Arbeit Macht Frei

Yep, work brings freedom.

There are lots of businesses with "Freedom" in their name these days. Just today I recycled a phone book put out by a firm called "Freedom Publications." Just up the road there are two car dealerships called Freedom whatever. Yahoo yellow pages lists several more of these patriotic establishments. I'm fairly confident that none of them are owned by people who think Dark Lord Cheney and his cabal's adventures in invasion, torture, and wealth transfer is a bad idea.

Then again, I've been doing Anne Frank research, and there are too many parallels for a thinking person not to get nervous.

Since they've co-opted family, I'm going tribal.

First they stole the word "life" (Pro-Life, Culture of Life, etc.) to mask their efforts to limit women's reproductive rights and control people through the end of their lives as well, and now they've laid claim to the word "family." My favorite definition of family is "a circle of people who love you." The folks behind this latest insidious plot to Redeem America have appropriated this perfectly serviceable noun and made it mean "that which is opposed to 'the homosexual agenda', any abortion, same-sex marriage, non-religious science education, and anything else that might offend the church ladies."

The American Family Association
Focus on the Family
Family Research Council
and
FamilyLife.com, a family ministry of Campus Crusade for Christ

It's like heaven: if these are the people who are going to be there, I'll pass. If they're the ones defining family, I'll call my circle a tribe.

Pity the Persecuted Majority

It is bad enough that white Christian Republicans control the government and much of business and media in America, but claiming that "conservatives" (a code for this brand of theo-fascism) are unfairly treated is unseemly. The fact that thinkers outnumber believers at many schools where thinking is permitted, and that the Wonderland logic that governs much of "conservative" dogma is discounted or ridiculed results in outcries claiming that they are persecuted on campus. The irony is that thoughtful, intelligent, truly compassionate, inclusive thought and action are decried as liberal idiocy by this gang of fools. Their ideological lock-step is way too close to a goose-step.

I'm Sure We're Not the Good Guys Anymore

From the BBC:

"An Australian TV channel has broadcast previously unpublished images showing apparent US abuse of prisoners in Iraq's Abu Ghraib jail in 2003."

"US defence department spokesman Bryan Whitman said the images 'could only further inflame and possibly incite unnecessary violence in the world'."

"He said: '[The images] would endanger our military men and women.'"

Starting this whole business, engendering a culture in which this sort of thing is possible, and actually doing it is the source of the danger.

It's not the images themselves, no matter how often you say it, that gets us in trouble. It's the dark forces at the top, and everything that emanates from that evil that makes this possible.

If the precedent holds, I'm for this one...

The fool in the White House today was once a Texas Governor. If Kinky can get elected, maybe someday...

I'm Not Sure We're the Good Guys Anymore

Maybe it's because I recently watched Schindler's List and have been thinking of directing The Diary of Anne Frank, but I'm finding it way too easy to see parallels between those times and our times.

What about the soldiers who didn't speak up and say, "This is not OK. I can't do what you're telling me we have to do to these people." What about the contractors who deliver shoddy goods (or nothing at all) because all that matters is making sure the right people get taken care of properly.

It's not that the other folk are any better, but it's fairly disingenuous to declare, as is so often done, that the gang in charge are wearing white hats, and civil liberties must be sacrificed in the name of Freedom and the bad guys hate us because of our Freedom and illegal actions are justified in the name of Freedom.

The whole business reeks, and it's not just because I'm not on the receiving end of the Wealth Transfer Program that drives the Republican Party.

qui ascendit sine labore descendit sine honore

"Who goes up without working for it, comes down without honor."

And I hope they come down so hard they bounce.