Drinking and Love Don't Mix

Outside the window tonight
hot and muggy
woman and man whine, wheedle
yell, cry, shout, swear
lost something -- keys?
whose fault?
who's lost?

"I'm messed up..."
"You're saying it's my fault..."
"You're taking it personally..."
"Don't leave me here..."
"Then start walking..."
"You're making me feel guilty..."
"I'm not making you feel guilty..."

Too much despair
too much alcohol
too much judgment

not enough...

this can't last, I think
or it could be hell for them
for eternity in a week
month year decade lifetime
children at their sides
grandchildren
confirming their own existance
in the little bites of pain

and then the cell phone rings
and then the cell phone rings.

Let Them Eat Cake: The true Bush view of Hurricane Refugees

First, yesterday, Minnesota Public Radio was interviewing a state official, a Republican, about preparations for refugees coming to Minnesota (our state will take 3,000 or so and house them at a National Guard fort). The official said that the state didn't want the media using the term "refugee." The people haven't come from another country, been the victims of violent conflicts or persecution, so, he said, they're not refugees. They're "hurrican survivors." Yeah, right. If they were in another country, say one where a tsunami hit, they'd be refugees. There are refugees from flood, famine, storm. And the question of persecution remains unresolved at the moment.

But I suspect the Bush administration would prefer to put a positive spin on its failure at true homeland security. I can almost imagine the Karl Rove memo (and I am imagining this, I have not seen any such memo or any report of one) to Republican operatives throughout the country: "Don't let the liberal media disparage the survivors of Hurrican Katrina. Don't call them refugees. If you want FEMA money to pay for any efforts your state makes to help, be sure your state officials call these people Hurricane Survivors."

Okay, there probably is no such memo. But the spin makes one dizzy nonetheless. And while trying to recover my balance, I read in the Minneapolis Star Tribune about Barbara Bush's tour of the Astrodome with her husband, George I. In an interview on Marketplace (public radio), she is reported to have commented:

"And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this [chuckle]--this is working very well for them." (A21)

The New York Times report doesn't include the chuckle. But it provides more of her thoughts on the matter. Just before the above quote, she apparently said:

"What I'm hearing, which is sort of scary, is they all want to stay in Texas." (Also run in the Star Tribune, A22)

It would not surprise me if Grand Dame Bush, the King Mother, expressed candidly the view of the whole Bush family and its administration (of course, at a deniable distance). Those Hurricane Katrina ref... er, survivors... are better off now than before. We did a good thing, didn't we, helping those poor, underprivileged people find a nice place to live in the Houston Astrodome. Gee, why is everybody so upset?

Gee. I wonder why.

first entry-- Labor Day, 2005

Okay. I haven't done a blog before, but here goes. I am a writer, so I should be able to do this, right?

On my mind right now are several inter-related issues having to do with the nation state in general and our nation state (United States) in particular. Competing forces likely mark the critical moment (crisis, or not?) of change in nationalism / nation state:

Rise of state rights / federalism in the conservative agenda

Technological blurring of boundaries and collapsing of space and time--from air travel to the internet to satellite phones, we live less and less in isolated conclaves of people like ourselves

Globalization and multinational capitalism (in both liberal and conservative agendas) that push against boundaries and exist across many boundaries

Over stretched resources by nation states, especially the U.S. as it increases its deficits and puts its military and wealth into quagmires abroad (to the point of not being able to respond adequately or quickly to Hurricane Katrina, despite advanced warning--what will the government do in the event of an unpredicted disaster or terrorist attack on U.S. soil? -- increase surveillance of its citizens?)

Lack of coherent identity or sense of purpose for the U.S.

Increase in multi-national and trans-national families

I don't think this is necessarily bad. Nationalism and the nation state have, as ideology and historical entity, escalated technologies of war. Certainly empires before the invention of the nation state also did this, but, in my reading of history, the period since the nation state (roughly, since the enlightenment) has escalated conflict and technologies between those nation states. Perhaps this is a misreading.

However, with increasing conviction, I believe that the nation state will not hold. Maybe this is the beginning of its decline, and maybe I won't see it. I have heard some scholars speak of the "new" organizational structures that will emerge from society. They might already exist. Two examples in opposition to each other:

multi-national capital holdings (corporations)

Al-Qaeda

What are the other possibilities? Could tribe.net be part of technological organizing structures? What might those look like? Affinity groups? Self-interests? Professions / guilds? Race? Religion? The flexible nexus of many of those? The shifting web of social desire for connection?

Ok. Add to the mix global warming, natural disasters such as Katrina, assertion of indigenous rights, religious fundamentalism, religious universalism, and any number of other things. What do you get?

How do we organize? How do we identify our "us"? do we have to have "others"? can we organize social structures, support, etc., flexibly and inclusivity? what would that look like?

If there were aliens invading, as movies and tv shows provide our fictional imaginations, would we organize as earthlings - humans? Would we pit ourself against these external "others" to survive and make the earth whole? If so, should we invent those others? Or would we unite with them, find connections and degrees of connection of some sort? Would reaching across boundaries make the earth whole?

Who are "we"?

How can we provide the support systems necessarily to help fellow humans while making the earth whole, without creating an antagonistic "other"?

Finally, to wind this rant down somewhat-- is the current demonization of religions, cultures, societies, and geographies that seems to be accompanying a rise in a nationalism rooted in fascism and control (i.e., the Homeland Security Act) a reactionary attempt to prevent the failure of the nation state and the way it has organized power, labor, and resources?

Ok. So those are pretty heavy thoughts for Labor Day. And somewhat sketchy, incoherent. Hey, reply or whatever. Argue with me. Help me find the holes and see what might be. Or not be. Or whatever.

So, I begin this journal/ blog to an unknown audience on Labor Day, 2005. Maybe I'll keep it up, maybe not. But it's a fun experiment in moving to post-nation state society. Join me, if you wish.