Les said, the better II

is the question in an election “who do you think is the best candidate” or “who do you want to win?”

– danica

Sometimes the question is “who do you want to lose”. In life, we are not presented with Platonic forms. We have our core ideals, but we must weigh circumstances to figure out the best way to express those principles. Everything in life depends on circumstance. Which is to say the politics make strange bedfellows. Some of the people most active in trying to stop military atrocities in the third world are highly conservative Christians. Sometimes, the goal of stopping mass murder is great enough that that other goals must be temporarily put aside to achieve that goal. If you can have one piece of what you want and not the rest or you can have nothing at all, it’s sometimes better to go for the piece. If it’s a worthy goal. If it’s achievable. Because if you don’t do what you can to stop mass murder done in your name, then you are a party to that mass murder. If you have a clear choice, If you can win a small victory, then the morally correct thing to do is to go for the small victory.
This is not the year for a symbolic vote. Voting for Nader (or whomever) is the moral equivalent of staying home, but somehow compounded by caring enough to show up and be aware of the issues, but not caring enough to actually act on them. It is to act as a passive observer to mass murder. You could have acted, but you chose not to. There are sins of comission, which are things that you do. And sins of omission which are thigns you should have done. Both are sins.
Vote Kerry or risk an afterlife spent in eternal torment.

The most important election of your lifetime is taking place tomorrow. Polling Hours and a link to locations.

Now look, I want to give you my thinking on third parties. I voted for Nader last time and I’m registered Green. Nader said there was no difference between Bush and Gore. It seems this was probably incorrect (but of course, we can’t really know). According to the rhetoric Bush and Gore both used, that was a prediction that looked right. Also, Clinton was hardly a progressive. And to build a strong third-party movement, you have to vote third party. The democrats are right wing and the republicans are super-right wing. People say greens will split the left vote, but I think that the republicrats will split the right vote.
some have accused Nader of lying, for his incorrect prediction. If you make a mistake, that’s not the same as a lie. However, he was lying in pretending to be a part of the Green party. The previous election, he didn’t even campaign. In 2000, he did campaign and did so well, but I think he was registered Green. In this election, he’s left the Greens hanging and run his own meglomanic, republican-backed campaign. He is not doing anything for third party or even progressive politics, but instead is acting as some sort of leech. He’s done so much good for this country and this seems like a new direction for him. I think it’s clear he’s lost his marbles. Which of course, explains the republican support. If he was so senile he didn’t know what year it was, they would just go ahead and run him on a republican ticket.
Getting back on track, Nader did not lose al Gore the election in 2000. Massive dirty tricks and election stealing cost Gore the election. Plus his inability to run a winning campaign. He should have won, but was not compelling and then sat by and didn’t do anything while bussed-in repbulican mobs disrupted the re-count. He let the vote get stolen, as did all the white democratic senators who would not co-sponsor a house bill to question the election result. White democrats, like Gore, were perfectly happy to watch thousands of African American voters be disenfranchized.
That wing is out of power in the dem party (I hope), but the dirty tircks will occur anyway. The reason Bush was able to get away with it because the vote was close. Not only was the electoral vote close and the race in florida was close, but the popular vote was close. If Gore had won a clear majority of the popular vote, Bush would have been at a disadvantage. That is why there are no safe states this year. Every state is a swing state.. They can only steal the election if it’s close. If Kerry is the clear winner of the popular vote, this will change how things happen with post-election shenangians.
Nader is running a real campaign, but he’s out of his mind. He’s taking Republican money and colluding with dishonest Republican signature-gathering firms including the one in Nevada that shredded democratic registrations. The Greens and other left parties are not running a campaign. Cobb is telling people in swing states not to vote for him. The Greens are in a tough spot because after this crisis passes, they want to build a strong third party, but in the meantime, they have to work with moderates and center-right folks to get Kerry, the guy with the best chance of unseating Bush, into power. Then Green party’s spot on this year’s ballot is a placeholder for their spot on next year’s ballot. The same is true of every left party. They don’t want your votes. They want Bush out. Then come talk to them.
You have to vote your conscience, but sometimes ideological purity must be sacrificed for realpolitik. Bush must go. Vote Kerry. Then protest him up one side and down the other. If Bush stays in power, he will lead us into more wars and probably also bankrupt the country which will be personally economically disasterous for every american, ideologically pure or not. Vote for Kerry or vote for re-instating the draft and economic depression. Your call.

Berkeley Measure Q. Yes or no? I live in District 2. (well, sometimes.) I’m naive. I always wondered why there were so many condoms on the streets. Who was leaving them there? I mean, it’s not like the sidewlks are carpetted, but I’d have to be alert to keep xena from getting in to them. And chicken bones. How do so many chicken bones get on to the street? Am I naive again? What about the creepy men in the berkeley aquatic park? Are they looking for drugs or female prostituttes or male prostitutes or each other? That park is creepy in the middle of the day.

The green party says vote yes. But Barbara Lee is remaining quiet on the issue. The city council memeber endorsed by Lee, Darryl Moore, is against Q. The NOW said 30 years ago it favored decriminalization.
Casaninja 1 had prostitutes in the front yard on weekends. Rich folks would come down from the hills and come into my neighborhood to buy cars, drugs and sex. My house got broken into more than once. I lost stuff. I don’t think that I want prostitutes hanging out in front of any house that I’m in. As far as I know (I’m still naive), I’ve never seen anyone working outside of my Berkleey place. What about a ballot measure to enforce anti-prostitution laws only within 500 feet of a residence or a park? Then, theoretically, creepy guys would leave the park and the condoms would (as they are now) stay confined to in front of warehouses. And what about child prostitution? I mean, consenting adults are one thing, but shouldn’t kids get swept up into the system? In short, mix a desire for equal rights for women and workers with some NIMBYism and a what-about-the-children plea. Oh and a concern about property values, which I hate when I hear people say that, but I’m about to make a major transaction and I don’t want my place to fall from its current value. It can stay put forever, but not down. That would make me sad.
Danica didn’t vote on this, so I can’t consult her blog. Arg. What to think?
Say something soon, I’m going to priority mail my ballot tomrrow. I thought it was a postmark deadline, but it’s a reciept deadline. bleah!
[update: i voted yes for every single non-state ballot measure aside from Q, which i dunno about. i’m feeling very affirmative today. bart! sure! parks! ok!. Danica voted no on CC, but Barbara Lee signed the argument in favor of CC . . . Vote against the patriot act, get loyalty from me. . . ]
[update again – what about state props 60a, 61, 65, 67 & 71? state initiatives are not as fun as berkeley measures.]

I’m feeling much better today. Which is good, because I’m in the midst of a disasterous server move. I managed to knock Tiffany’s blog offline. (If you’re looking for it, it’s back up at http://rc.bx9.net/~tiffany/blog.html and hopefully will get a www in the front of it soon.) I even managed to knock down christi’s email for several days and she’s not even on the ded server. Bah.

So anything you have for me at xkey.com is no more. I don’t have an email address there. I don’t have a photolibrary there. I don’t have anything, cuz the domain got killed. If you used to email me at celesteh@xkey.com, email me instead with the same username at gmail.com. If you are looking for my web presence, aside from this blog, it is now at celesteh.com. My photo library is at celesteh.com/pics. My XML feed for pictures is now at celesteh.com/pics/atom.xml. so the silver lining is that i finally got my super-vanity domain off the ground. But I don’t get email there yet, so don’t email me there.
I registered the domain gardenofmemory.com at dankon.com because it’s the cheepest place to register domains. Network solutions is pricey. However, gardenofmemory now has the wrong DNS servers listed. and the email address I used to register it was at xkey. So I can’t log in. Fortunately, the service is owned by my Esperanto teacher, Ed. In case you’re wondering, “Mi estas en la mezo de la servilatranslogxo de Diablejo” means (i hope) I am in the middle of the server move from hell. I think this is the first time I’ve written a plea for tech support in Esperanto.
I own eguilt.com. Ironically, I sometimes feel bad for not doing anything with it. do you own a silly domain name? Maybe we can trade. Also, I’ve got gmail invites. Get ’em while they’re not nearly as hot as they were.

yes

forgiveness is knowing that even as somebody was driving you crazy, she’d have given her right lung for you in an instant if you needed it.

You can only do the stressed, busy, i’m-not-think-about-that-Ican’t-hear-you-la-la-la-la thing for so long and then you have to stop or be stopped. Being sick and in bed all day has given me ample time to think about my Mom whether /i want to or not. Being sick isn’t all bad. I didn’t have to wash the dishes. I get to sleep a lot. And when I start to feel fuzzy-headed and confused, i keep thinking it’s almost Christmas and I’m going to grandma’s house.

Then I think of the sermon I heard last xmas at the Neuman Center in Berkeley, where the preist read an essay from a newsletter for a group for divorced Catholics where one woman was talking about her first Christmas after being divorced. I did not want to hear it
I’m not going to grandma’s for Christmas. For the past few years, more than a quarter of my life, I’ve had two invitations for every holiday. this Thanksgiving, I’ve got zero. Before it seemed like maybe there was too much love. My mom really wanted me at every holiday and would lay on some pressure. I’m confused, will it be second or third without her?
maybe i should go get a tofurkey. they’re not bad. . . or,no, they’re terrible. i had xmas with all the families one year. so many people. it was all vegan. tofurkey was not a hit. but the stuffing was. it had 11 sticks of margarine in it. oh the transfats. i shortened everyone’s lives. now they’re all dead. no, it’s the people who went to grandma’s house who are dead: mom, grandma F, grandma H, larry, seymore, tom, catherine, cyril, bobby, ernie. it’s like ghosts hovering over us in a ghost house (it’s gone too). there’s only a few survivors and that artificial tree my grandma used every year is my dad’s garage, maybe with those ornaments still on it and the rug it sat in is in brother bob’s living room.
it’s the ghost of xmas past! it’s only october, but it’s so cold already.
forgiveness is not forgetting. i can think about things my mom did that made me angry and how they have chnaged me and that’s ok to think about. I think more often of my grandma’s house then i think of my grandma. how can a place be gone when i can see it so clearly in my mind? I tried to memorize every detail, like a solemn duty, after she died. a death i maybe caused. i don’t know. how is it possible? i felt guilt, tho. what should i memorize about my mom? what should i rememeber? what should i forget?
One year, when I was in junior high, we got in a terrible argument in the car. it was always in the car, becuase neither of us could walk away from each other and i was in puberty and she was in menopause and hadn’t started on hormones yet. and we got in a terrible argument and it was almost christmas and all my christmas presents were in the trunk and she drove me to the mall and made me return them.
it’s only october. why do i keep thinking about christmas?

The reality is people will pay whatever we charge them. There’s no end to what people will pay. In fact, the more you charge, the more they like it. People look around and say, “If they charge a lot, it must be good”

– Wesleyan Vice President of Finance and Aministration Marcia Bromberg on tutuion, New York Times, Spet. 26, 2004, by way of handbill I picked up at homecoming

Apparently the current undergrad tuition is $39k per YEAR. So there’s really no question as to which “people” will pay to no end. It’s not a school for the middle classes. So what’s the purpose of chasing away the middle class? Well, the endowment grows, which, um allows the school to buy more stuff and pay more for graduate stipends and hold on to valuable graduate housing like India House. But they’re not spending it on grads. And they’re not spending it on undergrads either. They’re increasing their endowment. A large endowment increases the prestige of the school and allows them to attract more prestigius trustees, a student explained to me. Then she said that the two newest trustees were from Colt weapons and Bechtel. If they make the school out of reach to all but the elite, they will be able to attract arms manufacturers and war profiteers. woot.
But something very strange is going on at Wesleyan. It used to be a boys school. There are a lot of boys around. I feel like, culturally, male issues are more evident, although maybe that’s just a mirror of the larger society or maybe it’s because I have more experience with undergrad women from my own undergrad days. In any case, the school colors are red and black, but instead of red, it really ought to be pink. Many, many of the boys here really like pink. I’m not saying that most of them are gay. I’m saying most of them like pink. They are radically deconstructing gender. What it means to be a boy at Wesleyan is different than what it means to be a boy in most other places. It does stick with them when they leave. The environment here molds their personalities and their thinking and they are embracing a radically different view of masculinity.
So the upper class is sending their progeny off to an exceedingly epensive school where their sons are deconstructing gender, wearing pink, wearing dresses, expressing masculinity through sincerity and sensitivity and striving towards a non-gendered or multi-gendered ideal.
What does this mean?
I recorded a concert today, which was almost a church service. A bunch of people singing hymns while a pastor talked about them. They were all protestant, some written by Wesley’s brother (the school was named for Wesley), so I only recognized a couple of them. There was also organ music. The very first hymn that the choirs and everyone in attendance (except me – I was running the tape recorder) sang was “Lift Every Voice and Sing”, the hymn of the NAACP since the 1920’s. It was sung boldly and with great heart. The people there were proud to be singing it. I leaned way over the balcony to get a good view of the choir and the congregation. There was not one person in the entire building who appeared to be African American that I could see.
There are black students at Wesleyan, but not many. And there are black professors. Anthony Braxton and a few others. I didn’t see any of them at the hymnody concert.
There are black people in the community. Public safety just put out an APB for a tall black male. Somebody saw him in the Rehersal Hall around the time there were a bunch of thefts. I accidentally set off an alarm today in that building, but the public safety officer who came by saw me walking off and didn’t stop me. Cuz I didn’t match the APB? Cuz I turned off the alarm and nothing was actually stolen? A lot of the public safety announcements mention african americans. The public safety guy who spoke at my orientation last year talked a lot about the local criminal element. The large fight down the street from my house last august involved mostly african american teens.
I sense that something is going on when an entirely non-black population proudly sings “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” but it’s relationship with the black folks living next door mostly involves thefts and fights.
This school has some very complex dynamics to deconstruct. What does it all mean?

and on a personal note

I’ve been recording concerts and playing in concerts and tuba practicing and music listening and thesis writing and getting hassled by the local criminal element and pot luck attending and movie watching and blogging all in the last week but mostly trying like hell not to think about my mom.
current mood: stressed

So I was just walking home with my lap tuba in it’s backpack case, loaded down, tired, etc. Some local teen boys were walking down the street, doing a “cool” walk, I guess to impress each other or I dunno who, it’s not like they had an audience.

Me: Hey
Them: Hey
pause
Them: Are you a man?
Me: Fuck off
Them: What’s that thing he/she is carrying? It’s carrying?
a small rock thumps off my tuba
Me: (Turning, making eye contact) You kids better knock it the fuck off, ok
The back off a little bit
One of them: (in sing song) You kids better knock it the fuck off, ok
Me: (deadly glare, reaching towards pocket unconsciously)
Them: (actually alarmed) She’s got a gun! It’s got a gun! (then, from a distance as i go into my house: more sing songing, etc)

I need a better way to handle this. I’ve been getting gender harassment as long as I can remember and I’ve never learned how to diffuse the situation. There was four of them and only one of me and I was carrying my tuba, which is dear to me and quite heavy. Wesleyan kids get periodically fagbashed, and my dressing in Wesleyan colors (for pep band) clearly marked me as a student. Normally, I look more like just a regular person, although, you know, carrying a tuba.
I’m going to start carrying my knife again. This town is so fucked up. Those kids have reason to hate the University. I don’t want to be in the middle of it.
So, I’m thinking that I should not swear at them or show anger when my gender is questioned. And although my tone of voice was strong, there should have been no “ok” at the end of my “knock it off.” I need to present some sort of credible deterrent or threat. I don’t know their parents, so anything on that front is not credible. Also, I dunno if they really thought I had a gun or not, but it’s not necessarily in my best interest to weild a fake threat. If you’re going to have a weapon as a deterrent, you need to be prepared to use it. You don’t pull a gun, if you’re not willing to shoot. I don’t even have one.
I need to walk to the library. I don’t want to walk to the library. I want to move to a place where I can walk around without people calling me “it.”

Let’s look at the factors: the economy sucks. Many folks don’t have extra money to throw at good causes. Those who do are freaked out by the election. This election is the most expensive ever. Four billion dollars, more than a quarter of that spent in the presidential campiagn. So donations to non-profits are down. This means that many worthy organizations, like say, in the arts are in trouble.

The arts are important. Feeding hungry people, saving the rainforest and a bunch fo other causes are importnat too, maybe more important. But we as a people need a culture. We need music. We need the arts. Fudning the arts is vital to us as a cosiety. And arts funding has been slashed by government. California is not finding the arts right now.
what this means is that worthy organizations like Other Minds are having a massive cash shortage. Other Minds, which I am on the board of, has had to take out an amergency loan. Cash flow is going to recover late in the year, but in the mean time, they need some help.
Giving money to chartiable organizations is tax deductable. This means that if you’re paying income taxes, the money you give to, say, Other Minds, counts towrds your taxes, so you get money back after you file your taxes. You’re going to pay the tax money anyway, but if you give it to a non-profit, you get to decide how your tax money gets spent. Instead of spending it on bombs, no bid contracts for Haliburton and corporate give-aways, you can send your tax money to the arts.
If you want to donate, there is a secure, on-line form that you can use. This money is tax deductable and they will send you a reciept. You can just give a little if you can give a little. If you don’t have money to give away, but have a budget to buy stuff, you can also order a CD. I’m fond of Antheil Plays Antheil which features a recording of “Ballet Mechanique” and I also dig Amy X Neuburg’s new record Residue.
If you do decide to donate, you can get free stuff (this makes your gift less deductible) and a good feeling of smugness. Even if you don’t give money, you can get free stuff from Other Minds, like their on line radio station.
I’m listening to the American Maveriks PBS series on the web right now. And one thing they’re talking about is forging an American musical identity. Are we different from Europe or should we (musically) just follow where Europe goes? Is an American music a worthwhile goal? I think it is. I think it’s one real strength of the US. It’s something to be patriotic about. All of these issues of creating an American Music are doubly so for California Composers. New Yorkers whine about being the in the shadow of Europe. California is culturally dominated by New York and by Europe. Our composers are not taken seriously. If we’re so great, why aren’t we in New York? Then New Yorkers want to know, and then, if we’re so great, why aren’t we in Europe? Certain composers, like Aaron Copland have created an American Music and hae helped fight this tendency. These composers, like John Cage, Lou Harrison, etc had the help of organizations designed to promote their music. Other Minds is one such organization. Other Minds helps define an American Music and also a West Coast Music. Unbeleivably, many east coasters still diss Lou Harrison for beign too tonal and too Californian and unorthodox. For serious. We need Other Minds to combat this. Other Minds raises the prestige of West Coast Music and of American Music. If you think there’s something to love about art music in the Us or in California, then there’s something to love about Other Minds.

Coulter pied. heh heh heh.

I’ve decided my piece about her should be titled “Coulter Shock”

UPDATE!!

Ann Coulter Pie Video [ifilm]