Don't Look Now, The Arseholes Are Creeping In!

As a refugee from the anti-smoking wars in NYC, it is dismaying to see that the disease of legislated morality is spreading like an ebola of the mind.

First, we must change all plans and rush to Ireland before New Years Eve if we ever want to see it in its natural state again because beginning on the first of the year, Ireland will become the first EU country to ban smoking in pubs.

Enveloped in a cloud of smoke and clutching a glass of Ireland's most famous export, Leslie -- a 54-year-old builder with the mannerisms of a left-bank philosopher -- says: "This is not America. Over here it's part of our culture to drink and smoke.".

Not any more, Paddy. Just drink and shuddup, yea. Smoking is baaaaad for you, dontcha know? And thank GOD we have an absolutely brilliant load of government bureaucrats throughout the world who couldn't pass a law to help society to save their pathetic, slinking lives of corruption and thievery but can damned well mumble the same hymns and slogans over and over again if it helps save the bloody nation from death by smoking and GOD ONLY KNOWS how cancer is ONLY CAUSED by smoking, not by oh, let's say the burning of fossils fuels, such as gasoline in cars or coal in power plants, that create air pollutants such as ozone, airborne particles small enough to be inhaled, carbon dioxide and other gases. Or the shite and preservatives they put in food to make it more convenient for our busy lives to have five seconds for a tastily-nuked meal to shove down our healthy traps.

"God help the fellas from the Department of Health who have to enforce the ban," says one local drinker, tucking into his second pint of Guinness before lunch.

Coming on the heels of this is the ribald quackery are the arseholes at the Lancet who are calling for a jihad against smoking, whining that the Government should all be our morality nannies and calls on the Government to ban tobacco to "save the lives of hundreds of thousands of people" and make tobacco an illegal product.

Ohhh dear, save hundreds of thousands of people! We must enlist for this straight away but tell me dear Mullahs good vicars, why not insist upon a smoking ban now, everywhere, forever? Why not insist that everyone eat yogurt and meditate over the bible or over medical journals or over good health and we all pray for good karma and no giant meteors to strike us and that we all live for ever and ever, billions of years even, Amen, because if we stop all those mean old tobacco smokers from smoking, we could save BILLIONS of useless lives straight away!

"If tobacco were an illegal substance, possession of cigarettes would become a crime, and the number of smokers would drastically fall. Cigarette smoking is a dangerous addiction. We should be doing a great deal more to prevent this disease and to help its victims. We call on Tony Blair's government to ban tobacco," it says.

Better still, let's read what the Lancet says about Desultory Turgescence's favorite jackal-in-waiting, George W. Bush:

"Since Sept 11, 2001, President Bush's main preoccupation has become the safety of the American people. Their health is taking a back seat. While searching for weapons of mass destruction abroad, Bush is in danger of ignoring the real and proven effects of a harmful agent found in his country--tobacco. The evidence that tobacco products kill or disable is incontrovertible. "

Yes indeed, let's keep our priorities straight, shall we?

Jaysus! Don't they realize there is War on Terror being fought? (mumblemumble...)

If you're not convinced, have a look in the streets of Birmingham these days. Think all those armed police are patrolling the streets to fight off the evils of tobacco?

Hopefully, this anti-smoking hysteria will die out like the smoldering butt of a cigarette in an ashtray so we are not all forced to move from country to country like a caravan of smoking gypsies in search of less draconian anti-smoking regulations.

And if you have to, BURN your copies of the Lancet like a good ole Hamlet cigar in order to save the planet from more moralistic stupidity bleeding through.

Chanson du Jour:

Career Opportunities
The Clash

(Strummer/Jones)

The offered me the office, offered me the
shop
They said I'd better take anything they'd got
Do you wanna make tea at the BBC?
Do you wanna be, do you really wanna be a cop?

Career opportunities are the ones that never knock
Every job they offer you is to keep you out the dock
Career opportunity, the ones that never knock

I hate the army an' I hate the R.A.F.
I don't wanna go fighting in the tropical heat
I hate the civil service rules
And I won't open letter bombs for you

Bus driver....ambulance man....ticket inspector

They're gonna have to introduce conscription
They're gonna have to take away my prescription
If they wanna get me making toys
If they wanna get me, well, I got no choice

Careers
Careers
Careers

Ain't never gonna knock

IF I HAD A ROCKET LAUNCHER

Bruce Cockburn

Here comes the helicopter -- second time today
Everybody scatters and hopes it goes away
How many kids they've murdered only God can say
If I had a rocket launcher...I'd make somebody pay

I don't believe in guarded borders and I don't believe in hate
I don't believe in generals or their stinking torture states
And when I talk with the survivors of things too sickening to relate
If I had a rocket launcher...I would retaliate

On the Rio Lacantun, one hundred thousand wait
To fall down from starvation -- or some less humane fate
Cry for guatemala, with a corpse in every gate
If I had a rocket launcher...I would not hesitate

I want to raise every voice -- at least I've got to try
Every time I think about it water rises to my eyes.
Situation desperate, echoes of the victims cry
If I had a rocket launcher...Some son of a bitch would die

Queen OKs Sex Change Weddings

The Independant reports men and women who have had sex-change operations will be able to marry and adopt children for the first time under a change to the law to be announced in the Queen's Speech today.

The Gender Recognition Bill will allow transsexuals to tear up their birth certificates, which record their original sexes, and apply for fresh ones recording their new genders.

This of course, comes as wonderful news to a certain President of the United States because everyone now knows that George W. Bush is in fact, a black transsexual named Wilma. This explains his otherwise inexpliquable trip to England recently: to lobby the Queen for transsexual marriages and to begin plans to move to England with his wife and first lady, that tough Hombre, Laura Bush. It certainly beats Jail for the Bushes.

Of course, not all the news is "good" news. A bitter battle over the future of the Scottish parliament will be sparked today when the Queen's Speech opens the door to Holyrood reform. By the way, Holyrood is not Engrish for Hollywood, it is the The Queen's official residence in Scotland. The annual speech, which reveals the Government's agenda, will include plans to reopen the Scotland Act that set up devolution.

The main aim of the move is to take out a clause which would slash the number of MSPs from 129, in line with plans to cut the number of Scottish MPs from 72 to 59.

Coming on the heels of the Dutch 6-0 thrashing of Scotland last week, it spells bad news for those who believe that if it's not Scottish, it's crrrraaaaap!

******

28. RETAINING INTEGRITY

Whilst developing creativity,
also cultivate receptivity.
Retain the mind like that of a child,
which flows like running water.

When considering any thing,
do not lose its opposite.
When thinking of the finite,
do not forget infinity;

Act with honour, but retain humility.
By acting according to the way of the Tao,
set others an example.

By retaining the integrity
of the inner and external worlds,
true selfhood is maintained,
and the inner world made fertile.

The Tao Te Ching
A Translation by Stan Rosenthal

*****

On a completely different note, here are a few choice, hideous photos, via rotten:

Michael Jackson's mug shot

fingerhead

some poor bloke who did not quite make it all the way across the railroad tracks

*****

A final update on the World Cup of Rugby:

Rugby fans downed 37m pints.

The United Kingdom has one of the highest excise taxes on beer in the European Union. Estimates are than more than one million pints a day are being smuggled into Britain by increasingly organised criminal gangs.

It Must Be The Local Water:

Fat Buddha says:

"My two year old has taken to telling anyone who will listen "Bush go home!", at least when he isn't enquiring "you want a peice of me?". He doesn't get it from me."

My kind of kid.

England Wins!

Ah yes, jump on the bandwagon! Rugby has given England its first chance since 1966 to celebrate winning a world championship in any sport.

And let's just say that the accomplishment is enough to merit knighthood. England's coach, Clive Woodward, is already being called Sir around these parts, as is the nation's biggest hero, the soon-to-be, Sir Johnny who is rapidly replacing footballer David Beckham as England's biggest sports marketing entity.

Of course, Becks and Sir Johnny have already worked together doing Adidas commercials so, who knows, maybe they'll like, rule England if England win the Euro 2004 Championships in Portugal this summer.

*****

The World Values Survey is a worldwide investigation of sociocultural and political change. It is conducted by a network of social scientist at leading universities all around world. The survey is performed on nationally representative samples in almost 80 societies on all six inhabited continents. A total of four waves have been carried since 1981 allowing accurate comparative analysis.

The World Values Survey has produced evidence of gradual but pervasive changes in what people want out of life. Moreover, the survey shows that the basic direction of these changes is, to some extent, predictable.

According to surveys, Nigeria is the happiest nation in the world, (could it be the joy of all letter writing? After all, the Nigerian's are famous for their Nigerian Spam Blog, while the United States is only 16th on the list for overall satisfaction. Actually, England has leapfrogged everyone since Saturday afternoon's victory over Australia and by now, must rank number one happy, as they say in Chinese carry-out menus everywhere.

*****

If you're happy and you know it, clap your hands. Otherwise, you might end up on the FBI Shit List for malcontents and protesters who refuse to love the beloved leader, George W. Bush and his beloved wars.

*****

If you want to stay off of the FBI Shit List, perhaps it might be handy to memorize these 25 Rules For Being a Good Republican

1) You believe that drug addiction is a moral failing and a crime, unless the addict is a millionaire conservative radio jock which then makes it an "illness" and he needs our prayers for his "recovery".

2) You believe that those privileged from birth achieve success all on their own.

3) You believe that the US should get out of the UN, and that our highest national priority is to enforce the UN's resolutions against Iraq.

4) You believe that government should stay out of people's lives but it needs to punish anyone caught having private sex with the "wrong" gender.

5) You believe that pollution is okay, so long as it makes a profit.

6) You believe in prayer in schools, as long as they don't pray to Allah or Buddha.

7) "Standing Tall for America" means firing your workers and moving their jobs to India.

8) You believe that a woman cannot be trusted with decisions about her own body, but that large multi-national corporations can make decisions affecting all mankind with no regulation whatsoever.

9) You believe that you love Jesus and Jesus loves you, and that Jesus shares your hatred of homosexuals and Hillary.

10) You hate the ALCU for representing convicted felons, but they owed it to the country to bail out Oliver North.

11) You believe that the best way to encourage military morale is to praise the troops overseas while cutting their VA benefits.

12) You believe that group sex and drug use are degenerate sins that can only be purged by running for governor of California as a Republican.

13) You believe it is wise to keep condoms out of schools, because we all know if teenagers don't have condoms they won't have sex.

14) You believe that the best way to fight terrorism is to alienate our allies and then demand their cooperation and money.

15) You believe that government medicine is wrong and that HMOs and insurance companies have your best interests at heart.

16) You believe that giving free health care to all Iraqis is sound government policy but giving free health care to Americans is socialism.

17) You believe that tobacco's link to cancer and global warming are "junk science", but Creationism should be taught in schools.

18) You believe that waging war with no exit strategy was wrong in Vietnam but right in Iraq.

19) You believe that Saddam was a good guy when Reagan armed him, a bad guy when Bush's daddy made war on him, a good guy when Cheney was doing business with him, and a bad guy when Bush needed a "we can't find Bin Laden" diversion.

20) You believe that government should restrict itself to just the powers named in the Constitution, which includes banning gay marriages and censoring the internet.

21) You believe that the public has a right to know about the adulterous affairs of Democrats, while those of Republicans are a "private matter".

22) You believe that the public has a right to know about Hillary's cattle trades but that Bush was right to censor 28 pages from the Congressional 9.11 report because you just can't handle the truth.

23) You support state rights, which means Ashcroft telling states what locally passed voter initiatives he will allow them to have.

24) You believe that what Clinton did in the 1960's is of vital national interest but what Bush did in the 80s is "stale news" and "irrelevant".

25) You believe that trade with Cuba is wrong because it is communist, but trading with China and Vietnam is good for business.

Source: unknown

Da Bush Has Landed!

The man whom London Mayor Ken Livingstone called " the greatest threat to life on this planet that we've most probably ever seen" has arrived in London. Maybe that's why London is deploying 14,000 cops on the streets.

The Spectator has a nice Hail To The Chief homage, complete with silly photo:

"Buckingham Palace is not equipped to cope with George Bush. The 100 new telephone lines and elaborate satellite networks that inevitably accompany an American president are causing dismay. One courtier expressed alarm that they will disrupt domestic communications in the palace, above all committing the cardinal sin of interfering with the Queen’s favourite viewing, Channel Four Racing and Coronation Street. A palace source says that White House security men wanted a Black Hawk helicopter, identical to the gunships used in the Gulf war, hovering above the palace throughout the period of the presidential occupation, ready to shoot down with awesome fire-power any suicide bomber or terrorist seeking to crash a plane into Buckingham Palace. The Queen rejected the idea on the grounds that it would be ‘too noisy’. "


For up-to-the-minute information on Dubya's whereabouts and body parts, have a look at Chasing Bush.

or, Bush Flies to Fortress London


And, of course, in your free time, there is the ever-popular Impeach-Bush-Now

So when you're bored at watching the protesters shot down by over-zealous American secret service agents, you can all sing along to Bush's "Bomb":

Wanted to buy you shiny red things
Thought I'd be with you until the end
How did I know that I would be there
Blow me away
See if I care

Death of a future
Goodbye to my friends
Wish I could see you all again
Family hollow
Family real
Wish you were here see how I feel

Kill a man
Kill a girl
Kill a man
Kill a girl

Jekyll in you
Brins out the wired in me
I have no defense
I'm all that you see
The night is a bomb blast
The night is on fire
Sing with me in the gasoline choir

And you say you want to change our minds
I've paid for your belief with mine
Of all the bravest stands in ti;me

You stoop so low you'll never rise

The Metamorphosis of Lovers
Robert Marteau

On all sides the night cracks & splinters
And lovers find themselves covered in feathers
With grains of salt between the fingers.

Lovers are thirsty in their drained beds
For all the moisture has left for the sea
And in the window the roosters are pouting,
Pecking in the glass the last stars.

Lovers who carry white plumes and knives
Bleed these cocks in an earthenware bowl
Spead the blood that they may sleep,
Sleep in the chalk circle your arms seal.

MORE ZANY POETRY FROM JAAP STIJL

Radical Surgery

Uncle Sam blows a hole in the chest
of Iraq to kill cancer cells
instead of simple radiation,
drunk on patriot juice, waving his rifle

he applies shaving wounds
toilet paper dabs with an artery burst
gushing blood like wildcat oil veins
on the walls, across eyelashes,
beneath the shoes, poured
like concrete molds
into the subconscious;
an underworld of parasites
raining rouge and profiteers.

The patient explodes upon the table.

Car bombs go off in the abdomen,
snipers fire at blood clots,
every sect sets foot
to fight for space
in the sudden Twister game,
where the space is going
quickly.

He spackles up the arm pits
and wraps the forehead
while blood continues pouring out;
tapped at the Oktoberfest,
carried out by men of principles
questionable but for their enormous arms
which carried enormous jugs
of blood to drink in celebration
"There's plenty of blood to go around!"

The donors line up with contracts
and in the hot sun, filled with flies
and sandpaper, enlist themselves
for another stab at surgery,
for the wounded beyond recognition
and the history still repeating
at the dinner table, take two aspirin
and call me in the morning
for the cure for indigestion.

Oorlogsplein

the tailor clears his thread
and runs a needle through his throat.

ik ben tegen.

prayer that slithers like bad oysters
introduced and misguided

de waarheid

will fall in on deaf ears so
the screaming will mean nothing

illusies, slangenbezweerders

when stopping this hand,
cette main se trouvera demain
again because the cycle never ends:

kwesties

in the old years the old loves
will drip like leaky faucets
and the bones will ice over

voor grijpgiers

the remains never discovered remain
the thread that holds together
the strand of thought
you could do better.

The Neocon Architects

"The Neocon Architects will, in time, be more popular than spaghetti. They will boggle the eyes with spectacles of war and killing, they will bleed societies and kill their mothers. And they will raise their bloody palms to the skies, shrug their shoulders and say: 'At least I tried'...."

-- Alfredo Van Nucci, 11th century Glasic Poet

Otherwise, keep yer mout shut.

Smartlappen Festival, Utrecht

In search of a small weekend diversion, take the plane from Birmingham to Amsterdam and the train to Utrecht to visit the Smartlappenfestival 2003.

Of course, the main reason is to see friends, revisit old habitats like Cafe de Stad to watch the ever-wonderful Tranen met Tuiten and hang out in Cafe Marktzicht to watch The Cactus Cowboys do the business, make you moan and drink the ole Oranjeboom faster.

If was also good to be back and to watch the Dutch humiliate themselves by losing 1-0 to Scotland in the Euro 2004 playoffs.

Best of all, the Blues Estafette Vredenburg-Utrecht where for one small price, you could see the following live all day long on Saturday:

Howard Tate, Lou Pride, Charles Walker, Billy Lee Riley, Chick Willis, Fillmore Slim, Little Freddie King, The Spaniels, Ray Campi & The Supro Kings, Long John Hunter & Tom "Bluesman"Hunter - Brothers In Blues, Linda Shell & The Blues Thang, Joe Turner & His Memphis Blues Caravan with Karl Davis(vocals), Geno Parks with The Rhythm Rockers, Sam Taylor, The 100% Chicago Blues Tour featuring Little Smokey Smothers, Lurrie Bell and Matthew Skoller.

Beroep: Buschauffeur
© Ome Cor / speciaal geschreven voor het GVU, sponsor van het Smartlappenfestival

Als ik mijn dienstriem pak en mijn bus inroetsj
En van de garage naar mijn startpunt rij
Dan voel ik me als een koning in een gouden koets
Ik geef een poepie gas en ik voel me blij

Ik draai mijn hand niet om, om een gelede bus
Volgepakt achteruit te rijden
En met de Galgenwaard of een nachtelijke klus
Kun je mij af en toe best verblijden

Pas op! (pep pep) zwenkt uit!
Hier zit een beroeps achter de ruit
Ik lijn van Lombok tot Lunetten
Wat ze maar op de richtingsfilm zetten
En ik ben trots op wat ik ben
En dat ik ons hele stadsie ken

Ik steek mijn hand op naar mijn maten
Op het Ledig Erf geef ik ze de vijf
Maar ik raak echter wel in alle staten
Omdat het rooster nooit hetzelfde blijf

Pas op! (pep pep) zwenkt uit!
Hier zit een beroeps achter de ruit
Ik lijn van Lombok tot Lunetten
Wat ze maar op de richtingsfilm zetten
En ik ben trots op wat ik ben
En dat ik ons hele stadsie ken

Als ik dan thuis land, na een dag vol ritten
Horen ze enthousiast mijn verhalen aan
En dan ga ik met een glimlach pitten
Omdat ik morgen weer de weg op mag gaan

Pas op! (pep pep) zwenkt uit!
Hier zit een beroeps achter de ruit
Ik lijn van Lombok tot Lunetten
Wat ze maar op de richtingsfilm zetten
En ik ben trots op wat ik ben
En dat ik ons hele stadsie ken

Thoughts of the Day

"To be stupid, selfish, & have good
health are three requirements for
happiness, though if stupidity is
lacking, all is lost."

— Gustave Flaubert

Would You Take A Bullet For A Man Who Isn't Really President? via Bloggerheads

ROMA - Ecco l' elenco dei 16 militari italiani morti oggi in Iraq (12 carabinieri e 4 dell' esercito) e dei due civili.

Carabinieri:
Domenico Intravaia: 46 anni, di Monreale, appuntato dei Cc in servizio al comando provinciale di Palermo; sposato e con due figli di 16 e 12 anni. Lascia anche l' anziana madre, il fratello gemello e due sorelle.

Orazio Majorana: 29 anni, di Catania, carabiniere scelto in servizio nel battaglione Laives-Leifers in provincia di Bolzano.

Giuseppe Coletta: 38 anni, originario di Avola (Siracusa) ma da tempo residente a San Vitaliano, in Campania, vicebrigadiere in servizio al comando provinciale di Castello di Cisterna (Napoli); sposato e padre di una bambina di due anni.

Giovanni Cavallaro: 47 anni, nato in provincia di Messina e residente a Nizza Monferrato, maresciallo in servizio al comando provinciale di Asti. Era noto con il soprannome di 'Serpico'. Lascia la moglie e la piccola Lucrezia, 4 anni.

Alfio Ragazzi: 39 anni, maresciallo dei carabinieri in servizio al Ris di Messina, sposato e con due figli di 13 e 7 anni. Era partito in luglio e sarebbe dovuto rientrare a Messina sabato prossimo: i familiari stavano già preparando la festa.

Ivan Ghitti: 30 anni, milanese, carabiniere di stanza al 13/mo Reggimento Gorizia. Era alla sua quarta missione di pace all' estero, dopo essere stato tre volte in Bosnia. Lascia i genitori e una sorella.

Daniele Ghione:, 30 anni, di Finale Ligure (Savona), maresciallo dei carabinieri in servizio nella compagnia Gorizia. Era Sposato da poco. Era stato ausiliario dell' Arma, poi si era congedato e iscritto all' Associazione carabinieri in congedo.
- Pubblicità -

Enzo Fregosi: 56 anni, ex comandante dei Nas di Livorno dove viveva con la famiglia. Lascia moglie e due figli, un maschio, anche lui carabiniere, e una ragazza che studia all'Università.

Alfonso Trincone: 44 anni, era originario di Pozzuoli (Napoli) ma risiedeva a Roma con la moglie e i tre figli. Il sottufficiale era in forze al Noe, il Nucleo operativo ecologico che dipende dal Ministero dell' Ambiente.

Massimiliano Bruno: maresciallo dei carabinieri di origine bolognese, biologo in forza al Raggruppamento Investigazioni scientifiche (Racis) di Roma. Viveva con la moglie a Civitavecchia. I genitori e un fratello vivono a Bologna.

Andrea Filippa: 33 anni, torinese, carabiniere dall' età di 19. Era esperto di missioni all' estero che lo tenevano costantemente lontano da casa. Prestava servizio a Gorizia presso il 13/o Battaglione Carabinieri. Viveva a San Pier D' Isonzo insieme alla giovane moglie, sposata nel 1998.

Filippo Merlino: 40 anni, originario di Sant' Arcangelo (Potenza), sposato. Con il grado di maresciallo comandava la stazione dei carabinieri di Viadana (Mantova).

Esercito:
- Massimo Ficuciello (figlio del generale Alberto Ficuciello), militare dell' Esercito;
- Silvio Olla, 32 anni, Isola di Sant' Antioco (Cagliari), sottufficiale della Brigata Sassari.
- Emanuele Ferraro, militare dell' Esercito
- Alessandro Carrisi, militare dell' Esercito.

Civili
- Stefano Rolla, regista cinematografico, produttore della "Gabbiano Film". Stava facendo un sopralluogo per un film del regista Massimo Spano
- Marco Beci, 43 anni, operatore nella cooperazione internazionale, originario di Pergola, nelle Marche.

"I was worrying a lot about the screen," Kasparov, 40, said. "I knew before this match that I could have some psychological problems with this technology."

Gary Kasparov draws first match against X3D Fritz Computer

Bureau of Statistics...

Shot for desertion: 266 soldiers, 2 officers
Shot for cowardice: 18 soldiers
Shot for disobedience: 5 soldiers
Shot for sleeping on post: 2 soldiers
Shot for quitting post: 7 soldiers
Shot for striking or violence: 6 soldiers

— British Army Official Statistics, 1918

*****

You,
The hyena with polished face & bow tie,
In the office of a billion dollar
Corporation devoted to service;
The vulture dripping with carrion,
Carefully & carelessly robed in imported tweeds,
Lecturing on the Age of Abundance;
The jackal in the double-breasted gabardine,
Barking by remote control,
In the United Nations...
The Superego in a thousand uniforms,
You, the finger man of the behemoth,
The murderer of the young men...

— Kenneth Rexroth, "Thou Shalt Not Kill",
written in response to the death of Dylan
Thomas.

*****

Anarchists and Subcommandante Bush

THOUSANDS of protesters are planning to storm Buckingham Palace in an attempt to humiliate President George W Bush when he stays there during his State visit to Britain next month. (um, don't think he's going to need any help humiliating himself once he opens his mouth...)

Anarchist groups are secretly planning to swamp tight security at the Palace by sending thousands of protesters over the walls at the same time.

They are using the Internet and text messages to organise the attack on the Queen's residence - where the US President and his wife Laura will be staying.

*****

The Stop the War Coalition and the Muslim Association of Britain hope that 100,000 protesters will take to the streets. Scotland Yard has cancelled all leave for the three days Bush will be in London.

About 3,800 British police will be involved in the security operation, in addition to up to 250 armed US Secret Service agents.

Sir John Stevens, commissioner of the Metropolitan police, is in a position of acute sensitivity. While the White House is insisting on maximum security, Livingstone's office has made clear to Scotland Yard its insistence that those who want to are left free to demonstrate. One source said: "The view was expressed that a legitimate protest must be facilitated."

*****

British police have refused to comment on media reports that White House security staff have demanded vast central London exclusion zones for President George W Bush's visit, which starts next Wednesday.

With all police leave cancelled, up to 100,000 protesters vowing to take to the streets and with Prime Minister Tony Blair attempting to quash anti-Bush rhetoric, London's Metropolitan police commissioner admitted the visit presented an "unprecedented" challenge.

"It's going to be a big test for the Met in terms of what we have to do to prevent an attack on the president, any member of the royal family and any member of the cabinet," said a spokeswoman for Scotland Yard police headquarters.

"We have to balance preventative measures with allowing people to demonstrate in a peaceful manner."

The police acknowledged that having Mr Bush, Mr Blair and Queen Elizabeth in the same place at the same time presents a tempting target for would-be attackers.

The Lord Mayor of London Ken Livingston says and exclusion zone that would take in the Palace of Westminster, Buckingham Palace and Downing Street during the visit would cause unacceptable economic disruption.

Mr Bush will stay with the Queen at Buckingham Palace.

Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace

Anarchy in the UK

Shame

by Richard Wilbur


It is a cramped little state with no foreign policy,
Save to be thought inoffensive. The grammar of the language
Has never been fathomed, owing to the national habit
Of allowing each sentence to trail off in confusion.
Those who have visited Scusi, the capital city,
Report that the railway-route from Schuldig passes
Through country best described as unrelieved.
Sheep are the national product. The faint inscription
Over the city gates may perhaps be rendered,
"I'm afraid you won't find much of interest here."
Census-reports which give the population
As zero are, of course, not to be trusted,
Save as reflecting the natives' flustered insistence
That they do not count, as well as their modest horror
Of letting one's sex be known in so many words.
The uniform grey of the nondescript buildings, the absence
Of churches or comfort-stations, have given observers
An odd impression of ostentatious meanness,
And it must be said of the citizens (muttering by
In their ratty sheepskins, shying at cracks in the sidewalk)
That they lack the peace of mind of the truly humble.
The tenor of life is careful, even in the stiff
Unsmiling carelessness of the border-guards
And douaniers, who admit, whenever they can,
Not merely the usual carloads of deodorant
But gypsies, g-strings, hasheesh, and contraband pigments.
Their complete negligence is reserved, however,
For the hoped-for invasion, at which time the happy people
(Sniggering, ruddily naked, and shamelessly drunk)
Will stun the foe by their overwhelming submission,
Corrupt the generals, infiltrate the staff,
Usurp the throne, proclaim themselves to be sun-gods,
And bring about the collapse of the whole empire.

Adieu, Dylan


1953 -- Welsh poet Dylan Thomas dies, age 39,following a six-day coma brought on by drinking 18 straight whiskeys in a New York tavern. At the funeral parlor, a friend looking down at the body with its rouged face & garish suit, carnation in buttonhole, says: "He would never have been seen dead in it."

"I hold a beast, an angel, & a
madman in me, & my enquiry is as to
their working, & my problem is their
subjugation & victory, downthrow &
upheaval, & my effort is their
self-expression."

*****

The hand that signed the paper felled a city;
Five sovereign fingers taxed the breath,
Doubled the globe of dead & halved a country;
These five kings did a king to death.

The mighty hand leads to a sloping shoulder,
The finger joints are cramped with chalk;
A goose's quill has put an end to murder
That put an end to talk.

The hand that signed the treaty bred a fever,
& famine grew, & locusts came;
Great is the hand the holds dominion over
Man by a scribbled name.

The five kings count the dead but do not soften
The crusted wound nor pat the brow;
A hand rules pity as a hand rules heaven;
Hands have no tears to flow.

— Dylan Thomas

_____________

The Sax Bit
Ted Joans
(This poem is just a poem of thanks)

This bent metal serpent holy horn with lids like beer
mug/ with phallic tail why did they invent you
before Coleman Hawkins was born ?
This curved shiney tune gut/ hanging lynched like/ J
shaped intitial of jazz/ wordless without a reed when
Coleman Hawkins first fondled it/kissed it with Black
sound did COngo blood sucking Belges frown ?
This tenor/alto/bass/baritone/soprano/moan/cry &
shout-a-phone ! sex-oh-phone/tell-it-like-damn-
sho-isa-phone !What tremors ran through Adolphe
Saxe the day Bean grabbed his ax ?
This golden mine of a million marvelous sounds/black
notes with myriad shadows/or empty crooked tube of
technical white poor-formance/calculated keys that
never unlock soul doors/white man made machine saved
from zero by Coleman Hawkins !
This saxophone salvation/modern gri gri hanging from
jazzmen's necks placed there by Coleman Hawkins
a full body & soul sorcerer whose spirit dwells eternally
in every saxophone NOW and all those sound-a-phones
to be

Bonfires!

Yesterday was Guy Fawkes Day here in England which calls for large bonfires throughout the towns and villages of the land and loads of fireworks.

Even our little village hall in Blackwell had a huge bonfire and fireworks display, along with hotdogs, jacket potatos and of course, ladles full of mulled wine which tastes, in essence, like hot sangria. Yum!

Guy Fawkes was one of the masterminds of The Gunpowder Plot, which was a conspiracy to blow up the English Parliament and King James I on Nov. 5, 1605, the day set for the king to open Parliament. It was intended to be the beginning of a great uprising of English Catholics, who were distressed by the increased severity of penal laws against the practice of their religion.

An alleged newspaper account on January 27, 1606 outlines the criminal/terrorist plot and reports the conspirators were found guilty of treason.

"To the charges - in brief, that the eight defendants, together with Catesby, Percy, the two Wrights, Tresham, and the three Jesuits Henry Garnet, Oswald Tesmond (alias Greenway) and John Gerrard (all killed in the pursuit), did traitorously conspire to kill the King and the Queen and Prince Henry; to raise sedition and to produce a miserable slaughter in the realm; to cause rebellion and to subvert and change the government and true worship of God established in the Realm; and also to invite foreigners to invade the Realm and make war against the King - all surprisingly pleaded not guilty, despite the extreme notoriety of their previous confessions. This prompted Chief Justice Popham to ask Guy Fawkes how he could deny the indictment, considering he was captured in the cellar with the powder, and never denied his guilt before, to which Fawkes responded that he disagreed merely with certain details of the indictment."

****

Of course, the Gunpowder Plot Society is exhaustive on the matter. In the interim, I've been reading a great book by Antonia Fraser on the subject called, predictably enough, The Gunpowder Plot: Terror and Faith in 1605.

*****

I guess the only thing I don't get is that this is basically a big party about a failed terrorist plot that mimics what might have happened had the terrorists succeeded. 36 barrels (approximately 2500kg) of gunpowder, concealed under a store of winter fuel. Not very becoming behavior for a nation which is supposed to be against terrorism. It seems unclear if this is a celebration of the execution of a terrorist or a celebration of the spirit of the attempted terrorism. Especially because Uncle Dubya might not be happy about it if he ever finds out.

The Unknown Citizen
by W.H. Auden - March 1939

(To JS/07/M/378 This Marble Monument Is Erected by the State)

He was found by the Bureau of Statistics to be
One against whom there was no official complaint,
And all the reports of his conduct agree
That, in the modern sense of the old-fashioned word, he was a saint,
For in everything he did he served the Greater Community.
Except for the war till the day he retired
He worked in a factory and never got fired,
But satisfied his employers, Fudge Motors Inc.
Yet he wasn't a scab or odd in his views,
For his union reports that he paid his dues,
(Our report of his union shows it was sound)
And our Social Psychology workers found
That he was popular with his mates and liked a drink.
The Press are convinced that he bought a paper every day,
And that his reactions to advertisements were normal in every way.
Policies taken out in his name prove that he was fully insured,
And his Health-card shows that he was once in hospital but left it cured.
Both Producers Research and High--Grade Living declare
He was fully sensible to the advantages of the Installment Plan
And had everything necessary to the Modern Man,
A gramophone, a radio, a car and a frigidaire.
Our researchers into Public Opinion are content
That he held the proper opinions for the time of the year;
When there was peace he was for peace; when there was war he went.
He was married and added five children to the population,
which our Eugenist says was the right number for a parent of his generation,
And our teachers report he never interfered with their education.
Was he free? Was he happy? The question is absurd:
Had anything been wrong, we should certainly have heard.

Blaine Returns To Earth

"DAVID BLAINE is back on earth. At 10pm precisely, the 30-year-old New Yorker was lowered in his 7ft by 7ft by 3ft Perspex box by the crane from which it had dangled for the past 44 days. As he stepped out he burst into tears.

Calm in his goldfish bowl, against the dramatic backdrop of the floodlit Tower of London and Tower Bridge — he could not have picked a more spectacular setting — Blaine smiled down beatifically at the waiting throng below."

Of course, FAR more interesting than watching this nutter hang suspended in a box, was the hostility he generated. People threw threw eggs, golf balls and beer bottles at him, had gay people throwing sausages at him, taunted him by grilling meats below him as he fasted, had hamburgers flown by remote control helicopter to tease, bared their breasts, taunted him about his dead mother, etc. Maybe people were just upset about the excessive traffic-tie ups caused by David Blaine gawkers at the Tower Bridge.

*****

For Halloween, the Osama masks are outselling the Saddam masks, much to DT's bitter disappointment. After all, the scariest costume in the world must be the face wearing the dreaded Dubya masks.

Considering that we'll be celebrating Halloween at Black Swan in Henley in Arden, perhaps an I'm Fighting For Whitey! mask would be more appropriate.

*****

Are exams really that hard at NYU? After the first two library suicides maybe it's time to reassess the students themselves rather than the balcony barriers. After all, only 18% thought that NYU beats prison.

*****

From the Why Can't This Happen To Dubya Department:

Tony Blair underwent treatment at the Hammersmith Hospital in West London, where he was admitted earlier in the day after feeling unwell. It was revealed that the British Prime Minister suffered from an irregular heartbeat and will follow doctor's orders to rest today. Oh, right. You have to have a heart before you can have a heart scare.


*****

Meanwhile, disaster was averted as Birmingham City fans called a truce against Turkish villan and Aston Villa player Alpay. Game time was moved to an unsightly noon on Sunday making the hours-long pregame drinking ritual impossible and thereby avoiding a greater degree of violence than usual. For shame.

SOMETIMES THE SKY'S TOO BRIGHT

Dylan Thomas

Sometimes the sky's too bright,
Or has too many clouds or birds,
And far away's too sharp a sun
To nourish thinking of him.
Why is my hand too blunt
To cut in front of me
My horrid images for me,
Of over-fruitful smiles,
The weightless touching of the lip
I wish to know
I cannot lift, but can,
The creature with the angel's face
Who tells me hurt,
And sees my body go
Down into misery?
No stopping. Put the smile
Where tears have come to dry.
The angel's hurt is left;
His telling burns.

Sometimes a woman's heart has salt,
Or too much blood;
I tear her breast,
And see the blood is mine,
Flowing from her, but mine,
And then I think
Perhaps the sky's too bright;
And watch my hand,
But do not follow it,
And feel the pain it gives,
But do not ache.

*****

God Loves Bush

An outspoken general in the American War Machine has some groups hopping mad (or in the case of Desultory Turgescence, doubled over, gasping in laughter) because of comments he's made regarding radical Muslims.

Gen. William Boykin is a Christian and one of the men overseeing the hunt for Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein.

At a recent religious meeting he spoke about why radical Muslims hate America.

He said, "One of the most fundamental reasons they hate us is, a: We're a nation of believers; and, b: We support Israel."

Some groups are saying Boykin should resign, but Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld says he has a right to express his opinions, apparently, no matter how stupid they are. Rummy should know. He's the professor of the Stupid Sayings Faculty.

The Los Angeles Times reports Gen. Boykin told an Oregon Christian group in June that radical Islamists hate the United States, "because we're a Christian nation, because our foundation and our roots are Judeo-Christian and the enemy is a guy named Satan."

(I like that: "the enemy is a guy named Satan." -- the war on terrorism is now a war on Satan. Deftly, he's cut out the possibility of opposition. Whereas some have gotten confused as the lines blur between a "terrorist" and an oligarchic putsch that slaughters innocents because they are unfortunate to be in the way of the big war machine, everyone knows Satan is bad. Even the Muslims know Satan is bad. Isn't that what they've referred to America in the past, "The Great Satan"?)

Referring to a battle against a Muslim warlord in Somalia, Boykin told another audience, "I knew my God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God and his was an idol."

Ah, yes, the ole, 'My God is Bigger Than Yours' argument. Brilliant.

And the Los Angeles Times reports that Boykin said that President Bush is, "in the White House because God put him there."

Finally! An explanation. God Wanted Him There. In which case, your vote as a citizen is pretty useless since God has the final say anyhow...

*****

The new rage in Denmark is issparkning which, I suppose, could roughly be translated as ice cream kicking. Roughly indeed:

Officielle regler

1 liter vanille is stilles på højkant og sparkes fra flad jord med bar fod uden sko og strømpe så langt som muligt. Kun vanille is er tilladt og kun i rektangulær firkantet indpakning (Frisko, Premier, Polar). Længste spark vinder.

Udstyr

Det er med til at højne totaloplevelsen såfremt du har en hat eller dragt på.

Teknik

Den optimale vinkel er 45 grader - såfremt du sparker i vakuum. Da de fleste har svært ved at efterkomme dette sidste punkt er der ikke andet at gøre end at eksperimentere. Sparker du i en vinkel på ca. 50 grader er du ikke helt galt på den. Isen tages ud af indpakningen og placeres på højkant. Man afprøver lige sit tilløb til et par gange, og så sparker man ellers. Isen skal som udgangspunkt være kold og hård som muligt. Tjek fryseboksen i den forretning hvori du køber isen. -20 grader er anbefalet. Er isen blevet for hård kan du lade den stå et par minutter. Husk også toiletpapir eller håndklæde så du kan rense din fod efter sparket.

Isen

Vanille Flødeis (8% mælkefedt) med vanillesmag

Ingredienser: Skummetmælkskoncentrat, glukosesirup, sukker, mælkefedt, vallepulver, emulgator (mono- og diglycerider af vegetabilske spisefedtsyrer), stabilisator (guargummi, johannesbrødkernemel, carrageenan), aroma
Nettovolumen: 1000ml
Næringsindhold: pr 100ml pr 100g
Energi ca 393kJ (94 kcal) 771kJ (184 kcal)
Protein ca 1,5g 3g
Kulhydrat ca 12,1g 23,7g
Fedt ca 4,3g 8,5g

*****
Meanwhile, in Bolivia, instead of kicking one liter containers of vanilla icecream, El Presidente de Bolivia, Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada, firmó su renuncia a la Presidencia de Bolivia y partió en vuelo a la ciudad de Santa Cruz de la Sierra (900 kilómetros al este de La Paz), informó un empresario cercano al mandatario.

"Yi Sang v

Four Poems
Translated by Walter K. Lew

Poem no. XIII
Holding the razorblade my arms became severed and fell off. Looking closer I see how cold and pale they are as if seriously threatened by something. Confronted with this I stood my pair of lost arms up as candlesticks to ornament my room with. The arms are dead but seem to show all the more nothing but fear of me. Such frail etiquette I consider more lovely than any flower basin.


Poem no. II
when my father dozes off beside me I become my father and also i become my father's father and even so while my father like my father why do i repeatedly my father's father's father's... when I become a father why must I lopingly leap over my father and why am I that which while finally playing all at once my and my father's and my father's father's and my father's father's father's roles must live?


Poem no. X
In the tattered wallpaper I see a butterfly dying. Secret mouthpiece bearing endless traffic to and from the other world. One day in the mirror I see on my beard a butterfly dying. Wings collapsed in exhaustion the butterfly eats the meager dew that collects glistening out of my exhaled breath. If I die while blocking the mouthpiece off with my palm the butterfly too as if starting up after resing shall fly away. Never do I let any word of this leak out.


Poem no. XI
That porcelain cup resembles my skull. I was grasping the cup tight with my hand when out of my arm another arm absurdly sprouted like a grafted branch and the hand pending from that arm grabbed the cup in a flash raised and hurled it against the floor. My arm is defending the porcelain cup to the death and so the shattered peices of course are my skull which resembles the procelain cup. If my arm had budged before the branching arm like a snake crept back into it the white paper holding back the flood water would have torn. But just as before my arm defends the porcelain cup to the death.

"The writer generally known as Lee Sang was born Kim Hae-gyeong in Seoul in 1910 and was trained as an architect. During his short literary career he showed an interest first in poetry, turning out some highly idiosyncratic and experimental pieces, and then short fiction and anecdotal essays. In the fall of 1936 he journeyed to Tokyo, where he soon ran afoul of the authorities and was imprisoned. He died of tuberculosis in a Tokyo hospital in 1937.

His "Nalgae"(Wings, 1936) is one of the best-known modern Korean stories. Whether its read as an allegory of colonial oppression, an existential withdrawal from the absurdities of contemporary life, an extended suicide note, or simply the degradation of a kept man, it is strikingly imaginative.

Lee Sang was a writer ahead of his time. While his debt to Western and Japanese modernism is evident, recent scholarship has investigated the influence of traditional Korean literature on his work. Since the 1970s his critical reputation has soared. In the 1995 issue of the review Muae(U.S. edition), the translator of the poems published below writes: "Lee Sang characterized himself as split between 'the 19th century's solemn morality' and 20th-century modernity, labeling himself a 'vagrant who slipped into a crack between the centuries with the sole intent of collapsing there.' What this typically self-deprecating remark omits is his undaunted, far from vagrant development of a new, intensely melded Korean idiom that exploited the particular recursive possibilities of the language, as well as its compendious, richly nuanced lexicon. For all their pranks and provocations, the poems' underlying designs are deft explorations of patterns of repetition and divergence, identity and repression, desire and dissipation. Yi Sang's work stands as an important sign of the greatly underestimated range and vigor of Korean responses to the influx of modernist culture, both high and low."

*****

Meanwhile, somewhere in the world, the beer is just too big to handle.

Pilgrimage

I go with my father's staff in my hand
My burning heart on the staff

My footsteps murmur the letters
Which the holy road writes out

I trace them in the sand with my staff
Before sleep
At every hospice

Lest they be wiped from my memory

I am still far from guessing
Their meaning
But they look like the constellation Wolf

No empty nights for me
If I get home safe and sound

--Vasko Popa

tr. Anne Pennington
fr. *Earth Erect*
[London: Anvil Press Poetry, 1973]

Stratford Mop Fair

Despite the exhaustive research of picking through the locals for an answer, it was only via the internet where I've finally come across a lucid explanation of what this weekend's Mop Fair in Stratford-upon-Avon is all about.

I'm not even sure why I bothered, considering that The Stratford Herald proclaimed in bold headlines this week that Stratford Demoted to a 'Third Rate Tourist Town'.

To the untrained eye, it looks a little like chaos. The main streets through town are all blocked off, carneys appear out of nowhere, rides, food and kiddies. But its on everyone's lips as in, are you going, have you gone, etc...

So, relying on my own handy servant, the internet, here is the explanation I've long been looking for:

However, ‘Mop Fairs’, which were held twice a year and it was here that servants were hired. Groups of servants, dressed in their best clothes, walked to the fair where they stood in rows waiting to be picked out.

The mop fair tradition goes back centuries and stems from hiring fairs, where farmers, tradesmen and householders gathered to employ their servants for the coming year. very word 'fair' coming from the Latin for holiday, 'feria'

It was customary for those looking for work to display an item which showed their trade. Waggoners wore whipcord in their hats, a knot of horse hair indicated a groom, while more lowly workers wore a piece of mop, which is where the mop fair name comes from...Mop fairs where servants were ritually bought and sold to the present day, where fairs are based purely on entertainment rather than trade.

If you were chosen for a job, you were given cash as a retainer which was usually spent at the fair on sideshows, food and drink and having a good time.

In Stratford, which is home to one of the country's biggest fairs, the mop became a funfair after World War I. This was also when the custom developed of the mayor holding a pig or ox roast before the opening of the fair.

The custom remains today and with typical Stratford pomp on civic occasions, the mayor reads the mop proclamation and the master of the mop leads the mayor around the fair before the mayor selects a ride to go on.

On the first morning of the fair, which is almost always 12 October, children of the town enjoy the rides free of charge.

Charity is also a huge part of the mop. The first slice of meat from the pig roast is auctioned, which often raises hundreds of pounds.

The fair operator and master of the mop, William Wilson of Bob Wilson Funfairs, also makes a contribution from the takings on charity night, which is traditionally the first night of the fair.

Anyway, as a precursor to the big England-Turkey match today, I'll be having a look at the Mop Fair, snap some shots, step on a few toes and see what the fun is all about.

Brotherhood of Pigs

"America’s Iraq-sticker-shock may turn to anger when taxpayers discover the small group of men and companies reaping the benefits of President Bush’s newly found appreciation for nation building.

While Vice President Dick Cheney’s company, Halliburton, has attracted most press attention for its Iraq-related contracts, Halliburton is hardly the whole story. Its share is but a slice of the multi-billion dollar pie being divided up among a brotherhood of unusually well connected and economically related individuals and entities.

Cukoo For Christianity

Oh. whom to root for on this one? On the one hand, while there is a strong belief that fundamentalists of any religion should be rounded up and executed, TV Evangelist and Fundamentalist Christian, Pat Robertson suggested that the State Department should be nuked.

But this wasn't even the first time he suggested it.

In a June interview with Mowbray on the "700 Club", Robertson made similar remarks. "Maybe we need a very small nuke thrown off on Foggy Bottom to shake things up like Newt Gingrich wants to do," he said.

Just Another Drug-Addict

Looks like the debate is over. A little over a week ago, Rush Limbaugh, the waterboy for the Pathologically Ignorant, noted that "I think what we've had here is a little social concern in the NFL. The media has been very desirous that a black quarterback do well,'' Limbaugh opined. "There is a little hope invested in McNabb, and he got a lot of credit for the performance of this team that he didn't deserve. The defense carried this team."

Some applauded his honesty but everyone outside of Republican monkeys and racists, were appalled by the stupidity and ignorance of such a remark. Shortly thereafter, Limbaugh resigned his position on ESPN's Sunday NFL Countdown pregame show where he worked primarily to draw in the remaining moron viewing audience who somehow weren't already drawn to the NFL to begin with.

Not surprisingly, those whacky remarks can now be attributed to drug addiction. Limbaugh now whines that that he is addicted to painkillers and is checking into a rehab center to "break the hold this highly addictive medication has on me."

Why is HE the one taking the painkillers when his he's such a pain in the ass himself?

The Society of the Spectacle

"The world at once present & absent which
the spectacle makes visible is the world of the
commodity dominating all that is lived. The
world of the commodity is thus shown for
what it is, because its movement is identical
to the estrangement of men among
themselves & in relation to their global
product."

— Guy Debord, The Society of the Spectacle

Item One: Sexually-harassing Nazi wins the day in California. Californians voted overwhelmingly on Tuesday to recall Gov. Gray Davis and chose as his replacement Arnold Schwarzenegger, the bodybuilder and movie actor making his first run for office, according to a survey of voters leaving the polls. Perhaps California, not New Mexico, should be named the Dumbest State in America.

Item Two: In a "shocking" revelation, President George Bush has said he does not know whether federal investigators will ever find who leaked the identity of a CIA agent:

"This is a large administration... I don't know if we're going to find out the senior administration official"

What more would one expect from an administration that can't find any weapons of mass destruction?

*****

By now, everyone must know: Absinthe is the drink of Champions! C'est ma santé!

*****

The Jury Is Out:

Justice Thurgood Marshall reportedly told one of his law clerks during the Reagan administration that "if I die while that man's president, I want you to just prop me up and keep me voting."

"It has been assumed that President Bush would have an opportunity to appoint one or more justices. However, since Bill Clinton selected Stephen Breyer in 1994, the high court lineup has remained unchanged — longer than any lineup in more than 150 years. Retirement speculation reached fever pitch in the spring, when pundits predicted that as many as four justices might retire."

*****

Was it all the nuclear testing back in the 40s that finally did them in? New Mexico is officially ranked as the Nation's Dumbest State.

And to think, California is 44th! Who will New Mexico elect as their new governor...the Alien of Roswell?

Meanwhile, the President Bush Dog Toy has its day.

*****

Threatening to throw a monkey wrench in an already highly anticipated match,the England football squad last night voted unanimously to strike unless Rio Ferdinand was reinstated to the squad.

The players said that they would not travel to Turkey for Saturday’s vital European Championship qualification match unless Ferdinand, who was dropped from the team for failing to take a random drugs test, was given his place back.

Buggery

Nothing is left and this nothing is increasingly
aggressive, totalitarian, & omnipresent.

Our experience today is the strange one of
empty political institutions in which no one
has any confidence any more, of a system
of government which functions only in the
interests of a political class, & at the same
time of the almost infinite growth of power,
authority, & social control which makes any
one of our democracies a more authoritarian
mechanism than the Napoleonic state.

— Jacques Ellul,
Anarchie et Christianisme

If it's true, what they say, that California is the trendsetter for America, well then, some of you bastards are in for a hard ride ahead.

They say poetic justice is defined thusly: The rewarding of virtue and the punishment of vice, often in an especially appropriate or ironic manner.

Ladies and gentlemen of America, may I present your reward for idly standing by or even applauding as your half-wit President led the nation into economic ruin, bloodshed and scorn:

The Ultimate American Dream: Arnold Schwarzenegger, soon-to-be governor over the 5th largest economy in the world. You might say he's come the full circle.

It's a shame he can't be President because virtually no man better symbolizes the half-wit nature of American politics while simultaneously exemplifying the single-minded glorification of greed for the almighty Dollar that led the world into the invasion of Iraq and the blood-letting of the American economy.

Now I can let the cat out of the bag:

All I want for Christmas is a bombed-out dollhouse:

Welcome to the new millennium of war toys. Gone are cartoonishly idealistic action figures, soft plastic guns and the model jet fighters of yore. They have been replaced by bazookas with explosive noises, exacting copies of long-range sniper rifles, a "peacekeeper" battle station complete with tripod-mounted cannon and counterterrorism advisers as action figures.

*****

driving the freeway while
listening to the Country & Western boys
sing about a broken heart
& the honkytonk blues,
it seems that things just don't work
most of the time
& when they do it will be for a
short time
only.
well, that's not news.
nothing's news.
it's the same old thing in
disguise.

from the poem: "The Last Song," by : Charles Bukowski

Time does not bring relief; you all have lied
Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892–1950). Renascence and Other Poems. 1917.


Sonnet II


TIME does not bring relief; you all have lied
Who told me time would ease me of my pain!
I miss him in the weeping of the rain;
I want him at the shrinking of the tide;
The old snows melt from every mountain-side, 5
And last year’s leaves are smoke in every lane;
But last year’s bitter loving must remain
Heaped on my heart, and my old thoughts abide!

There are a hundred places where I fear
To go,—so with his memory they brim! 10
And entering with relief some quiet place
Where never fell his foot or shone his face
I say, “There is no memory of him here!”
And so stand stricken, so remembering him!

HIGHLIGHTS FROM THE ADMINISTRATION'S IRAQ REQUEST: Fun With Numbers
(sans commentaire cynique)

•$3.6 million for 600 radios and phones ($6,000 each). Administration has requested $3.6 million for 400 handheld radios and 200 satellite phones at an average cost of $6,000 each. According to Businessweek on May 12, "When Baghdad's telephone system was knocked out during the war, small-time Iraqi businessmen ordered up satellite phones from Jordan for $900 each.

•$33,000 a piece for 80 pick-up trucks. Administration has requested $2.64 million for 80 pick-up trucks at a cost of $33,000 each. Prices in the United States for a new truck begin at $14,000.

•$2 million for museums and memorials - Administration has requested $1 million for "Memory Foundation" to record Saddam's atrocities, $500,000 for a memorial marking atrocities his son committed against Iraqi athletes, and $500,000 for a memorial at Abu Gharaib prison.

•$50,000 per prison bed - double average U.S. cost. Administration has requested $400 million to build two 4,000 bed prisons for a cost of $50,000 per prison bed. The Federal Bureau of Prisons estimates that incarceration in high security prisons in the United States costs $26,134 annually.

•$10,000 per month for business school - more than double monthly cost of Harvard Business School. Administration has requested $20 million to teach a 4-week course business course at a cost of $10,000 per student. Tuition at Harvard Business School costs less than $4,000 a month.

•$200,000 per person witness protection - nearly 20 times cost of U.S. program. Administration has requested $100 million to protect 100 families with average of 5 members per family. Per person cost of protection is $200,000. The U.S. Federal Witness Protection program costs $10,273 per person and the Iraq's GDP per capita is $2,400.

•$10 million for 48 bureaucrats ($200,000 per bureaucrat). Administration has requested $10 million to establish an office for 48 staffers to "regulate and inspect the standards and training of the guards of public facilities." Cost per staffer of $208,333.

•$333 for a month of half days of computer training. $55 million for computer training, including $40 million for a $333/month half day course. American community colleges charge between $100 - $200 for computer training (6 months, three hours a week).

•$1500 per student for a 6-month English class - at least 50 percent greater than U.S. cost. Administration has requested $30 million to enroll 20,000 students in a 6 month English class in Iraq. American community colleges charge between $500 and $1000 for a comparable ESL course.

•$9 million for a state-of-the-art Iraqi postal service. Per capita, this amount is greater than the federal government spends annually on the U.S. Postal Service.

SOURCE: Office of Senate Democratic Leader - September 30, 2003

*****

excerpt from To Shout In the Ruins
by Louis Aragon


Let's spit the two of us let's spit
On what we loved
On what we loved the two of us
Yes because this poem the two of us
Is a waltz tune and I imagine
What is dark and incomparable passing between us
Like a dialogue of mirrors abandoned
In a baggage-claim somewhere say Foligno
Or Bourboule in the Auvergne
Certain names are charged with a distant thunder
Yes let's spit the two of us on these immense landscapes
Where little rented cars cruise by
Yes because something must still
Some thing
Reconcile us yes let's spit
The two of us it's a waltz
A kind of convenient sob
Let's spit let's spit tiny automobiles
Let's spit that's an order
A waltz of mirrors
A dialogue in the void
Listen to these immense landscapes where the wind
Cries over what we loved
One of them is a horse leaning its elbow on the earth
The other a deadman shaking out linen the other
The trail of your footprints I remember a deserted village
On the shoulder of a scorched mountain
I remember your shoulder
I remember your elbow your linen your footprints
I remember a town where there was no horse
I remember your look which scorched
My deserted heart a dead Mazeppa whom a horse
Carries away like that day on the mountain
Drunkenness sped my run through the martyred oaks
Which bled prophetically while day
Light fell mute over the blue trucks
I remember so many things
So many evenings rooms walks rages
So many stops in worthless places
Where in spite of everything the spirit of mystery rose up
Like the cry of a blind child in a remote train depot

Shakespeare Myths and Notes

The days are flying by recklessly, stuffed with sorting out the details of relocation and acclimating oneself to the locals; the (coughcough) “necessary” visits to the White Hart in order to “research” local information. No, not just the daily quality control checks of the Adnams from the cask, but also to fill in on the local gossip, detail the activities in Newbold on Stour and begin to sketch in the character of oneself so as not to arrive each late afternoon a nameless skeleton form of a visitor but giving shape to the individual instead. Shape which not only defines one to the locals but which legitimizes one’s very existence in the place to begin with.

When not busy with that, there is the daily morning bike ride into Shipston On Stour for a stop by the butcher, the news agent, etc.

But Friday, at least, was a break in the pattern – wandering instead, the streets and parks of Stratford Upon Avon. Actually, Thursday night was peeled away with Mick in the Garrick Inn, listening to him wax forth on the fraud that is Shakespeare, the fraud that is Stratford, the lies told to tourists, etc.

So the following morning, I went to a used bookstore and picked up a copy of Ian Wilson’s Shakespeare: The Evidence: Unlocking the Man and His Work. I figured to try and sort out a few myths of my own, arm myself a little with knowledge for the next conversation. And in fact, one chapter in particular caught my eye, entitled "Stratford-upon-Avon ‘One of the Biggest Frauds in England’?"

So I took the book with me to Bancroft Gardens and sat around by the Swans, watching tourists meander along the canal in between passages. On occasion, stretching out the legs to have a look at the Prince Hal statue since I thought the Prince Hal I already know from Banana Fish Zero might get a kick out of seeing a replica of his namesake.

You could compare the two yourself, actually:

Banana Fish Zero's "Prince Hal"

or,

Shakespeare's "Prince Hal", aka, Henry, Prince of Wales.

Of course, with the sun ducking in and out all afternoon and the tourists getting louder, I decided to try and find a quieter locale, dipping in and out of pubs, sating a beer craving as the thirst of knowledge evolves, when wandering alone, into a thirst for beer and the two must be equally sated.

In any case, some of the quotes, overall that shocked or were of interest with my own occasional, parenthetical commentary:

•“Shakespearean England’s meat quality controls required butchers (Shakespeare is often cited as being a “butcher’s son”) to have licenses, and Stratford’s only known licensed butcher in John’s (Shakespeare’s father) time was town Alderman Ralph Cawdrey of Bridge Street.”

•John being the son of Richard Shakespeare from the neighboring hilltop of Snitterfield (where a friend of mine, also named Richard, currently lives), where he farmed as a tenant on additional land….but sometime before John must have left to set up in his own right in Stratford, for in that year he somewhat ingloriously enters the historical record with a fine more amassing a dunghill…(apparently, dunghills were hygienically located in a town and you weren’t allowed to build your own dunghills wherever you felt like it)

Now these first few chapters go on to detail how it was highly unlikely that Shakespeare was merely a butcher’s son and that in fact, Shakespeare’s father was largely involved in land, money and local politics, rising in fact, to the height of what was today’s equivalent of local mayor, in Stratford.

What interested me more at this point were the historical accounts and references, trying to visualize Stratford in the 16th century rendered even odder perhaps, by the fact that many of the streets of today’s Stratford had the same names they did back in Shakespeare’s day, the highly original Sheep Street, Chapel Lane, Wood Street, etc. The layout, at its core in any event, doesn’t seem to have changed very much from that time. It lends a little more weight to the walking, I believe, when the visions can be so exacted.

Rather than just ramble on and on, I’ll bullet a few more passages, which for personal reasons, I found interesting. Even if no one cares to read it, I’m still saved the trouble of having to look it up for reference in conversations later…

•“Of this latter, most notable in his particular year was the rising of the Northern Earls, a serious pro-Catholic rebellion that threatened to overthrown Elizabeth and replace her with the Catholic Mary Queen of Scots, now Elizabeth’s prisoner in England.”

•“The Jesuits were the Roman Catholics most militant arm, founded in 1534 to counter the tide of Protestantism…

•There was a big demand for priests and Catholic missionaries to cater to England’s secret Catholics (of which, it is alleged Shakespeare’s father was a member according to a disputed Catholic will found in the attic rafters of Shakespeare’s house many years later that indicate even while Shakespeare’s father was running things from a Protestant point of view in Stratford to keep up appearances, he might secretly have been a Catholic...

•“Pope Pius V’s excommunication of Queen Elizabeth as a heretic in 1570, declaring her monarchy illegitimate and thereby sanctioning any Catholic attempt to overthrow her. It meant all English Catholics could be regarded as, and treated as, traitors, whatever their true feelings on the matter.”

•“At Tyburn on 1 December 1581 Campion (a Catholic missionary) and two fellow priests were despatched by being publicaly hanged, cut down while still alive, then having their genitals cut off and their bowels drawn out before their eyes” – sounds like one of those teary-eyed and somber descriptions the pro-Invasion advocates like to give in justifying the Invasion of Iraq for reasons of Saddam’s tyranny)

•“Conversely, anyone over sixteen who did not attend Anglican services was liable to a fine of £20 per month, a sum equivalent to a year’s wages for those of middle income, and therefore quite impossible to pay except for the very rich…” (just an interesting background note, I thought, on religious intolerance…)

•”In 1552 money-lending had been forbidden as ‘a vice most odious and detestable’ -- it still is (performed by odious and detestable people like bankers and credit unions…too bad it’s not still outlawed)

There’s plenty more, but this covers the outline of the first few chapters. Perhaps I’ll toss in more quotes as time goes on, given reasonable appeal indicated by readers.

For now, I’ll leave it at this and recover, pending further reading and catching up on other sorts of andecdotes.

The Marajuana Tax Act, signed August 2, 1937 in the United States, notes that there are 100,000 total marajuana smokers in the US and most are Negroes, Hispanics, Filipinos and entertainers. Their "Satanic" music, jazz and swing, result from marajuana usage.

*****

For those of you who demanded it incessantly: Asterix, Découvrez leurs différentes pages consacrées à l'univers d'Astérix.

*****

On the other hand:

"American 'energy'... is the energy of violence, of free-floating resentment and anxiety unleashed by chronic cultural dislocations which must be, for the most part, ferociously sublimated. This energy has mainly been sublimated into crude materialism and acquisitiveness. Into hectic philanthropy. Into benighted moral crusades, the most spectacular of which was Prohibition. Into an awesome talent for uglifying countryside and cities. Into the loquacity and torment of a minority of gadflies: artists, prophets, muckrakers, cranks, and nuts. And into self-punishing neuroses. But the naked violence keeps breaking through, throwing everything into question.

from Susan Sontag, Styles of Radical Will

*****

Poem of the Day:

Form Rejection Letter

We are sorry we cannot use the enclosed.
We are returning it to you.
We do not mean to imply anything by this.
We would prefer not to be pinned down about this matter.
But we are not keeping--cannot, will not keep--
what you sent us.
We did receive it, though, and our returning it to you
is a sign of that.
It was not that we minded your sending it to us
unasked.
That is happening all the time, they
come when we least expect them,
when we forget we have needed or might yet need them,
and we send them back.
We send this back.
It is not that we minded.
At another time, there is no telling...
But this time, it does not suit our present needs.

We wish to make it clear it was not easy receiving it.
It came so encumbered.
And we are busy here.
We did not feel
we could take it on.
We know it would not have ended there.
It would have led to this, and that.
We know about these things.
It is why we are here.
We wait for it. We recognize it when it comes.
Regretfully, this form letter does not allow us to elaborate
why we send it back.
It is not that we minded.

We hope this does not discourage you. But we would not
want to encourage you falsely.
It requires delicate handling, at this end.
If we had offered it to you,
perhaps you would understand.
But, of course, we did not.
You cannot know what your offering it
meant to us,
And we cannot tell you:
There is a form we must adhere to.
It is better for everyone that we use this form.

As to what you do in future,
we hope we have given you signs,
that you have read them,
that you have not mis-read them.
We wish we could be more helpful.
But we are busy.
We are busy returning so much.
We cannot keep it.
It all comes so encumbered.
And there is no one here to help.
Our enterprise is a small one.
We are thinking of expanding.
We hope you will send something.

--Philip Dacey. *How I Escaped from the Labyrinth*. Carnegie-Mellon UP,
1977.

Plugging in the Kettle

Now that we’ve had a chance to “plug the kettle in” (as BT’s new customer welcoming letter to us read), it’s time to set forth with the inaugural Desultory Turgescence British Home Office entry.

First and foremost, the content will likely be changing if it hasn’t already. Although long-winded political ranting cleverly-disguised-as absurdist distortions of the lies and destruction of the Bush Administration upon its own, until recently, majority-ignorant population and society, was quite a lot of fun and had become some sort of a hallmark of Desultory Turgescence, it was often the final resort of a heart and mind sickened with disbelief over the chain of events that began with the theft of a presidential election that officially turned the United States of America into a banana republic of corruption and lies and has continued on an unprecedented rampage of cynical, reductionist manipulation masquerading as patriotism with such vigor and verve that living even in a city as open and exciting as Manhattan once was had became unbearably toxic.

(whew! Now there is a sentence that would be hard fought to complete in one breath...)

However, now freed of the incessant barrage of ignorance and stupidity, no longer hamstrung by fears of caustic reactionaries belching out their undigested thoughts of patriotism and morality or offended by the sickening degree of selfish indifference while the world collapses around them, Desultory Turgescence is prepared to embrace a world as far apart from Manhattan as is chalk from cheese, as they say.

That embrace begins with our new digs in the tiny village of Blackwell.

One of the primary reasons for restarting the blog at this point in time, convinced that Desultory Turgescence had already long ago exhausted the limitations of Bush-whacking and political raving, was the rather flowering realization that no longer living the lie of politics in America did not necessarily mean that commentary of a different sort couldn’t flourish as well. Seeing so many opportunities to observe and remark upon; the graphic contrast of urban versus rural, the mean-spirited autocratic morality of Manhattan’s midget mayor compared with Shakespeare’s Stratford-Upon-Avon.

Shall I Compare Thee To A Summer’s Day? or a mayor who kvetches about his city having no gambling casinos?

Small wonder, getting out.

For one thing, its difficult to work up an righteous indignation out here. The things to complain about seem less urgent. For example, here is a small letter to the editor I cut out from the Stratford Herald last week, so touched was I not only over the issue of complaint but the ferocity of the rage involved in what some might consider such a trivial matter:

”Sir: In your issue of 7th June 2001 you were good enough to print my letter “Pee-d off with locked loo”, referring to Bell Court, Stratford.
I am now even more brassed off with the new toilet in Town Square: not only is it locked, they’ve never even bothered to open the damned thing. I can only assume the people in charge, whoever they are, consist of a constipated, bottle carrying brigade, who have no regard for the normal bodily functions of our many visitors or the poor benighted folk who live in Stratford.
Please, please open these toilets and I promise to buy my own toilet roll.”

Finally, after to all these years, I’m beginning to glean a sense of what Monty Python was on about.

Even this still-small taste of the kind of dry, sardonic British humor typically spilling out from street corners to pubs to bicycle shops and side-remarks in libraries and news agents, is sufficient to understand that one is not dealing with the same sort of oneupmanship of creeping meatballism and boorishness that one was force-fed so often on the streets of America. Not at all.

But I don’t want to give the false impression I’m actually in Stratford. Only for trips to the Holy Trinity Church to maudle over Shakespeare's tomb in between pints at the Garrick Inn just down High Street, sometimes, when the urge for department store shopping becomes overwhelming, and every great once in a while when I get lonely for the sight of large swarms of German tourists brought in by buses crowding the streets with their big feet and bellies. Otherwise, it's just a crazy burg 8 miles up the road from here.

In fact, from where this is in Blackwell, Stratford-Upon-Avon is a virtual metropolis. They’ve got the Royal Shakespeare Company, theatres, shopping centers, 500 year old pubs, housing developments and tons of tourists.

Blackwell on the other hand, has houses, a few horses and a few sheep. The nearest pub is a mile and a half down the road in Newbold-on-Stour, called The White Hart. It is there that in time, I am going to one day learn how to cook partridge and pheasant properly or learn how to skin a rabbit.

In the meantime, I’ll enjoy the refreshing change of pace and the lack of outrage and sense of injustice. For some reason, the mind functions better riding a bike along empty roads on cool mornings as the translucent veil of fog is still lifting off of plow fields and horse farms, and the air is ripe with manure and burning wood. Those last few weeks in Manhattan were positively Dantesque with the stale urine and rotting garbage wilting upwards from the asphalt in the stultifying humidity.

Humanity seems much more edifying when not experienced through the excruciating persistence of its morality monopolists and the dull hum of what some might deem to be civilization.

In the meantime, "Wouldn't it be weird if in twenty years Iraq had a functioning Social Security system but America didn't?". Lovely to see Get Your War on back in the pits.

Lastly, two brief announcements which are utterly unrelated:

The first trickle of hope for America? Looks like the Draft Clark mission was a success. Congratulations. Since seeing him for the first time on Meet The Press several months ago, he's been my favorite choice.

The last trickle of hope for Queens? Looks like The Great Satan Quarterly is back on line. The pressure's on, lad. You're my primary source of local sports now that I can't pick up the Daily News at the local bodega anymore. Now the only thing to sort out in the absence of the Daily News is where to find all those shots of Beyonce's bum.

That isn't to say I haven't seen some strange things out here. Without a doubt, I still do a double take every time I see a sign for Faggots and Mushy Peas.

But I'm hard at work already here. Only last Saturday night, I won a free t-shirt at the British Legion's Third Chipping Campden Beer Festival five miles down the road from home in lovely Chipping Campden for quaffing ten different pints of their mind-altering ales and ciders.

So Desultory Turgescence is strapping it back on again. And as once mulled in that song for the generations by EBN-OZN, EIOU and Sometimes Y,

"Yeah she took me home man she threw me all
around the room man
I mean this chick was really hot she was nice
to me you know
She let me keep on my cowboy boots and everything..."

So it feels, smoking up the Drum once again in pubs, no longer under the thumb of the mismanaging moralists and happy to be free again.