico] has no serious prospects of regional secession or disputed territories, unlike the Middle East.

-Enrique Krauze, New York Times

Dear NY Times,

I know financial times are tough and you want to trim the fat, but it is probably not advisable for you to continue to publish your paper sans an editor. Y’know, one of those people in suspenders who hold a pencil between their teeth and squint at the articles you are going to run. They usually serve to make sure you don’t print insane things.

Hell you could just hire some kid to scan Wikipedia and give him or her college credit. Spending 45 seconds visiting at the Wiks would have revealed that: “In August 2003, the EZLN declared all Zapatista territory an autonomous government independent of the Mexican state.”

[pause for any gasps or drinks spit out]

The Electric Kool-Aid Loyalty Test

Oh, hello, I didn’t see you there. Welcome back. I hope you had—or are having—an enjoyable spring break and had a happy St. Patrick’s Day (or ‘Talk Like Shane McGowan Day’ as I celebrate it).

Gene Fowler once said that “writing is easy: All you do is sit staring at a blank sheet of paper until drops of blood form on your forehead.” Computers have made this already difficult process harder. Do we honestly believe that Conrad or Dickens would have turned out better bodies of work if their pens and paper were replaced by a source of free and unlimited pornography and college basketball updates? Honestly it’s a miracle most of us make it out the door in the morning.

Why do I bring this up? Well, being as I’m on a Watchmen kick (slightly disappointed with the movie, but not as much as V for Vendetta or League of Extraordinary Gentlemen since you asked), the first chapter of Hollis Mason’s Under the Hood recommends that an author should “start off with the saddest thing you can think of and get the audience’s sympathies on your side. After that, believe me, it’s a walk.”

The reason I started with trying to garner your sympathy is that I will be delving into the Israel/Palestine issue.

Workweek at Bernie’s

To pay for the programs that they’re going to put in, they’re going to have to get the money somewhere, and the unions will go after anybody who works for a living…there’s no question about it. Joe the Plumber, whatever the hell he does for a living, is going to pay for this in the future along with everybody else. This is the demise of a civilization, this is how a civilization disappears…. If a retailer has not gotten involved in this, if he has not spent money on this election, if he has not sent money to [Minnesota Senator] Norm Coleman and all these other guys, they should be shot…. Trying to get CEOs to understand this, so far, some of them have come out of their deep sleep, but most of them have not come out of their deep sleep. Hopefully, calls like this will stir up the pot. As a shareholder, if I knew the CEO of the company wasn’t doing anything on this, on something that was going to have a dramatic effect on my business, I would sue the son of a bitch.

– Bernie Marcus, Grand Moff of Home Depot (via Doug Henwood)

Well, anything that would provoke this reaction is probably worth supporting, eh? As it happens, the subject of Bernie’s rant is the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) which will, with the passage of the simulus bill, become the next piece of legislation in the crosshairs of domestic reactionaries.

The More Things Change…

Well, Blog-Master Liam has demanded a second post this week and as I have been unable to gnaw through my leg where I am chained to my desk, a winner is you!

Thusly, we return to Afghanistan, “The Graveyard of Empires,” as it has become chic to declare. As Tom Engelhardt pointed out earlier this month, this idea has actually been getting some play recently in mainstream liberal circles. Engelhardt is also probably right that this peculiar state of psychology amongst our ruling class, namely doubt, probably has its roots in the collapse of the Soviet Union, which left America sans its favorite bête noire.

To Waziristan With Love

Obama and Hillary on their latest diplomatic foray.

Well, I was planning to start off with a bang, delivering a hard-hitting Israel/Palestine post. Don’t get me wrong, no one loves wild speculation more that me, but since a prime minister has yet to be picked, I’ll refrain from commenting at the moment.

So then, let us turn to an equally cheery place: Afghanistan and Pakistan (or ‘Af-Pak’ in beltway-insider lingo, where people seem to be under the impression that everything proper-noun should be contracted until it sounds like an Apple product).

Everybody Talks About the Weather … I Won’t

Hello all,

My name is Shawn. Like many other people I am made up of spiralling coils of self-replicating DNA. However, unlike many people I have finagled myself a place on this blog, mostly because of the pictures I posses of the editors in various compromising positions.

So, it would seem prudent, as you will be reading me religiously every week, to do an introductory post. You know, explain a little bit about myself, what this blog will be like, maybe dinner and some drinks if you play your cards right…