I've changed my mind...

I've had a lot of chances to think recently and one thing I noticed is how there is a stigma against changing one's mind. As a philosophical person, I always try to see every side of the argument, even the sides that seem crazy or far-fetched. In politics, the idea that a politician could change his mind is actually used as an attack on their competence as a public official. During the 2004 Presidential campaign, John Kerry was repeatedly called "flip-flopper" because he had voted one way before, but later changed his stance and voted in the other direction later. This is actually being used in current elections throughout the country. Candidates are attacking incumbents who voted for the war in the first place but who now oppose it by calling them "flip-floppers". The sad thing to me is that this is saying that our government can't change a stance on something for fear of being seen as weak-willed.


I'm a flip-flopper. I actually think about things and analyze the results of my decisions, and sometimes realize that I've made a mistake in my choices. I don't try to cover up my mistakes or deny myself the opportunity to improve on that mistake. Hell, I used to consider myself a Republican and supported Bush over Clinton (when I was too young to vote) and had strong feelings AGAINST legalized abortion. But as I learned more about the world around myself through experience and education, I found my opinions shifting left. I knew a few girls who had abortions before turning 18 and thought about what the cost/benefit of bringing a child into that situation. If she had given birth to the child, it would have been raised to an unwed teenage girl with alcohol and drug problems. That made me consider that there are many situations where an abortion is justified. So I changed my mind.


To me, changing one's mind is a sign of intelligence. Everyone is able to formulate an opinion, but it takes an open mind to change that opinion. I also believe being open minded is a sign of intelligence. Having an open mind doesn't just mean that one is open to suggestion, but is also able to take in new and alternate methods when thinking about or discussing something. Unfortunately, our government doesn't believe this. They think the opposite way. If one sticks to their convictions, they have "strong opinions" which makes it sound like a good thing to go down with a sinking ship. Instead of letting that ship sink with me at the helm, I'd much rather figure out a way to right the ship, even if it means damage to the hull or losing some of the cargo.


The Republican party is taking this stance. Why else would we step in and impede on social progress taking place in Mexico because it conflicts with our failed drug policies. Instead of taking a serious look at how damaging the war on drugs has been to this nation and many others, we continue to force it upon cities, counties, states and nations that are doing everything in their power to change things up. If nothing else, we should learn from our past that our first instinct isn't always the right one. It's like saying that slavery should remain because it's already going on, or that women shouldn't be allowed to vote because only men voted in the past.


Time brings progress, and it's only stopped consciously. We saw this happen en masse during the "dark ages" of Europe when the Middle East was advancing in culture and education. Then they switched roles and the Middle East went religious and stopped progressing and began regressing while Europe was enjoying rebirth (rennaissance literally means "rebirth). It's happened in every empire in history, a period of expansion, a time of dominance, and then the contraction. During the contractions of Rome, Greece and the Holy Roman Empire the people grew complacent with their position of power and allowed others to overtake or weaken them. I see our closed-mindedness as a sign of our impending downfall. After all, it's only a matter of time before all of our bad decisions catch up to us.

Iraq's My Lai

http://www.lies.com/wp/2003/10/20/us-deaths-in-vietnam-and-iraq-by-month/
http://slate.msn.com/id/2111432/
The above pages have some graphs and information that will help clear up some of the claims I am making.


For a couple of years I have been drawing comparisons between the Iraq and Vietnam "wars". As we are able to look back on the early days of the war now, we are given a better perspective than we've ever had on this highly flawed war. Like with Vietnam, we began this war under the pretenses of stoping a global threat (WMDs and connections to Terrorism), the Vietnam war was started under the idea that we were stepping to stop the "red tide" of Communism encompassing the globe. But as the war progressed it became clear that there were a lot of other hidden reasons for why we sent so many of our youth to die in a nation that most of them wouldn't be able to find on a globe. Recently the news broke that some American Marines were responsible for the massacre of 24 innocent Iraqis including women and children. Unfortunately that news broke about 6 months after the event took place, and there has been a coverup undertaken to keep another scandal from surfacing.


My Lai is synonymous with the American sadism in Vietnam. The Marines didn't think of the Vietnamese civilians as people and hunted them like ducks. Now I know for a fact that there are officers in Iraq serving for the marines who look at the trip to Iraq as a hunting trip. There were these two marines (who were of Jewish heritage, I might add) that I was in Navy with in college and they always acted as if I was friends with them. Because of our "friendship" they used to say things to me that would just drop my jaw. Right after 9-11, we (those of us in NROTC at Tulane) all knew that we would be sent out to the Middle East at some point. But these two kids were hardly worried about it, they actually were excited for the chance that they might get to go. As one of them said to me "I can't wait to get out to Iraq so I can kill me some fucking ragheads"...never mind the fact that "ragheads" are actually more common in India and Pakistan than in Iraq. But that clearly showed that he, as a Marine officer to be, had views that could easily lead to an event such as the one in Haditha.


The thing I noticed in my time in the military was that being psychotic is actually a virtue in the Marines. Of the guys who were the craziest in ROTC, all of them were Marines or ended up getting kicked out of the military altogether because they couldn't follow orders. Marines in general are aggressive, domineering and shoot-first, which goes hand-in-hand with the kinds of massacres they've been responsible for in Vietnam and Iraq. Think that My Lai was the only one of those incidents in Vietnam? Think Haditha is the only one in Iraq? Unfortunately they will always happen as long as we allow our military to have the attitude it has. Marines are "killing machines", not "peace machines"...so why does it surprise us when a bunch of testosterone-laden, violent men (most of whom are also sexually frustrated thanks to being stuck at war in a country without the kind of sex trade that was in Asia or Europe) are committing these atrocities? I was actually surprised that this was the first story to break with such an incident. I figured after Abu-Ghraib there would be a story like Haditha coming out within weeks, but it took years.


Maybe the problem is that we give the kids the guns and stick the men behind a desk. I certainly don't trust a college freshman with a bottle of Jack, let alone a .50 caliber assault rifle. And keep in mind that MOST of these kids with the guns over there weren't college material or else they'd be on scholarship to a ROTC program somewhere. So we're placing our reputation in the hands of violent, testosterone-laden, horny, uneducated young men. Maybe we should make it a rule that only those who pass psychological exams and two years of combat duty can carry live rounds.


So this war is becoming more and more similar to Vietnam, yet we continue to make the same mistakes. Watch our next move to see what the future holds. If we increase troop levels any time soon, we will be seeing this war become a decade-long struggle between two rival factions. No matter what, we will see this prolonged struggle produce more and more incidents like Haditha. After all, as long as we're fighting a hidden enemy in a nation full of people different from us, we will continue to see Marines taking out aggression with trigger-happy fingers. But at least Saddam isn't killing Americans anymore...oh wait...he never really did.

The only logical solution to the Steroid Problem

With all the ongoing steroid debate, there have been many suggestions as to how it can be solved. Some have campaigned for longer suspensions, harsher fines and even expulsion from baseball altogether. But how effective will those punishments be? We've learned from the prohibitions on Alcohol and marijuana (among others) that making a drug illegal doesn't make it go away. Marijuana is illegal in the NFL and has been since Ricky Williams entered the league, but he keeps lighting up and getting suspended. So making roids illegal doesn't change anything. It only puts them in the hands of those willing to break the rules and gives the cheaters a huge advantage over the rest of the competition. So what I propose is that instead of making steroids against the rules in the Majors, they should make them MANDATORY.


Think about it, if they were mandatory, they wouldn't be an advantage. It would make it a lot harder to cheat in that manner and the players would have to start cheating the old-fashioned way: trick pitches, stealing signs, spiking shortstops...and it would end this stupid debate over steroids as an added bonus. It's not like the older generations didn't have their ways around the rules of fair competition. On a recent episode of the great HBO series CostasNOW there were some interviews with former players who all said that they would take steroids if it was prevalent in the game in their era. Mike Schmidt said there was no question that he would do them, and Willie Mays was on speed for parts of his career; I say this because he admitted that he was willing to try anything that would give him a leg up if other guys were doing it, and we all know how prevalent "greenies" were in his era. So if we're chastizing Bonds for cheating, we should chastize his godfather too, since he surely was on speed for at least one of his games.


Athletes are competitors, and when they see their peers with some magic pill, cream or juice, they wont let that advantage tip the scales away from them. It's not always performance enhancing drugs too, Bill "Spaceman" Lee once pitched a no-hitter while tripping on LSD. Drugs and cheating are part of human nature, and this is not the first generation to be guilty of either. It's just the first generation to have the resources of genetic engineering available to help their cheating. Basically, this problem will never go away because there will always be a BALCO working to develop the next "Clear" or "Cream" and the Barry Bonds/Jason Giambi types will prosper at the expense of the guys without the same superstar talent. Making them mandatory would eliminate the whining from players who aren't willing to take them. If you don't want to take roids to be in the MLB, move to Japan and play out there. Ask any ballplayer who can't reach that upper echelon if they'd be willing to take roids if it meant they'd be a major leaguer with a minimum of $300,000 a year. You won't hear too many say no. And baseball players are notorious for being druggies anyway, so for most it'd be a welcome change from Oxycontin or Meth.


But why do we really care anyway? I love sports, but as I have gotten older, I have become less of a fantatical fan, though I am still a participant. I play baseball and basketball every week, but I generally only watch the final few minutes of NBA games that aren't being played by the Warriors. Baseball I can watch as long as it's not a blowout and is a well played game. I used to love watching NFL games on TV, but I've just grown bored of the shift from blue-collar guys who leave everything on the field to the superstars of today. We have these 20 year old kids who are basically illiterate, yet they make more money on one day (draft day...well the day they end their holdout) than most Ivy Leaguers make in a career. And what about teachers? Alex Smith got $50,000,000 to spend a season losing and throwing interceptions. I think that the priorities have gone seriously out of whack in the past couple of decades. Go back to 1991 and the highest paid Major Leaguer was a cokehead named Darryl Strawberry (also a famed guest-star on the Simpsons around that year in one of the all time classic episodes) who was making a whole $3,800,000 a year. I'd take 1/100 of that to play baseball 162 games a year. But now (2005, actually), the AVERAGE salary is 2,632,655 and the MINIMUM is 316,000. Just 15 years earlier the AVERAGE was $578,930 and the MINIMUM was $100,000. Wouldn't those numbers be enough today?


Baseball is continuing to shoot itself in the foot. The strike in 1994-5 almost killed the sport (look at Ice Hockey now, playoff games on OLN?) and they used the steroid era to bring obscene amounts of money and advertising to the game. But instead of embracing this new era of baseball, they are using it to solly the good name of baseball. No longer is it America's pastime, not to watch, not to play. Basketball is played more, football and NASCAR (are you kidding me?) are watched more. People think baseball is too slow and boring (but they like NASCAR?), so either baseball has to spice things up with Mammoth homers every inning like the late 90s, or they can move the mound back up to the 1968 level and let pitchers dominate again. I'd take the latter, make games last 2:00 instead of 3:00. It just seems crazy to me that baseball could have such a public steroid controversy and sports that actually have those freakish athletes as the standard do not. Where are the stories about NFL and NBA stars juicing? You can't tell me that all of those guys have 4% body fat on a 6'1" 255 frame without a little outside help. They have a hardcore testing policy, but BALCO was all about beating those tests. The less we're able to relate to the players (millionaire, muscle-bound freaks instead of alcoholic, corn-fed Oklahoma farm boys) the more professional sports will suffer. Free agency has eliminated loyalty and the "Career Oriole (or Cub or Giant...)", the fans will only keep loyal for so long. After all, if the players, owners and league administrators aren't loyal to the fans, they'll realize that they are just wasting their money to fatten the pockets of greedy owners and players.

Socio-Economic Development Theory

Yesterday I introduced my theory that the only way to bring about peace in the middle east is to invest in local economies and not to try and influence politics through strong-arm techniques. As per a request from one of my more loyal readers, I will expand on my theory today.


First lets go through some history...Europe was a constant battleground for centuries. The Romans conquered, then the Huns, Goths, Moors, etc. took their turn. Once kingdoms started to emerge they started fighting each other over resources, land, religion and out of pure hatred. As economics became more and more significant in politics, nations started to join forces and ally to protect economic interests. The colonial era was the last stage of this transformation from nations of people to nations of economies. The 19th century saw industrialization and a stronger focus on infrastructure and economics and Europe was relatively peaceful as a result. But as nations joined forces and created rival alliances, the relations broke down once again and Europe went to war. The interwar period was a time of isolation for most countries as they recovered from the devastation of the Great War and Influenza Pandemic as well as the Great Depression. Then came WWII, a war caused by the lack of closure after WWI and the rise of fascism and nationalism. WWII brought about the United Nations, but more importantly, the Marshall Plan. The Cold War brought tension to Europe and the World, but Western Europe recovered from war dramatically, creating some of the most vibrant economies in history. The European Ecomonic Community was formed and it further integrated the economies of Western Europe. The cold war ended and Eastern Europe began making the changes needed to join the European Union (the EEC evolved into the EU) and we've seen an unprecidented period of peace in Europe.


When two nations are economically reliant on each other, they cannot afford to dissolve relations. If Germany relies on Russian Oil, they surely wont go to war with Russia because they'd lose that supply and be at a huge disadvantage. As economies become more sophisticated the resources needed to survive increase. 1000 years ago all one needed to survive was a small shelter, some water and a little food. Now we need clothing, gas, energy, electricity, transportation, computers, pharmaceuticals and many other things that we use in modern metropolitan life. No one region can supply every material needed, so we need trade. The other thing that open global trade markets can do is keep an eye on the activities of various countries. If a nation is buying up Uranium and Plutonium, it's clear that they are engaging in some kind of nuclear research. Simply put, the international economic community can control nations from building up and being an aggressor by monitoring the commodities trade.


Investing in a nation is one thing, but investing in private corporations owned by ordinary people from that nation is totally different. Compare us giving money to Citgo (the state-run Gas company of Venezuela...for you Bostonians, I bet 50% of you didn't know Citgo was run indirectly by Hugo Chavez) to giving money to a young entrepeneur in Iran. Giving money to a large state-run entity just asks for corruption, that money will not go anywhere but the top. But giving money to that young entrepeneur in Tehran who wants to start a computer company creates a new ally who may well gain the kind of power private businessmen have in the US. Not only that, but helping the economy can only aid in secularization as religion and poverty tend to be intertwined.


I do believe that there is no progress with religion. Religion is a barrier to progress: The world is flat, god created animals as they are today, the Earth is the center of the universe, weather phenomena are "acts of god" and not a result of natural atmospheric processes. Religious nations stand in the way of peace too, as they have fanatical beliefs and see any opposition to those beliefs as heresy. A "spiritual" leader can urge his people to do most anything in the name of a "god". The wealthier they get, the less god will influence their lives (in general, there are ALWAYS exceptions). With the wealth that would come from investment, there would be improved schools. The more quality education available to the people, the less of a role god will play in society. I envision a world where spirituality is a private matter, religion is extinct and the peoples of the world are able to coexist without religious conflict. We're already seeing this happen in Europe: 17th century (among many...) saw wars between factions of Catholics, protestants and persecution of Jews (well, that's every century...). Now we are seeing less and less conflict between religious groups, even the IRA has become tamer.


Imagine if a new tourist industry was developed in Iran's most hard-line cities, would they remain hostile for long? Sure, tourists are annoying (live in New Orleans, San Diego, San Francisco for 21 of your years and you'll agree...) but they also drop tons of money into society. Look at Las Vegas. It used to be a desert haven for crime and a place to disappear. The casinos were all run by murderous criminals, but too much money started to flow into Vegas and it became more and more business-like. Now it's a metroplis with falling crime rates and the Mafia has basically none of its former influence over the casinos. Steve Wynn replaced Bugsy Seigel and the Italian/Jewish mafia presence. So why can't we do the same thing in Tehran? I suggest that we build a massive MGM-Grand sized mega-resort in Tehran and watch it help to transform things. Maybe, just maybe, that will help to avert the coming holy war.

Cotinued Blog from Yesterday

So how will we avert WWIII? Simple, we need to shift our focus from being a peacemaker to being an investor. If we invest in local companies trying to build up the infrastructure and economy, we will help change the region organically. If we move into Iran and destabilize things like we've already done in Iraq and Afghanistan, we will be opening up Pandora's box. It may seem like the best route is to install a puppet government that will do anything we ask of them, but if past history is any indication, it will take a lot more than a friendly government to bring about the change we need. After all, the Weimar republic was designed by the Triple Alliance powers after WWI to provide Germany with a friendly "democratic" government. We all know what happened with that, they elected Adolf Hitler and the Nazi party and disbanded the democracy.


Dubai is an Arab place that is a perfect example of where the Middle East can eventually go. They've invested in themselves and built up an economic base that will succeed once Oil is no longer the main economic base of the region. Dubai will emerge in the 21st century as the equivalent of any American or European metropolis but with a unique Middle Eastern flair and architecture. We can help the region grow organically if we invest in the private companies, give them the power to control the government like businesses in western nations.


In this country we have a business monopoly on politics now. Basically everyone who has any power in politics, also has some corporate power. But in the Middle East there is a different situation. Religious leaders hold the most power. Powerful clerics control the social movements and politics. This is why we need to step in, bring about an internal change without trying to control things ourselves. We just need to create powerful relationships with wealthy businessmen with political aspirations. Find the right route for this and we just might avert the imminent WWIII. Otherwise, we will just topple that government and destabilize the region even more. And then we will see a real attack on our soil and not just a sneaky killing of 2800 people in a pair of office towers.

Coming to Israel's Aid

So Bush said in a press conference today that Israel is our ally and we will stand by them in the event of any attack. But what about when Israel launches a pre-emptive strike on Iran? We know it will happen soon, especially since Ahmadinejad is instituting all kinds of Nazi-esque policies such as making non-Muslims wear an outward symbol identifying their religion. Our support of Israel has directly caused the animosity of the muslim nations, as we support an unwanted invader in a region formerly dominated by the Muslim powers. Now, the single most dominant nation in the region is Israel and nobody likes being dominated by their most hated enemy.


Personally I am surprised about how PEACEFUL the Middle East is. With all of the centuries-old tension and incredible disparity of wealth, as well as the past political and military history, I would think that we'd be seeing civil wars, and wars across borders between factions and religious groups. Sure we're seeing conflict, but not war. War is when the nation shuts down and concetrates 100% on the struggle. At most, we're seeing skirmishes and battles, but we're not seeing major military operations. The fact that Israel is not in a war is just beyond me. Their political strategy is to dominate and not take any shit. If someone slaps them, they shoot and stab back. Look at the 1967 war http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1967_war and the Yom Kippur war http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yom_Kippur_War and you can see that they could stand up to 4 nations with far superior numbers of troops, tanks and planes. In fact, Israel simply destroyed the military of Egypt, Syria and Jordan despite the fact that they started off on the defensive. It's been a while since a country had the balls to attack Israel outright with a full military onslaught, but Iran seems to be growing a pair.


A little while back I wrote about a scenario where Israel launched a preemptive nuclear strike on Iran. Nobody knows what kind of nuclear arsenal Israel has because they've never allowed the outside world a glimpse of their weapons of mass destruction technology. But what we do know is that Israel is willing to launch strikes that kill innocent civilians as long as they reach their target. So this doctrine that Bush just put forth may put us in the position of choosing sides in a nuclear conflict.


I think that WWIII is a foregone conclusion, it will be the Christians versus the Muslims with the Jews joining sides with the Christians. China and India will jump in in a opportunistic grab for power. In the end, we will all emerge as losers. The world will sink back into the dark ages and progress will be lost. But can we avert this pending disaster? Tune in tomorrow for my answer...

Who are your role models?

Maybe it's just me, but our role models and heroes have gotten significantly worse in recent years. In the past, people would strive to be like Eisenhower, Martin Luther King, FDR, JFK, RFK, Jackie O, Eleanor Roosevelt, Susan B Anthony...presidents, and other highly respectable men and women. Today, it seems like that has shifted. People no longer care about morals when selecting a role model, all they care about is on the surface. Think of the most public figures today: George Clooney (I guess he's alright...at least he stands for something), Donal Trump, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, Warren Buffett and worst of all, Britney Spears (Jessica Simpson) and Paris Hilton.


Before we had a poorly trained Chimpanzee "elected" president, the position was something that oozed respect. It was as if we had a automatic male role model (with his wife as a great role model too) who stood for patriotism, education and accomplishment without being born into the position. People like Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton personified this, though the first Bush and his wife were quite respectable during his tenure even though Babs' star has severly faded since Katrina. Jimmy Carter has spent every moment since he lost the 1980 election making the world a better place, using his former position as a tool to bring about social action. MLK fought the FBI, rednecks and history to bring about a new era in race relatoins. Eleanor Roosevelt held no formal power, but she transformed the way the first lady was looked at, and did some things (like chair the committee that composed the Declaration of Human Rights) that made a huge difference in this world. These are people who did things not for themselves, but for the greater good, at times putting themselves in harm's way to bring about a major change.


Now compare those people to Warren Buffett, Donald Trump, Britney Spears, Paris Hilton and Brangelina. Buffett is worth over $40,000,000,000, but only gives about $4,000,000 to charity. People flock to him as if he is a prophet (and he might just be, considering that he's the second richest man in the US despite the fact that he didn't do anything himself, he just invested in others), and consider him a role model simply because he's amassed great wealth. Bill Gates has about the same amount of money, but he's given more to charity than anyone in history. Trump is just a jackass. He takes pleasure in firing people, was born into great wealth, yet went bankrupt, faced legal problems because he's a tax cheat and somehow is one of the people most looked up to in this country. Trump is also known for incredibly paltry charitable donations as well.


Now lets move on to the superstars. Most superstars are people who are born with something that makes them a star. They generally don't strive for years to become a superstar, they achieve stardom before they are 30. How can a 16 year old popstar be a role model when she's not even an adult. But girls listen to what Britney says more than what the City Council says. When Britney said "I think we should follow the president no matter what (or however she said that)" it may have set back the progress of Democracy amongst teenyboppers, since they will probably follow what Britney said to a T and never question the President. Why is Brad Pitt a role model? You wont look like if you try, he was born looking like that, and there's a reason why he's on every magazine cover. There are only a small handful of these types of stars, the ones who have the $25,000,000 paycheck and paparazzi posse. The rest of those in Hollywood are struggling to get by, working tables at some local restaurant known for being the place where someone was once "discovered". It's a very shallow goal to become a famous actor/actress/model, but look around myspace and see how many "models" you can find. I was a model as a kid, made $125 an hour and have had offers to go back, but it's such a vapid and shallow industry that I'd rather struggle to make it based on my skills and dedication and not my movie-star looks.


Paris Hilton...do I really need to say anything here? She's a rich girl, spoiled rotten, never exposed to anything other than the rich and shallow society of Southern California until she was given her own TV show. "The Simple Life" was a personification of everything that's wrong with this nation. Girls follow her, imitating her style (showing as much skin as possible, wearing rediculously hideous bug-eye sunglasses), her mannerisms "That's hot", and following every little club outing and sex scandal as if it was actual news. I'm sorry, but if I was Conrad Hilton, I would be appalled by my daughter being anything like Paris. She's a vapid, moronic, ignoramus who shows no real compassion for anyone who isn't in the same social group as her. I'd disown her and give every penny of her inheritance to schools and youth programs. If I was worth as much as Conrad Hilton and had a daughter, I'd be sure that she was highly educated, learned responsibility from a young age and didn't gain stardom for being a drunken slut.


While I cannot really say that I have a specific role model, I have used a conglomeration of many people to create my own ideal image of what I should be. I will never be president, nor do I think I will be as rich as Warren Buffett, but I know that I will succeed because I have spent my life trying to build myself in the image of MLK, Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton and the people I've met along the way that gave me a new perspective on life. Teachers, coaches, even teammates have had a bigger impact on who I am and who I strive to be than any of my favorite baseball players. Why don't we see more about men like Raoul Wallenberg, who saved the lives of thousands in WWII only to be killed in a Soviet Prison just a few years after the war? I just hope that we don't find this generation growing up with President Brad Pitt and VP Britney Spears.

Nazis for the 21st Century

I was going to write about Jimmy Hoffa today, but this story was just too important to ignore.


Iran's parliament passed a law this week that sets a public dress code and requires non-Muslims to wear a special insignia. Jews, Christians and Zoroastrians would be forced to wear a yellow, red or blue strip of cloth, respectively, on the front of their clothes, according to the newspaper.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060519/wl_canada_afp/iranrightsreligion


So if this isn't a clear sign that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is an Iranian Hitler, I don't know what is. Think they wont be using this insignia to persecute non-muslims? The Nazis didn't just start by sending the jews to Aushwitz, they started by ghettoizing them and identifying them with the "Yellow Badge" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_badge#Timeline . Iran is a highly religious nation with a penchant for oppression, so why is it not feasible for them to begin some Nazi-like actions? All too often we see signs of disaster without doing anything about it. We let the genocide in Rwanda not only start, but continue because we were too slow to react. The Sudan has been mired in civil war and genocide because the West is unwilling to step in. North Korea suffers famine, Cambodia faced the massacre of millions because nobody stepped in when people were crying for help.


Okay, so the world is really overpopulated and would actually prosper if there were a bunch of genocides, but we are morally responsible to protect the innocent. We cannot wait for the genocide to happen because by that point we will have missed an opportunity to avert disaster. Imagine if the Senate passed a law that stated all homosexuals must wear a pink triangle pinned to their shirt at all times. That would open them to all kinds of discrimination and likely violence from homophobics. They would certainly be denied the equality with everyone else that they deserve. It might quickly become the badge that keeps them out of public places. Some shop owners might not allow anyone labeled with the pink triangle to enter, just as we did with brown skin in the time prior to the Civil Rights Movement.


Just put yourself in Iran and tell me how it would feel to walk around the street being forced to wear a mark identifying your religious affiliation. This is in a nation that is known for being violently protective of Sharia laws and there are plenty of lunatics willing to beat or even kill someone simply for not being Sunni, Shiite or whatever else they are. Unfortunately I have been looking at MSNBC (though it's not propaganda like Fox News, it's trash and just horrendous news) all day and all they have talked about is that stupid Jennifer Wilbanks (that pointless runaway bride story from a year ago) and searching for Jimmy Hoffa. Maybe it's just me, but shouldn't news be on the news? I'd think that a Nazi-like action by a rogue government would be the major story. But they've got Pamela Turner (another one of those stunning blonde teachers who is fooling around with her 13-year old student...why didn't I ever have one of these? Check that, why can't I find a woman that gorgeous now?) and her myspace naughtiness, The Da Vinci code (horrible reviews, by the way http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/da_vinci_code ), more about immigration and some on Jennifer Wilbanks again. Not only that, but it's the same exact footage I saw 20 minutes ago and it's not exactly fine quality camera-work. Still nothing about Iran.


One of the reasons why the Holocaust, Khmer Rouge, Great Leap Lorward, Rwandan genocide and Stalinist collectivization deaths were so great was that the rest of the world ignored warning signs and didn't make attempts to step in until after the damage was done. We should have known that there was more to come when the Jews were ghettoized in 1933. So we should know that this isn't the last we will hear about the Islamist tyranny in Iran oppressing other religious groups. We should know that genocides are common in history, that people are always looking to oppress those who see the world in a different way. I for one am scared about the other Muslim nations following Iran's lead if we don't step in. What's to stop the Saudi's from doing this? Don't say I didn't warn you...

I feel the need, the need for speed!

And no, I am not back on the Adderall...The news came out that some highways are going to be raising speed limits to 80 MPH. To me there shouldn't even be a debate on this, as 70 is not really that fast when on an empty highway. But for some reason there seemed to be this opinion, expressed by CNN, that this would somehow cause gas prices to increase and that it would cause accidents. The first argument was repeated by a number of CNN viewers, saying that they should LOWER the speed limit as a method for lowering gas prices. See this is a very flawed argument, as my car gets far superior gas mileage the faster I go.


I have a lot of experience with the West Texas Highways, and I know for a fact that 80 is actually rather slow for those endless stretches of pavement. The first time I took I-10 across the southwest part of Texas I was afraid to go faster than 80 because I feared the Texan police. However, I learned quite quickly that the cops don't patrol those stretches and that if you are doing 80 in the slow lane you will get rear-ended by a trucker. They don't honk, they just approach your tail with blistering speed, sometimes in excess of 100, and if you don't get out of their way or speed up, they will bump you. Each trip I took between San Francisco and New Orleans, I became more and more comfortable with the pace of the highway. I could easily do 1000 miles in a day's drive with stops thanks to the 100+ MPH stretches. Not only would I cover a ton of distance (and thankfully spend as little time in Texas as possible) but I would also save huge amounts of gas. I normally would get about 300-350 miles per tank (MPT), but on those trips I would get a minimum of 550 MPT. If I could drive that way the entire trip from NOLA to SF, I would only have to fill up 4 times, instead of 7. There, I just saved $150 on gas and conserved 45 gallons.


The other opposition to this logical increase of the speed limit is basically a fear of speed. Take a drive on I-5 in San Diego and see all those morons going 70 in the left lane. People just aren't comfortable doing anything fast, they even turn slowly on green lights. Ever try to drive into Pacific Beach at 5:15 on a weekday? It's amazing how slow people are to react to things, how long it takes them to realize a light is green and how SLOWLY they accelerate. Traffic is caused by people who are just too slow to react to something and those who panic and over-react by slamming on their brakes in the left lane and slowing down to 60 when someone in the far right lane brakes. I see that EVERY day at the 8 interchange.


I just look at this move as another positive step from the 55 speed limits. In this era of sprawling cities and inconvenient locations, we shouldn't have to worry about being pulled over when we're driving perfectly safely. That extra 14% of velocity isn't enough to make that much of a difference. We drive that fast anyway (if there's enough space, I will never go less than 80 on the highway), so why waste our law enforcement on arbitrary speed limits? Reckless driving has very little to do with speed and a lot more to do with attention and aggression. All of my accidents came long before I ever even drove 80, when I was an ADD teenager. The most accident prone people I know aren't the ones who drive like a bat out of hell, but the cautious, nervous and absent-minded ones.


So the next time I drive up to the Bay Area in June I will be driving at least 85 on I-5. Wouldn't it be nice if I could still do that speed without having to constantly check in my mirrors for 5-0? I'm not about to make that drive 15% longer than it should be, I'd do 130 if I didn't have to worry about a felony speeding charge. The danger isn't in the fast drivers, it's in the slow ones. The old people driving in the left lane at 5 MPH below the speed limit, the housewife in her SUV doing 65 in the fast lane, the absent-minded moron who changes lanes without looking in their rear-view...those are the ones who cause the accidents. Sure, the high-speed racing accidents are horrific, but those are incredibly rare and are only major news stories because of their rarity. We have attention-deficit accidents all the time, and they are not given lead-story status on the local news. The Autobahn is successful and makes long-distance travel in Germany a dream. Wouldn't you love to be able to drive from SD to LA in 60 minutes? I know I would!

Homey don't teach that!

Today I heard a story about a teacher in the Midwest who got in trouble for an assignment he gave his students. He asked the students to write a paper on who they would kill and how. There was major outrage over this assignment because of the topic, but I have to support the teacher. To me, the main purpose of a teacher is to challenge the students intellectually and to make them ponder questions of morality and philosophy. School is supposed to socialize kids, to expose them to the diversity of the society in which they live. If we didn't want to expose kids to anything offensive, we might as well eliminate public schools and home-school everyone. That way if you are some close-minded hick from Missouri, you can raise a perfect little Neo-Con baby with the exact same views as you. Any teacher who doesn't challenge their students to think about uncomfortable subjects is just not doing his job.


This anti-intellectualism (I believe the outrage to this assignment is that) is nothing new, as every nation has faced anti-intellectualism at some point. But it's more dangerous because we are allowing these people to bully us into taking them seriously. How on earth was the Dover School Board allowed to add "Intelligent Design" to the curriculum? Isn't time supposed to bring progress and not devolution? We allow close-minded parents who were "C" students in public school to tell us how we should teach, but we don't listen to scientists and progressive teachers who are trying to bring progress. This teacher was trying to bring his students to think about a difficult topic as a way to create an interesting writing assignment. Writing about a murder may not be "Christian" or whatever, but who would want to read a fictional story about a character who doesn't kill, doesn't have sex, doesn't do drugs, doesn't believe in science and has no conflicts over sexuality? When I think of my favorite books, they are all ones that have been opposed by the same groups that got this teacher in trouble.


Let's ban Romeo & Juliet, Catcher in the Rye, Brave New World, On The Road and Macbeth, it's not like those are important in the development of Western Culture. I think we should just eliminate all books except for the Bible and just read it over and over again until we believe that all of its stories are literal. Isn't that what the Red States are doing? Sure, the Bible is a fantastic book filled with some of the all-time classic stories, but it's simply a collection of stories. And it's not exactly a bastian of morality. Some of the stories promote murdering children to appease God, killing people who hold different beliefs and promoting retaliation/revenge. It also contradicts itself at times, saying one thing in one story, and then saying the opposite in another one.


To me the scariest thing about this is the generation that is growing up in this era of closing minds and increasing censorship. When this generation get older, they will be completely void of that other point of view, only being allowed to read books approved by their Church's minister or local conservative group. I've read some great novels about murder, heroin use and I've never found myself falling prey to their appeal. The more I read, the less it influences me, as I am diluting its impact by perpetually reading and learning. But if I concentrate on a few inoffensive books I will eventually find myself lacking the creativity needed to really succeed in this world. Not only that, but I am being robbed of the sheer brilliance of Kerouac, Huxley, Verne, Wells and even Shakespeare.


Teachers should make students feel uncomfortable, not by being preachy or by molesting the students, but by challenging their beliefs and pre-conceived notions. It's the duty of a teacher to help the student grow academically as well as personally. I applaud a teacher that strikes controversy in his classroom, even if it is offensive to some. This is a world where dialogue is slowly going extinct, people don't discuss things, they just get outraged when their opinion isn't aggreed with. We need to teach our children how to think about things that they've never thought of before, how to put themselves in the shoes of others. Instead of forcing your child to hear only what you want them to hear, let them hear everything and develop their own opinion. Otherwise that child might find themselves overwhelmed when they hit the real world and see all the things they've been sheltered from their whole life. Or do we just want to give up on free speech, expression and religion and become just like Iran?

Troops on the Border

Maybe it's because I'm 15 miles from Mexico (and in the world's busiest border city), but I just don't see this crisis that the media and congress are talking about. Yesterday the administration announced that they were sending a few thousand troops to secure the border. Is anyone not convinced that this is just a distraction from the impeachable spying offenses this administration has sponsored? Any time the immigration debate get heated, it just so happens to be during a critical election period. So many of these candidates for congress are using immigration as a scare tactic to sweep themselves into office. So where does immigration fit into the terrorism, gas and healthcare problems in this country?


Terrorism is not something you can fight a war against. Terrorists aren't from a specific country, as some of the worst attacks have been committed by Red-Blooded Americans (Koresh, Applewhite, McVeigh, Rudolph), and they certainly aren't easy to distinguish from regular people. We continue to lock down in fear because of this abstract threat of something that by its very nature is rare. If all terrorism deaths in modern history were added together, they'd pale in comparison to the deaths by starvation, dehydration, and other diseases of poverty that happen monthly. 115 People die every day in car accidents, but terrorism gets more airtime. Bush claims that he's putting troops on the border as protection from terrorism, but don't we have a large border with that little country known as Canadia? Where's the troops up there? All this move tells me is that if I'm going to bomb the US, I'm going to enter through Montana or Wisconsin.


Maybe we're pissed off about the higher prices of energy because of those pesky immigrants. After all, they are the reason why we're able to eat that mega-burrito for $6. I'd much rather pay $10 for my burrito if it meant that I wouldn't have to see a Mexican in the kitchen. That way I'd be sure to get a sub-par burrito made by some lazy white man like at the Mexican restaurants in Ireland. How about that $40 bill at Vons...think you'd still be paying such low prices if the farming community was made up of American-born high school graduates with a union? Baja Fresh probably doesn't hire illegals, but their prices are higher and quality is lower than your local taco shop, which is likely to be staffed with illegals. Keeping them in the shadows actually helps us as consumers because of the lower prices. Now if we legalized immigration and made all new immigrants register with a tracking device (like people do with their dogs and cats) we could not only violate their civil rights (yes, all people are entitled to civil rights), but we could also much more effectively protect ourselves.


The other problem with using troops to secure our borders is the simple fact that we don't have enough troops in the places we actually need them! How many generals (that have been fired) have stated that we need more troops in Iraq? What about the response to Katrina? I have a good friend who is a marine reservist who VOLUNTEERED to go to NOLA when Katrina was destroying her. They planned and planned to go, but in the end, they just sat in Orlando wasting tax dollars and not doing anything to help. In the end, his platoon was told that they wouldn't go to NOLA afterall. How is it when we need troops, we cannot get them to go? I'd think that saving one of the most historical American cities or winning a war would be a good way to win elections...


To me this is not just a problem with the leadership of the Republican party. It's a problem with Americans. They are too eager to place the blame, to find a scapegoat. They don't take the time to look within and really discover what the true problems are. They elect oil men, then complain when the administration seems to be favoring oil companies. They elect a certifiable retard, then complain about how he doesn't seem to get anything and is always a step behind. This country WAS great, but we're quickly losing ground to the rest of the world. We keep trying to punish people for doing what's best for themselves and their family. Haven't we learned that punishment is not the best deterrent? Regardless, we're walking a thin line and endangering the American people by this buildup of troops on the border. It will weaken international relations and expose us in the event of a major natural disaster. A disaster is looming, and unless San Diego falls into the water, it's likely to be hudreds of miles from Mexico.

Really Big Love

No, this isn't going to be about having sex with large women...not that there's anything wrong with that. What I am talking about today is monogamy, polygamy and polyamory. The idea that everyone on this planet belongs to only one other person seems wrong to me, and sometimes I see the concepts of poly-relationships as being the more natural way for man and woman to comingle. In agrarian societies the family unit was very important, as children provided the labor needed to keep the farm productive enough to support everyone. But today in our urban lifestyle, it seems as if people are just too busy to dedicate themselves to just one single person. Not only that, but lives are more complicated and one person isn't always enough to provide that emotional support. Maybe it's because I've never been in a really serious relationship, but that's also why I feel this way.


For me, the beginning of a relationship is the hardest. That stage where both people are judging each other to decide whether or not that person can be "the one". We look at certain qualities we think we want in a mate, but in the end we are just searching for "red flags" to call things quits. Some people are the opposite, they think everything is love at first sight, but then watch as perfection turns to imperfection. In the end, 50% of all marriages end in divorce and those are the relationships that people thought would work. What about the dozen relationships that ended before that person got briefly married?


Maybe it's because of all the people I grew up with, none of them had a divorce-free family. Most of my friends growing up were the second family of a divorced older father, and a few (of their parents) got divorced during my childhood/adolescence. Marriage is this great union when two people are perfectly fit for each other, but that perfection is incredibly rare. What gets me is that people still defend marriage as if it's this pure and untouched tradition. People cheat on their spouses like crazy, or they fight all the time because they're stuck together with someone they just aren't right for. I know a couple who just got married a couple months ago despite his cheating ways and her apprehensions because of his actions. They will never work out, she even debated whether she should take his name because she didn't think she'd keep it. I went to dinner with them last week and there was no way to even tell that they were a couple, let alone newly-weds. If I was this guy I would never want to leave her side, but he already knows that he can get away with anything because she took him back after he cheated. The wedding was in Hawaii, cost a bundle to put together and had been planned for months. Why bother going through the ceremony? Because it's something all little girls dream about, that perfect wedding, and they will look past all the warning signs if they see that wedding on the horizon.


So what's wrong with polygamy? In a word: Jealousy. People cannot accept that they don't monopolize the time of their loved one. They feel inadequate in comparison to other lovers, and get jealous when they aren't involved. But really, what is more natural? Is it natural for a man to ignore everyone around him because it'll make his girlfriend jealous if he checks out someone he finds attractive? How about two professionals who can only get together once every 2 weeks, why should they be denied companionship because they have a busy mate? It's okay to have multiple friends, but multiple lovers is very taboo. You don't cheat on your best friend by confiding in a different friend.


So maybe I'm cynical on monogamy because every experience I've had with it has been a negative one. Either I couldn't remain faithful because I was 3000 miles away from my girlfriend, or I got possessive because she wasn't spending enough of her free time with me. Sometimes I just don't feel like I'm into her enough, but because I have to remain faithful, I just end things because I don't want to prolong the suffering. Ever since I started having "casual" relationships, I've been a better boyfriend despite the fact that monogamy is not something that is expected. I feel that monogamy should only happen if it's totally natural, if you feel attraction for only one person. Unless that happens, you're forcing yourself to do something unnatural and will fail eventually.


Instead of taking a chance on someone you don't know and committing to a futile monogamous relationship, why not try being casual for a while until you develop that trust needed for a successful relationship? I'm not an expert on this, considering the fact that my longest relationship was shorter than the Baseball Season. But it seems to me that people just aren't naturally designed to be stuck with just one mate. After all, I feel that we learn and grow with each person who touches our lives, and a lover touches it more than anyone. Having multiple lovers can help a person grow exponentially as a person, learning how to see things from multiple angles. Maybe I just feel this way because I've never fallen in love...maybe I'll change my mind when I do.

Who else was juicing? (Mini-Blog)

I was watching CostasNow recently and he had this great special on the steroid controversy. Take a look if you can. But I have been thinking: sure McGwire, Giambi, Palmeiro, Bonds, Caminitti, Sheffield and Canseco were all juicing, but who else seems like a prime candidate?

Here's my list of other guys who I think were juicing:

John Rocker (Roid Rage anyone?)
Glenallen Hill
Patrick Lennon
Ellis Burks (before he was 30: .281 .347 .467, After 30: .300 .379 .552)
Luis Gonzalez
Brady Anderson
Jason Kendall (0 homers since testing started, highly competitive)
Darryl Kile (I think his death might be related to Caminitti's)
Mike Hampton (might have started when he went to Atlanta)

That's my list; completely free of evidence, but look at the numbers and most of these guys had a season come out of nowhere; usually after the age where most others break down.

Life is a series of Deadlines

For once I am not being political here, this is a very philosophical blog on my feelings of the rushed feeling I get from living my life as a series of deadlines. This is just something I've wanted to write about for a while...


Sometimes I wonder how people go through life without ambition. Even when I was a child, I used to have dreams of where I could go and always set goals for myself. Unfortunately, this isn't really the case with most people. Sure, they have pipe-dreams of being rich and famous, but how any people actually try and do something about achieving these dreams? I think the evidence for this is how many people purchase lottery tickets and how many get-rich-quick schemes can be found during late-night television. Nobody has a long-term goal anymore, they only live month-to-month or year-to-year. Even when people have goals, most don't really follow through in seeing those goals become reality.


I've seen this in a few different forms, when I was a student in Public School, in college, living in San Diego and coaching kids. When I was in public school, I was surrounded by kids who had no ambition or drive for anything other than having a good day. They didn't even consider tomorrow, as today was all they could see. This short-sightedness is just another form of ignorance to me, as I feel that knowing where I am going is just as important as where I am and where I've been. I had already started looking at college when I was in 5th grade because I saw my sister going through the process and wanted to make sure that I had my options when the time came. Most of my classmates at Burlingame didn't even consider where they were going to college (if at all) until junior or even senior year. If I set a goal, I know what I need to work towards, even if I don't always reach it. Setting goals may lead to the failure to reach it, but you can't fail if you don't try and failure is key to growing as a person. If you never fail at anything, you're just not trying hard enough.


When I moved out to Pacific Beach, I met a lot of people, but most of them were basically the same. There is a stereotype of the PB people, and it's pretty much true. You have people approaching 30 who are still living in trashed houses with 3 roommates, go out every Taco Tuesday, College Night Wednesday, Cheap Drink Thursday and of course on Friday and Saturday too. If there's a game on Sunday night, they'll be at the bar to watch it too. Sometimes I wish I could still be like that, like the 2 or 3 semesters in College where I let loose and forgot my responsibilities. But then I look at myself and think "I'm almost 25 and I'm still so far away from where I'd like to be at this stage in my life". It's as if I am living on a series of deadlines, and I see the major pending deadline of death sitting ahead of me. Time is limited, and we have less time on this planet than we sometimes realize. I have goals related to a career, family, and just personal development. I don't see the drinking buddy relationship as a worthwhile one, as the only thing keeping you together as friends is alcohol. PB bars bore me, it's nothing but a bunch of vapid people out to get drunk for a night of mild fun. Even in my days of heavy binge drinking while living in New Orleans, I never found that getting trashed brought me anything but miscomfort. It certainly didn't make me get those gorgeous women I wanted, all it did for my sex life was hook me up with appallingly unattractive girls who I only talked to because I was intoxicated.


One-night stands are like masturbation. Except in a one nighter you have the danger of your hookup being diseased (with Herpes, the Clap or Insanity), obsessive, impregnated or they might just rob your house. What's the point if you two will never see each other again? The funny thing is that most of these people who do the whole one-night stand thing are adamantly opposed to online dating even though you really know nothing about the person you meet at the bar to take home and screw. How many healthy and lasting relationships have you known that started during a drunken encounter at PB Bar and Grill? These girls who meet guys at those bars always complain about how they never meet nice guys...um...you think that the nice guys are the ones who are approaching you and getting you drunk to bring you home? Nope...they are the ones who are at home on Taco Tuesday working on their next promotion at work or that paper on the History of German Democracy.


Since when is 25 the new 21 and 31 the new 25? Just because we live longer doesn't mean we should delay our professional and personal development for an additional 5 years. Then again, it does make it easier for those of us who are career-oriented. I am the youngest person in my office, and despite that, I am working on my licensing exams before my boss has even tried and she is 37. I just don't understand how people can be satisfied where they are when there's a way up higher. In my industry all it takes to get promoted is to take an exam related to a specific area of the industry, but there are so many here who've been working here for years and haven't even tried. It's not about money, it's about a challenge to yourself. When you're 75 you might look back on your life and say: "I wish I could've taken that promotion test when I was 25...or I wish I could've traveled the world" if you don't realize that the older you get, the harder it is for things to change. If you wait till you're 31 to start your career, you'll end up far below where you'd be if you started at 25. That 6 year difference might make it possible for you to retire 10 years earlier while you're still young enough to enjoy your time.


People who don't set goals for themselves never accomplish anything of worth. Things don't fall into your lap, you're not Prince Harry or Paris Hilton. Paris didn't become rich because she was famous, she got famous because she's rich. Try setting a deadline for yourself like: by 2007 I will have passed at least 3 licensing tests. You may not make it, but if you have that pending deadline, it might just motivate you to get more diligent. How can it hurt?

Who you gonna call?

So it didn't come as a surprise to me when the news came out today that the government is secretly obtaining phone records of all Americans in order to "combat terrorism". After the release of the story about the NSA wire-tapping program, it was obvious that the government wasn't just tracking those who were definitely Al-Qaeda types, but innocent Americans as well. It's about time that we finally bring this administration to court in order to protect our civil rights to privacy and illegal search and seizure. Think the government should be allowed to look at your phone records? What about the websites you visit? Maybe they should track our credit card purchases too...what's to say that the next time you go to a head shop to buy some inscence that the government wont use your patronage of a head shop as a way to harrass you?


The most dangerous part of this program is the fact that the Bush administration claims that it's necessary to defend our nation and they use that irrational American fear to scare away our civil rights. When the warrantless wiretapping program was leaked to the public, it revealed the willingness of the administration to sidestep laws designed to protect the people from the government. We have a system of checks and balances to ensure that the government isn't spying on us, and isn't using an irrational fear to erode our civil rights. Afterall, they are ignoring the right to stand trial for many SUSPECTED terrorists and holding them indefinitely in solitary confinement whilst torturing them in order to extract information that they don't even have. Look at the result of the Moussaoui trial: he pleaded guilty, sentenced to life for the 9-11 attack despite the fact that he was already in prison weeks before the attack. After the sentencing he renounced his guilty plea and is asking to be retried so he can plead not-guilty.


What is most frightening about this is not that the government is doing all this spying on innocent Americans, but that there are enough people in this country dumb enough to ignore all the warning signs of authoritarianism. The Weimar republic began as a perfectly designed democracy and within a decade had become the Totalitarian Nazi nation that committed the atrocities of WWII. Think the US is too good to have their own holocaust? Remember how we interned the Japanese in concentration camps during WWII despite the fact that most of those interned were innocent Americans who had no connection to the bombing of Pearl Harbor and just happened to be ethnically Japanese. The first people who will suffer as a result of this invasion of privacy are those who have Arab names. My friend Samer Sharaiha is Christian, but is from Jordan and calls back home frequently, and speaks Arabic in most of those conversations. I guarantee that the government is in possesion of his phone records, as they claimed the reason for the seizure was to watch for patterns and they might have even listened into his phone calls.


Defenders of the wiretapping program claim that the government is only tapping those who are connected with terrorist organizations. Maybe it's just me, but if there was evidence that someone was in a terrorist organization, wouldn't it be safer for us to have him in custody? If they have the evidence that he's a terrorist, shouldn't that be enough to charge him with something? If there's not enough evidence to charge him, how can they be sure he's a terrorist? Even if they have evidence, how do we know that it's not fabricated or a figment of Rumsfeld's imagination like the WMDs in Iraq? Our nation was founded on the principal that governments are not to be trusted and the people should always be protected from overreaching authorities. In 2001 as many people died every 26 days on US roads as died in the terrorist bombings of 9/11 (http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/medicalnews.php?newsid=34352) Think terrorism is our biggest problem? How many Americans have died since 9/11 in terrorist acts? How many people died in car crashes today? What about from the effects of alcohol? The administration has used terrorism as a way to forward an agenda of a controlling and authoritarian regime.


If this isn't grounds for impeachment, what the hell is? Clinton was getting blow jobs in the Oral Office and he got impeached for covering his ass from getting kicked by Hilary. Bush has lied, cheated and stolen (an election) while running up a massive debt and cutting taxes on rich people. He's thumbed his nose at the FISA courts and the bill of rights, and he's not exactly done anything that I can pinpoint as good. So how come the Democrats can't do anything about it? As long as we continue to let this regime bully their way around our rights, they will continue to erode them. If you don't want the FBI kicking down your door the next time you buy a book on "The Teachings of Allah", take a stand against this regime. Otherwise, you'll find yourself living in a nation without privacy, without a bill of rights, and you'll be sitting in a solitary cell awaiting a trial that will never come. Just don't say that I didn't warn you.

Get it before it's gone

As the world enters into the post-modern era it is quickly changing the way we should look at our future. 300 years ago we had an abundance of land and resources and could afford to ignore the long-term cost of development. Humankind requires an obscene amount of resources to flourish, and as we've advanced and modernized we've exponentially increased the requirements for life. In 1706 there was no electricity, no computers (obviously) and the main means of transportation was through the legs of a mammal and there were no pharmaceuticals either. Look how much we've changed since then, how this world has shifted from rural farming to urban service. If all that can happen in just 3 centuries, imagine how much quicker the progress will be now that we have machines to do most of the toughest work.


When I look at the future I see disaster pending. We're thumbing our noses at the wrath of nature and what we need to do in order to survive as a species. As the population balloons by the billions, our resources dwindle exponentially. Think Oil is expensive now? Imagine what it's going to be like when the 2 billion people living in China and India approach our American rates of consumption. The world's oil reserves do not replenish, and therefore the price can only go up based on the most simple rule of economics. As the supply goes down and the demand goes up, the price will rise.


This isn't just about Oil, and it's not just about land. Everything in nature is diminishing. Even trees are diminishing because we're clearing them out faster than we replant them. Certain materials will vanish while others might be able to be grown and kept alive, but as long as we continue to repopulate we will use up those non-renewable resources. Gold, copper, silver, coal, aluminum, uranium, etc. All of those serve very important functions in our technology, and could be the key to future progress, but their increasing scarcity will cause them to become prohibitively expensive for anyone except super-corporations and nations.


I'm not sure if anyone other than my friend Matt Dunphy has noticed the recent market for commodities and companies that manufacture, distribute or mine for these commodites. Prices have been skyrocketing for a couple years, and if you had bought one OZ of gold in May of 2005 for about $420, you'd be able to sell that same OZ for over $700. That's just one year and a ~75% increase in the price of gold. Just like Oil, there may be factors in the current geo-political climate which are bringing the price up, but the scarcity and lack of new sources of the material are more of a factor to the rising costs. So what this means is that if you want to be able to afford to live in the post-modern world, you have to invest now. Buy some gold and aluminum shares and sit on them until you need the money. You'll be happy that you bought that gold when you could afford it, because soon that OZ of gold may cost over $1,000 and you wont be able to afford it. Not only that, but you'll be able to profit off of these rising prices.


Remember the old saying: Buy land, because God ain't making any more of it. But you can just turn that "Land" into "____" because mineral will fit into that statement. You'll also be happy that you bought that material because I'm not the only person saying this...Wall Street bigwigs have been preaching this for years, but wouldn't you rather feel the profit and not the cost? So instead of bitching about how the prices go up totally as expected (if you thought oil would never increase in price as the supply diminished, you're just plain DUMB), be smart and use these increasing prices to your own advantage. Either that, or you can keep your money in that Savings account and watch that same $420 you turned into $700 by buying gold sit and grow from $420 to $448 in the Savings account. People never plan to fail, but most fail to plan. You know we're going to run out of resources, so the only way to go is to profit off of that.

Freud vs. Pfizer

I am a big supporter of Sigmund Freud. His brilliance forever changed the way we looked at ourselves and the world around us. However, in the latter half of the 20th century a war was declared on his beliefs and methods of curing mental imbalance. It's funny how the country that spearheaded a international war on drugs naturally occurring in nature has become so dependent on manufactured pharmaceuticals. Lipitor, Viagra, Cialis, Claritin, Vioxx, Adderall, Ritalin, Clonodine, Paxil, etc. All of these drugs have a specific purpose, and some of them do enable people to live a life which wouldn't been possible without one of these magic pills. But a lot of these pills are just excuses made by people so they don't have to examine the roots of a psychological problem.


Chemistry plays a major role in things, but it is a proven medical fact that internal attitude and optimism can definitely affect the healing process. If someone gives up on life, they will have less of a chance of fighting depression than if they learn how to look at the bright side of life. It's cheesy, I know. To me the worst part of the American Pharmaceutical addiction is that we put our children onto these drugs without letting them grow up. I honestly believe that when someone is put on Ritalin for their ADD at age 10, they will never be able to learn how to focus their energy without the aid of the drug. This is dangerous because it is a basic addiction. We're teaching the kids that medicating your problems is the way to go and that analyzing the causes and triggers for negative behaviours is not important.


I am about as ADD as they come (shouldn't I be working right now?), but Adderall was not this magic cure that caused me to stop focusing on sports and girls and start focusing on school. All it did was make me eat less and drink more water to combat the dehydration that comes from being on 40 mgs of Ampetamines. When I went to the Psychiatrist to get my ADD drugs, I expected to see this sudden change in my study habits and grades. I definitely didn't, I actually think it made things worse because all it did was make my focus concentrate on what I wanted to focus on, and that was never my Political Economics Readings for sure. I did learn a whole hell of a lot about baseball stats and Playboy Playmates, but nothing really about Adam Smith and John Stuart Mill.


The other problem is in the Pharmaceutical industry itself. Even the Daily Show has talked about this, having this stunningly gorgeous girl (miss Florida 2006, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cristin_Duren) who worked as a pharmaceutical sales rep talk about what the companies do to sell the drugs to the public. Most of the drugs that are most famous are the ones that are the most expensive and most advertised, and not necessarily the most effective. This girl, Cristin Duren, could sell me a sailboat in Death Valley or anything else she wanted and I had no use for. They offer the doctors trips to the Bahamas or French Riviera if they get enough patients to take their drugs.


This problem of privatized medicine also extends to the specific ailments that these massive Pharmaceutical companies focus on healing. They spend billions making drugs for Erectile Disfunction when it's not a public health issue. But penis pills really sell. So they spend their money and time and top scientists on these pills that only serve to give one (maybe two) people pleasure without doing anything about their health. How often do you see a commercial for drugs that help to curb anger or ones that combat addiction to food or alcohol? Wouldn't those be so much better for society than giving Hugh Hefner a boner so he can sleep with his three 20 year old girlfriends?


Freud has relevance even if his ideas have been proven to be a little too focused on childhood and parents. I believe in nurture being stronger than nature, that our environment really affects who we are and how we react to our world. Genetics played a role in making me who I am, but I am vastly different from my father because I grew up in a totally different situation than he did. Certain things from my past affect how I act now, like being a fatty in middle school has made me always keep diligent at staying in shape. When I went to Freud's office in Vienna and saw all of his writings and experiments, I really gained a lot of respect for what he did and gave to this world. I just feel very sad that in Psychology 101 classes in college, they are now claiming that everything he said was wrong, because it isn't. Drugs aren't the only answer, one has to work on themselves before a drug will really alter them. It's basically like putting the blame on "god" instead of taking responsibility for your own betterment. That is why I'm no longer on my pharmaceuticals, and if you've been on them for a while, try taking a month off to find your true center and see how much better that feels than 20 mgs of Paxil 3 times a day.

Scapegoats...

So yesterday Zacarias Moussaoui was sentenced to life in prison for his role in the September 11th attacks as the so-called "20th Hijacker". This man was in prison almost a month before the attacks and was not directly involved in the death of any American citizen, yet his sentence is life in prison. Something about that is just wrong. Sure, he's a dangerous and absolutely insane man, but he should be in a mental hospital and not prison. Afterall, what crime did he commit? He was in prison when the hijackings took place, and any attempt made to link him to 9/11 has failed. His trial was also a farce. The trial had dozens of these 9/11 victims who just can't get over their loss and have to blame someone testify tearfully. They would tell about how losing their husband ruined their life, and about how good of a person he was. Yes, it is devastating to lose a loved one, but blaming someone who had no hand in the death and putting him away for life is not what our legal system is supposed to do. Bin Laden is a ghost, so Moussaoui took his place.


This is not to mention the fact that we essentially convicted Bin Laden within days of the attacks. Even if he were to stand trial, he would come into the trial as a guilty man and have no chance for justice. On April 22, 2005, in one of the court sessions at the end of the current trial phase, Moussaoui surprised the whole audience by pleading guilty to all of the charges against him, while at the same time denying having any intention of a massacre like 9/11. He said that it was not his conspiracy and that he intended to free sheikh Omar Abdel-Rahman. According to him, his master plan was to hijack a Boeing 747-400, since the plane is one of a few that could reach Afghanistan from the U.S. without any intermediate stops. (from wikipedia). However, the man directly contradicted this on numerous occasions. Actually, he was constantly contradicting himself, and he also would fight against his lawyers and have frequent outbursts during the trial. How can someone be sentenced to life when he isn't even sure of what he did?


Scapegoats are common in this country. Whether it's the Mexicans we're blaming, the German-Americans back in WWI, the Japanese-Americans in WWII or people with left-leaning views during McCarthyism, we are always looking to blame someone for our problems. Instead of taking responsibility for our actions: destabilizing the Middle East, TRAINING OSAMA BIN LADEN TO KILL, ignoring warning signs of terrorism (like the fact that the WTC was bombed in 1994!) or even natural disasters like the levies in New Orleans which had been considered basically useless for more than a decade. Americans are so quick to place blame that they forget that they are responsible for themselves. I wasn't surprised that we were attacked by terrorists because we'd been attacked before and Europe and Israel had been facing this for decades.


As we continue to go down the road towards right-wing authoritarian governance, we can look at this trial of Zacarias Moussaoui as the point where we abandoned the right to a fair trial and punishment. Look how the administration has used terrorism to erode the right for the accused to stand trial. Just because a prosecutor thinks someone is guilty doesn't mean that they are. Prosecutors think everyone is guilty, they have a chip on their shoulder that they are something like a superhero in the courtroom, dedicating their life to cleaning the streets. If a heinous crime is committed, the first person arrested will be guilty until proven innocent in the mind of the prosecution. Not only that, but in the Moussaoui trail there was a ton of evidence that wasn't allowed to be used in court because it would "undermine national security". If we are locking up innocent people as terrorists (and Moussaoui is not one of these, he plead guilty...) we aren't helping to protect ourselves, we're endangering ourselves. Afterall, the US is looked at as an evil country which acts as a dictator for the world. If we continue lock up people without a trial, and do these Kangaroo Court trials for those who are actually charged with something, we WILL face another major attack. But then again, that next attack will probably come as a surprise to Americans and they will once again blame the government or some Arab they never heard of before the government told them about him. It's just like blaming illegal aliens for gas prices being high...

Vigilante Justice

Here in San Diego we have a lot of news related to the Border. Afterall, I can see Mexico from my office right now...but there is a scary thing happening now along the more isolated sections of the Amerixican (I think I invented that word just now) Border. The Minuteman Project is an emerging threat to the safety of our border and not the other way around as they believe. These people set up barbed wire fences and sit on their easy-chairs while watching for illegals crossing over the border. They claim that they are just there to watch the border and they report any suspiscious activity to the US Border Patrol, but nobody can believe that some of these Vigilantes wont try and take matters into their own hands.


On the one hand, these people are honestly trying to do something to benefit this country, but Vigilantes are even worse than cops. The Border Patrol is a highly trained group that I have a lot of respect for (despite my anti-border beliefs...I believe a world without borders would be far better than our segregated world) and they are being undermined by these vigilantes. Most of these people are retired WHITE men, in fact, every person I have seen who claims to be a member of the Minuteman Project is a older white man. They are all worried about Mexicans coming over the border, but they claim that they are protecting our border from terrorists. Didn't the 9/11 hijackers enter this nation through Canada? So how come we aren't seeing a bunch of Minnesotans sitting with their shotgun and doberman at the Canadian frontier? Make no mistake about it, this is not about protecting our nation from danger, but protecting it from MEXICANS.


What really upsets me about this whole immigration debate is that WHITE PEOPLE STOLE THIS LAND FROM MEXICO AND THEIR NATIVE PEOPLE!!! What's wrong with a little healthy job competition? Wages may be brought down a little for low-paying jobs, but the costs of goods are also held down by those low wages and vast unskilled labor base. I shouldn't be allowed to live in San Diego if Jorge Manzanillo from Tecate isn't. I belong somewhere near the Baltic, but I live here in San Diego, so why should I deny someone else the opportunity that I was given by my ancestors? So why is this such a big deal right now? Because the Republican party is using it as a distraction from the real problems we are facing: high energy costs, futile and losing wars on drugs, terrorism and Islam, vast differences in wealth of the American people, a broken and worsening public education system and of course our weakening position in world politics. You'll notice that every politician advocating a border fence is also a staunch conservative who uses his religion as justification for many of his political decisions.


So here's a scenario of what WILL happen if these vigilantes are allowed to continue patrolling the border.


A Vietnam Vet is sitting on his easy chair on a sunny afternoon in southern Arizona when he sees a hint of movement in the distance. He sits at attention and tries to peer into the distance as to what it is. As the movement becomes more clearly human he reaches for his shotgun. The man is starting to get nervous and anxious anticipating a hostile immigrant. As the figure is within shouting distance the Vet yells out "Turn around and go back to Mexico or be shot!". The man either doesn't hear him or doesn't understand and continues to move closer. The Vet's trigger finger is now trembling and suddenly a bird lands nearby and startles him. BLAM!! The figure falls to the ground, dead by shotgun fire.


Now does it matter who that man was? If he was an illegal immigrant the Vigilantes might say that it was justified, but he could have been another minuteman or a Border Patrol officer. Can you honestly tell me that if these minutemen are allowed to continue dolling out justice on their own time that we wont see an event like this? After all, the vice president was a very experienced hunter and he shot his friend in the face...

The Homogenization of America (and the world)

This Sunday on the Sopranos there was a great storyline about Tony's reluctance to sell a property to the Jamba Juice Corporation because of the impact it would have on his old neighborhood. It brought up a very good point: our cities are becoming carbon copies of one another and we're abandoning our past. Tony felt this guilt when he saw the little old Italian lady from the old neighborhood, as he was partially responsible for the shift in demographics. While this nation is becoming more ethnically diverse, we are losing our culture completely. Basically every city in the US has a Starbucks, Jamba Juice, McDonalds, Krispy Kreme, etc. But what is happening to the specialized local business? Tony's property was being used by a chicken and egg shop, something that you'd never see in "new" cities like Omaha, Oklahoma City or even San Diego. But that shop was part of the neighborhood's personality and identity, and Tony had a lot of trouble coming to grips with the fact that selling the property would be more profitable than retaining it. In the end, his reluctance to sign ended up making him almost double the money.


What made this storyline compelling to me was that it is a great representation of what really happens in this country. I remember when Burlingame Avenue (in Burlingame, the city where I started high school) was this hip, alternative shopping street with unique shops and a distinctive personality. In the 90s it started to change, first a Noah's Bagels and Starbucks moved in, then Bebe, Banana Republic and a bunch of other retail chain stores found in every shopping mall in rich cities in the US. All of a sudden, Burlingame Avenue just became an outdoor shopping mall with very little difference from Hillsdale Mall (the main mall in San Mateo). Recently our favorite Chinese restaurant (Gau Pong) closed its doors, though I haven't been back to the Bay Area since to see what moved in. I used to love going to the funky little shops and seeing all of the unique people on Burlingame Avenue, but now it's just rich people, yapping toy dogs and BMWs like everywhere else in the Bay Area.


Even Garnet Avenue in San Diego is undergoing the same kind of change. H&R block wouldn't have been in a beach neighborhood 20 years ago, but now it's right next door to the 24 Hour Fitness and STA travel, which could be in any city in the US. Ocean Beach hasn't had this process kick into gear yet, but it's only a matter of time before we lose the uniqueness of that wonderful neighborhood. Imagine if Haight Street became just like Union Street with Ben & Jerry's next to Starbucks, next to the Gap, next to McDonalds...wouldn't that hurt San Francisco and it's personality? Why would people want Starbucks instead of a alternative and funky coffeeshop in their neighborhood? Starbucks is devoid of any real personality and it isn't exactly cheap either. Not only that, but the local family-owned coffee shop has a certain personal touch that a Starbucks could never have.


This problem isn't just here in the States, but we're surely ground zero for the homogenization of the world. The melting pot, where everything comes in with it's own unique personality and traits, and ends up a diluted version of itself. Think of your Italian friends, how many of them speak Italian? How many of them know a family recipe for marinara? In this country we are taught that our background is something to ignore, that we are "Americans". This is why there is such an anti-immigrant sentiment, because they come in with their own traditions and people don't like to see things get shaken up. When I was in Russia, I saw McDonalds, Burger King, KFC, and even Pizza Hut! Do we really want to take a trip halfway across the world to go to a mediocre fast food place? The corporations aren't to blame though, it's only natural to seek out more profits and growth when running a business. I just don't understand why people go to Taco Bell or Del Taco when La Playita or Antonio's Taco Shop is better and just as cheap? Why go to Pizza Hut when you have Amici's? I rarely go to those chain places, not because I am boycotting them, but because I get more out of going to my local shop. Not only that, but I am supporting someone who needs it. I'd much rather my $4 go to Antonio's than to the shareholders of Taco Bell.


So the next time you plan on going to Jamba Juice, go to Chronic Smoothies. When you are craving a burger, go to Rocky's. When you want Chinese, don't go to Panda Express, find your own Gau Poang. It wont cost you any more and you'll get a lot more out of it. Otherwise, in 20 years we may not have any locally owned restaurants to eat at. And by 2032 maybe all restaurants really will be Taco Bell...hey if it happened in the movies, why can't it happen in real life?

Mexico's Big Move

After a week off in my Series 7 class, I am back at work and have the time to blog again. In the meantime, Kevin Mench realized that he wears a size 12.5 shoe and hit homers in 7 straight games after getting a pair of shoes that fit...this guy has the biggest head in the majors (size 8 hat) but probably the smallest brain. Who knows how good he could have been if he knew his own shoe size when he was 20 and not 28!


And now to the blog...


Over the past week the Mexican government made a huge decision to legalize basically all drugs for personal use. Conservatives are outraged about this saying that it "undermines the war on drugs"...but isn't that what it is supposed to do? Mexico has shown that the United States is no longer able to dictate the policy of other nations and that the war on drugs may be finally coming to a well-deserved end. I am just incredibly surprised that Mexico was the nation to do this. Being a conservative catholic nation with a history of authoritarian governance, Mexico seemed an unlikely candidate to perform a liberal action that hasn't even happened in The Netherlands or Germany.


Opponents of this landmark bill have claimed that it will cause the number of addicts to explode and will somehow increase crime. Isn't the main source of crime related to drugs the fact that they've been made illegal? Legalizing for personal use frees up the police to focus their attention and time on actual criminals and not people just looking to alter their consciousness, kill pain (physical or psychological), or even have a good time. After all, we have legalized alcohol, and that's a major source of violence, crime, accidents and addiction. The other claim here in San Diego made by our mayor Jerry Sanders (a former Police Chief) was that we'd see all kinds of crime and drugs coming over our borders...but isn't that what happens now?


The way I see it is instead of all of that cocaine coming over the border, we'll see more people going down to TJ to snort some blow and party till sunrise. This will actually help the crime here because people will be able to find the drugs a lot easier in Tijuana without fear of prosecution for the possession as long as they keep under the legal limit. This way the drug traffic will be shifted partially from the Cartels to the individual users. Not only that, but when people are partying while all coked up they are violent and aggressive. I honestly believe that those who love partying while coking up will be more likely to stay in TJ if they don't have to be concerned with arrest.


The other reason why I think this is a good law to be passed for the safety of Americans is the shakedowns the corrupt cops are known for. This is taking away a major weapon of corruption, because they will no longer be able to extort bribes from people partying in Tijuana with a little cocaine, marijuana or MDMA. Personal habits are impossible to regulate and the war on drugs has failed miserably while costing us billions. Mexico will prove to be a pioneer and the drug war will not be supported by too many countries within a couple of years. The European Union has already had a number of regions decriminalize some drugs, and this move by Mexico will give their liberalization movement wings. Our government has already seen efforts in a number of states to legalize, and cities such as Denver, Oakland and Santa Cruz have essentially decriminalized marijuana. It's obvious that the world has grown tired of America's hegemony and we no longer have the complete economic dominance to continue to be the world's dictator.


When we see that Mexico doesn't slip into anarchy and chaos from the legalization, maybe our voting populace will actually realize how stupid they've been for 70 years. But then again, most of the American people still think that legalizing marijuana will cause more problems when they've completely neglected to take a look at what happened in the Netherlands when they passed their legalization bill. Wouldn't you rather we earn 25 cents on every dollar spent on drugs (by taxing them) than spending it? Wouldn't we rather our policemen spend their time booking criminals guilty of assault or robbery instead of frat boys with a gram of coke and joint? It's the regulation of personal behavior that needs to stop if we are to continue to be a factor in the 21st century.