It is from Steve Clemons post on The Washington Note: Rebuilding America's Stock of Power and it is mostly a review of Charles Kupchan's essay titled "Grand Strategy: The Four Pillars of the Future."
Relax, read all the links and let your mind think beyond the corporate media's coming circus of doom coverage of the 2012 Presidential Election.
The NFL, NBA, NHL and MBA should be offering up our super star 20-something athletes to fight for America. Same goes for the young music artists and TV and movie actors. These young guys are in the best physical shape of any American kid their age. What a patriotic inspiration that would be... these young men defending the country that has given them so much.
Let's roll!
Next day: Rain, 50 degrees, no more snow, but flooding.
A tradition that started with the release of The Godfather Part 3 is to go to the movies as a group on the day after Christmas. This year it was Avatar. I some how managed to skip it with the promise to mind Mom while everyone was away. We watched cooking shows. She likes Chef Ming.
Chinese Food take out feast that night. (egg rolls!!!!!! with duck sauce and hot mustard).
Final day: Cheesesteaks for lunch and the night flight back to LAX. Security, even after Amsterdam declared war on us, was minimal and easy. Sat and watched a Terrorism Special on CNN with my fellow travelers. The flight was six hours of which I slept five. The best the Republican Party can do is Newt Gingrich? Every time I turn the TV on, one of our right-wing, suck-ass News shows is interviewing the biggest loser from the 1990s.
Where are the Republican leaders? Where are their smart people? And don’t give me this Sarah Palin bullshit.
Are there no Senators or Congress-folks from the Republican Party that are not consider freaks by any normal American? I guess not because there are none available…and my cable news babble is 24/7.
The Republican Party is deader than dead in the water. Looks like their policies, both domestic and foreign, have left their philosophies and their 'brand' in tatters…as well as leaving the nation shipwrecked.
So why not just not interview any Republicans? Nobody wants to hear from them. We want to know what the Democrats are thinking.
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I don’t like Bill Richardson, never have. But I do think it is very interesting that President-elect Obama would talk to Senator Clinton about the Secretary of State job. Boy, what a Democratic whammy that would be.
The professional Clinton haters, both conservative and liberal progressive, are already screaming reasons why Bill would fuck things up if his wife were in such a prestigious job. But think about it; think of how Democrats voted in this last primary. It sure would be tempting to have Hillary around and Bill only a phone call away, even if just bounce ideas off of.
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Well, there just doesn’t seem to be any good news for Americans as the holidays approach. Our kids are so used to getting anything they ask for and this season that may just not be possible. It will test our mettle as a ‘brat-nation’. We’ll see if our kids still love us when they can’t have a new Wii or iPhone...or worse, have to drop out of college...or move with the family out of your house and into an apartment.
I don’t want to debate a New Deal; I just want a rocket lit under one.
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I have a credit card that has moved between four different banks since the summer.
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Question of the day…I would call it the question of the week, but we may not have that much time…Will the Volt save Detroit?
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I couldn’t wait for Christmas. I bought myself the latest installment of the Oxford History of the United States, From Colony To Superpower: U.S. Foreign Relations Since 1776 written by George C. Herring. 1000 pages of history. Yummy. It’s going straight into the bathroom.
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My favorite song this week is Elvis Presley’s Tomorrow Is A Long Time, a cover of the Bob Dylan song. I have listened to this song over a hundred times this week. It is a great version and brings out the best in both artists. I wish Elvis had done more serious work like this song. He never seemed to trust himself to take himself seriously…or had doubts others would. This song shows why Elvis is the once and future King.
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I’m out of Port! That will not stand. Today’s mission is to venture out and re-supply.
-- Television was loaded this past week with white people at war with tanks in Europe and white people swimming in China. I have to admit it is kind of mesmerizing to watch tanks roll down city streets in Europe. It’s like playing Call of Duty. It is even more fun watching the President not give a fuck as he waves flags and tries to hit on beach volley ball chicks.
-- McCain is still running for President and sounding like a feeble, senile, mean old man.
-- Has Senator Obama given the nomination back to Hillary Clinton? What brilliant Democratic strategist thought it was a good idea to ignore the world and the Presidential campaign because Americans would be watching the Hamm brothers try to steal more gold medals in Beijing? Well guess what, bra, the Hamm brothers stayed home and are distributing McCain flyers while you are running around shirtless on a beach in Hawaii. Why is it always painful to watch Democratic Presidential campaigns unfold? Eight years of George Bush, Jr. and this is what the Democratic Party gives me to work with. Get off your Kenyan/Hawaiian ass and get back in the race. We are depending on you, and the Republicans and the Media are going to kick it into overdrive in September and October.
-- Instead of getting a job, Ellen is going to get married this weekend to her girlfriend. That should spark another book deal and maybe a reality show.
-- No one wins a silver or bronze medal at the Olympics anymore, they lose the gold.
-- Babe Ruth died August 16, 1948. My favorite Babe story comes from Big Leagues by Stephen Fox: "At a party celebrating the 1928 pennant, Babe Ruth stood on a chair—a beer in one hand, sandwich in the other—an announced, “Any girl who doesn’t want to fuck, can leave now.” Few left."
-- I lost Pat Conroy after Beach Music; in fact Pat Conroy may have lost Pat Conroy after Beach Music. There were other writers to hype, like Cormac McCarthy and Michael Chabon. Last week my friend from back east gave me My Losing Season, written in 2002 by Pat Conroy. Sad and deep, brothers, sad and deep. Put this in your mid-life crisis friend’s Christmas stocking this year.
-- Musically this week, I am still trapped in the 1970’s and loving it. We’re talking Joe Walsh, Heart and Dave Mason’s Alone Together deep into the ‘70’s. Heart released Dreamboat Annie Live celebrating the 30th anniversary of the release of their first album, Dreamboat Annie. Man, time flies. I remember being a screaming adolescent seeing the band live; all flutes and mandolins and long white dresses looking like gypsy rock goddesses and the perfect fantasy prom dates. Clean and wholesome rock & roll. Well, Ann Wilson’s big ole’ voice is not so big anymore and kind of sounds like I look thirty years on, kind of a ragged, bloated and fractured version of its formal self, but still screaming like the music is the most important thing…and the encore is Led Zeppelin. Let’s hope so.
I will be posting some alternatives each night to watching the Olympic coverage on NBC.
FRIDAY: Olypmpic Opening Ceremonies from 7pm - 11pm (Lame-assed Chinese propaganda about how they too are as gross as America)
FRIDAY: Turner Classic Movies Evening Lineup starting at 7:30pm (Michael Caine night)
7:30 PM Alfie (1966)
A British womanizer refuses to grow up until tragedy strikes. Cast: Michael Caine, Vivien Merchant, Shelley Winters. Dir: Lewis Gilbert. C-114 mins, TV-14, CC, Letterbox Format
9:30 PM Pulp (1972)
A pulp fiction novelist fights to survive an assignment to ghost write a controversial star's memoirs. Cast: Michael Caine, Mickey Rooney, Lizabeth Scott. Dir: Michael Hodges. C-95 mins, TV-PG, Letterbox Format
11:10 PM Short Film: Lion Roars Again, The (1975)
An MGM promotional featurette advertising its resurgence into the movie industry in the mid-1970s. Showcased movies include "Logan's Run" (1976), "The Sunshine Boys" (1975), and "The Wind and the Lion" (1975). C-17 mins.
11:30 PM Get Carter (1971)
A small-time gangster searches for the truth behind his brother's death. Cast: Michael Caine, Ian Hendry, Britt Ekland. Dir: Mike Hodges. C-112 mins, TV-14, CC, Letterbox Format
All young men should watch Alphie and Get Carter. They are rites of passage.
- In the unlikely event that Hillary Clinton takes the Democratic Presidential nomination (and she will literally have to take it at the the convention) many progressive Obama supporters will not vote for her and will probably find solace in voting for a third party, Republican sponsored, progressive candidate, thus giving the election to John McCain.
- If Obama wins the Democratic nomination, the Press and the Republican Party will see to it that he loses 49 out of 50 States. (A large part of the Democratic Party machine, sitting on their hands or unwelcome in the Obama campaign will watch bitterly from the sidelines).
- When John McCain becomes President the world will once and for all turn their backs on America as a serious influence in the world. What possible use would Europe or Asia or South America have for us? We are a nation of bridge burners.
- Economic Musing: By the second half of this century your grandchildren will be sewing blue jeans for $5.00 a week for Chinese export.
- President Reagan did away with most of the College Student Grants in the 1980's so Americans had to go into debt to educate themselves. Now the Student Loan network is collapsing. This didn't come up at the ABC debate in Philadelphia. (learn to sew blue jeans)
- Our television shows are not going to be needing commercial breaks to sell products. (That damned mute button should never have been allowed on remotes.) Products are going to be incorporated into the programs so its more of a brainwashing. NBC is starting with some on-line experiments and well, we'll keep watching. Just another thing changing this century...for the worse as movies, internet, games, TV all blend into one system that makes us capable of doing nothing else but...sew blue jeans.
- A friend of mine just gave me The Complete Tom Sawyer novels by Mark Twain. (This includes Tom Sawyer, Detective !) I am going to sit in my yard and let myself drift back to a more youthful, more innocent time. With a drink in my hand of course.
"I have never let my schooling interfere with my education." - Mark Twain
The poor, already digging deep to pay for expensive gasoline, also will face much higher heating fuel costs, especially if oil prices stay near record levels.
Consumer groups and state energy officials have sounded the alarm, saying a federal program to help poor families pay heating bills will have nowhere near the money needed to cover those expected to seek assistance.
The government's Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, known as LIHEAP, only has enough funding to cover 16 percent of the 38 million poor households eligible for the program."
This President, his entire Administration and the Republican Party do not care about this issue.
The Christian Right will not be quoting passages from the New Testament about charity to their Republican representatives on this issue.
When low-income Seniors freeze to death this winter, the Bush, Jr. Administration will use that as proof that there is no such thing as global warming.
