What the…? When the…? How the hell?

Written by Gore Vidal for The Nation….

“Early in February, the Justice Department leaked Patriot Act II, known as the Domestic Security Enhancement Act, dated January 9, 2003. A Congress that did not properly debate the first act will doubtless be steamrolled by this lawless expansion.”

“Some provisions: If an American citizen has been accused of supporting an organization labeled as terrorist by the government, he can be deprived of his citizenship even if he had no idea the organization had a link to terrorists. Provision in Act II is also made for more searches and wiretaps without warrant as well as secret arrests (Section 201). In case a citizen tries to fight back in order to retain the citizenship he or she was born with, those federal agents who conduct illegal surveillance with the blessing of high Administration officials are immune from legal action. A native-born American deprived of citizenship would, presumably, be deported, just as, today, a foreign-born person can be deported. Also, according to a recent ruling of a federal court, this new power of the Attorney General is not susceptible to judicial review. Since the American who has had his citizenship taken away cannot, of course, get a passport, the thoughtful devisers of Domestic Security Enhancement authorize the Attorney General to deport him “to any country or region regardless of whether the country or region has a government.” Difficult cases with no possible place to go can be held indefinitely.”

“Where under Patriot Act I only foreigners were denied due process of law as well as subject to arbitrary deportation, Patriot Act II now includes American citizens in the same category, thus eliminating in one great erasure the Bill of Rights.”

Take me out to the ballgame….

Yellow, Blue, Orange, Green…..

Does anyone *really* pay attention to the terror alert level anymore? Each month the administration picks a new color…. let’s move to orange, no yellow, no orange.

Let’s be real for a second. The reasons I’m aware of level changes are because:

1) I’m forbidden to open my office window when the alert hits orange and the building engineers stroll the corridors searching for the rebels breathing in fresh air.

2) I live in D.C. and sometimes overhear hysterical alarmists on the metro, freaking out into their cellphones to relatives in Nebraska about how they’ve got to stop riding the metro because terrorist threats make it a prime target.

Does anyone out there know what the colors MEAN?

Savoring the unusual


Reading John’s blog is a little like eating a square of Godiva almond toffee chocolate. It’s delicious and even though it’s just a little bit, the thought crosses your mind that maybe, just maybe, it really isn’t good for you.

And if HE can find himself – hell, so can I!

[especially considering that my formative years were as normal as his were completely wacked out!] —> IF it’s true.

Keeping promises


This week flew by. The holiday is a blur of inactivity. The rain usurped my motivation.


I have lists of things “to do.” I was supposed to clean….supposed to do laundry…..supposed to work out…… supposed to do some home repairs.


Instead I sat on my couch and read and thought about cycles and breaking promises.

Every five years, I take notice and realize that “Gee, I’ve been here before.” Instead of growing and moving in a linear direction (which I optimistically perceive to be a ladder where I climb from down here to up there), I find that I’m actually moving in a circle.

Imagine if you will, a clock. I start off at 6:00, moving in a counterclockwise direction. Things start off well enough…. I make some decisions, radically change some aspects of my life that just aren’t working for me, and progress quite smoothly. Opportunities present themselves and I’ll pause to smile and laugh and hope that this time I’ve got it right.


And for about a year and half I’m on top of the world…. literally – I reach that 12:00 spot. And then *something*….

I’ll reach that peak and go on cruise control. It’ll take about a year before I realize – oops, I hit cruise control at the moment of my descent, only accelerating my decline. Instead of moving on up the food chain, I find myself back where I started.

I’ll sit at a desk, scribble in a journal/type in a blog, and wonder “Hey – I was movin’ on up, how did I get here AGAIN?” and why do I keep breaking the promises I make to myself.

I had an epiphany over the weekend – the promises stay the same. Each time. Read an entry I wrote back in 1988, you can be sure to find something similar in 1993, then again in 1998, and now in 2003 I find myself making the same promises or *goals*.

Scary thought that this is the first time I consciously noticed my quirky five-year schedule….. and I managed to sit still long enough to see the common denominator. Now all I have to do is fix this… fix me.


Easier said than done.

Sharing the homo genus with a furry cousin

One thing DNA sequencing has illustrated is that every organism on earth evolved from the same primordial soup. The genetic blueprints of many animals are astoundingly similar to our own because all species are related.

Scientists have also stated that humans share 99% of their genes with mice and dolphins. Yet Morris Goodman hasn’t recommended adding these animal friends to the homo genus.

Human beings and chimpanzees may share 99.4% of the same DNA but these species differ significantly in appearance, behavior and ability. These are the critical differences that differentiate humans from the animal kingdom. Chimps need to stay where they belong.

As for the “far-reaching implications” mentioned by the Herald News Staff…. Why wouldn’t we continue to cage our furry cousins? Humans cage their brethren. Perhaps a visit to the Old Colony Correctional Center in Bridgewater will serve as a friendly reminder. According to the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics, over 2 million inmates were held in federal or state prisons or local jails in June of 2002.

As for medical testing, humans have to participate in clinical trials of experimental drugs prior to approval by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Each successive phase of testing involves a larger number of human subjects. And even after the FDA has granted a New Drug Approval (NDA), pharmaceutical companies conduct studies on people. Humans are subject to plenty of testing by the medical community. It’s only fair that animals serve as the first line of defense.

The religious community doesn’t hold a monopoly on the belief that the “soul,” or the ability to reason, separates man from animal. Animals do not weigh decisions based on future consequences or any code of morality. Animals cannot develop language to communicate or a culture to celebrate. Animals do not practice religion or recognize the possibility of a “higher power.” Animals do not have the ability to conceptualize.

And while man needs to curb the current rate of consumption, humans must learn to take care of their own before jumping on a bandwagon to clean-up “jungles and wild places.”

If the current state of global sustainability is any indication, the chimpanzees may prefer to do without our assistance.

Dining with strangers

I travel a lot with work and stumbled on this great article in the Washington Post. Elissa Leibowitz offers dining alternatives when visiting other cities.

and

Another rant on languages

As AP reporter Ted Anthony so eloquently put it, “the dominant language of commerce, the internet, science and the skies, nearly a quarter of the human population uses what is fast becoming the world’s first global language = English. Turn on the news almost anywhere on Earth and many stories are reported in English.”

I’m not contesting the emergence of the English language on the global scene – but do find it interesting that Americans tend to overestimate the number of people who speak English.


In 1998, Humphrey Taylor conducted a Harris Poll that concluded that, “On average, adult Americans believe that just over half (52%) of the whole world’s population speak English. The real number, according to The National Foreign Language Center in Washington DC, is probably closer to 20% at the most.”

And whereas people have lost interest in real live languages, it’s interesting to see an urban myth, like that of the Klingon Interpreter, grow to such proportions.


A quick surf through the internet reveals the Elvish Linguistic Fellowship (E.L.F.) – “an international organization devoted to the scholarly study of the invented languages of J.R.R. Tolkein.


Tolkein was a linguist. I wonder how he would have reacted to today’s headlines.