slavery

driftglass gets it right:

In 1861 the South was prosperous specifically because of the forced labor of four million brown people who were reviled, exploited, abused and utterly necessary.

In 2006, America is prosperous specifically because of the peonage-cheap, illegal labor of twelve million brown people who are reviled, exploited, abused and utterly necessary.

We tolerate with a wink-and-a-nudge a system that simultataneously criminalizes a labor force of twelve million to keep them underground and terrified, and then carefully extracts their labor for pennies.

Any social policy which doesn’t confront immigration on those terms will fail and fail badly because, in the end, we really only have two choices: Either a renegotiation of the social contract to pay working people a living wage, or an open recognition that we will forever rely more and more on cheaper and cheaper labor to remain spoiled and Holy.

christianistas

the christianistas are holding a conference in DC entitled "the war on christianity and the values voters" or some such bullshit---since they think they are at war with us, maybe we oughta oblige and give them a real war.

must be spring

event 1----Sunday, late afternoon, sidewalk on 10th just west of myrtle----a roundy-round with hershey and another dog, which provoked comments from the other dog's men people about it being a "butt sniffing sunday" and much laughter all around as we try to keep moving, only to be intercepted as i turn to go by one of another pair of what must have surely been gay homosexuals, one of which leans in to kiss me in the mouth as they walk by---

event 2----an hour later, relaxing in my chair, reveling in the knowledge that someone had actually kissed me, someone not unattractive and decidely younger, whatever his sick and perverted reasons for that blatant display of homosexuality----my arm casually hanging over one arm of the chair, and the dog sniffing at my arm the way a dog will, but then all of a sudden deciding to mount the arm and hunch it, which he has never done before---

event 3---monday night about 9:30---2nd-husband kevin calls me up to say he'll be in town next week, before and after a visit to charlotte to see his folks----

evenr 4---after work, between 5:15 and about 6 i read brokeback mountain (have yet to see the movie)

event 5---i toss and turn the night through with crappy kinda dreams---

conclusion: love's a bitch and we got a fukn aries sunsign going on, although i dont know if that accounts for kevin or the butt-sniffing dogs.

chris bliss

midtown changing

i got used to the lack of change in inman park---sure the buildings got renovated and "upgraded" and the whole neighborhood looked a helluva lot better than it did when i moved over there in 1977.

but midtown, at least the part west of piedmont, is changing all over the place---the blocks just south of the metropolis will be next to go---

spring

i noted the vernal equinox in concord, new hampshire, where spring has definitely not yet arrived---but it's spring in midtown

fools

how can tom cruise be such a fool? and isaac hayes? parker and stone will get the last laugh:

So, Scientology, you may have won THIS battle, but the million-year war for
earth has just begun! Temporarily anozinizing our episode will NOT stop us from
keeping Thetans forever trapped in your pitiful man-bodies. Curses and drat! You
have obstructed us for now, but your feeble bid to save humanity will
fail! Hail Xenu!!!
- Trey Parker and Matt Stone, servants of the dark
lord Xenu."

the view

a lot of things attracted me to this place---but it was the view that sealed the deal---and it is the view upon which i meditate each day--sunsets and sunrises of course---tracking the sun's progress as it rises higher in the sky each day---next week, it'll be over the equator for the vernal equinox---somehow, in a way i can not yet describe, seeing horizon to horizon every day is a profound experience

hershey

this is hershey sinclair deuteron, but all his friends just call him hershey---staring at his pink ball, trying to will it into my hand so i will throw it---time for his evening constitutional

windows

i'm not sure why i like this image so much, except that it somehow reminds me of how i feel most of the time---anyway it seems like a good place to begin this bit of exhibitionism known as blogging---we'll see