September

I don't really fee like writing anything about the Republican Convention. It's bound to be clown show - McCain's campaign has been a clown show so far - picking Palin as VP? it's hard to believe. Skim through the Sarah Palin posts at Lawyers, Guns and Money: we've got pork barrel politics and lies about government pork; we've got the secessionist party; we've got the abuse of power to settle old grudges and personal feuds; the book banning; the ignorance about history (the founding fathers and the pledge of allegiance); the inexperience and incompetence and hilarious attempts to cover for it (Commander in Chief of the Alaska National Guard!); the fact that she's never been to Canada - and oh yeah, the kid... Well, it's not fair to pick on the kid - lots of kids mess around, and it's not as though the GOP and their supporters would ever criticize the choice sand misfortunes of others. Right?

Those fuckers. Its endless - the things they - the right, at least the public face of the right - do to prove, one more time, that they are utterly without shame. Shameless moralizing hypocrites - they have no values, no morals, nothing, but sheer naked self-interest. There's no reason to be surprised any more - one reason I haven't bothered writing much about politics in a long while. There's nothing left to say. The modern republican party is a party of hypocrisy and power -there is nothing to say or do but vote as many of them out of power as is necessary to convince the rest to grow up and act like human beings again. I imagine most republicans are decent human beings - the ones I know are, they just don't agree with me. But they make common cause with scum, and reap the benefits of the viciousness of the bad ones, so they - the decent republicans - need to lose some elections and fast. Though who knows - there's no sign that the public is much better...

I don't know. You can see the results of of Republican governance on display - Tucker at Pilgrim Akimbo has a post up about protests in Minnesota, and police over-reaction; Thoreau at Unqualified Offerings comments; Glenn Greenwald reports and summarizes.

This is nothing new. Police have been ramping up their response to demonstrations since at least Seattle 1999. September 11, of course, provided an excuse or even more "security", especially around big events like political conventions - though lot of this occurs at a more day to day level. 9/11 put the fear in us - with cause - but we allowed the fear to linger, and it has become paranoia and cowardice. The republicans, in particular, have been the party of paranoia and cowardice - which translates into shows of toughness - attacking the weak, from Iraq, to torturing POWs, to sending cops out in riot gear against radio personalities. (And lite brites! don't forget lite brites!) And what I said then - at some point, it's hard not to see all of this, the petty crap, the bag searches at ball games, the riot cops in subways, the absurdities at airports, the illegal phone tapping and retroactive immunities, the shows of force at conventions and the like, as being meant to teach us to take a police state for granted. Keep pretending they're protecting us, so that when they need to act to genuinely control us, they can - and we can't do anything about it.

I'm not inclined to paranoia, though - I doubt anyone is planning all this. I don't expect a coup, by anyone. But things happen. And habits form. And we form the habit of having everything supervised by men with guns and bullet proof vests and we form the habit of keeping quiet about it. And - if anything happens - our government is in the habit of using those security forces to control it. So... we should not be so willing to accept it. None of it.

So anyway. This stuff won't go away when the republicans lose power - Obama voted wrong on the telecom immunity act - democrats will use it - they encouraged it in the 90s..... But they haven't made a career of it - they seem to have values other than just their own power, and they appeal to emotions besides fear and the desire to find someone else to blame and hurt. So there is hope there.

Oh well. I don't want to write much about politics - too depressing by half. Septembers do it though. The anniversaries of September 11, of Hurricane Katrina - and of my friend's death in Iraq - push this stuff to the front of my mind. And the insult of McCain's choice of Palin for VP (insult to everyone - the American people, women, Palin herself, competent republican women politicians, HIllary Clinton, etc.) plus the usual thuggery in the name of security gives me ample material to rave about....