Instathoughts

Hi. I’ve been tossing around ideas to write about today. As you know, I’ve been trying to write daily to keep the creative juices flowing. To a certain degree, it worked. I’m writing more than ever and when I’m not, I’m jotting down ideas…snatches of thoughts to use later on. The problem is, it’s an embarrassment of riches. I’m writing so much, especially for the blog that I barely have time to piece together longer essays that I have been working on.

The thing is I feel I have a social contract with whomever reads this site to provide sharp and original commentary, not merely draft up some half-assed thoughts to go with some links I found. But before I go on, I do want to say that Tom Tomorrow (see the This Modern World link on the left) today had some great commentaries today, especially on the Green Party’s misjudged crusades in the upcoming election cycle, including the observation (by another writer) that the Greens completely missed the boat on corporate malfeasance, which Ralph Nader touched upon during his controversial 2000 presidential campaign. It’s obvious the Greens have not transformed into a formidable juggernaut after the 2000 race, most likely due to the stigma of what Democrats feel Nader and the Greens did to Gore’s chances for the White House (oh god, don’t get me started on that).

But there is a point to be had, from Tom’s blog’s point of view. The Greens appeared to just have sputtered out after 2000, only to rise to life now to cast a shadow in the 2002 election cycle, especially in Minnesota where Democratic Senator Wellstone is being targeted by the Greens. A laughable idea, since Wellstone is one of the most liberal politicians in the mainstream. Even Winona LaDuke, Nader’s V.P. choice, has stepped in and asked the Minnesota Greens to lower the banner of battle and leave Wellstone alone.

By missing the boat on corporate greed on Wall Street and running against Wellstone, the Greens are doing more to shoot themselves in the foot. The Green Party has no firm leadership, no strong infrastructure nationally, no rallying cry to share among the masses. After it became evident that the fix was in during the 2000 vote recount in Florida, Nader should have take to the airwaves and said, “Look, I may have been hard on him before, but Al Gore is the president of the United States. I say to all those who believe in democracy, to all those who worked on my campaign and to all those voted your conscience, let your voices be heard now. Let us join with the democrats, the party who won the White House, and let’s stop the GOP machinery in Florida. Go out. Protest. Call your elected officials. This is democracy’s most dire hour, and it needs you.”

And with that, Ralph Nader would have gone a long way to helping to build a third party and cemented himself as a man of public service, instead of someone who is the cause of bile in the stomachs of so many democrats I have met.

Know Your Rights

Ted Rall’s most recent column (you can click on the Ted Rall link on the left of the screen) is a brilliant analysis of the railroading of John Lindh, the so-called "American Taliban." In case you haven’t heard, Lindh has pleaded guilty to his charges of fighting for the Taliban and carrying hand grenades and could face 20 years in the pokey. Rall contends that Lindh caved in to the Feds, even though Lindh could have mounted a defense that had a good chance of having him walk out a free, but despised man. Face it, he’s fucked no matter what.

Maybe Lindh was thinking that at least he has a shot at freedom one day, unlike Jose Padilla, who was picked up for a role in what could kinda be called a bombing plot. As a result, Padilla (a U.S. citizen) is under lock and key, and will stay that way. No hearing, no trial, do not pass go, do not use your rights as a citizen.

Or maybe Lindh has visions of the judicial chaos that Zacarias Moussaoui is in the center of. Today, Moussaoui reversed his guilty pleas to defend his own life in a court case so strange that, if he were alive, Franz Kafka would be sought after to give insight on cable news shows. Moussaoui now has a trial date in what will be one hell of a legal proceeding, maybe the only one the U.S. will ever have in the war on terror. Maybe Lindh knew he’d be the target of showboating prosecutors and judges, eager to find the first O.J. Simpson of the 21st century. Maybe he understood that politicians looking for votes and pundits seeking ratings would use him like a rag doll until some deluded member of the public would pull a Jack Ruby as he was carted off to a Supermax facility.

Maybe he was scared. Lindh, after all, was captured, interrogated, shot, stripped naked, starved, possibly beaten by his captors and who knows what else. Maybe, while he lay naked in his cot under the scowling (and maybe abusive) production of U.S. military, this kid thought that something worse waited for him in America. Maybe he knew that the safest place for him would be jail. In his mind, maybe there was no way for him to eloquently defend his civil rights, so jail, a place of security and routine, would be the ideal location until this “war’ blows over. In time, maybe a couple decades, he’ll end up like some antiquated black militant that’s behind bars, a relic of a different time with no allies because the world has morphed into a different landscape until he becomes a man without a country, without a cause, without an identity.

French Word of the Day

Coup manqué (koo mah kay): a failed attempt

P.S. Salon.com is starting a blog service. I have a few thoughts on that, but it seems too disjointed to place here today. Tune in tomorrow.