Rage Inside the Machine

There is no joy in Mudville. 

As the week ended, new waves of emails came crashing upon the beaches of the Internet: another Wikileaks dump, of correspondence found inside John Podesta's inbox. CNN had been claiming the reading of the Wikileaks emails was actually illegal, and that they operated under different conditions, as journalists. Besides making clear the DNC's strategic and calculated navigation of the primary process, the Podesta emails reveal the internal workings of a political campaign: from the daily press briefings to the logistics of departures and arrivals to pleas for attention from voters, special interest groups, institutions, and organizations. The implication of these emails-- multiple troves of documents, each including thousands of files-- is unprecedented. Never before has a political campaign had the means to communicate with each other so directly, so clearly-- and never before has a citizenry been afforded such access. Imagine such a document dump during the time of the American Revolution: one must imagine first that such documentation was even maintained, let alone what the people in the streets would do with such information. We, however, who are still learning how best to Tweet and represent ourselves inside of the text boxes of Facebook, may still be most likely to fall for whatever story-cover produced by the mainstream media.

I found out in a conversation with my father that, as the week ended, Rush Limbaugh and I agreed on something: FBI Director Jim Comey's letter, which basically said a lot of legalistic nothing regarding the ongoing investigation of Hillary's email practices and security, may have been an intentional distraction from another round of Wikileaks. Focusing the American public's attention back to the mild reprimand of Hillary Clinton that emerged from within the government itself is surely preferable to having nothing for the people to focus on over the weekend: the less attention, and thus web traffic, the better. Rush Limbaugh's seeing this conspiracy for different reasons than mine-- he wants to see a Trump presidency, and is willing . I am in favor of neither candidate, and felt like an anarchist as I cast my absentee ballot for Jill Stein, a candidate I do not agree with fully but believe isn't part of The Machine, as it were.

Image by Kim Dotcom (seen here in green).

The same cannot be said of Hillary Clinton, who has been, at the very least, part of a two-person team of attorneys that have already had a major effect on the United States of America. The heartfelt narrative, of the wide-eyed white lawyer woman working on behalf of children and families across this country-- whether it's true or not-- has been overshadowed by this massive set of circumstances and circumstantial evidence. Like a child who has surrounded themselves with a wall of building blocks of their own making, Hillary-- not any nanny, caretaker, aide, or consultant-- has put herself in this horrifically awkward position.

John Kass's Saturday morning editorial in the Chicago Tribune tried to turn the tide on the Presidential campaign of 2016; as I write this, talking heads across the networks are offering their Sunday-morning contextualization of his clear demands. "If ruling Democrats hold themselves to the high moral standards they impose on the people they govern, they would follow a simple process," wrote Kass,


"they would demand that Mrs. Clinton step down, immediately, and let her vice presidential nominee, Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia, stand in her place."

Under the weight of a network of her own making, Clinton's ability to govern has been irreparably damaged, forever tainted by the means of her questionable rise to power. Kass begins with a reasonable argument: were she to win, the potential for us to endure another "long national nightmare" is too great to put up with any longer. The "[...] during this presidential campaign, Americans were confronted with a two-tiered system of federal justice: one for standards for the Clintons and one for the peasants." Kass doesn't have to go any farther than to make his claim about "federal justice"-- but anyone with a Facebook account knows the landscape of right and wrong and good and bad in this country has become far more complicated than pitting Cruella DeVille against the well-being of some adorable puppies. Kass knows Hillary's 'getting-away-with-it' cannot be undone or unmuted, but could prove to be a scourge on our democracy, long after the election is over and a winner is declared.

If there is A Machine at work, this situation could not have been a part of their plan. The Podesta emails, brought to us by Wikileaks, reveal the internal workings of the Clinton campaign-- with far more nuance and detail than anyone may have expected (these emails include communication related to HRC's failed bid for the Presidency in 2008). So much of the email dump is banal, the kind of emails we all accumulate: documentation of our situational awareness, 'FYI' messages from institutions and organizations, and endless back-and-forth exchanges regarding logistics. These emails have not yet produced information that would end Hillary's campaign, and few are willing to speak about the true motivations of Julian Assange have yet to be uncovered (Russian operative or unprincipled computer whiz?). Snowden, Anonymous, and other shadowy entities have shied away from giving context to the most recent bouts of Wikileaks. The most there is to go on is this Twitter exchange in late July 2016, between Snowden and Assange.

The difference between the philosophies of these two men is important to understanding our modern information warfare: one claims to believe "modest curation" of the release of illegally-accessed information to be critical to its maximum impact, while the other characterizes "curation" as "censorship." Before this Twitter tussle, Snowden appeared in the April 2016 issue of Reason magazine, where he drew distinctions between himself and Assange ("I am not anti-secrecy. I am pro-accountability." as cited by Feeney).

In the spirit of Snowden's distinction, I browsed the latest Wikileaks dump last night, and found the server processing search requests to be reliably unavailable (how many other thousands of people were wading through this, I wondered?). There were over seven pages to visit; each page held a few dozen emails, sorted by subject line, sender, and recipients. I was struck by one email-- copied below-- from early November, 2008. With the confidence of a job well done (or as well as possible) and with the promise of continued work within the Executive Branch of the government, Hillary's team communicates about a list of "proposed briefings to be requested"-- that is, the global and domestic situations on which she needed more information. Some of the places and countries on these lists are familiar headlines; this list, written in the blissful early winter of 2008, when the nation was busy celebrating the election of our first black President, and all seemed right with the world (within weeks, he would be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize). This email represents the beginning of an era in the United States' foreign policy: on military intervention, the expansion or moderation of trade, and our increased collaboration with other countries, to fight global terrorism. ISIS, domestic gun violence and mass shootings, racial violence and law enforcement's abuse of power, climate change-- these do not appear on this list (to my knowledge; there are many mysterious acronyms). What does appear, at the top of both lists, are the United States' ongoing conflicts: where boots may or may not have been on the ground at the time (2008), but where American lives may have been lost in the eight years that have followed. It is the context of these lists that adds an unescapable chill (I liberally added line breaks, but changed not a word): the non-governmental email addresses (AOL; GMail) are troubling, but not as much as the communication's final line. Attached automatically, it brands the entire transmission to be part of a larger, dark toolbar-- an application on someone's desktop, just like yours.


###


Re: Proposed Briefings to be Requested

From:ricesusane@aol.com To: mlippert@barackobama.com, dmcdonough@barackobama.com, djsberg@gmail.com, tblinken@barackobama.com, john.podesta@gmail.com, john.podesta@ptt.gov 

Date: 2008-11-07 18:29 

Subject: Re: Proposed Briefings to be Requested


yes, we envisioned that as part of ongoing operations.? Would you separate it out? Come to think of it, we should also ask for AFRICOM brief.


-----Original Message-----


From: Mark Lippert <mlippert@barackobama.com>

To: Ricesusane@aol.com;

Denis McDonough <dmcdonough@barackobama.com>;

djsberg@gmail.com;

Antony (Tony) Blinken <tblinken@barackobama.com>; 

john.podesta@gmail.com;

john.podesta@ptt.gov


Sent: Fri, 7 Nov 2008 3:19 pm


Subject: Re: Proposed Briefings to be Requested

Just skimming - I'd throw CTJF-HOA brief into the mix for DOD.


From: ricesusane@aol.com

To: Denis McDonough; Mark Lippert; djsberg@gmail.com ; Antony (Tony) Blinken; john.podesta@gmail.com ; john.podesta@ptt.gov


Sent: Fri Nov 07 14:17:07 2008


Subject: Proposed Briefings to be Requested


Below is the list of briefings Jim and I propose we request of the IC and others for senior transition national security staff over the coming weeks.?? A subset of these TBD could subsequently be requested for POTUS-E and VPOTUS-E.? We leave it to others to decide if it?is desirable and appropriate for POTUS-E to request any or all of these in his meeting?with Bush on Monday). We welcome your thoughts.

IC


Iraq


Iran


Afghanistan


Pakistan


Russia


China


MEPP and region


Mexico


Counter-narcotics and Crime


North Korea


Al Qaeda and global CT threat


Global WMD Threat (bio, chem and nuclear)


Cybersecurity and CI


IRDPA briefs






NSC Policy briefings on:






Iraq


Iran


Afghanistan


Pakistan


Russia


China


MEPP and region


North Korea


Al Qaeda and global CT threat


Global WMD Threat (bio, chem and nuclear)


Cybersecurity


Mexico


Counter-narcotics and Crime


Syria


Lebanon


Egypt


Saudi Arabia


Darfur


Zimbabwe


DRC


Weak States strategy


OMB Budget briefing


DOD


Ongoing Operations


Iraq


Afghanistan


Pakistan


Nuclear safety and security


Readiness


Homeland Security Infrastructure


security


Border security


Disease/pandemic preparedness


First respone/disaster preparedness


Crisis Response plans/processes and continuity in government


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###

Feeney, M. (April 2016). "Snowden makes distinction..." Reason [magazine]. Retrieved from http://reason.com/blog/2014/04/09/snowden-makes-distinction-between-himsel

Kass, J. (29 Oct. 2016). "Democrats should ask Clinton to step aside." Chicago Tribune. Retrieved from http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/kass/ct-hillary-clinton-emails-kass-1030-20161028-column.html

Wikileaks. (2016). "Re: Proposed briefings to be requested." Podesta Emails. Retrieved from https://wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/emailid/1299

Stars and Stripes

Hillary Clinton's Nightmare at 20,000 Feet

The Clinton campaign plane was in the air this morning, traveling to Cedar Rapids, Iowa, and then on to Des Moines, a two hour drive. The whole crew was reported to have been on board: Huma, Jennifer Palmieri, the unnamed aides seen aside Clinton in so many photographs, all riding along on the short flight to the next stop in the vast state of Iowa. For some reason, the plane's wifi wasn't working when they left Cedar Rapids, leaving all of them in the dark, virtually. This was important as to how the day was said to have unfolded, because while they were in the air, the news broke: news that would linger like a stench in the air for days to come. FBI Director James Comey sent a letter to Congress making clear that he was re-opening the investigation into Hillary's email server.

Imagine those moments on the tarmac, with the whole gang still cloistered inside the plane, as they huddled around screens, reading information that the rest of the world had been digesting for dozens of minutes, close to an hour even. The Clinton campaign-- the front runner for President of the United States and her entire staff-- flew through their own version of Serling's Twilight Zone today, an unexplained vortex of information. I imagine it had been peaceful, or at least as peaceful as those birds had it, the ones that were trapped in the eye of Hurricane Matthew a few weeks back, as it rounded Florida. Networks were reading Comey's letter verbatim, unable to contextualize. I was driving around the roundabout in Trinidad, Colorado when I heard the excited voice of Phil Mattingly on CNN (via Sirius). Phil had been patiently waiting at the gate for nothing but this plane to arrive, and now suddenly had a story on his hands:
 "The plane did not have wi-fi during the entire fight. So you have senior advisors, as well as Hillary Clinton on the plane, and as the plane landed they were finding out about this as we were landing. I had one advisor tell me, 'we're learning about that at the same time you guys are.' They didn't have advanced notice of this, they seem similarly stunned and we saw them huddling, we've been waiting for Hillary Clinton to deplane to go to that first event in Cedar Rapids, as of now she has not. [...]
She's expected to speak in about 20 minutes. She hasn't gotten off the plane yet. The reporters are waiting outside her plane right now to yell and see if she'll come over and say anything. Usually the deplaning process happens rather quickly, but it's worth noting her top advisors are on the plane, campaign manager Robby Mook, communications director Jen Palmieri, Huma Abedin, her close advisor is also on the plane right now. They have not deplaned yet. Still waiting far to happen, waiting to see if they will have reaction. I think the takeaway is they had no idea this was coming so they're trying to formulate a response right now."

Once Hill was en route to her scheduled event, John Podesta-- of the email treasure trove fame-- came out as swingingly as one can against the Director of the FBI, claiming the timing of this letter plays right into the small, greasy hands of nobody's favorite land developer. Diane Feinstein was also appalled and said so to the press. The New York Times ran a feature about a 26-year-old lawyer on a road trip to follow not just her dreams but her heart, right into Arkansas. The Washington Post found a nameless Comey apologist who filled up word count quickly, with endless rhetorical questions:
"What would it look like if the FBI inadvertently came across additional emails that appear to be relevant to the Clinton investigation and not at least inform the Oversight Committee that this occurred? What would be the criticism then? That the FBI hid it? That the FBI purposely kept this information to themselves?" What, surely, was a poor, ethically-upstanding government official to do? Delete the files? Delay the process? Put it off for a month? I've always heard that's how, sometimes, it works. Some other news sites describe the brink of World War III-- irreegardless of the outcome of this charade of an election-- so I can't help but wonder if I'm intentionally supposed to be caught up in the drama of Hillary's gang using unauthorized email addresses (like huma.abedin@yahoo.com, as the Drudge Report ran this afternoon), instead of asking about the implications of what was said to be a close call by US and Russian air forces in the skies over Syria, which happened within the same news cycle as this re-ignited email controversy. The NYTimes also cited a former Watergate attorney, Nick Ackerman, as saying it's not the place of the FBI director to be making such a scene, about any ongoing investigation, "never mind about an investigation based on evidence that he acknowledges may not be significant." He's right, but in this election year, it has been just about anybody's business, to get up on the wing of the airplane and jump around like a madman-- metaphorically, if not rhetorically. Clinton did the same-- jumped up and down on the wing of her own plane-- later in the day, demanding documentation from the FBI regarding the status of the email investigation (what else can one do?), while the New York Post was running humiliating PhotoShop jobs of Anthony Weiner on their front page, as it came to be understood that Huma's ex-husband-- the texting, sexting freak-- was a likely cause for Comey's renewed and public interest. The election of Barack Obama in 2008 made a statement about race in the United States. The election of 2016 has sadly become a statement about the behavior of the most piggish and deplorable of men: the adulterers, the molesters, the abusers, and the portion of us that collectively look the other way. Charlie Sheen, Bill Cosby-- these people never ran for office. If Anthony Weiner is at the center of Comey's re-opening of the investigation, this scandal will dissipate as quickly as anyone's reservations about Trump's "locker room talk." But there is something much uglier than that on the wing of the plane these days.

Horwitz, S. (28 Oct. 2016). The Washington Post. "FBI Director..." Retrieved from
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/fbi-director-james-b-comey-under-fire-for-his-controversial-decision-on-the-clinton-email-inquiry/2016/10/28/fbad009c-9d57-11e6-a0ed-ab0774c1eaa5_story.html

Hains, T. (28 Oct. 2016). "CNN Reports..." RealClearPolitics. Retrieved from http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2016/10/28/cnn_reporter_on_clintons_plane_she_learned_about_fbi_reopening_case_at_the_same_time_you_did.html

Presidential Debate Bingo

Bingo card for the final Presidential debate.

Bernie Sanders Joins the Suicide Squad (August 2016)

[Originally written in August 2016, and intended as a review of the film Suicide Squad; presented here in edited form].

"The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity." I posted this quote, alongside a screenshot of Frank Sinatra performing in the 1970s, to my Facebook page on the morning following Bernie Sanders' submission at the Democratic National Convention. I was feeling disheartened and ornery and hungover, and intentionally misattributed the quote-- the final line from William Butler Yeats' poem "The Second Coming"-- to The Chairman of the Board. Nobody commented; nobody cared. I corrected myself two days later, not willing to be complicit in the charade-- but we have become so. The Democratic National Convention had been, by many accounts, a tumultuous event, riddled by scandals sprung from multiple email leaks that proved Bernie Sanders never have a chance. Some have alleged that the Democratic party conspired against the popular Socialist-turned-Democrat; others interpreted the emails to reveal a nefarious and corrupt political machine, one whose influence reaches into the operations of the federal government. By the time Sanders called for a vote by acclimation from the floor of the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia, the email leaks were making for bold headlines coast-to-coast-- not for their content, but for their alleged ties to Russian hackers (and perhaps had something to do with the Republican frontrunner's allegedly cozy relationship with the Russian President).

As Bernie spoke that night, this country kicked off a new era of politics: one in which we can expect not just the active participation and manipulation of the media by political groups, but intentional deception. Paid online trolls to riddle the opposition's Facebook group pages with provocative and fictional facts. Elected representatives speak so deceptively as to require "fact checking." Within two weeks of the close of the Convention, the Democratic nominee was applauded-- loudly-- by a gathering of the Washington press, at her first "press conference" in hundreds of days. All question as to the tactics that got her there had clearly evaporated: she was and is an alternative to the GOP nominee, always has been. Lauded by the Fourth Estate, the democratic process limps forward, almost mocking itself, as only one real candidate appears to have long been the plan. Formerly-passionate Facebook friends of mine declare their willing ignorance and resignation to all things political. This morning among my friends a link is spreading that explains how people's minds aren't changed because of what they may read online, and that commenting on politics on Facebook is useless. We seem to be beginning to live in a world that truly accepts when the ends justify the means-- and we seem to be more willing to look the other way, when the ends seem to match up with our own.

Into this ethically nebulous space enters the Warner Brothers film Suicide Squad, which opened nationwide on the first weekend of August and promptly set a record for box office revenue. Suicide Squad is less of a vehicle for any specific star, and more of DC's answer to Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy: a collection of morally questionable misfits band together to save the world. Unlike Marvel's cutesy and glitzy box office mechanism, DC's Suicide Squad is explicit in its politics: Amanda Waller (played well by Viola Davis, though I kept imagining Robin Quivers in the role) is a calculating official operating on behalf of the federal government and in the name of national and global security, assembles a team of ethically nebulous superhumans. Waller's practices are unorthodox, and may be perhaps more reprehensible than any individual member of the gang she assembles-- but she is in it because she sees the future of the country at stake. It is politics by any means necessary.

A real-life Amanda Waller?

I won't unpack the symbolism of each member of the Suicide Squad (is there any?), but will draw attention to the timing of the movie's release: filling summertime theaters just as Bernie Sanders, who somehow motivated millions politically, called for a vote by acclimation from the floor of the Democratic National Convention. His concession came amid scandal that would, in months hence, become thunderous, ominous. By the time the foliage was in full bloom in his (and my) home state of Vermont, Bernie Sanders' name had become synonymous not with his political platform or stance on a given issue, but rather a symbol of the documented corruption within the Democratic Party. Sanders never had a chance. His only hope was to play it by the rules that were handed him: join the team and be given an important but not ultimate role, one that will look and feel like power. Sanders joined something like the Suicide Squad on that afternoon in Philadelphia, knowing his work would continue to have meaning as long as he was willing to fit into somebody else's larger scheme. "Ignore everything I've been saying for the past nine months," the memes would say. Who among us will continue to lack all intention? And will the passionate intensity of this election subside in early November-- or is concession the only hope? 

The Unable Danger of Curt Weldon

When I was ascending through elementary school, I was also climbing the ranks within Cub Scout Pack 292 (Aston, PA). We were a small Pack-- twenty or so scouts, and a handful of dedicated leaders-- and met weekly within our two or three 'dens,' and monthly, as a pack. With what looked like high formality to second and third graders, we would set up the flags-- the Pack flag and the American flag-- that were stored in a hall closet at the church that hosted us (Aston Presbyterian). That closet was loaded with decades of scouting history: the Pack's flag was there, but so was the flag for a (not long to be) defunct Troop bearing the same number. So were flags noting patrols and dens of Scouts long since moved on. When me and my peers became Cub Scouts, we grew accustomed to the ritual of setting up the flags-- and the heavy, brass-looking stands that held them up during our meetings.

Scouting played a big role in my life; it put me in touch with many people I would have otherwise not known. One of those people was Curt Weldon. My then-Congressman appeared at one of our monthly Pack meetings and presented us with a brand-new American flag-- that had actually been flown over the Capital of the United States! We were in awe of it, and in awe of this tall, dark-suited "politician." Later, during the height of my awkward high school years, Curt reached out and voiced his support for an event connected to my Eagle Scout project: an 'anti-gang rally' held in the school auditorium. On a break from my undergraduate years spent in Aston, I ended up on a bus tour with my mother and the Aston Republican Women's Committee, organized by Weldon's wife. I remember little from the trip, except shaking hands once again (for a third time?) with Curt Weldon-- and also the moment when the gaggle of us happened upon Sonny Bono as we were escorted through the halls of Congress.

Congressman Weldon's political career ended in controversy surrounding his daughter, wife, lobbying, and unethical ties to a Russian oil company, first reported by the Philadelphia Inquirer. Some, including Weldon himself, allege the timing of the FBI's investigation in 2004-- which involved searching the contents of his office as well as his daughter's home-- was to influence his fast-approaching re-election day. Some conspiracists believe Weldon's uncovering of Mohammed Atta's connection to the 9/11 terrorists, as well as his uncovering of a secret military scheme titled "Able Danger" led to his unseating from Congress. Weldon lost badly that year, to a retired Vice Admiral running as a Democrat, and hadn't been from since-- until a letter a few months back, supporting the 'let's-clean-house' rhetoric of both Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump. And this morning, lurking in my Facebook feed like fresh dogshit on an unmowed suburban lawn, sat a picture of a white-haired Weldon-- not the way I remembered him, from second grade, or high school-- and the headline, which was Curt's a full-throated endorsement of Donald Trump, hosted as a "guest columnist" by the Delaware County Daily Times. His clearest lines:

I am disgusted with both national political parties and their manipulation of the process and the people I served for 30 years. [...]

We now know that Bernie’s campaign was doomed from the start because he dared to challenge the “system” and the national machine of the Clintons. Donald Trump has many personal shortcomings – but at this point in our country we need a strong leader who will clean out the cesspool in both political parties in Washington, DC. This may be our only opportunity in our lifetimes to dramatically change the direction of our country!

Curt's op-ed descends into the rhetoric that has become commonplace during this election cycle: trade deals have killed this economy, law enforcement are being targeted in the streets, drugs are "pouring" over our borders and destroying society. I couldn't help but wonder what Curt thought he was going to accomplish in penning this op-ed: was his voice still a viable one? Did his endorsement matter? Did the people of Delco buy the official narrative regarding his unethical behavior, or did they think it was somehow a political smear? Did it matter, ten years later? Weldon seemed to think time heals all political wounds (though he mentions early in his op-ed that he voted for Carter over Ford, due to Ford's pardoning of Nixon?), and that his voice, the voice of Curt Weldon, once a respected politician and someone Cub Scouts looked up to, was important enough to raise in support of the GOP front runner. Trump is a man whose total lack of experience and destructive, childlike behavior continues to get a pass from so much conservative media-- but not, I had expected (or hoped?) from armchair conservatives like Weldon, with records of public service and time spent in DC. I don't know what, if anything, I had expected to hear from Curt Weldon, regarding the Presidential Campaign of 2016. I do know his op-ed was written to have been run in the Daily Times within a week of the election, as Weldon's sign-off pledges his (and his wife's) support for Trump 'this coming Tuesday': 

Folks – believe me – it’s leadership in both political parties that cause the problems that we face every day. And, in this election only one candidate will take on the “system” and those who have benefitted for years.

On Tuesday, my wife, Mary, and I will vote for Donald Trump!

In comment boxes online and on Facebook, the public was not especially kind of Weldon, though some Trump supporters posted memes ("Drain the Swamp" was most memorable). While I don't blame Weldon for wanting to be vocal about his distrust for Hillary Clinton, seeing this former politician from my hometown make the case in print for a liar, a bigot, and a man willing to admit publicly to sexual assault to be the next President of the United States was difficult-- at one point, at a very young age, I looked up to Curt Weldon. I do not know about his daughter, her company, or any of their ties to Russia; I do know who he is supporting for President, and who he will refuse to support. I know too he believes his voice is important, and so does his county's daily newspaper-- important enough to print, as a guest columnist. I know he once handed my Cub Scout Pack an American flag, a symbol of freedom, and how, in this country, we're to treat each other. Those days are over now; perhaps they never actually began. Weldon will not be the only skeletal-closet/former Republican to come out and support the Presidential nominee over the next twelve days. Perhaps Curt really did crack open something he shouldn't have, and thus really has been shunned politically, to the extent necessary to believe Trump's 'outsider' status is actually going to get him anything. Any fool can make a pro-Trump argument featuring Hillary, which is what Weldon accomplished, but that does not necessarily make him a fool. The spelling error in Weldon's final paragraph was retained from the original, in the excerpt above, for accuracy, and to help (for yourselves) answer the "who's the fool?" question. Maybe it was Curt's own error, or maybe it counts as one of "newspaper racket" editor Phil Heron's mistakes, for not catching it. Regardless: they deserve each other. 

###

Later in the day, a WCAX poll emerges, from the Green Mountains: Hillary will handily beat Trump, but nearly one-third of those polled claimed to be voting for someone other than Clinton or Trump. A few points for Jill Stein, a few for Gary Johnson-- but ten percent for someone other than even those four. Ben? Jerry? The World's Most Interesting Man? Or are the Green Mountains still Feeling the Bern, despite all rational thought? 

Martin, P. (23 Oct. 2006). "The Case of Curt Weldon: Republican Congressman targeted after criticizing 9/11 cover up." World Socialist Web Site. Retrieved from https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2006/10/weld-o23.html

Weldon, C. (26 Oct. 2016). "Guest Columnist: Curt Weldon in Trump's Corner." Delaware County Daily Times. Retrieved from http://www.delcotimes.com/opinion/20161026/guest-column-curt-weldon-in-trumps-corner

Birth of a Blog: Hangin' Tough at the Wonderful House

After eight years of Ike, it was hard to imagine anyone except a retired board chairman or a senile ex-general having any influence in Government. They were the government—a gang of rich, mean-spirited old fucks who made democracy work by beating us all stupid with a series of billion-dollar hypes they called Defense Contracts, Special Subsidies, and “emergency tax breaks” for anybody with the grease to hire a Congressman. –HST, to Jim Silberman, 1/13/70 (261).

Two weeks until the Presidential election. I sat in the Wonderful House Chinese Restaurant, in one of the small pockets of development out here in the high desert, as I waited for my Schezuan Beef Lunch Combo. The news was still breaking in east coast time, while here in southeastern Colorado, the two hour delay made each scathing headline more surreal, each allegation of journalistic collusion more like a fantasy, told far away from the dry and dusty hills I was hiding out in. In addition to the coyotes last night one of the Clinton’s main “fixers” was howling last night to Sean Hannity about Hillary’s torrid sex life, her alleged affair with the undead Vince Foster, and so much more squawking from the shadows of the past and not so distant present. The night before that, much of America tuned in to watch one human beat another with a baseball bat lined with barbed wire on The Walking Dead-- pop fiction, as if ultra-violence were anything new. There are no fixers for that: people would rather watch humans bash in each other's skulls than confront the political binary. At least the Internet punditry gave up on berating Bob Dylan for not acknowledging the Nobel committee, and moved on to rant about the gruesome and gory sequences. I didn’t watch it, but supposedly it was a high water mark for violence on television—that is, the fictional and intentionally-scripted stuff. The real violence—be it in Chicago, North Dakota, or in Cleveland—hasn't been broadcast on the television in a very, very long time. Sometimes it is found inside the clickable windows on our pocket-sized devices; more and more of the time, it is becoming knowledge that one must seek out. 

The speakers in the Wonderful House are usually pumping out some Internet audio stream of 1980s music. The last time I was there, NKOTB’s “Hangin’ Tough” came on while I slowly enjoyed what the menu calls “General” Chicken. On this visit, however, two songs began playing at once—“Girls Just Want to Have Fun” and something else from the 1980s, at a much lower volume, unrecognizable, but with a masculine tenor moan that was likely The Police. I was seated in the back corner, directly beneath the speaker. Nobody seemed to mind the music; I’m not sure anyone else even noticed. The waitress refilled my water glass from a plastic pitcher, unfazed. The two songs—like the two candidates—were cancelling out each other’s relevance, only adding to the din that was the aural background of the restaurant. Nobody cared which song was which; we had heard it all before. Both were recordings completed and distributed over thirty years ago; if both were to be playing at once, no one would care, and maybe even no one would notice. Because it was so memorable, I will probably always hear NKOTB's "Hangin' Tough" when I eat at the Wonderful House, simply because I will probably never be paying as close attention again. My food arrived.

As I was eating, another update came through, from what felt like a faraway location: Democratic running mate Tim Kaine was holding a rally for thirty people somewhere on the eastern seaboard. Photos confirmed that there were just about as many people present here in the Wonderful House. Two weeks remained. Patrons came and went. A new campaign appeared in my Facebook feed, on behalf of the GOP nominee, offering one’s name forever emblazoned on the wall of Trump Tower in New York City for a mere $2,000 donation. Could he pull it off? Some polls had him up by one or two; others had her up by twelve, or twenty. Some said the election was over. Some said it never began. I wondered if any of my Facebook friends-- mostly high school peers-- were successful enough to be able to afford to pledge $2,000, and if so, would any want to. It seemed incredibly doubtful that any of my Facebook friends considered attending Tim Kaine's failed attempt at a rally. The simultaneous songs continued as I finished my lunch, still creating nothing but a cacophony that all of us eating learned to ignore.

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I am a Hunter S. Thompson fan from way back, long before he met Johnny Depp, and long before his days as an ESPN columnist. His collected letters (edited by Douglas Brinkley) were published while I was completing my MFA degree at Goddard College, and I made these central to my study of 20^th century poetry and creative nonfiction. I am not, however, an aspiring “gonzo journalist,” nor am I seeking to emulate or imitate Hunter’s drug-fueled antics, the stuff of legend. I am interested, however, in how Thompson would view this election, were he still alive. While Wikileaks’ troves of information have provided at the very least circumstantial evidence regarding the unethical behavior of Hillary Clinton, I believe Thompson may have been most disgusted by the collusion of the press with one of the major party candidates. As we sadly lack Hunter’s voice in our American political discourse, this blog represents my own—which is in no way to suggest my chops as a political writer or journalist are even in the same ballpark as Thompson’s. This blog, to be active in the two weeks prior to the Presidential Election of 2016, will represent my thoughts and experiences surrounding the Presidential Election of 2016. It is inspired by Hunter S. Thompson, and thus posts may include quotes from his collected letters and other works. The postings on this site are my own and do not necessarily represent the postings, strategies, or opinions of any employer or client I have at present, or may have in the future. --CS