I Am an Influencer of World Opinion

So I haven’t been doing this very long, but I’ve noticed something.  Something wonderful.  I have, literally, DOZENS of readers from around the world following my every, or every other, entry.  Take a look at at this, loyal minions, a screen capture of the geographic view map from my stats page:

You’ve probably noticed, with understandable awe, that my influence now spans upwards of several non-national borders, including such distant locations as remote and exotic as—wait for it—ALASKA.  By now you have reached the same obvious, humble conclusion as I have: THE PALINS ARE READING MY BLOG ENTRIES.  Potentially both of them!  (Blog entries that is.  Extensive research has uncovered that there are, in fact, more than two currently known Palins; more are discovered every day!)

Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine that so early would I have influence over such recognizable and beloved reality TV personalities!  And this, as we all know, is but a gateway to a Jesuslike power to shape history for millennia to come.  Well, I for one am not going to let this momentum slip.  I cannot yet assume that Sarah herself is following me—it could just be Todd, which is a great start, but... oh who am I kidding?  That's a terrible start.  Not enough by half.  Meh!  But still, it IS a start.  Oh yes, it is.

And so now is the time to leap into action.  NOW is the time to insert imagery and metatags to ensnare Sarah herself (AKA the Angel of Anchorage, AKA Foxy McFairbanks, AKA Yukon Yummy, AKA Bridge to Nowhere (But My Pants!), AKA Glacier GILF, AKA You Can Lay THIS Pipeline!, AKA ok I think you get it).  If I am successful, she will glide, unknowing, into my clever plot to steer American opinion!  And so follow images of rare, huntable Alaskan wildlife that no well-armed beastslayer could help but stalk and mount proudly on a gilded plaque.  And once she is here and in my clutches, my evil totally patriotic plan will be realized.... BEHOLD, and wonder!!

Common Name:  Northern Oreo Caribou

Scientific Name:  Doofus incredibus

Habitat:  Underfoot

Strengths:  Snow camouflage; pathetic staring; speed; "Shake"

Weaknesses:  Any food and/or nonfood items

Conclusion:  Always nearby, not much challenge. Also endangered. Do not kill.

Common Name:  Denali Bighorn Ram

Scientific Name:  Yougottabe kiddingus

Habitat:  Traffic jams; anger management seminars (attendee)

Strengths:  Leaping; cavorting; strategy gaming; oratory

Weaknesses:  Being hunted, killed, and eaten or mounted on gilded plaques.  Or both.

Conclusion:  Wily and elusive, not to mention slightly disturbing.  Do not get too close.  Do not kill.  (Please.)

Common Name:  Seward Devilbat

Scientific Name:  Ohmigosh thatsocute

Habitat:  Sunny spots; christmas trees; not-yet-haircovered furniture or clothing; that closet shelf which was thought to be unreachable, and yet, here we are

Strengths:  Curtain annihilation; desperate pawing at windows because that damn squirrel is out there taunting me again.  Look at him... hiding acorns and not being eaten.  By me.  Bastard.

Weaknesses:  Batnip

Conclusion:  Nine lives and tiny, not worth the ammo expenditure.  Do not kill.

Common Name:  Santa Claus

Scientific Name:  Homo sapiens whogivesstufftous

Habitat:  North poles

Strengths:  Jolly; army of elf denizens; knows when you are sleeping/awake, or have been bad/good; breaking and entering

Weaknesses:  Mantle cookies; kryptonite; foot-tickling; being caught kissing mommy underneath the mistletoe last night (awwwk-waaaard!)

Conclusion:  UNKILLABLE.  And handsome.  UNKILLABLY handsome.

So there we are.  They're out there for avid hunters and the Outdoor Sporting Network to latch onto and popularize, which means they'll be known in Alaska within 2 - 3 seasons!  PATIENCE, little one, patience!  Our day is coming......

Actually not sure who I was talking to there.

IT’S AFTERNOON IN AMERICA

And so what?  Why would we be so afraid of that remote possibility?  I say remote, because in all probability (and “probability” meaning there is, of course, a margin of error implicit in any obviously subjective statement) few of us alive will still be alive to see a world in which the United States is not a defining economic, military and political influencer on the global stage.  But still, why do we so fear the possibility of #2 status?  What is it about not completely WINNING that automatically makes so many of us assume that all is lost?

A major factor, as I see it, is in the black and white perception with which many seem to view the world.  Pop lit and hysterical media would have us envision a U.S. which must necessarily be either far and away on top of all the charts, or else a crumbled, dilapidated U.S.S.A. in which corporations and a post-apocalyptic overmind control all activity and thought.  Like great empires before—Rome, Persia, the Inca—everything is viewed in the irremediable binary.  Great, or fallen.  Dominant, or extinct.  An entity relevant in and spanning decades and centuries, or else ceasing after a mere season, relegated to the dustbin of cultural association in only one momentary meme. As in, The Simpsons v. Alf.  And as we all know, if we’re being totally honest, The Simpsons is probably far more representative of American cultural placement.  (I mean really—eating cats?  Gross.  Who does that?!?  And how are there cats but not people on some alien planet???  Stupid Alf, you suck.)

Let’s be serious here, the central nation of our “great power” predecessor—the British Empire, have you heard of them?—is not doing too shabbily.  I’ve not seen much to-do about the extinction, or even relative poverty, of the British state just yet.  In fact, I’d love to see the dollar as strong as the pound.  Struggling a tiny bit more than before (as a whole)?  Sure.  Not calling all the shots in every timezone anymore?  That's right.  But unavailable health care, over 20% rate of HIV infection, 23% illiteracy, 43% unemployed, and/or greater mortality than birth/net immigration rates, at least one of which is actually present in various other nations?  Not by a freaking relativistic longshot, people.  Not even close, nor will it be anytime in our visible future.  (A little gratitude would be nice when you've got it great compared to the rest of the known universe, that's all I'm saying.)

There are not many—though they are not all dead yet—who remember an America that was not the pre-eminent global power and cultural hegemon.  And yet there are still in our midst those who lived before this ongoing brief moment—and it is, in fact, a historical blip—in which the United States was forefront of all influence.  It was not too many decades back in which we were, while quite productive and innovative, not the top producer, exporter, and factory-rich country on the planet.  Not the highest standard of living, not the highest per-capita GDP, and not the most exorbitant consumer of resources.  All this dominance was yet potential, not the entirety of remembrance.  But were those no less great times?  Were those dark days, particularly relative to the options concurrently available in rest of the world?  Most telling: were the immigration rolls any shorter?  How many now-entrenched and successful American families were then new immigrants, hoping that maybe—just maybe—they could scratch out a slightly better living here than in whatever beloved homeland they chose to forsake?

In our disgusting, polarized, and insecure political climate, which it is noteworthy to point out every generation bemoans, there are those who would charge me (because I speak a plain truth as I see it) with denying “American Exceptionalism.”  I would dispute that in the strongest possible terms.  Quite the contrary, the point I am trying to make is that our exceptional nature is completely unchanged, merely confused by many (though not all), and wrongly, with wealth.  No, as I see it, we as Americans need to strive to remember what it is that made this county the miraculous, noble and fantastically successful—indeed, “exceptional”—experiment that it was and continues to be:  the very idea of it.  The inherent morality of a nation that not only purports, but in fact was invented to be, of the people, for the people, and by the people. You see, scarce readers, it is not in economic, military and cultural might that our exceptionalism lies.  It is in the promise that here lies a unique social contract, that merit more than birth, right more than might, and intelligence more than financial advantage will carry the day.  That here, you may peaceably disagree, stand up to, and protest wrongs (UC Berkely notwithstanding, rather ironically) without fear of violent reprisal.  This ideal, the inherent rightness and freedom to express intellectual honesty, is what I would be (and am) willing to fight for whenever the need arises to stand in others’ stead in a dangerous land.

I do not fear NOT being the richest country on Earth.  I do not fear a lack of military dominance, nor losing the ability to broadcast our media across the globe.  Neither am I afraid that some other government may hold more foreign nations to debt than ours, nor even that ours itself may eventually be held to account for our collective excess (as inexcusable as that may be, and shame on us).  No, the only thing I fear is the day in which our one, beautiful and unique moral advantage—our freedom of voice and unfettered thought—is laid to siege and irrevocably harmed.  This alone is the true light we hold up to the world, and I hope above all hope that this is the light that we never, ever allow to be dimmed, sidelined, tarnished or  forgotten, as we stumble blinded by material preoccupations.

It's true that a few historical and geographic accidents made us fantastically rich.  But our ideals, not our wealth, are what have always made it Morning in America.

Long may the dawn remain.

The Point of It All, or Catharsis, or Whatever

I think life is funny.  Or at least it better be, at least in the most absolute, reductionist sense, otherwise it means one of two things—either I’ve taken everything far too lightly in the final assessment, or all the horror and cruelty in the world is as sinister and sadistic as the a surface glance would suggest.  I fear both of those.  Which is probably why I feel the need to make light of it all, lest the weight of reality become greater than it itself can bear, and that reality collapse inward on itself like a dying supermassive star and become some kind of existential black hole from which no light or energy can escape.  Since the actual reality of life may just be that awful, I prefer to think of laughter as the human manifestation of the relativistic jets that explode out of even the blackest, most inescapable of phenomena we know of.  No matter how dark, dense, and inescapable the pull may be, there is inevitably a poorly-understood mechanism by which energy somehow blows outward and lights up our night sky.  (If you happen to have an x-ray telescope.)  As if the universe is telling us, “yeah, man, that shit is inescapable—but you can’t silence this energy!”  And thus, boom goes the galactic-center dynamite.

That said—am I going to make fun of the child starving in the Rift Valley, just to ensure my own survival in the face of the horror of his/her life at at face value?  Nah.  Am I going to jest at the limbless veteran home from Iraq?  Again, dear god, no.  Holocaust?  Uh-uh, touch that, are you crazy?  Am I going to try and pry a guffaw from the plight of the polar bear mother watching her cub drift away on the last ice-floe on Earth?  OK maybe, but only be because Earth will outlive us all no matter what we do (at least within our doomsday-device-less generation) and probably laugh last despite feeble humor.  And am I going to fain levity as the Cylons rain nuclear death upon the twelve colonies, driving us all into spatial exile and a years-long quest for Kobol and Earth?  Well on that one, definitely, after which I will self-administer a noogie and forcibly extract any milk money I may have on my person.  Freakin’ nerd.

No wait, no no nononono…. My point is, it’s bad enough.  You—WE—have got to be able to laugh about all our ghosts out floating around out there!  Again, not that I plan to offend, but sanctimony is just another way to say “my hurt, or my creed, or my plight, or my injustice is greater than yours or anyone else’s, so go ahead and laugh about someone else’s grief or wrong but mine is untouchable or else you’re a(n) monster/xenophobe/racist/heartless beast/antisemite/liberal and/or dick.”  Or both.  Probably the latter.

Now, THAT said, the point of healthy laughter is catharsis—at least in the context I’m talking about.  So yeah, I’m going to crack wise, but hopefully not in the way some do, which is to make individuals or groups of people secondary to my own viewpoint.  Examples:

*  Have you heard the one about the ethnic stereotype? It’s funny because of my racial superiority!  [Drum hit!]

*  A religious individual, another of a separate creed, and a third, none of which share my worldview, are all in a liferaft and die.  The humor lies in their clear misunderstanding of theological orthodoxy!  [Drum hit!]

*  A cracker, a heeb, a queer and a negro walk into a… oh shit, wait -- [Drum hit!]

No, dammit!!  I need some absolution on that one before it’s cut off!  Crap.  Well whatever… I hope my point was obvious from the start, though I’ve learned over a few decades that such is often not the case.  In the event you need it spelled out, the POINT was… the point, that is, the crux of the… you have to, can’t… should….. aw hell.

You know what?  I’m not sure anymore, these are rough times.  But I know this and want to make it plain—there’s a vast gulf between superiorist laughter at the expense of the “other” for its own sake, and laughter in the face of mutually recognized foibles and the absurdity of our shared experience.  Yes, absolutely, there are those that use jokes to lift themselves above those they deem inferior, but there are also a great many—I vainly hope the majority—that simply have to laugh, or else cry, and prefer the former.  I think I’m one of those.  I really do.  If not, see first paragraph and thus end of existence blah blah blah.

No my friends, THAT—the need to laugh not at others, but in the face of our shared state of existential ridiculousness—is catharsis.  And thereforeinwith (sp?) shall I strive.  Note to self: What does that even mean?  I guess we’ll work toward figuring that out.  Until then, let’s just try not to take ourselves more seriously than we merit (myself = least of all, if I’m successful in my endeavor, which in all honestly isn’t assured but I’m trying), and I wager everything will be just a little more enjoyable in the end.

*  THAT’S WHAT SHE SAID!  [Drum hit!]

IN THE BEGINNING...

I should caveat this from the start--this blog (since all the kids have one nowadays) is going to be uncensored.  I do not set out to offend or disappoint anyone, but lately I feel the need to express myself (read: drool out my unedited thoughts which are not crystallized or final in any form) without the constraint of worrying about external judgment.  Since I have long since realized I will never seek political office (a truly honest mind cannot win a bipartisan election, duh) this is less of a material hindrance to me.  However, I feel this brief caveat is warranted to warn off anyone who deludes themselves about some idealized vision of me as belonging to a particular moral subset, ethical persuasion, intellectual culture, religious tendency, literary guild, Colbert Nation, subnet mask, or whatever.

You in the back, go ahead…  Why do I feel this need, you ask?  Excellent question.  Frankly, who cares?  It’s a blog, not freaking The Apology of Socrates.  Geez people, settle down.

What I end up putting in here, infrequent as it is likely to be, will be utterly meandering, non-coalesced musings that represent my thoughts on life in general, or a topic in particular, at a specific point in time, such as time exists as we perceive it.  They could change.  Or maybe not.  There will probably be occasional swears, as appropriate or amusing.  Or maybe, if I’m lucky, a flash of insight that, if I were hit by a bus in the morning, I’ll be glad I left behind somewhere other than buried in my congested, multidirectional, ADD-addled, never-quite-in-one-place

Oooh, I want minty-chocolate-chip ice cream! Humans are a largely flawed and therefore frighteningly efficient evolution. I wonder if the furnace guy will call in the morning? God I want to build a deck for some reason. Mmm, whisky. Blue is way prettier than orange--how curious that they’re considered aesthetically complimentary! (Note: delve further into this oddity.) Is that spider on the wall aware I’m going to kill him? Does that mean he’ll try to kill me first? Better move fast. I hope that CERN neutrino did travel faster than light, that’ll open a whole new reality for readers of sci-fi who have a problem suspending disbelief. I want to say something no human has ever said before: “What ho, that craptastic centipede stole my carnivorously crapulent testicles!” YES, that’ll do it… Where are my keys and was I talking about something else?

brain.

If nothing else, maybe some curious anthropologist can one day deconstruct me as part of a study of today's detached, postmodern, pre-evolved, postconformist countercultural study some years in the future.  If I’m incredibly lucky, or everyone else is unlucky, or both, maybe I’ll even get my own display in the Natural History Museum of the Future (or, as they’ll call it then, Natural History Museum of the Current).  Somewhere buried between Homo Erectus and Homo Hooloovoo.  Look it up.  Douglas Adams.  Worth the read.

My point is, if you know me and feel the need to maintain some previously constructed perception of me as any particular idealized thing, this would be a good time to leave.  Or not, your call--you have been caveated.  Caveated HARD.  (YOU’RE WELCOME.)  It’s also altogether possible or likely you’ll find yourself saying, “yeah, actually this affirms a lot of the assumptions we’d made about your insane inclinations all these years.”

Contrarily, if you don’t know me, who are you?  Why are your stalking me and my pointless musings and arbitrary thoughts!??  Creep.  Also:  Creeps welcome!  Tell your creep friends, so they too can wonder why I bother!  (Tangentially, if you or they figure it out, please let me know.)

In the next chapter… Life!  That’s right, I’m finally going to figure it out.  (As before, YOU’RE WELCOME.)

Or maybe not, we’ll see.