Government isn't the solution--Government is the problem!

Via the wonderful Roy Edroso, who has also posted an actual (I think) Libertarian's long and droningly deranged rebuttal (not recommended for narcoleptics or the easily-bored, at least, not unless your desktop is down-filled.)

Friday Saturday Frank: Bucse Festival, Budapest; 1991

In one of his last on-stage performances, Frank Zappa leaves us a beautiful and extended solo for the memory banks: his guitar gently weeps; his cigarette smolders away. It's hard to listen to this and not feel a familiar lump-in-the-throat. Before I came across this clip, my boys and I watched a segment of FZ's appearance before Congress during which he argued that words were simply words; that anything and everything--from a hairdo to a phrase to a certain-colored chair--could potentially set off the antisocial behavior of an insane person; and that, at the end of the day, censorship was wrong.

And that's the main reason for the familiar lump-in-the-throat, really: we need Frank's voice now more than ever, but upon hearing his beautiful music, we're reminded, all over again, that he's gone.

And that we're alone (but not really), so we're going to have to keep fighting the same fights without him (but not really).

Bon Weekend, everyone.

Swine Flu Update: A NY fatality; a higher alert; a lawsuit

One could be forgiven--if one relied on mainstream media for all one's information--for thinking that the swine flu (AH1N1 virus) has lost its momentum and somehow grown weaker and less threatening since the initial and frightening coverage we saw a few weeks ago. But one would be horribly wrong in so assuming. Indeed, the virus remains deadly and has brought about (ongoing) school-closings in New York, as well as other affected states (all emphasis mine):

The assistant principal of a Queens school who had been hospitalized with swine flu died on Sunday evening. It was the first death in New York State from the outbreak and came as city officials announced that five more Queens schools had been closed.

The assistant principal, Mitchell Wiener, 55, had been “overwhelmed” by the illness despite treatment with an experimental drug, according to Ole Pedersen, a spokesman for Flushing Hospital Medical Center, where Mr. Wiener had been a patient since last Wednesday.

The World Health Organization is poised to raise the Pandemic Alert Level to 6--its highest--and Japan, with 93 confirmed cases, is rapidly closing schools and screening citizens:

In Japan, authorities ordered more than 1,000 schools and kindergartens in and near the cities of Kobe and Osaka to shut down. There were no confirmed cases in Tokyo.

Until Friday, Japan thought it had contained the virus after finding four infected people who had visited North America and flown home. It quarantined them and 50 other passengers, began sending medical workers to meet each flight arriving from North America to take temperatures of those on board and told visitors they would need to have their temperatures recorded daily.

But on Saturday, the authorities confirmed that a 17-year-old student in Kobe who had not been overseas was infected; as of Sunday evening, the number of recorded cases rose to 93 throughout Japan.

Kobe residents rushed to hospitals, where doctors in biohazard suits checked people for fever in tents set up in parking lots, Agence France-Presse reported. Transit workers and supermarket employees began wearing masks.

And Stateside, the widower of the first American casualty, 33-year-old special education teacher Judy Dominguez Trunnell, has taken the first steps toward filing a wrongful death lawsuit against Smithfield Foods:

Trunnell's petition seeks to investigate claims that the H1N1 outbreak began in Smithfield's massive pork operation in La Gloria and that the virus may have been caused in part by the conditions under which the farm operates, which the petition terms "horrifically unsanitary."

"This affected my family," says Trunnell, a paramedic who will now be raising two children on his own. "I need someone to be held accountable for this."

If Trunnell ends up following through with a wrongful-death suit against Smithfield Foods, it will most likely make legal history. No one has ever tried to hold a corporation responsible for the inadvertent creation of an infectious disease. Trunnell and his lawyer, Marc Rosenthal, do not claim that Smithfield purposely bred the virus, but rather that its Perote operation, which raises some 1 million pigs annually in close quarters, established the necessary conditions for the virus to arise. If Smithfield had taken better care of its farm, the petition claims, H1N1 might never have been introduced to the world.

"We think that the conditions down there are a recipe for disaster," says Rosenthal. "This type of virus is more likely to evolve and mutate in this much filth and putrescence. It's more than a mere coincidence that the first cases emerged right there in La Gloria."

Tonight, the families of Judy Dominguez Trunnell and Mitchell Wiener, who coincidentally had both devoted their lives to educating children, are in my thoughts--as of course are the many families worldwide who've been affected by this virus.

Okay, maybe the future doesn't suck...

...if we'll get to enjoy the talents of musicians like this little guy. Watch 9-year-old guitar whiz Yuto Miyazawa play Ozzy Osbourne's Crazy Train on the May 11th episode of Ellen. And be sure to stick around for the finale, ahem.



(H/T Sons Two and Three)

The future sucks!

Bruce Dern, playing a beleaguered fortysomething guy in the very funny movie Middle Age Crazy (1980), addresses the graduating class and tells it like it is.

(The previous post sparked my memory and sent me searching for this clip; lo and behold, there it was--thank you, O Beauteous Internets.)

Happy F*cking Graduation Day, Young People

Since Sir Charles kickstarted the whole bitterness theme last night, I thought I'd keep the bile going by sharing this wonderful rant, by Drew Magary of Deadspin, with all of you, my lovely readers.

(Has it really been, uh, twenty-eight years since I stayed up all night party-hopping across Gainesville, crawled home to my apartment at dawn, downed a quart of sludge-thick coffee, plunked the same silly tasseled hat on my head--just as they're doing this month at campuses around the nation--and wrapped my already-overheated body in the same heavy robe?

Yes...yes, I suppose it has.

And from what I'm seeing in the news, grads today will have just as much futile fun trying to parlay said degrees into paying careers: thanks to the flaccid economic conditions that characterized the early 1980's, we fresh-faced, newly-degreed journalismers considered ourselves lucky to land the odd bar-tending or cocktailing job, supplementing as we could with hilariously cheesy modeling stints for used car lots or cafeteria chains while waiting to hear back from one of the fourteen airlines to which we'd sent in applications for a flight attendant position. Good times!)

But Drew says it all so much better:

That's the reason there are celebrity graduation speakers: to boost the already healthy egos of the graduating class. It's strictly for name-dropping value. Oooh, you guys are so special, Fed Chairman Ben Barnanke wanted to give you a pep talk! This is bullshit. College grads don't deserve to be feted by celebrities, or honored, or lifted up with inspiring words. They deserve to be BROUGHT THE FUCK DOWN BY THE CRUSHING WEIGHT OF REAL LIFE'S BITTER DISAPPOINTMENTS. They deserve a stern lecture from someone like me, who is NOT famous, NOT inspiring, and NOT attractive to look at.

I bet you grads had one hell of a spring, didn't you? Oh, I bet you spent your whole spring taking a miniscule courseload, lounging on blankets outside on the quad, fucking each other, drinking your gay little Twisted Teas... I bet you even smoked pot on Wednesday morning, just for the hell of it. I bet you just had the time of your fucking lives the past four years, didn't you?

YOU MAKE ME SICK.

Guess what, fuckos? Party's over. You're out of college now, and your parents are now too poor to nurse you through grad school. No more fantasy life for you. No more ice luges. No more intellectual discourse. [...]

At some point, you will not be able to sleep in past 8 or 9AM, and this will piss you off. I used to be cool. I used to be able to sleep until noon no problem. I SPAT RIGHT IN MORNING'S FUCKING EYE. No waking up at dawn for me. Waking up early is crazy gay. Am I right?

Except then I got a job, so I had to wake up early every day. Then, my body got used to waking up early every day, so it just woke the fuck right up at the same time on weekends, too. "But Body," I said to my big fat body, "There's nothing to fucking do, and I wanna sleep more." But my body wouldn't have it. Then I got married. Then I had kids. And holy shit, do kids wake up early. Not only does my kid come storming into the room at 6AM, but she screams WAKE UP at the top of her lungs every damn time. Having a kid is just like having a really mean spinning instructor. They give no fucking quarter. They're like tiny little Hitlers.

Now, even if there are no kids around, I wake up at 7AM at the latest. This should be good for me, I suppose. I get to run out and experience the full day, or something. But I don't feel that way. I feel like a complete asshat for getting up that early. I feel lamer than shit. Which is completely irrational. Then again, most anything I think or do now is beyond explanation. So rest up, kids. Because soon you'll be chewing Ambien like they're fucking Bubbalicious.

Seriously, read the whole thing.

(H/T Cajun Boy in the City)

Jesse Ventura on Bush II, torture, legalization of drugs, surfing, and more

If you enjoy hearing straight-up language delivered by someone who's certainly been there (and there, and there, too), and you happened to miss Larry King's May 11th show, it is my pleasure to post for you herein the unique and thought-provoking words of Jesse Ventura, Minnesota's former governor (party: Independent), as well as a retired Navy SEAL, professional wrestler, author, actor, passionate surfer, and--as of this interview's airing--the first American politician I've heard pitch President Obama for the position of Ambassador to Cuba at some undetermined point in the future.

Well.

As you're aware, I'm a Florida-residing Brit, and I don't claim to know a great deal about Minnesota politics; based on this appearance, however, I can certainly say I'm impressed with Ventura's take on a number of hot-button topics. For example, Ventura, who was subjected to waterboarding during SERE training, states unequivocally that the "technique" IS, without question, torture. Point final.

In fact, Ventura says that if you were to give him Dick Cheney and a waterboard, in one hour he'd have Cheney confessing to the Sharon Tate murders.

Just watch the interview--parts one and two (the whole effort is not that long)--and you'll see what I mean. And perhaps, like me, you'll be wishing (again) that we could have an honest-to-goodness, full-throttle-powerful third party in this country. Because with respect to the very serious subject of war crimes, the cowardice, lies, diversionary tactics, and flat-out bullshit we've seen both Republicans AND Democrats serve up to the public these past several weeks--and that they've expected us to swallow whole so they can move on, country be damned, Constitution be damned--have turned my stomach and chilled my blood. Watch:

Cogitamus ergo ridemus: Michael Steele writes to us

Oh dear.

I was sorting through a pile of Monday mail a little while ago, and right in the middle of it, wedged sideways between the bills and an office supply catalog, was a chunky envelope from the Republican National Committee.

That Robert, he's such a kidder. My Republican husband had thoughtfully opened it for me, too, knowing how susceptible my tender fingers are to paper cuts (more likely, he didn't want to let me have all the laughs first).

Inside, I found a pre-paid envelope, a long letter, and a questionnaire entitled Obama Agenda Survey, with the words *DO NOT DESTROY*--printed just like that, with asterisks--repeated no fewer than five times in a row across the top of the page. Before the first question was even asked. Oh dear.

Okay, okay, I thought. You do seem inordinately troubled, Mr. Steele, so I'll give you a couple of minutes of my time.

I set the plea for mercy plea for money single-page questionnaire aside for a moment and turned my attention to the four-page (!) cover letter that addressed us by our surname followed by the word "household" (hmmm...could the Republicans be warming to the idea that numerous households might not contain both a Mr. and a Mrs.? Nah.)

As Chairman of the Republican National Committee, I am sending out this questionnaire to gauge where you and other grassroots Republicans stand on the critical issues facing our nation--I need to hear back from you right away.

You know that the liberal media elites and the Obama-Democrats are hoping you will put this letter down right now and do nothing...

...they want you to give up, desert your Party and walk away from your conservative principles.

I'm asking you to please not turn your back on us now.

I want you to know that the Republican Party is not dead and we are not going away.

Oh DEAR.

"Robert! The Undead are closing in on us!" I shouted, wiping the tears from my eyes. "Quick, darling--turn off the brain-shaped beacon before it's too late."

The pleas went on for four--count 'em, four--pages.

[Please, please, please, etc.]...you and every one of the many who didn't vote for Barack Obama (WRONG)...Democrat allies in Congress...please, no matter what, do not discard or destroy your Survey. (Aside: will someone please explain capitalization rules to Michael Steele?)

Turn the page over, please.

Okay.

...be as exact as possible, you must return your survey--Even if you leave some of the questions blank.

We're still a big tent! Even illiterates are welcome! It's the il-LEGALS we don't like!

There is so much about the Obama Agenda that most Americans do not know about...

Because most Americans have no electricity and can't read?

...thanks to the non-stop, swooning coverage of the ultra-biased media.

But with your help, we are going to expose the Obama Agenda for all Americans to see so that we create a groundswell of opposition.

"Robert! After you turn off the brain-shaped beacon, get ready for some more teabagging, darling."

Well, that got his attention. Sort of.

"For fuck's sake, do they really think small business owners have time for this kind of bullshit, especially right now?" Robert said, kicking off his work-boots and squeezing honey into his tea while simultaneously turning on The Ed Show. "Oh good, I like this guy."

"No, seriously, darling--listen. They keep saying please: please fill in the survey; please don't destroy it, whatever you do; please send us money, oh, and don't forget, please be aware that the Democrat party wants to force everyone to pay higher taxes so they can make our kids go to re-education camps or something. We really ought to send this in."

(I paused and considered anointing the questionnaire with a selection of truly dreadful, truly naughty, truly litbritish sentences--really long, compound ones, too, so as to confuse them thoroughly and cause unrest--but decided I'd rather spend the time folding laundry.)

Instead, I read some of Steele's finer servings of, er, bullshit, aloud:

...we are asking where you stand on Barack Obama's promise to raise taxes...

...On his plans to give amnesty to illegal immigrants, which could lead to billions of dollars of government handouts and possibly bankrupt Social Security...

...And how do you feel about Obama's efforts to nationalize health care and have it run by bureaucrats in Washington, D.C.?

"As opposed to unregulated bureaucrats in Big Insurance who refuse coverage, deny sick people's legitimate claims, and cancel policies altogether--in the name of profit?" I fumed. If, instead of being the ladylike person who is me, I was a guy--make that an excitable, ah, forceful kind of guy like, say, Tony Soprano--this is the point at which I'd have stood up and spat on the ground. But while I am (perhaps) a little on the excitable side, I am neither Tony Soprano nor Michelle Malkin and am thus not usually given to spitting. Besides, we were sitting at the kitchen table enjoying the perfectly nice pot of tea with which--mirabile dictu--I'd actually managed to not scald myself.

I skipped over the countless appeals to resist destroying the survey--and the even greater number of pleas for money, helpfully repeated (with suggested dollar amounts!) yet again in the postscript--and read the closing paragraph:

The future of the Republican Party is in your hands. Act now.

...Said Mark Foley to the congressional page. (Thank you, I'll be here all week, etc.)

Now, all this would be funnier by orders of magnitude if there weren't plenty of people out there--some of whom Robert and I know personally, alas--who are stupid bigoted naïve enough to believe Michael Steele's weaselly distortions and baldfaced lies about President Obama raising taxes, scheming to bankrupt Social Security--which in reality was something George W. Bush seemed hell-bent on doing; how quickly they forget!--and the Evil Librul Media being so, you know, Evil and Librul and all. I mean, never mind the interviews, breathless and multitudinous, with Dick "How to Shoot Friends and Interrogate People" Cheney to which we've been treated on a regular basis since Obama's inauguration; never mind the countless affronts-to-journalistic-ethics-made-flesh like Bill Kristol or even Morning Joe stooge Willie Geist, who is routinely allowed to get away with making utterly fact-free, uncorroborated (and by design, unverifiable) comments like this morning's gem: "I was talking to someone this weekend, and he said he thinks Dick Cheney is sincere and really worries about the nation getting attacked under Obama". Mmm-hmm. "Someone" said it, so hey, it must be true, and while we're at it, let's just get that statement out there again about the nation possibly getting attacked. How disgusting. Shame on your sorry ass, Willie.

Anyway, since Michael Steele did ask nicely, and often, I won't destroy the survey, which, after the four pages of begging excerpted herein, seemed kind of sad and anticlimactic, really--just a sheet of paper stamped with poorly-written lies, damned lies, and hilariously biased framing. But I'm open to suggestions as to what to do with it.

Thoughts?

Also at Cogitamus.

Mothers' Day

To my Mum Christine and Mother-in-law Rita on Mothers' Day,
with much love from the firstborns and their thrice-born.

Morning Song

Love set you going like a fat gold watch.
The midwife slapped your footsoles, and your bald cry
Took its place among the elements.

Our voices echo, magnifying your arrival. New statue.
In a drafty museum, your nakedness
Shadows our safety. We stand round blankly as walls.

I'm no more your mother
Than the cloud that distills a mirror to reflect its own slow
Effacement at the wind's hand.

All night your moth-breath
Flickers among the flat pink roses. I wake to listen:
A far sea moves in my ear.

One cry, and I stumble from bed, cow-heavy and floral
In my Victorian nightgown.
Your mouth opens clean as a cat's. The window square

Whitens and swallows its dull stars. And now you try
Your handful of notes;
The clear vowels rise like balloons.

-- Sylvia Plath

Friday Saturday Frank: I am the Slime; SNL, 1976

As ever, Maestro Zappa was ahead of just about everyone, calling attention to the mind-control aspects of the dread Teevee. (However, the irony of FZ decrying television while appearing on television is not completely lost on your caffeine-deficient hostess, thankyouverymuch.)

Bon Weekend, everyone!

I am gross and perverted;
I’m obsessed and deranged.
I've existed for years,
But very little has changed.
I'm the tool of the government
And industry too--
For I am destined to rule
And regulate you.

I may be vile and pernicious,
But you can’t look away;
I make you think I’m delicious
With the stuff that I say.
I am the best you can get;
Have you guessed me yet?
I am the slime oozin’ out
From your tv set!

You will obey me while I lead you,
And eat the garbage that I feed you
Until the day that we don’t need you;
Don’t go for help...no one will heed you.
Your mind is totally controlled--
It has been stuffed into my mold,
And you will do as you are told
Until the rights to you are sold.

That’s right, folks..
Don’t touch that dial!

Well, I am the slime from your video
Oozin’ along on your living room floor.

I am the slime from your video;
Can’t stop the slime, people, look at me go.

Also at Cogitamus.

Today in exquisite metaphors: In libertatem vindicavit

The Statue of Liberty was a generous gift to America from France in 1886, and she honors the friendship and alliance the two countries forged during the American Revolution. She has long represented freedom and democracy; indeed, her features and dress were inspired by the Roman goddess Libertas.

After the attacks on September 11th, 2001, however, the Statue of Liberty was closed completely, and the world-famous icon was off-limits to visitors until August, 2004; even then, her enormous walk-in crown--a feat of engineering and sculpture that offered, arguably, one of the nation's most beautiful and inspiring views from a man-made structure--remained closed.

But on July 4th, 2009, the crown of the Statue of Liberty will be at last be re-opened to the public, as U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced today.

I was never fortunate enough to climb that narrow staircase leading to the crown and experience that famous view myself, but I have certainly admired and photographed the beautiful statue from many vantage points during countless visits to New York City. The most heartbreakingly lovely of these visual memories--and also my first sight of the Statue of Liberty--dates back to the summer of 1980, when my friend Effie and I treated ourselves to Champagne and coconut shrimp with orange sauce in the surreal and elegant Windows on the World restaurant, located on the 106th and 107th floors of the World Trade Center's North Tower. It wasn't a busy day, and we'd been given a table right at the edge of the room, affording us a gorgeous view of the city and harbor below. While we waited for our lunch, we gazed through the great oblongs of plate glass, noting how far below us the wispy clouds and buzzing helicopters were. The sun came out, and then, to our delight, we saw her: Lady Liberty.

Even then, even at that distance, Lady Liberty evoked an emotional response from Effie (daughter of Greek immigrants) and Yours Truly, a British immigrant celebrating her seventh American summer. And the two UF co-eds who'd been trying very hard to remain cool and aloof while walking around the city were now drying their tears on massive white linen napkins and laughing at themselves for getting so mushy.

Little did we know.

In early October, 2001, I was among a handful of people on a nearly-empty plane flying into New York; I was to attend a photo-editing meeting, scheduled months beforehand, for a vintage fashion book I'd co-written with my friend Linda. As we approached southern Manhattan, the pilot announced that visibility was really good, in case any of us wanted to look at the still-smoldering remains of the World Trade Center. Of course I looked--how could I not?--and of course I cried (again). But not too far away, there she was, still, torch aloft in defiance of all that dark smoke and drifting poison: Lady Liberty.

And carved in bronze beneath her, though obviously not visible from the air, her sonnet, by Emma Lazarus, gave proof through the night that her promise was still there:

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

Also at Cogitamus.

Dear Mike Galanos: Kindly walk a nine-month mile in our stilettos

"We're enabling teenagers to act carelessly with an easy way out. [...] That is not what is best for our daughters."

-- Mike Galanos, host of CNN's Prime News, on the FDA's long-awaited approval for over-the-counter sales, to sixteenseventeen-year-old young women, of the effective and laboriously researched and tested "morning-after pill", Plan B.

If Mike Galanos is to maintain his credibility as a journalist, professional and human ethics demand that he properly research his subject matter.

Accordingly, Mike Galanos should begin with an injection of time-released chemicals designed to make him vomit day and night for at least four months. Then, he must have all his clothes taken in radically so that absolutely nothing fits, necessitating the spending of not-small fortunes on poorly-made (if not flat-out throwaway) specialty clothes in order to avoid showing up at work naked.

At this point, a large bag containing a remote-control Rock-'em-Sock-'em Robot, one that has a 9-month battery life, along with several handfuls of marbles, will be inserted into the abdominal cavity of Mike Galanos, and the surgeon will create a portal for adding more marbles every week; the bag will thus press ever more firmly on his bladder, reminding him of its presence even as he tries to ignore it and go about his day. Eventually, it will routinely push the small amounts of food he is able to swallow back into his esophagus on a wave of stomach acid. Then, the bag will partially obstruct his intestines.

Further, Mike Galanos must have his blood supply increased by half and his appetite chemically adjusted so that it takes strange turns at even stranger times. He must also have his nose turned into a hair-trigger solenoid switch that activates his gag reflex at inopportune moments.

Mike Galanos must then attempt to commute, work, go to school, grocery-shop, house-keep, socialize, and/or otherwise try to live his life while every single human being with whom he comes in contact passes comment on his increasing girth and speculates on the number of aliens he's "got hiding in there, yuk, yuk, yuk." He will crave sex more than ever, but the swollen, wildly undulating stomach thing won't do much in the way of turning his partner on, so he'll have to be content with racy dreams. If he can even sleep, that is.

After forty weeks--at which point, if his "pregnancy" style is anything like mine, he will have gained more than 50% of his non-"pregnant" body weight, all of it in the stomach--Mike Galanos must be placed on a crackly vinyl-sheeted hospital bed with a single rubber pillow and have his precious parts subjected to the probing forearms of at least twenty different nurses and other healthcare sorts (did the cafeteria manager get a turn? I can't remember...). Meanwhile, a large vice will be placed around his pelvis and extreme constriction applied thereto for about thirty seconds, over and over, at steadily decreasing intervals.

As the day wears on and his energy dwindles, Mike Galanos will probably ask for food. When it appears no-one is listening, he'll scale back his demands and ask for some crackers, a sip of water, anything. He must be denied, of course, though if someone is feeling charitable, he or she could always offer him a Dixie-cup containing cubes of imitation orange-flavored Jell-O product, along with an ice cube to suck.

Mike Galanos will undoubtedly then beg for drugs; or, as I did, he will ask to be killed. (I think I might have said Please, since it's all part of growing up and being British--plus my Mum was in the room--but again, agony like that can make one's memory a bit fuzzy.)

Mike Galanos should then be patted on the hand and told, Sorry, sweetie, but the anesthesiologist is busy helping another Mom right now; he'll be here soon.

Mike Galanos must then undergo a high-tech pain-simulating technique whereby the experience of being drawn-and-quartered Wild-West-style--old school!--is recreated via the magic of electrodes connected to his brain's pain receptors. This won't take long. It doesn't have to.

Then, Mike Galanos will feel his precious parts strain and tear asunder as the enormous bag containing the Rock-'em-Sock-'em Robot and marbles is pulled from his lower unit. He will leap from the restraints and try to jump up and down for joy, so happy is he that it's finally, finally over. It will take four nurses to pin him back onto his bed, all the while screaming at him that he'd better listen and he'd better lie back down if he doesn't want to hemorrhage to death right then and there.

Mike Galanos will then be stitched back together, and this actually will take some time. (Even so, it will be more than a month before he'll be able to sit in a chair or drive a car without feeling that ripping-stabbing sensation.)

When Mike Galanos has completed this research exercise, then--and only then--will he have any right whatsoever to opine on pregnancy and the choices of those who really do face the undertaking thereof.

Thanks to Sir C. for the heads-up.

Also at Cogitamus.

Swine Flu: Smithfield Foods' statement vs. the ugly truth (with photos)

American multinational CAFO Smithfield Foods this Sunday denied responsibility for the outbreak in Veracruz, Mexico, of swine flu, now an international public health emergency and currently classified as a Level 4 Pandemic ( sustained human-to-human transmission). Smithfield also states it is cooperating with government officials in the investigation:

Based on available recent information, Smithfield has no reason to believe that the virus is in any way connected to its operations in Mexico. The company also noted that its joint ventures in Mexico routinely administer influenza virus vaccination to their swine herds and conduct monthly tests for the presence of swine influenza.

The National Pork Producers Council reported today that according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, "people cannot get the hybrid influenza from eating pork or pork products" and "preliminary investigations have determined that none of the people infected with the hybrid flu had contact with hogs."

However, Smithfield's statement fails to mention that countless residents of La Gloria were routinely and relentlessly exposed to airborne droplets of pig feces and decayed tissue for an undetermined number of years, thanks to toxic and sick-making clouds blowing outward from Granja Carrol's so-called "oxidation ponds"--or pig sewage lagoons. And that they have long complained of respiratory illnesses, well before their children started dying in March.

Nor does the company's statement explain that contracting the H1N1 influenza virus does NOT necessarily require that one "have contact with hogs"; in fact, the flu virus is spread via tiny droplets of infected matter--feces, body fluids--that reach the mucous membranes and lungs when someone touches a contaminated surface before rubbing his eyes, for example, or when he unwittingly inhales the airborne, virus-containing waste droplets floating around his town courtesy of a nearby pig or poultry CAFO.

And there's something else--several things, actually--that Smithfield Foods left off its website: photographs of the Granjas Carrol plant itself. The photos are published on the news website Enlace Veracruz 212 (Veracruz Connection) - Analytical and Investigative Journalism. It must be said, these writer(s) and photographer(s) are very brave journalists indeed--for reasons both obvious and not-so-obvious: according to the accompanying article, speaking out against the Granjas Carrol operation has, disturbingly but not unsurprisingly, led to various residents being intimidated, threatened, and arrested by certain officials tasked with protecting the company's financial interests. (These images are, in a word, grisly. You've been warned.)

The infamous oxidation ponds, or pig-waste lagoons, filled with concentrated excrement, blood, and the rotting bodies of dead pigs; note the broken pipe.

Rotting pig carcass floating in the oxidation pond/pig-waste lagoon

Dead pigs, stacked on a wheeled cart and left out in the heat. It is not clear if these animals' bodies were destined for processing or disposal.

More dead pigs left out to rot; scavenger animals got hold of these carcasses. As the Enlace Veracruz writer notes, "This is the how Granjas Carrol cares for its dead."

So, readers, are you horrified yet? And are you, too, wondering where on Earth the American mainstream media are?

Also at Cogitamus.

Swine Flu: CAFO Smithfield Foods implicated; must come clean

"Pobre Mexico--tan lejos de Diós; tan circa á los Estados Unidos."
- Mexican saying
Poor Mexico--so far from God; so close to the United States

From the latest edition of Mexico City's La Jornada (I've translated this for you):

Granjas Carrol, protected by authorities*

We are mistaken to believe that authorities responsible for guaranteeing public health and protecting the quality of our natural resources (especially water) have acted to avoid a situation where Granjas Carrol, one of the largest pork processors in the country [Mexico], would negatively affect thousands of people as well as the surrounding environment.

It has been three years since we reported here about the population of Perote, Veracruz, and the hardships they suffer owing to the protection that officials [to whom we] issued requests give to said business. Granjas Carrol was established 15 years ago in Perote because it was an ideal site for pork-processing: a good climate, close proximity to the country's central market, the availability of cheap manual labor, and the ease with which to bring in the agricultural supplies required to process nearly a million pigs per year and maintain 40,000 breeding animals.

Carrol is distinguished for its high consumption of water and the resources that allow the pigs to grow rapidly and to be "healthy". But the waste that originates from this breeder is dangerous: pig excrement, chemical and biological residues, wastewater leaching into in the water we use ourselves. For [the violation of] contaminating [the water and environment] with waste, the United States fined the powerful enterprise Smithfield, majority owner of Carrol. Here, in contrast, everything is allowed, as demonstrated in public reports, last week, by correspondent Andrés Timoteo Morales. Furthermore, he notes how local authorities persecute those who fight for the environment and for health. And the federal authorities?

Another matter that marches at the pace of a turtle: the cleaning-up of beaches. According to the government, they have invested 2 thousand-million pesos into water treatment plants in the main tourist-destination cities of the coast. The secretaries of Health and Environment give priority to the water-quality monitoring--for critical contamination--of some 21 beaches; these are in Jalisco, Campeche, Veracruz, Chiapas and Guerrero. But there is much more going on, according to the association El Poder del Consumador [the Power of the Consumer]. For its part, Greenpeace states that authorities do not inform the public in a timely way, or with proven data, about the water quality issues at the beaches.

A short summary, then; one that doesn't even require reading between the lines: American-owned interests in Mexico--from pork processing giants built alongside villages to water-treatment facilities serving the fancy hotels in coastal cities--are largely unregulated by Mexican officials.

This much is fairly well-known, I think--certainly it's well-known in agribusiness circles.

And my own between-the-lines take, offered herein with a sad shrug of my shoulders that will be well-understood by those who have even a passing familiarity with how business is done, ah, elswhere: the article's headline itself, protected by authorities, which can also be read/translated as protegé of the authorities. *

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By now you've all heard about the virulent H1N1 strain of influenza, currently referred to as swine flu, and perhaps you saw Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano on television explaining to America that declaring a state of emergency, as she was doing, was just a precaution--a preparatory step, just in case--so that Federal money was made available. Just in case.

Consider this post a case presented, then.

At this point, beyond America's borders, people are somewhere between rightly worried and seriously panicked, and that's just the government officials. The state legislature in Veracruz, widely thought to be the outbreak's epicenter--certainly it is the largest "hot spot"--has already demanded that Granjas Carrol, the Mexican-based subsidiary of giant U.S. pork processor Smithfield Foods, come clean, so to speak:

The state legislature of Veracruz has demanded that the Smithfield subsidiary turn over all documents and environmental certifications on its three massive waste lagoons, but so far, the company has only supplied information on one of them, news reports said today.

As part of normal (!) operations, Granjas Carrol dumps many tons of the hogs' waste into what are essentially sewage lagoons, referred to as lagunas de oxidación (oxidation ponds) and these constantly emit clouds of waste droplets and flies; this in turn befouls the air and water of adjacent La Gloria, the residents of which have long complained about respiratory infections they feel are related to this "pollution of the water and wind".

Then, in March, those respiratory infections began killing residents. Mexican authorities are quietly exhuming the bodies of two La Gloria children believed to have died of this new strain of flu, and officials have declared a cordon sanitario--literally, a sanitary cord; in this case, a public health barricade or quarantine--be placed around the Granjas Carrol and other pork and poultry CAFO's (Confined Animal Feeding Operation) in the area, and around bus terminals and airports.

When reading about and reporting on swine flu--a virus--it's important to bear a couple of things in mind.

First, this swine flu virus contains elements of avian, human, and swine influenza. According to the CDC's partner website PandemicFlu.gov, avian (bird) flu is transmitted thus (emphasis mine):

Infected birds shed influenza virus in their saliva, nasal secretions, and feces. Susceptible birds become infected when they have contact with contaminated excretions or with surfaces that are contaminated with excretions or secretions. Wild bird avian influenza viruses of low pathogenicity mix with avian viruses in domesticated birds and become highly pathogenic in poultry. Domestic poultry may become infected with avian influenza virus through direct contact with infected waterfowl or other infected poultry or through contact with surfaces (such as dirt or cages) or materials (such as feces or feed) that have been contaminated with droppings that harbor the low-pathogenicity virus.

In other words, low pathogenic avian influenza, which naturally occurs in wild birds, can spread to domestic birds; the relatively mildly-pathogenic flu can become "highly pathogenic" when domestic poultry come in contact with infected birds--or with feed or feces that has been contaminated by the droppings of wild birds. And from there, other animals can contract the virus. For example, during the last major flu outbreak, the H5N1 avian flu virus also infected cats in Europe.

Second, the aforementioned CAFO--Granjas Carrol, subsidiary of Smithfield Foods--is essentially an enormous, concentrated hog farm, and while hog farms are not what anyone would call the cleanest places in the world, one would expect the massive doses of antibiotics CAFO's routinely administer to confined livestock would keep infections at bay, right?

In a word, NO.

Influenza is a virus, not a bacteria, and antibiotics treat, and prevent the spread of, bacterial infections--this is likely why the drugged-up pigs didn't get sick all that time, meanwhile the unprotected residents of nearby La Gloria constantly complained of respiratory infections, most likely bacterial--at first. At some point in the recent past, however, a new mutation of the flu virus, the triple-whammy H1N1 bird-pig-human combo bug, found its way to the infamous clouds of pig waste and flies drifting across--and spreading outward from--the "oxidation ponds" about which Granjas Carrol/Smithfield released only partial information, and about which they are still remaining (mostly) quiet. Even as people have begun dying of those infections in what are, quite frankly, alarming numbers.

Finally, a question: what of the connection between avian flu and this new swine flu, with its human, avian, and swine DNA--is there one?

He [Mexico's Chairman of the Committee on the Environment, Marco Antonio Núñez López] was referring to another CAFO, this one containing poultry, called Granjas de Bachoco, located near the state capital of Xalapa. He said there was an epidemic of avian flu among the chickens being raised there, but that this was being kept quiet so as not to interfere with exports. Influenza-infected chickens raise the risk of cross-infection to pigs in the same area, scientists say.

I'll be keeping a close eye on developments in this story, both in the US and Mexican media, as I've already noticed some interesting and significant differences in what--and how much--they're saying south of the border versus here in the land of Los Norteños.

Further reading:

The article in Grist, by Tom Philpott, that connects Smithfield to the Swine Flu outbreak
The World Health Organization's Swine Flu information center
The Center for Disease Control's Swine Flu information center

Cogitamus ergo ridemus: Eddie Izzard on Techno-joy and computers ending the world

Because thinking people need to laugh, and Eddie Izzard is a thinking person's laughmaker. (I'd recommend using headphones if the innocent or easily-offended lurk nearby, ahem.)

Bon Weekend, everyone!

"United by a Shared Intolerance, to Protect Dual-Sex Marriage."

Awesome. Via Watertiger.

Good Friday Frank: a Very Special History Repeats Itself Edition

In 1990, Frank Zappa was guest-host for a program called Focus, produced and aired by the long-since-shuttered FNN. In the clips below, he interviews Emmy-award-winning journalist and current NPR news analyst Daniel Schorr, who discusses, among other things, his decision (in the 1970's) to publish the Pike Committee report--which detailed the CIA and FBI's various and many illegal activities at home and abroad--as well as his subsequent "resignation" from his then-employer, CBS (shades of Rathergate?!)





A bit of context, via Wikipedia:

Schorr attracted the anger of the Nixon White House. In 1971, after a dispute with White House aides, Schorr's friends, neighbors, and co-workers were questioned by the FBI about his habits. They were told that Schorr was under consideration for a high-level position in the environmental area. Schorr knew nothing about it. Later, during the Watergate hearings, it was revealed that Nixon aides had drawn up what became known as Nixon's Enemies List, and Daniel Schorr was on that list. Famously, Schorr read the list aloud on live TV, surprised to be reading his own name in that context. Schorr won Emmys for news reporting in 1972, 1973, and 1974.

Schorr provoked intense controversy in 1976 when he received and made public the contents of the secret Pike Committee report on illegal CIA and FBI activities. Called to testify before Congress, he refused to identify his source on First Amendment grounds, risking imprisonment. This did not mollify CBS executives, and Schorr ultimately resigned from his position at CBS in September 1976.

On May 14, 2006, on NPR's Weekend Edition, Schorr mentioned a meeting at the White House that took place with colleague A. M. Rosenthal and president Gerald Ford. Ford mentioned that the Rockefeller Commission had access to various CIA documents, including those referring to political assassinations. Although scolded at first for his television report by former CIA director Richard Helms, Schorr was vindicated by the text of the Pike Committee, which he obtained from an undisclosed source and leaked to The Village Voice.

I was cheered--though completely unsurprised--to learn that Schorr and Zappa were friends:

Though by no means a fan of rock music, Schorr became friends with composer Frank Zappa after the latter contacted him, asking for help with a voter-registration drive. Schorr made an appearance with Zappa on February 10, 1988, where he sang "It Ain't Necessarily So" and "Summertime". Schorr delivered the eulogy on NPR after Zappa's untimely death on December 4, 1993; he professed not to understand Zappa's lengthy discourses on music theory, but he found a kindred spirit—a serious man with a commitment to free speech.

A commenter at YouTube notes: I think when Frank died the world's intelligence level must have dropped by 80%.

Thankfully, we still have Frank Zappa's astounding body of work, and it continues to inspire, amuse, provoke, and, yes, demand. "Pay attention!" it says. "Teach yourself; fight for your ideals; stop accepting mediocrity."

We're trying, Frank. We really are.

Best HuffPo Headline EVER

That screeching you hear is the sound of a thousand feet stomping on the brakes as some of us head down the street toward that billboard and suddenly notice a sea of oddly stationary cars and giddy, wide-eyed pedestrians located directly in front of us.

If we absolutely must have shrinkage, well, bend it like Beckham, I say.

(The actual story about sales of men's undies being an economic indicator is here.)

Shopping the Middle Ages for Bras and Panties

Consider this Reason Number 3,999,999,999 that Deborah is grateful for the moderately-modern mindset of the society in which we live here in the West. Not that I'd be embarrassed to buy undies from a guy, mind you--I'd probably enjoy watching him squirm at whatever extremely naughty jokes I'd made a point of telling him--but I would feel an ongoing need to loudly protest the fact that our Saudi sisters not only are prohibited from driving a car, but can't even turn to a lady bra-fitter to help them when they're seeking comfort and support for The Girls, because their law apparently says only men can be lady bra-fitters. Or store clerks or car-drivers. Or something.

Oh dear. I am imagining a loudly-protesting Me, standing in a lingerie store in Saudi Arabia, assuredly not wearing the forty yards of black wool draping they like to throw all over our Evil Temptress Female bodies, and if it's hot outside (!), probably sporting bare legs, bare arms, and at least one wayward bra strap.

Wait! Wait! I want my lawyer! I want my gift-with-purchase teddy bear! I promise not to name it Mohammed!

Inside All of Us is a Wild Thing

Maurice Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are--aka The Tornello family's Favorite Book Ever--is coming to the Big Screen, courtesy of the wonderful Spike Jonze.

I'm thrilled to bits; after all, there are at least three copies of the book lying around my house, and I know we had all the monster puppets at one point (though Heaven help me try to find them right now). And each of us has one variation of the t-shirt or another, even Mama.

Wild Things Fever really took hold when Son One turned six, and we threw him a huge Where the Wild Things Are birthday party. On the morning of his big day, Son One walked into the back garden to find a real, full-sized and red-painted wooden sailboat that Robert and our friend Jeff built, complete with a bamboo mast and a yellow canvas sail sewed by Yours Truly. We also set up a washing-line-and-flowered-sheet tent (just like the one Max plays in) over one of the lower oak branches, and designed a cake that looked like a limb from the scary forest and covered it with plastic creepy-crawlies. I had painstakingly copied the book title's font when making the invitations. And, of course, stuffed versions of the Wild Things were stationed around the house.

Everyone had a ball and no-one was sent to his room--not even Robert, who, later that evening, somehow managed to completely burn off the handle of my favorite wok while BUI (Barbecuing Under the Influence).

And in a world where it seems that pink maribou-bedecked books and rhinestone-covered fantasy gear dominate the real estate of children's retail and juvenile publishing, I have to say, thank goodness for Maurice Sendak, as well as Roald Dahl--both are children's authors who wrote brilliantly, sensitively, and unflinchingly about the dark (and funny!) sides of human nature.

Where the Wild Things Are will be in theatres just in time for my own birthday, this October. Hooray!