Grandiosity

So some guy named Zimmerman, who went to the University of Chicago in '58 when tuition was less than a K a year, says:

http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/10125-the-aftermath-of-occupy-will-surpass-the-sixties

Yes, you read the URL correctly: "the aftermath of occupy will surpass the sixties." Well, that'd probably be nice, I agree. But I'll tell you, friends, the dreams of movements in the '60s and '70s to effect real and lasting improvements in the lives of all Americans were quite a few tads out front of the current realities, wouldn't you say? It's not just that some of his commenters parrot the gibberish of the Right with the same vehemence with which they down a cold one after a day banging nails in July. It's that grand dreams are almost always forerunners of disillusion and reaction. It's hard to see why people like Mr. Zimmerman are so determined to promise so much, so fast.

The Civil Rights Era of the mid-'60s, which was actually over ten years of real blood, murder, police truncheons, firehoses, and German Shepards, culminating in the assassination of President Kennedy (who was at best lukewarm on the idea of really ending segregation), grounded some good laws making it criminal to surpress voters on race grounds, and criminal as well to segregate businesses open to the public. All these bits of progress are being resisted even today by the Right, including a good number of persons (such as Rand Paul) who have achieved Senatorhood. The vote this fall is going to be surpressed in many swing states on racial grounds--the racists are just legally slicker than they were in the '50s.

And, in a broader historical context, let us recall that the seemingly wonderful Civil Rights victories of the mid-'60s were followed immediately on by the Vietnam War, which was driven by the same Democratic Party that had at last joined the Civil Rights Movement more or less. Yes, that egregious war was finally ended in 1975. And in the late '70s the Equal Rights Amendment, which aimed to establish constitutional equality for women, was defeated in the various state referendae.

So it goes. It seems to me--just sayin', a geezer with a bunch of cats sweltering through the summer--that if the Occupy Movement actually does a bit to simply keep the various progressive actions grounded in the '60s from entirely evaporating in the boiling confusion of the Romney campaign, they'll be doing a great and lasting service to the United States. It is a long way to actually making a dent in the great edifice that is the current economic structure, grounded as it now is in the Supreme Court's Citizens United Decision.

There was a middling flap this week (brought to our attention by Roy Edroso) over the fact that The Google quoted "This Land Is Your Land" as a 4th of July memento. This is also American reality. The fact is, Mr. Guthrie wrote a whole lot of great songs, and some of 'em were a lot more pointed than this gentle anthem to our shared citizenship (and even with "This Land," I do wonder about what the native Americans in Mr. Guthrie's Oklahoma thought about his claims of ownership). My favorite Guthrie lines are these:

As through this world you ramble, you'll find lots of funny men,
Some will rob you with a six-gun, others with a fountain pen.

I'd also be remiss in not quoting Mr. Dylan (another Zimmerman, who probably spent some moments on the streets of Chi-town in the '60s):

And I hope that you die
And your death'll come soon
I will follow your casket
In the pale afternoon
And I'll watch while you're lowered
Down to your deathbed
And I'll stand o'er your grave
'Til I'm sure that you're dead

(from Masters of War, (c) Bob Dylan)

It's a long long road to the top of the mountain, and none of us are likely to live to see that promised land. That's why "Drive He Said" is the best advice for the faint of heart.

Laundry's Dry, Houds are Free, Free

There isn't a better meditation on our current situation that this one, by Driftglass:

http://driftglass.blogspot.com/2012/07/independence-day.html

In this piece he quotes extensively from the late Steve Gilliard, who quotes from Joe Conason on the perfidy of Ann Coulter. It's worth requoting here, the Conason bit I mean:

Coulter discusses McCarthy's impressive high school record in considerable loving detail. But somehow she neglects to mention McCarthy's first moment in the national spotlight. That was his infamous 1949 campaign on behalf of Nazi S.S. officers who were convicted of war crimes for the massacre of American troops in the town of Malmedy during the Battle of the Bulge. On their orders, 83 American prisoners of war had been murdered by Waffen S.S. machine-gunners. The S.S. officers were sentenced to death, but McCarthy insisted that the entire case was a frame-up, with confessions obtained by horrific torture. He intervened in Senate hearings on the case and lied repeatedly during his defense of the Nazi murderers. His most spectacular claim was that the American investigators had crushed the testicles of German prisoners as an interrogation technique. McCarthy was later shown to have served as the pawn of neo-Nazi and communist provocateurs who were using the Malmedy case to whip up anti-American sentiment in postwar Germany. The main source for his false charges concerning Malmedy was a Germany lawyer named Rudolf Aschenauer, whose closest ties were to the postwar Nazi underground and to American right-wing isolationists, but who has also been identified as a communist agent. Aschenauer testified at U.S. Senate hearings in Germany that he had passed information about Malmedy to McCarthy. The S.S. officers were guilty, as the Senate report confirmed -- although most of them later got their death sentences commuted in a gesture to former Nazi officials who aided the West in the Cold War. But McCarthy had succeeded in his larger purpose, winning publicity for himself and casting a negative light on the war-crimes trials.

As Driftglass points out later in his piece, the question of importance now is, why do people like Ann Coulter still get endless face time on major television news shows, when it is a known and proven fact that Coulter is nothing better than a liar and blatant propagandist whose lifes work is to destroy America's historical memory and replace it with right wing mythologies. Fox simply displays its commitment to the big lies by featuring Coulter, but the rest of the networks?

I've read enough World War II history to know about Malmedy. Yet this fact--the facts about McCarthy and Malmedy--I did not know until today. This is a remarkable black hole, America suffers. It widens daily. We all suffer from its existence.

Today is July 5th. We are on the downhill to November.

4th of July, Liberty Laundromat

The Houds returned from their big trip to Rawleigh in fine fettle, although it was turrible hot in the old S-10, with only minimal air, and them stacked like sardines in their carriers back behind the seats. But they made it back, and are mostly just perturbed that they are not allowed as yet to tussle and frolic as is their wont. Perhaps this is the fundamental lesson we see in the unreconstructed portions of 'Murica. A bunch of people, primarily white men, who just cannot stand the idea that maybe they can't do exactly everthang they want, when they want, as they want, and leap in frustration at the imagined bars of their imagined kennels, howling at figments, conjuring up absurd banshees of fear from nothing but cobwebs and cracker crumbs.

So it was, for a time, with Wuzzy in particular. We even brought him up to bed with us, hoping he'd "settle down," as the parents say. All he did was attack our feet. Fuzzy meanwhile was chasing his tail in his kennel. They're all so used to the distractions of each other that, when faced with existential aloneness, they immediately go insane. Fuzzy as a tail chaser--how extremely undignified and unlike Hiz Honor, who of all the three is most Kingly and Patrician, and tends to sit aloof on a table or chair while Wuzzy and Grey Bear roll in a ball on the floor till they tire, or are brought up short by rolling into their water dish and finding themselves suddenly sodden.

I think by nightfall of the 4th they'll be released and back to it. There are no signs of any problems with the tiny surgeries. The vet told us that they were already a bit overweight--no doubt due to our relentless feedings. We'll try to do better. Maybe we can have them outside, where they are absolutely fine to dine on all the squirrels they care to masticate. We'll pay for the wormings to see the squirrel population decline. But really, I don't think that's the trajectory of this. Right at this moment, Wuzzy is sitting quietly in the kitchen window, enjoying the breeze and the view, and not trying to tear open the screen and make his escape. This is exactly what we imagined. This is perfect life with cats. At least in my book.

Now, if they'll all just stop attacking our feet at night, when we're asleep--everything will be perfect in the land of the free. Meanwhile, I'm taking sparklers with me when I go to do the laundry in a bit. What a celebration. What a country, huh?

Update: Here's some serious reading, and an example of why too many American voters have no idea at all what's going on:

http://www.nytexaminer.com/2012/07/i-never-believe-david-brooks/

Mr. Brooks is easy to read and easy to find. He's even on PBS once a week. What he says is simply accepted by millions of people I'd imagine. But it takes some extra work to find analysis of his columns, such as the work linked above. And the question is, why does PBS and the New York Times allow Mr. Brooks to just propagandize, week after week, on issues of such importance.

New Adventures of the Hudahenians

Well, Libby just left the house with the three boys, for their visit with destiny, their irretrievable move to long-term pethood. They will forever miss out on the unreasoning drive to male dominance in the cat world, the battles with other male cats, the ripped ear, the festering bite or scratch, not to mention the joys of sex in the key of feline. Instead we expect that they will enjoy lying in a pile on the sofa, watching teevee and each other and us, keeping an eye on the birds and squirrels, having another bon-bon as they desire. They'll probably gain some weight over time, but hopefully, since they've not known privation, they won't feel like they'd better eat three helpings right now, just in case (as our wonderful little white kitty did after we brought her in). Hopefully the ops will all be successful and they'll be back home this evening safe and more or less sound (if you don't count a very small detail). We're supposed to keep them separated for at least 24 hours. That will not be easy in this house, but I expect we'll manage. Then it's back at it for them. They're still not ready to just crash on the bed with us--we tried that last night and just got endless bouncing and tussling for our troubles. Wake up times. Don't know what that means. Cats have no clocks. They, in fact, are clocks. Tomorrow being the Fourth of July, we'll at least be around. Nice to have a mid-week holiday.

Meanwhile, Digby posted this extremely heartening piece about a young boy who has some sense, even in the face of what must have been pretty hard-core propagandizing from his parents. One can only hope that true things speak out to people--that dogma and doctrine do not simply blanket people's common sense and ability to see what's out there. As Ezra Klein argued last night, the logic of the health care bill's details--the logic of money--should eventually make inroads into the political closets of the various state Republican governments which are now taking absurd and ruthless stands against merely helping their citizens to get better health care. The Houston Medical Center, he said (for example), will not allow the Texas government to reject billions in Federal monies for the sake of a faulty doctrine. Let us hope. The young lad in the story gives actual flesh to the whisper of sanity:

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2012/07/this-is-why-they-keep-kids-away-from.html

Congratulations to the kid. As well as judgment, he has courage. He ought to enjoy going to college. Ain't nothing more fun than reading about stuff you don't know.

A quick and instant update: momma just popped up on the porch. She'd like more breakfast, if you please. Isn't that nice.