Archive Page 2
For Bastille Day
“Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
These words, from “The New Colossus” by Emma Lazarus, are engraved on a tablet within the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor. They bespeak an idealism so far removed from the experience of contemporary immigrants to America, that one wonders if it might not be time for the country to forfeit Lady Liberty – perhaps send her back to France in pieces, on a boat.
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Survey of online habits
I’ve been tagged by Adrian (who was tagged by Sandrine) to answer a few questions about how I use the web, so here goes:
What site do you visit first thing in the morning (after your blog)?
Google reader, featuring feeds from Salon, Democracy Now!, International Herald Tribune, and BBC News.
Name a service that you recently discovered and like?
A blog whose design has impressed you?
This one. Most people go with templates offered by their blogging platform, and I’m presently into “Unsleepable”.
A widget that would really help out but which doesn’t exist yet?
A device that would display random scenes from the previous night’s dreams.
The last 2.0 book that you’ve read?
Everyware: The Dawning Age of Ubiquitous Computing. (Not quite 2.0, but close enough.)
An online service that you think will become indispensable?
I’ll look back rather then ahead and comment that Skype has become a regular tool of everyday communication (text, voice, and video) for my personal and professional life. The toughest part is getting timid technophobes to download the friggin’ software, but once they’re on, my how they’re on.
A service that should exist because it’s sorely needed?
A quick way to locate officials whose decisions have a real impact on any given issue. As Slavoj Zizek advises in a recent issue of Harper’s, commenting on the most effective forms of resistance: “The thing to do is to bombard those in power with strategically well-selected, precise, finite demands, which can’t be met with the same excuse [inaction]“.
A blogger or net-entrepreneur whose work you admire?
Noel Hidalgo is an engaging young man who has toured the world exploring the meaning of interconnectedness and freedom in the digital age. I had the good fortune to cross paths with him at Lift 08 in Geneva.
Filed under: communications, friends | 2 Comments
Dead on the Fourth of July
Today saw the passing of former US senator Jesse Helms, right wing supporter of death squads in El Salvador, opponent of federal spending on AIDS research, bosom buddy to big tobacco, enemy to the arts, and recalcitrant southern racist. In varied dark and twisted ways, Helms incarnated the worst, most inbred aspects of American culture. Narrow minded, petty, unshakably ideological, he and Cardinal Ratzinger (the present day pope) were the chief bogeymen of my college days. The dead one for his many sins of commission, the other for his clueless stance on liberation theology in Central America, and his unconscionable hostility to clergy who were laying their lives on the line to defend the very souls being snuffed by Jesse’s buds in San Salvador. Two sides of the same coin? You decide. As for me, I know there’s one grave in North Carolina that deserves some serious foot stomping tonight…
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Tags: Helms
Gangs of America
I just finished reading an excellent treatise on the origins and rise of corporate power in the United States. Gangs of America is expertly written by Ted Nace, a successful entrepreneur and community organizer. Perhaps the most shocking discovery for me was the Supreme Court’s dismal record at defending the interests of citizens against the encroaching influence of big business. By virtue of the long view afforded by Nace’s entertaining history, his canary-in-the-coal-mine warnings like the one quoted here (the links are mine) assume a particular urgency:
Authoritarianism may arrive precipitously; it may also be the result of a more gradual process, where democracy dies a “death of a thousand cuts.” After studying a cross section of seven societies during fascist episodes, social scientist Laurence Britt published a list of common symptoms:
- nationalism
- disdain for human rights
- use of enemies or scapegoats as a unifying cause
- militarism
- rampant sexism
- controlled mass media
- obsession with national security
- close ties between ruling elites and predominant religion
- protection of corporate power
- suppression of organized labor
- disdain for intellectuals and the arts
- obsession with crime and punishment
- cronyism and corruption
- fraudulent elections
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Tags: america, corporation, fascism, justice
Salon has just published one of the best attempts I’ve read yet to penetrate the thick fog of moral obsfucation surrounding the Iraq occupation and call the devil by its true name. From the article, by Chris Hedges:
Prophets are not those who speak of piety and duty from pulpits — few people in pulpits have much worth listening to — but are the battered wrecks of men and women who return from Iraq and speak the halting words we do not want to hear, words that we must listen to and heed to know ourselves. They tell us war is a soulless void. They have seen and tasted how war plunges us into perversion, trauma and an unchecked orgy of death. And it is their testimonies that have the redemptive power to save us from ourselves.
Filed under: america, international affairs, war | Leave a Comment
Tags: war truth
The End of Bad Government?
All eyes are on Texas tonight for the latest chapter in a remarkable campaign season. Barack Obama has gone from relative obscurity to capturing the imagination of Americans across the political spectrum. Listening to his late night address to supporters in San Antonio, I marveled at the salutary impact he’s had on a body politic so withered by 8 years of bad government as to be considered terminal.
Is it possible that America needed to reach the dead end of the Bush era to rise again to something approximating a real democracy? “The world is watching,” says candidate Obama. Indeed it is, and wondering if a country that has dedicated itself to destroying the dream for a better world is capable of so radical a shift.
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Sterling note
Bruce Sterling, the noted futurist and “Dostoevsky of Cyberpunk”, appeared at Lift 08 in Geneva, where he delivered an exhaustive exploration of 4 possible scenarios for French President Nocholas Sarkozy and his glamorous new pop star wife Carla Bruni. His message was simple and timeless: Be Here Now, forget about celeb matchmaking and boring tech news stories like Microsoft’s eating Yahoo. Always worth hearing.
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On the heels of last month’s visit to the otherwordly Selexyz bookshop in Maastricht, I had the good fortune to spend a night in the Kruisherenhotel Maastricht, a renovated 15th century monastery. The reception and dining areas are in what used to be towering Gothic church, which now also houses a library, boutique, and very chic bar. It’s a stunning place to stay – each room in what was formerly the monks’ quarters has been individually decorated by Henk Vos of Maupertuus, a trendy Dutch design outfit. Hats off, gentlemen.
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Everyday interviews
Videojournalist Jenifer Crandall’s OnBeing series consists of weekly interviews with everyday people who you might ride next to on the train or buy your coffee from. Except they’re not ordinary at all.
Filed under: communications | Leave a Comment
