At the ripe age of 100, Claude Levi Strauss, has moved along. Famed intellectual, academic anthropologist, he influenced a generation and more with his writing and allegedly changed the European White Man’s vision of those others, not European, White, Man or Rich. I am not so sure it wasn’t really a brand change operation in which the fundamentals remained.
In America, where each new violent assault upon our peace of mind brings new waves of either introspection or blame-gaming, the press is busy now masticating away on many bones:
The killings at Fort Hood have ignited the predictable knee-jerk right-wing impulse to lock up, or better yet kill, everyone with any vague Middle-Eastern name, look or quality that could be tacked on an Islamic person; the same people likely don’t know that most the world’s Muslims don’t even live there, but in South East Asia: Jakarta, you’re next up on the hate list. I’m surprised though they’re not taking out the present reason-for-anger on psychiatrists.
America’s finest on patrol at Ft Hood
The same event has brought forward a flush of navel-gazing “oh my, why us?” with lots of prayers aimed at victims and their families, and words of “innocents slaughtered” and “America’s finest” murmured by one and all, and Presidential condolences given in grave words about the “horrific outburst of violence ” - the usual verbiage with which we drape our tiny little minority (these days) of “warriors” who bravely go out to defend Uncle Sam’s domain. The trouble is all this rhetorical garbage simply isn’t true: the military is not made up of America’s finest, but mostly of a combination of America’s most economically deprived, and usually also educationally deprived and most easily victimized by the military’s offer of a snazzy uniform, “respect,” glory and a paycheck with medical care attached. Some deal! Nor are military people innocent in any way – they are well-trained killers, armed with American technology’s most lethal weapons, sent, usually with overwhelmingly lopsided force, to wreak mayhem on peasants in some third world place possessing some resource or another deemed useful by their corporate masters. That most of the pawns in this game don’t know or realize this demonstrates only how well the masters have honed their game. Most of the President’s lamented “horrific violence” is in fact inflicted by the US Army, Air Force, Marines and Navy, who generally compete to see who can do the most.
General McChrystal in Afghanistan, planning a new Disneyland along with Wally.
Lake Lucerne, Orlando, Florida
Over in Orlando, home of one Disneyland, another disgruntled soul made a minor blip on the American killing list, a day later. Tomorrow will be another, reported or not.
Meanwhile, out Far East, Disney and China have announced that a massive new Disneyland will be built near Shanghai at a cost of 3 billion dollars. Perhaps the corporate masters at Disney will ship over a boatload of American coolies to do the low-labor that Chinese no longer see fit to do. It’d be a job….
In order to accommodate local tastes, Disney assures that some elements will be changed to fit the cultural setting.
As in Disney’s concession (after losing money there) to allowing the drinking of alcohol at Disneyland, Paris, in order supposedly to accommodate the region’s culture, the real reason for any concessions from Disney’s morality is that good old All-American one, the bottom line: to maximize profits, a goal for which any supposed corporate morality can be bent like warm rubber, as has been shown by many other American companies in their dealings with China, as well as any other unsavory place.
Meanwhile, back on Wall Street, the wild ride of the last year continues, with the DOW Jones having leaped from its year long swoon down to 7,000 to back above 10,000 a week or so ago, where upon the talking heads of the corporate propaganda ministries of ABNBCBSCNNFOX pontificated, along with high-up economic honchos private and public, that The Great Recession was over. The following days economic data wasn’t so obliging, and having broken the alleged psychological barrier of the 10K numerological religion, the market nose-dived 200 points and more. However, then new applications for unemployment figures came in and mere half million Americans had requested aid for their new status as unemployed, on which good tidings, the market jumped ecstatically back over the mystical 10K barrier, making at least Wall Street merry in preparation for Christmas. But a few days later the government announced another 150,000 job losses, taking the official national unemployment figure to 10.2 percent, the worst official figure in 25 years. The market has waffled on this news for the moment. Curiously then the mainstream press decided to make the well-known ugly little secret that official figures aren’t exactly reflective of reality or accurate, and fessed up that the real figure was more in the realm of 17.5%. Which, naturally means the real real figure is considerably higher.
Broader Measure of Unemployment Stands at 17.5%
By DAVID LEONHARDT of the NY Times
The official jobless rate excludes millions of people who have given up looking for work and part-time workers who want to be working full time.
And today, wandering in off the mystical eathers of the internet, I got my very own private personal message from none other than Mr Timothy Geithner, former employee of Goldman Sachs, presently residing (I suppose) in Washington DC where he serves as Secretary of the Treasury for President Obama. That I should get such a missive from the Secretary was amazing to me. To say that it is the deepest of honors would be understating the matter. I would do virtually anything for this man.
I am Timothy Geithner, Secretary of the United States National Treasury.
From: Mr.Timothy Geithner (f.notification@btinternet.com)
Sent: Sat 11/07/09 4:22 AM To:
Hot damn ! Now I must stop so I can, as a duty-bound American citizen, do as my Secretary of Treasury has asked.
