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It’s no surprise to many that Bush’s “re”-election was shortly followed by a dizzying drop of the value of the dollar. Look next for the dollar being dropped as a reserve currency. Other countries have as reserves, instead of gold or silver, US dollars. This props up their currency, but with the dollar falling, it’s propping up our currency. As we got dropped, well, our currency becomes more volitaile. It used to be, before Reagan, that it was fine to pillage other countries in the south, but our own had to be kept fairly stable. Then Reagan decided to throw a party for the rich and with our own stolen election in 2000, it became clear that we were now playing by the same rules imposed by us upon the third world. Patriotism is put on by politicians as a sham while they let de-nationalized elite and multi-national corporations pillage our resources for the benefit of a very few.

Which is why the buisiness community did not oppose Bush. Half did. Half did not. The half that supported Bush are on the side of third-worlding the US. They don’t care what happens here. They want cheap labor and cheap materials. Or, they want to draw up policy to benefit them and nobody else. Take for example, Lockheed. The New York Times is reporting that “[I]n the post-9/11 world, Lockheed has become more than just the biggest corporate cog in what Dwight D. Eisenhower called the military-industrial complex. It is increasingly putting its stamp on the nation’s military policies, too.” Lockheed has taken over many of the functions of government, “It sorts your mail and totals your taxes. It cuts Social Security checks and counts the United States census. It runs space flights and monitors air traffic.” Lockheed is not a public company, although it is publically held. As in, it is not a utilitiy. It is controlled by it’s stockholders, not by government. It carries out government functions and sets policies and in exchange, gets your tax money. “Nearly 80 percent of its revenue comes from the United States government. Most of the rest comes from foreign military sales, many financed with tax dollars. And former Lockheed executives, lobbyists and lawyers hold crucial posts at the White House and the Pentagon, picking weapons and setting policies.” Lockheed it not accountable to anyone but it’s stock holders. By law, any corporation which issues shares must put short term quarter-by-quarter earnings as it’s number one priority. We’re waging wars so that lockhhed can show a fourth quarter profit. “‘It’s impossible to tell where the government ends and Lockheed begins,’ said Danielle Brian of the Project on Government Oversight, a nonprofit group in Washington that monitors government contracts.” And the stockholders who are receiving our tax monies have reason to be happy. “The company’s stock has tripled in the last four years, to just under $60.” That’s, of course, during Bush’s tenure.
Our foreign policy is being dictated by these stock holders. And our domestic policy. “Does the Department of Homeland Security have the best tools to protect the nation? Lockheed has a host of military and intelligence technologies to offer. ‘What they do for the military in downtown Falluja, they can do for the police in downtown Reno,’ said Jondavid Black of the company’s Horizontal Integration Vision division.” When what you’ve got to offer is strength, then you sell strength as the answer to every problem. And this is how a police state comes about. Lockheed has clout. They have weapons. They can order the government to buy these weapons because they are the government.
When the government is run by a heirarchical system where those under it have no say and those owning it do no work, well, in the past, we’ve called that feudalism. When a police state is run for the benefit of corporations, in the past, we’ve called that fascism. I don’t think there are any kind words to describe this fundamentally anti-democratic system. And, of course, how votes are counted is now a trade secret. Not of Lockheed (yet), but of other corporations.
The point of the system is the military industrial complex. Racism, homophobia, mysogony, fear, pseudo-theocracy are just side effects. They are fixtures that fit well with the system, which requires scapegoating and dividing and conquering to maintain power. Most of us would rather have nationalized health care than to purchase “robot soldiers and neural software – ‘intelligent agents'” to kill our “enemies” in the third world. We are becoming the third world. The victims of our warfare-based society are the natural allies of the American non elites. Just as we are scapegoated, they are scapegoated. Fear of “them” over there is fear of “them” over here. Any alien other can fill in when needed. We are all the alien others. However, if we weren’t being run by “a warfare company,” we wouldn’t need so much warfare. We would not require fear. We would not need to be constantly aware of how the other is plotting against us. At home and abroad. Fear of others abroad automatically leads to fear of others at home, which works out well when you are trying to see robot soldiers and spy sattilites to Reno Nevada.
Does Lockheed care if the dollar goes to nothing? Maybe. Maybe not. They have to put their first quarter profits first and those would be higher under Bush, so bush gets their vote, I surmise. They dictate policy and they, by law, cannnot look long term. Those with the power to make descisions at Lockheed must think short-term. They can’t think about their children. And they are an enormously large corporation, which means, psychologically, anyone who works in large system don’t personally take on blame for what their system is doing. They’re just doing their job. Yeah, it’s fucked up (maybe), but they’re just one person. If they don’t do it, somebody else will. Meaning that absolutely nobody is accountable. Most stocks are held by pension funds and whatnot. The people shoe money is invested get no say in how it is invested. The fund managers have to go for whatever stock is doing well or they lose their jobs. They might not agree with the system either (despite the wealth they accumulate), but they’re just doing their jobs, investing pensions so grandma can eat. You don’t want grandma to starve, do you? Even the sotckholders aren’t accountable. Thousands upon thousands of peopel are participating in a system that they likely do not want to. Only a few people profit. Only a few people are indoctorinated enough to think that robot soldiers in Syria would be good for our country.
A general strike could stop the system in it’s tracks, at least until they offshored all the production jobs. What irony to have our very important national security robots manufactured by our “enemy” China! Undoubtedly, war production jobs will move overseas. Can we stop lockheed?

I’m thankful my dad is here and I’m thankful I’m at Wesleyan and I’m thankful for Cola and for Xena and for writing music and my old friends and my new friends and for my health and it’s easy to see ways in which my life is good and I’m thankful for all of them.

Everyone is offline for the holiday except for me. My dad is here, but I still need to do things like check email, read blogs and do research. For example, according to Mondak, “When a listener cognitively processes weak arguments [in protest music], for example, counter-persuation is the probable result” (Mondak. “Protest Music As Political Persuasion.” “Popular Music & Society” (vol. 12; no. 3; Fall 1988) : pp. 27) Hey, this is fabulously great news for me. Why? Because I think right-wing pundits have weak arguments. If I make music that presents their arguments, then people will probably be persuaded against them, meaning in my direction. Why form your own words when you can just use the words of your opponent? Woot.
My string quartet generated a piece of fan mail.

The Flux Quartet last night played my string quartet along with the quartets of the other graduate composers. They’re great musicians. The concert went well. IT’s nice to hear something I wrote actually get played. I was a bit nervous, but everything went fine. That’s one nice thing about not playing your own stuff is that it’s out of your hands and so there’s no need for too much nervousness. Lots of folks said they like dhte piece. When I get a recording, I’ll make an mp3 available.

After the concert, it seemed like the entire music department was at Elis. We took up half the place. Tom came for the concert. It was fun.
Slept in super late today, but I’m going to get done everything I need to get done before my dad comes. I’ll be runnign around tommorrow. I emailed a professor about how to write a proposal for the upcoming Kent State Symposium. I’m excited about it. I want to go even if I’m not presenting, since I’m on a political music kick. I’ve never written a proposal before. I wonder if I can ask to give a paper and ask to play some music, or I just need to pick one or the other. I’m no expert on this topic, but I was listening to American Maveriks talking about how in the 1930’s progressive politics were linked with musical conservativism, which you can hear in the music of Aaron Copland. This is also evident in the music of a later radical, Cornielius Cardew. But in the vietnam era and later, some progressive musicians were making experimental works, like Steve Reich’s Come Out and It’s Gonna Rain. A guy named Sten Hanson wrote a brilliant piece of text art sound poetry (or whatever you call it) called The Glorious Desertion. Both Reich and Hanson seemed to be reaching out to an urban audience who were likely to agree with them. This is a necessary part of poltical movements: rallying the troops. However, in these times in the United States, it’s imparative that urban activists reach out to red-staters and find common ground with them. The arts are an important vehicle for this. Is it possible to do this without becoming musically conservative? One possible answer might lie with Paul De Marinis’ piece Cincinnati, which is perhaps the most brilliant political piece of music ever written. On the album Music as a Second Language, that piece is followed by another piece called The Power of Suggestion, which by itself is an excellent piece of music, but coupled with Cincinnati is just incredibly powerful.
Relatedly, I think I’ve found the pundit for my next piece, a guy called Imus. He wants to nuke Palestine and maybe the rest of the Middle East. Mocking the funeral of Arafat. I think this is a good clip to use because it really shows the connectedness of the diverse progressive affinity groups. Imus used the phrase “bearded fatwa fairy.” Racism meets religious descrimination meets homophobia. We cannot have peace at home without peace abroad and vice verses. When some of us are being scapegoated, all of us are. I also want to note that these highly offensive comments were boradcast on NBC. NBC! Even during the Reagan era, things were not like this. So how do we counter these messages? How do we reach out to red staters and say “we’re right and you’re wrong” without pissing them off? We’re up against decades of divisive radio. Decades of anti-art. Decades of anti-logical reasoning and pro faith. Yeah, I think their religion is wrong. It’s handicapping them. Cutting of rational thought is like cutting off some fingers. If there was a religion that made it’s members cut off their fingers it would be a cult. But hampering their brains is a-ok. The US is two countries. One is urban and first world. And the other is rural and not first world. We think we can connect with them on issues about labor, but those issues are incidental to their larger world-view. So then what?
Yeah, I’m just angry that Bush won and that NBC thinks it’s ok to use the word fairy and advocate genocide. Before the election, it was all going to be about “security moms” who are freaked out about terrorism and don’t care about domestic issues. But now those security moms are all supposed to be homophobic. I thought they didn’t care about domestic issues? Not that those are seperate issues as NBC had made clear with it’s diatribes about “raghead” “faries”.
And I’m aware that my position that reason is superior to faith is, in itself, a matter of faith. However, it disturbs me that those things might be seen as incompatible.

ok, submissions, I must submit my Rush Limbaugh piece on tape to the spark festival by monday. George Bush 4 channel piece to SF Sound as soon as possible. And a proposal for a paper about protest music and/or bush 2 channel + coulter + rush to kent state by december 3rd. I also need to send a cd of 4-channel bush to the holder of the copyright of some of the text, which i will do when i burns cds for sf sound. And I need to find out application dates to go to germany. And start booking gigs for winter break.

speaking of winter break, what am i going to do with the dog?

1. Concert works: Electroacoustic works with and without performers. 
Performance venues will accommodate 2-8 channel works and works with video.
 Although there is no strict limit of duration, pieces of twelve minutes or
less are encouraged.

Is 4’26” too short?

a self-imposed one beer limmit is the way to go.

i am way too skinny

Dubya trshed the ABM treaty, so Russia’s beuilding new nukes. (Note that Dubya said we needed to get rid of anti-nuklear proliferation treaties in order to fight terrorism as soon as he got in office, before we were at war with terrorism). Pundits say the way for Democrats to win is to become more fascist, and since they are not an ideologically driven party by any means, the new minority leader is an anti-choice Mormon. Anti-choice is called moderate. Time magazine thinsk this is a great idea. time magazine wants to put Bush’s head on Mount Rushmore. Time magazine is owned by the far left AOL Time Warner Corporation. Time Magazine is as left as all the rest of the media, which was brave enough to defend the baselessly smeared swift boat vets. Sure, everything they said was a lie, but they were war heroes damnit, not like that pruple heart faking John Kerry. and the right wing owns fucking everything. And making pieces of music using evil things Rush Limbaugh says is not going to stop them, because it’s like, I dunno, throwing a pebble at the tide to stop it. The cities and the rural areas hate eahc other and it’s because of these pundits and they don’t care if they drive everyone away and nobody votes again. The way to bridge this divide is with art, but cities have urban contemporary and rural areas have country music and there’s not much common ground there, more like animosity. And how do you reach out artistically to somebody who likes Thomas Kinkade? But that sort of elitism urban-culture-is-superior will drive rural folks away, no matter how true it is goddamn it.

My first string quartet is being played this evening (November 18) at 8:00 at Crowell Concert Hall on the Wesleyan University Campus in Middletown, CT

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There’s a map going around the internets which compares red states to pre-civil war slave states and territories. And Blue staters have noted that areas that supported slavery now vote republican.

The popular assumption is that any system which relied on race-based chattel slavery was obviously racist. Racist systems contain racist people. Racist people are also undoubtedly sexist and homophobic because if they beleive in the dominance of whites, they must also beleive in the dominance of heterosexual white males. And the red stateness of certain areas shows they’re still mired in attitudes of the past.
I don’t want to comment on the above paragraph, but rather discuss the economic aspects of slavery. Slaves are best suited for grunt agricultural labor. Not because of anything intrinsic to slvaes themselves, but rather, economies intrinsic to slavery. The Roman Empire could ahve industrialized, but it did not, possibly because of slavery. Slaves are the ultimate cheap labor. You can get them to do anything by hand. You don’t want to give them specialized skills. They’re slaves. They’re not worth investing in. For a slave to use machinery, that machinery must be extremely simple to operate, such that almost no training is required. Slaves could use the cotton gin, but slaves would not be sent to work in the mills. Slavery is incompatible with industrialization.
In the non-slave areas, industrialization did occur. Labor was inherently more valuable. Free workers are worth training. The earliest industrialization was in the textile industry. Giant looms. Industrializing countries all had or wanted access to cheap cotton. The US got in a war with Mexico to seize the prme cotton-growing land in Texas. England seized India. The cotton for England was cheap because it was imported from a subjegated colony. Cotton was cheap for the US because it was harvested by subjegated slaves. However, like colonialization hurt the economy of India, slavery harmed the economy of the south. In the north, industrialized cities sprang up, where there were workers and factories. In the south, labor was too cheap to bother building a factory. The south failed to urbanize in the same was as the north because it failed to industrialize.
Blue staters feel as if something is seperating them from the red state brethren, but they may be surprised to learn that red is all around them. Urban voters voted blue. Rural voters went red. The cities in the south are as much specs of bluein a sea fo red as are the cities in the north. So the fact that former slave areas went red may show more the economic consequences of slavery, where urban centerss did not develop, more than it points to a geographic character flaw.
It’s worth noting that rural political movements of the past have sometimes been extremely progressive. If you want to reach out to your out-of-town neighbors, instead of acting as if they are flawed or stupid, perhaps it would be better to make the positions of their candidates more clear, so that it is more obvious when people are voting according to their own self-interest. How do we do this?
Sources: slavery and industrialization from class notes from Prof Noonan, Mills College, 1995. Industrialization and cottom from Noam Chomsky

If gender is socially constucted, then how can the catagory “woman” exist, and therefore, how can anyone claim to be feminist or speak for women if the whole catagory is in question?

I’ll get back to you kn this after the pay gap goes away, when congress is 51% woman, when the university faculty is 51% women and whent he works of women composers are taken seriously in their lifetimes and posthumously.
Did it cause a major need to papers, books and scholarship in ethnic studies departments when somebody realized that race was socially constructed, or was race always obviously socially constructed, what with it’s “one drop” rules and other contortions of reason?
Noam Chomksy says that if somebody is causing you trouble by agitating and you want them to go away, a good way to do it is to appoint them to things, give them tenure, get them in a system where they talk about stuff a lot and don’t take any action. Jane Alden (music professor at Wesleyan) notes that there is gonzo amounts of feminist scholarship, but that the pay gap is generally getting worse and the condition of women (or “women” for those of you who have just been awed by Judith Butler) is not improving. She hypothesizes that having so much scholarship is making people lazy and they think things must be ok since so many papers are going around. I think perhaps instead that activists are being drawn to scholarship. Out of the street and into the campus.
I want to write a piece where a narrator repeats “the woman question” a lot and then “what is the role of women?” “what is the role of ‘women’?”
Of course I think that theory is important! Wasn’t I just talking about Cixous a couple posts ago?

Thought has always worked through opposition,
Speaking/Writing
Parole/Écriture
High/Low
Through dual, heirarchical oppotiotions. Suprior/ Inferior. Myths, legends, books. Philosophical systems. Everywhere (where) ordering intervenes, where a law organizes what is thinkable by oppositions (dual, irreconcilable; or sublatable, dialectical). And all these pairs of oppositions are couples. Does that mean something? Is the fact that Logocentrism subjects throughout – all concepts, codes and values – to a binary systems, related to “the” couple, man/woman?

Ok, that paragraph has heavily influenced not only my thinking but my sense of self. Theory is totally important. But still, real-world problems persist. They’re getting worse. People who do not read theory, people who are anti-theory are busy smashing everything. And we’re not mounting an effective resistance. Why? Because they control mass media? Because the theory of progress makes us complacent? (There are laws against sex discrimination. They’re not perfectly enforced, but once they are, everything will be fine.)
I just went to a lecture about feminst theory and my head is spinning. Maybe I’ll go to the post-lecture discussion tomorrow morning. Or maybe I’ll continue deconstructing the Star Spangled Banner and finding it’s points of commonality with The International. Not opposition, of course. Male domination is what got us into this mess.

Philosophy is constructe on the premise of woman;s abasement. Subordination of the feminine to the masculine roder, which gives the appearance of being the condition for the macinery’s functioning.
Now it has become rather urgent to question this solidarity between logocentrism and phallocentrism – bringing to light the fate dealt to woman, her burial – to threaten the stability of the masculine structure that passed itself off as eternal-natural, by conjusring up from femininity the reflections and hypothesis that are necessarily runious for the strong-hold still in posession of authority, What would happen to logocentrism, to the great philosophical systems, to the order fo the world in general if the rock upon which they founded this church should crumble?
If some fine day, it suddenly came out that the logocentric plan had always, inadmissably, been to create a foundation for (to found and fund) phallocentrism, to garuntee the masculine order a rationale equal to history itself.

From “Sorties” in The Newly Born Woman, Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press. Trans Betsy Wang. Exerpted in The Hélène Cixous Reader, New York: Routledge. Ed. Susan Sellers p 38 – 40
Theory is useless. Music is useless. Except that art and thought and theory are how we understand ourselves and construct ourselves and how we think about things and how we see (or don’t see) problems. So really, it’s very very useful. but one must always be willing and ready to take to the streets, which must be done often. Eternal vigelence is the price of freedom.

I have a draft of my percussion and vocal pice. Except that it’s 100% glockenspiel. I have a vague idea of giving Anne (the vocalist) a text about how binary oppositions are a masculinist construct that imply comparison and otherness.
And how instead of trying to create an opposition, i’m trying to create a transformation.
However, Cixous, the french crit-theorist i want to cite is not out of copyright. Also, it could be problematic to deconstruct the piece in the peice. Although it would be very post-modern.

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