mamacate

Another high-minded political post

Here's my endorsement for the other party.

Warning...so not work appropriate, I can't even tell you.  And just in case someone else is as out of the loop as I was, it's a parody of this.

Otherwise, I'm knitting slowly, packing to go on vacation, and working too much.  In other words, very little to say.  See you after my latitude attitude adjustment.

Tuesday

You know what to do.

(I'll also count this as my poetry reading for the day.)

Go Mass!

Today the Mass legislature defeated an attempt to put my civil rights on the ballot in 2008.  The next chance they have is 2012, and we have a lot of time to get people to grow up change minds between now and then.   My governor, the house speaker and senate president, and my stalwart state senator and representative made this happen, along with organizations like Mass Equality.  The support of a strong progressive leadership team is inspiring.

Is this what it feels like to live in Canada?

For Molly

Molly Ivins died yesterday.  I heard it first from Mel.

I think the New York Times, despite being No Fun, did a good job with her obit.

The last column she wrote gave us clear marching orders to "stand up against the surge."

I don't know about you, but I'm in the habit of listening to Molly.  I'm damn well not going to stop now.

If you're in the US, why don't you join me?  She'd want us to keep raising hell, you know.

Goodbye, Molly.  And thank you.

In Which There Are Pictures, Significantly More of a House, a Kid-Induced Bad Hair Day, Some Reasonable Outrage, and News of a Coming Toaster Award

The house is starting to look real.  I sort of believe it might someday be finished.  I mean, not counting on anything, but it does appear that there may, in fact, be at point at which I'm not sleeping in my dining room.

Also,

J (aka Jerry Poppins aka Governor aka the new male in-home day caregiver) and I were able to talk a bit because we were having our hair done by a pair of short hairdressers.  It was really hard to get the full sense from a photo (truly, it had to bee seen to be believed), but here's the best photo of it I have (with the artist in the picture--Henry did J's hair).

Truly, there's rather a lot of hair bling in there.  Anyway, it was a good talk, and we're happy, he's happy, and the kids are happy, and man, I'm just hoping the wind doesn't change.

Now for the outrage.  (For those not tuned in to the US news cycle and its cynical horrors, look here if you can stand it.)  I mean, it's horrifying that the hypocritical republicans let this go on.  But now they're trying to turn it on us truly boring gay people.  I mean, we're the ones whom you're trying to write out of the constitution just want to be able to get married.  You know, to be, um, monogamously committed to one (adult, consenting, power-equal) person.  Some of us don't even need the piece of paper to maintain our extreme boringosity.  The idea that you can claim a gay cabal in the republican house of representatives, and then blame this on gay people?  I...I....I mean...I just...what can you say?  How do you respond to something like this?  Excuse me while I scream now.

Before all this happened, however, I was doing something a bit more constructive than screaming.  I've been making calls for get-out-the-vote efforts in key races across the country.  It's easy to do and you can do it from home, and truly, most people are very nice and those that aren't just hang up.  So if you feel like it, I gather they need people to call in Foley's former district.  Go here to sign up.  Also, I've contributed to the exciting Mass. governor's race.  You can too if you like, here.  And then I think all we can do is keep screaming, because it seems like a pretty reasonable thing at this point.  And calling and contributing and volunteering, and...whatever you can, I guess.

Oh, and go me, I've biked to work every day this week.  I have a new bike on order, delayed with a shipping mixup--I'll tell you all about it when I get it, but i'm psyched.  I've got to get totally in the habit before the bad weather and really early nightfalls come.  I'm on my way.  And seriously, Riin, thanks for the inspiration.

As for toaster, master enabler Shannon Okey will be stopping by here tomorrow morning (hopefully fully recovered from her tête-à-tête with Dolores) with tips for the enabler and the enablee.  I love her new book: she gets a toaster for the thousands of new spinners she will no doubt create through it.  See you tomorrow!

 

Somebody Get Me Some Spackle.

Evolution Major Vanishes From Approved Federal List

Kellee, step away from the rusty farm implements.

Also, Mafia?  Is this proof enough that it is that bad?  And who are you and where did you put my fellow lefty paraniod conspiracy theorist friend anyway?

Speaking of lefty paranoid conspiracy theorists, thanks, mom, for the link to the article.

Too. Much. To. Say.

Must. Create. Separate. Blog.

http://mamacate.typepad.com/reality_tv_sociology/

Reality TV Sociology has its own blog.  My recap of Episode 1 of Black.White ("white people are stupid: discuss") is up.  I'm begging inviting blog contributors--come be a reality tv sociologist for a day!

See you there.

And Now a Word From the Reality TV Sociology Department

I give you Minh's predictions for tonight's premiere of Black/White (gentlewomen, start your TiVos).  Apparently reality TV sociology doesn't pay so well, because he's also taking bets on the side.  Anyone up for some action on the show?  Though I gotta say, lousy odds on the last one, dude, you need a lot more zeros on that number.  Sad but true.

Anyway, from Minh, with permission, of course:

I think the obvious message from this show will be that Race matters.  More specifically, the White family will realize that overt racism does indeed exist.  Although it will be mostly subtle examples, they will be treated more poorly (while black) than they originally expected.  This realization will be a big shock to them, because they will be coming from a color-blind ideology.  It will start as a novelty, but the whole experience of being black will be difficult on them.  It will be a slow process, but will ultimately be an eye opener that will change their world view (at least they way it will be presented on TV).  I think the issue of class will be brought up, but will not be considered seriously.

The Black family will not be impacted in the same way at all.  Their role in the show will not be the same as the white family's.  Although the show appears to be set up to make this an equal experiment, I think that the Black family is there to be the educators rather than participants (their experiences as white people aren't as important or interesting I don’t think).  Their purpose is to teach the White people about the "real" or "true" perspective on race.  Although they will have varied experiences, they will not make much about their observations around inequality.  They may get treated with more respect in some situations, but it will be more of an "I knew it all along" affirmation.  They may find that being White isn't as "easy" as they originally thought it would be, but this won't be life changing for them.  They will be more uncomfortable playing white than expected, and will be very happy to go back to being black.

Not groundbreaking predictions, and maybe I'm not giving the producers enough credit, but I'm sticking to them!  So if I’m right, I can say that all my years of education are good for predicting outcomes on reality TV shows on trading races and I can consider a career change.  If I’m wrong, it will be sad and embarrassing, and I will need to re-study for my race reality TV comps exam.  Now to seal these predictions up in a safe somewhere ... do you think Vegas has bets I can place on the show?

1:1   all cast members will complain about the make up process

2:1   the term “ignorant” will be used at least once an episode

4:1   more than 3 people will cry when this is all over

10:1  the kids will hook up (a modern day Romeo and Juliet)

20:1 someone is going to use a racial slur to someone’s face

50:1 a fist fight will break out

250:1 the black family decides to stay white forever

2500:1 racial conflict in the US ends

Tools to Assist Your Spiral into Despair

Despite my busy-busy-ness (it's getting better! I'm almost there!  next week will be better!), I am unable to rip my gaze from the horror of Katrina and its aftermath and the utter travesty of the government response.  I know I'm one of the people who have been saying how horrible, incompentent, or possibly evil the Bush administration is for all this time.  The really bad part is that this situation has proved those things to be far more gravely true than even I was willing to believe until now.  Even now I hope and pray that some of these facts (sadly well-documented now) turn out to be untrue.

But I just wanted to tell you that if your mental health is already down the tubes with this whole thing anyway, and you have no hope of turning your eyes from the horror and muttering new-age affirmations to yourself about how the universe is in balance or some such, it turns out that Teresa and Patrick Nielsen Hayden are once again providing absolutely seminal coverage of this tragedy.  Teresa's words from after the election still echo in my mind; once again they've gotten it exactly right.

Most particularly, check out here:

What we did on our vacation

Welcome to the insurgency (here's your accordion)

Not an imaginary story

They even have advice for dealing with news overload.  Not that they're taking their own advice.  Or making it easy for the rest of us.  But I thank them anyway.

In addition, there's the somewhat surprisingly excellent coverage of Brian Williams of NBC, whose blog is here, and of course the Times-Picayune, the absolute source.  And this interesting source from inside, including a web cam and daily photos.

Back to my report.  Can I just say how much I love clients with whom I have exchanges like this:

Me: I'll get it to you September 9th.

(two weeks pass)

Them: I was wondering what the ETA on the report would be; we want to plan a presentation date after the committee has had time to read it.

Me: It will be in your inbox first thing Monday morning (September 12th).

Them: Oh, that's wonderful!  Thank you so much!  We're so excited!

Thank you to the goddess of research deadlines for finding me a client who realizes that the difference between Friday night and Monday morning means nothing to them and everything to me. 

Yip-yah-hoo.

Devastating

On vacation, I've been kind of insulated from news coverage.  I had some data work to do today, and I turned on CNN to keep my mind occupied while I did routine tasks in Excel and SPSS.

Bad idea.

The coverage was really, really upsetting.  I could rant and rave for hours, I could talk about how when we try to get something for nothing, when we wage war while cutting taxes and ignoring the poor and hoping for the best, I could talk about that.  I could talk about the open letter Michael Moore sent to the president today.  I could talk about how my heart shattered every time they talked about how many infants had died in the superdome and how many corpses were outside the convention center and I could talk about what I wanted to do when I heard that they had sent the guard in, not to bring food and water but to stop looters, with orders to shoot to kill.  When C-Span turned away from the smug republican press conference when someone asked what they say to people who see black faces being left to suffer and die and they start to wonder if it's not because this suffering is happening to black and poor Americans. And when I heard that relief supply distribution points in Biloxi are in places only accessible by car.  Or how I cheered when I heard the Congressional Black Caucus speak the truth.

Or I could just tell you that I cried.

I don't normally blog about tragedies like this.  I don't typically cry at the news.  I often yell, and almost invariably roll my eyes, but I've managed to harden myself a bit to it all.  I didn't cry after 9/11, even though it happened outside my parents' living room window.  But this is too much, too big, and most of all, too terribly wrong.  We HAVE the resources, no one can say that we haven't, to save human lives.  And we're not.  And it makes me want to scream and cry all at the same time.

There's little I can do, in this reality here, but there are a couple of things.

First, knitters, as always are ready to help.  Thank you to Susan and Margene for organizing our community with Give a Little.  I did.  I hope you will too.

If you know anyone within driving distance from the tragedy, there's a wonderful effort connecting people with housing with those who are displaced.  Being in Mass., I can't be of much help, but if you're near and you can, please consider volunteering your space.  Go to http://www.hurricanehousing.org.

Air America has some great links and is coordinating a wonderful effort to connect people by phone, a more practical method than the Internet-based attempts.  If you know anyone who is looking for someone, or know anyone who might have someone trying to reach them, call 1-888-217-6255 and you can leave information linked to a non-working phone number.  A very smart idea.

Or if, like me, your connections to the Big Easy are in the deep past (my father went to college and then lived there for a while, and was involved in civil rights work during that time), and you can't make any direct offers of help, we at least can offer a donation in hopes that someone can help.