Good-bye, 2007!

What a year. A recovered neck, a new career, a new marriage, a new band, a new practice, a new major, a new grandson/nephew/cousin, a baby grand-nephew, and high school--all in the family. We have a lot to be grateful for.

In an hour or so, I will accompany the amazing Grace and her mother to a celebration of the new year at the home of some friends I haven't seen in a while.

I'm looking forward to an old fart's New Year's Eve, replete with banging pots and fireworks in the parking lot. I'll be in the common house, playing games. Our lovely hostess, L, surely will provide noisemakers and poppers and hats and lots of confetti. Plus champagne and chocolate.

Happy New Year!

Foment builds around the assassination of Benazir Bhutto. And now the Pakistan government's official story about her death has shifted.

I found this interview with Bhutto on Alternet. David Frost spoke with her shortly after her caravan was attacked in Karachi last November. She explicitly addresses questions about that attack and its intent, as well as her relationship with Musharaff.

Some are calling her assassination the end of hope in the region. Meanwhile, politicos in the U.S. are using Bhutto's death (Rudolph W. Giuliani) or "clueless" (that Huckabee guy).

Again, I think we need to be paying close attention to what this situation will justify in the world arena. Of course, Bush and the rest of the world have denounced her assassination. Consider how the whole thing has played out as projected, perhaps even as Bhutto herself projected. Still her death is a shock. From what her supporters say, her global reputation seemed to lend her protected status. She is the face of democracy in Pakistan. She even represented a reconciliation with India.

Yet the attack in Karachi upon her return from exile happened in a neighborhood populated by wealthy, politically influential residents, which suggests that political weight was not protecting anyone, including Bhutto.

Instead of a messy democratic Pakistan, Bhutto's assassination sacrifices democracy to martyrdom, which is much easier to manipulate. Musharaff likely will remain in charge. The chaos engendered by Bhutto's death paves the way for another crackdown, or at least, a postponement of elections in the name of fighting terrorism.

A real democracy in Pakistan might not sustain U.S. plans for the region. Now Bhutto's calls for democratic reform pose no threat to the expanding empire. Instead, the assassination fits right into the U.S. characterization of the "terrorists' war on us." As Rudy argues,

The assassination of Benazir Bhutto is a tragic event for Pakistan and for democracy in Pakistan. Her murderers must be brought to justice and Pakistan must continue the path back to democracy and the rule of law. Her death is a reminder that terrorism anywhere -- whether in New York, London, Tel-Aviv or Rawalpindi -- is an enemy of freedom. We must redouble our efforts to win the Terrorists' War on Us.

By this logic, Bhutto's martyrdom and the ensuing chaos, once dubbed "acts of terror", further justify our war. The only possible response to her death is expanding war. Without doubt, the attack on Bhutto's rally, like the attack on her caravan, was an act of terror. But responding to terror with terror breeds terror, as we witness in the news of Iraq and Afghanistan every day. If another crackdown is the type of redoubling effort Giuliani advocates, that move is also without doubt, a course of action that Bhutto would not have approved.

While I quote Giuliani, by no means expert in foreign relations (or justice or democracy or reason), it seems obvious that his rhetoric reflects the underlying logic of our warmongering lifestyles. That's what it all comes down to, this current propagation of "democracy" across the planet.

As the American Dream supersizes itself, we keep buying it. The gap between the uber-rich and the rest of us widens, and we keep insisting that the virtue of uber-wealth sanctifies its means. We keep insisting on lifestyles that require the exploitation of others. We eat Burger King and shop Walmart and pay taxes to fund Haliburton, all delivered through exploitation in Florida, in China, in Iraq. We justify the complete destruction of a sovereign country's infrastructure, the decimation of its internal systems, including the family, because we believe our "way of life" is worth more than their lives. I think it's really that simple.

We call our way of life "democracy" and claim "they hate our freedom" but we'll sacrifice our own freedoms for great sale prices. We know the war on terror is a war for oil, and really, what's wrong with that, as long as we can drive our cars and watch tv.

The sad residue of manifest destiny.

Dramatic, sure, but let's wake up. How much longer will we consume the war on terror's doublespeak? How much longer do we watch our rights erode? Our values? How much more terror will we ignore in the world? How many more soldiers will we sacrifice? How many more mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, sons and daughters?

Bhutto's death is ringing around the world.

Here the day was gray and quite cold. G and I went to dinner with our friends, C & T, in town from New York. First we went to the Red Iguana, but the line in was a forty-minute wait, and that was in from outside! None of us wanted to endure 18 degree cold. So we went to La Hacienda. Yum! It was great to see those two.

End of December

Belated Happy Birthday to my brother, who as of yesterday, has been alive for 38 years. He cooked the Christmas turkey and we all greatly enjoyed eating it. My sister made her famous pumpkin streusel pie, and my sister-in-law made a new favorite for my son--orange chiffon pie. Mmmmm. Mom made the traditional Christmas fish (jello--we are Utahns, after all). All I had to make was cranberry sauce, which I plan to eat on a turkey sandwich shortly.

My brother's wife's brother (my brother-in-law?) joined us for the eve feasting and for Dad's famous Christmas Day pancakes. He is recently graduated from boot camp, for which I congratulate him. He returns to his military induction on the first of the year. We wish him a long time in California and no time in war zones, though that doesn't seem likely today.

Benazir Bhutto was assassinated last night. A suicide bomber apparently attacked a rally where her supporters were gathered. Here are images of the attack, which resulted in the deaths of at least 20 other people.

Pakistan's bizarre political saga includes corruption in Bhutto's family history, as well as the accusation of corruption during her two terms as the country's prime minister. Some saw her Washington-backed return to Pakistan as a "power-share" with Musharaff. She returned to Pakistan to challenge his rule, despite his warning that her security could not be guaranteed. Upon her arrival two months ago, Bhutto's caravan was attacked by two suicide bombers in Karachi. Over 100 people died and more than 600 wounded in the attack.

Bhutto denounced Musharaff's declaration of military law "crackdown" last month. Her assassination, which comes ten days after Musharaff lifted "emergency" law, will prove to be another turning point, both for Pakistan and for global relations in the region.

It should be noted that our presence in Pakistan is scheduled to expand considerably in the new year. And again, what is our relationship to Pakistan? According to Amy Goodman on today's Democracy Now, Bhutto's assassination preempted the headline story about

US Special Forces expecting to vastly expand their presence in Pakistan beginning in 2008, the US troops reportedly taking part in an effort to train and support Pakistani counterinsurgency forces and clandestine counterterrorism units. We also brought you news that while the US expands its presence in Pakistan, questions have been raised over how Pakistan spent $5 billion in US aid since September 11th, the money supposed to have been sent to fight al-Qaeda and Taliban, instead US officials admitting funds were diverted to help finance weapons systems to counter India, another US ally.

Hmm. Seems like a lot of money for our war on terror gets diverted to other purposes. Good thing we've got those Democrats in Congress to get us out of Iraq, eh? Love those bold moves to protect the public well-being, home and abroad.

At least they listened to the testimony of Jamie Leigh Jones. This story deserves a post of its own. It's just too much to comprehend that Haliburton/KBR, one of the recipients of those aforementioned funds, promotes rape culture among its employees. And whose money is it, anyway?

Apparently, Mr. Bush thinks it all belongs to him and his pals. He thinks his authority to nix funds for SCHIP supersedes states' rights. His rejection of Ohio's bipartisan expansion plan exemplifies the appalling reality of our national priorities. While the Bushites slash public health and education funds (in collusion with the fearless democratic leadership), the Bush administration is the biggest-spending presidential outfit since LBJ. Yet another similarity between GWB & LBJ...

Don't think about it. Just go shopping.

And let's hear it for the FCC. Commissioner Michael Copps was one of two who voted against lifting the thirty-year ban on media consolidation. He says,

We claim to be giving the news industry a shot in the arm, but the real effect is going to be to reduce total newsgathering. We shed big crocodile tears for the financial plight of newspapers, yet the truth is that newspaper profits are about double the S&P 500 average. We pat ourselves on the back for holding six field hearings across the United States, yet today’s decision cites not a single word from the thousands of Americans who waited in long lines for an open mike to testify before us. We say we have closed loopholes, yet we are introducing new ones. We say we’re guided by public comment, yet the majority’s decision is overwhelmingly opposed by the public, as demonstrated in our record and in public opinion surveys. We claim the mantle of scientific research, even as the experts say we’ve asked the wrong questions, used the wrong data, and reached the wrong conclusions.

Copps urges the American public to pay attention to who the FCC is serving with this decision.

It’s time for the American people to understand the game that is being played here. Big media doesn’t want to tell the full story, of course, but I have heard first-hand from editorial page editors who have told me they can cover any story, save one—media consolidation—and that they have been instructed to stay away from that one. That’s a story for another day, perhaps.

Today’s story is a decision by the majority unconnected to good policy and not even incidentally concerned with encouraging media to make our democracy stronger. We’re not concerned with gathering valid data, conducting good research or following the facts where they lead us.

Our motivations are less Olympian and our methodology far simpler: We generously ask big media to sit on Santa’s knee, tell us what it wants for Christmas, and then push through whatever of those wishes are politically and practically feasible. No test to see if anyone’s been naughty or nice. Just another big shiny present for the favored few who already own an FCC license—and a lump of coal for the rest of us. Happy holidays!

Well, at least congress has responded to the FCC's maneuverings with bipartisan opposition.

To end today's rant on a light note, Regis Philbin is spreading some good news: Listen to Amy. He sat next to Amy Goodman at the Christmas bash of Phil Donahue and Marlo Thomas. After talking to her, he listened to her broadcast for the first time and plugged Democracy Now on ABC.

The Fifth of December

Today marks one month since I started this little project. A few friends of mine did NaNoWriMo last month. Inspired, but realistic, I decided to try some other way to write every day.

Well, every day, no. But 8 out of 30...anyway, writing is writing.

Little did I know, there is now a NaBloPoMo, which challenges bloggers to post 30 times in 30 days. My sister, Courtney, rose to the challenge with 30 entertaining posts in as many days. I congratulate her, the dough boy congratulates her. (I really don't understand the dough boy's relationship to the whole project, but there he is.)