Not that I have anything against patriot songs, as a concept—they just tend to be artless bursts of propaganda and often downright false. Now, it is true that sometimes I worry that I think this way about national anthems because my soul is a cold, black, petrified chunk of coughed-up lung cancer, but I just spent the last couple of days perusing the anthems of the world at Nationalanthems.info, and it confirmed my suspicions: Most national anthems are enormous pieces of patriotic caca.

You know how these things go: Every country is the best country. Every motherland is the most beautiful, inhabited by the bravest and most industrious people, who are loved by God more than anyone else. And they all have passages about opposing tyranny from other countries, which is funny when you think about it because, if all the countries are fighting tyranny, then which countries are doing the tyrannizing? Well, all of them, of course!

Even the most brutal dictatorships in history had anthems against tyranny. Take this passage from East Germany’s national propaganthem: “Risen from the ruins. . . / Germany, united Fatherland / Let the light of peace shine, so that a mother never mourns her son again.”

“Germany, united”? Oh, that’s rich. They built a fucking wall through the middle of Germany.

“Let the light of peace shine so that a mother never mourns her son again”? Really? How many mothers’ sons were shot trying to cross that thing?

The hypocritical anthem of Gaddafi’s Libya asks you to “Seize the forehead of the tyrant and destroy him!” which is appropriate, I guess, considering the propensity for despots to have offensive foreheads.

The American confederacy had an anthem, which called for “Freedom or death,” which meant, I guess, they would die before giving up their freedom. . . to keep slaves.

Incidentally, the only modern country without a national anthem was Afghanistan, during the reign of the Taliban, which prohibited music. It’s probably why they were so easily defeated—they had no anthem to rally behind. It’s too bad, because they could’ve easily gotten around the no-music problem. For instance, say they wanted to sing the anthem before one of their national sporting events, like a public flogging perhaps; well, they could randomly pick someone out of the crowd, have him sing the anthem, then shoot him in the head for breaking Sharia law.

Even better, they could’ve had someone perform the anthem in slam-poetry form: [Snapping fingers] “Afghanistan, oh great Afghanistan / Greatest when ruled by Taliban / Of which the west is not a fan / Death to all Americans.” [Snap, snap, snappity snap]. “Sharia law is our mandate / Lo, you may not masturbate / or even think to fornicate / And certainly not homosexualate.” [more snapping].

As for “The Star Spangled Banner,” it’s a little embarrassing to admit, but I never thought about the lyrics before. I just assumed them to be more artless propaganda and have always tuned out the song. So, I was quite surprised to learn, upon deeper analysis, that our anthem doesn’t suck at all.

The first thing I noticed was the brilliance of the title: “The Star Spangled Banner.” I never even thought about what that meant before. In fact, it occurs to me that, until a few minutes ago, I didn’t even know what the word “spangle” meant. Naturally, I looked it up.

I must be the only idiot in the country not to know that spangle , in this context, means to shimmer or shine. Regardless, what great imagery! The stars on the flag are (metaphorically) sparkling, like 50 little beacons of freedom on a banner of stripes. Not bad title imagery as far as anthem go.

Then there is the story behind the lyrics. As is commonly known, “The Star Spangled Banner” was originally a poem by Francis Scott Key. It was about how he witnessed the 25-hour bombardment of Fort McHenry by the British navy on Sept. 13, 1814. Less known is that Key was actually watching the battle from the deck of a British ship, with a small group of Americans with whom he’d been detained. From the deck, they watched in horror as the British armada besieged Fort McHenry with everything it had. They knew the country’s sovereignty lay in the balance, and when night fell, it got so dark and smoky that they couldn’t see what condition the fort was in—only the flag, which eventually became obscured by smoke and darkness, too. It was not till the next morning that Key was able to see that the flag had survived, meaning the fort had survived, meaning America had survived.

“Oh, say, can you see, by the dawn’s early light? / What so proudly we hailed at the twilight’s last gleaming?”

I never realized it before, but that stanza is Key telling his pals, “Hey, fellas, look! Remember the flag that flew during last night’s shit-storm? It’s still freaking there!”

“Whose broad stripes and bright stars / thru the perilous fight / O’er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming.”

Can you imagine that feeling, watching from the ramparts of the enemy’s ship as his countrymen sucked on British cannonballs all day and into the long, scary night of blackness—black but for the exploding British rockets that illuminated the flag? The next morning, when the sun rose—and he saw his flag, his country, still intact—Key must have thought, Well, holyfrickinshit, man, I have got to write a poem about that!

Now, I’m not all that crazy about the land-of-the-free-home-of-the-brave business, since all the other countries’ anthems have the same sort of free / brave lyric—which tells me that free / brave people don’t just live in America, they live everywhere. However, with a minor rewrite, something to make it more realistic, more self-actualized, I could learn to love the ending more.

How about this?: “O’er the land of the largely free, and the home of some brave.”

Happy birthday, America. We’re probably not the best, but we’re definitely top 20, and that’s something.

Ed Decker
7/4/11

The first thing I thought—when I heard about the backlash surrounding the Jerry Brown campaign staffer who called his opponent, Meg Whitman, a “whore”—was: What’s this now?! “Whore” is an offensive epithet? That’s news to me.

Apparently, Whitman had been offering pension-reform exemptions to California law-enforcement unions in exchange for their support, which prompted the staffer in question to use the word in question. Then, during the last debate, moderator Tom Brokaw asked Brown why he had not admonished the staffer for using a term that, Brokaw said, “many women have compared to the N-word.”

Brown replied that he did not agree with the N-word comparison but wouldn’t elaborate. “I don’t want to get into the term and how it’s used,” he said before issuing a second apology.

Well, if Brown doesn’t want to “get into the term and how it’s used,” I will, because I’m sick of so many words being arbitrarily removed from the lexicon without any real analysis of what they mean, whom they affect and why. If I’m to be expected to stop using the W- word—a word that has brought me overwhelming joy and ebullient laughter throughout the years—there had damn well better be a good reason. I intend to prove that no such reason exists. Consider it my line in the sand.

The Merriam-Webster dictionary lists three entries for the W-word. Here is the first:

Whore: noun. 1. a woman who engages in sexual acts for money: prostitute; also: a promiscuous or immoral woman.

Right away we can debunk the theory that the W-word and the N-word are “comparable” in nature. When you look up the N- word in any reputable dictionary (including Merriam-Webster), the first thing you see is a notation, in italics, that it is “offensive” or “offensive slang” or even “extremely disparaging and offensive.” The word “whore,” however, includes no such notation in any of the same reputables.

This seems reasonable.

The N-word is a foul epithet that vilifies a black person for no other reason than being of African descent. The word “whore,” however, describes a person’s behavior, a person’s choices. The fact is, there are people in this world, good or bad, who take money for sex, just as there are people who take political currency for pension exemptions, bribes for legal protections, covert contributions for bureaucracy bypasses and so on. These actions are similar to that of a prostitute and there is nothing wrong with pointing that out. It’s called a metaphor, and whore metaphors (metaphwhores?) are found repeatedly in literature, from The Bible to Hamlet to The Geto Boys’ Big Book of Dating Tips.

Of course, my lefty, pinko trollop of a wife and her slutty little sister-in-law disagree. They say “whore” is sexist because it is typically used to describe women, that nobody calls men whores.

Not so. Just type “manwhore” into Google and you’ll receive 150,000 hits, including links to a movie called Diary of a Male Whore, the Cheap Trick song “He’s a Whore,” a multiple-choice questionnaire called “The Manwhore Quiz” and a 1991 book by P.J. O’Rourke titled Parliament of Whores, which gleefully eviscerated our male-dominated government.

However, it’s our second Merriam-Webster definition that ends the debate on the matter of gender specificity:

Whore: noun. 2. A male who engages in sexual acts for money.

Look, I understand the inherent revulsion to this word. It comes from all those dickheads out there (“dickhead,” incidentally, is an aspersion applied only to males) who use “whore” to define all women. Now that’s sexist. I would never point at some random female walking along the beach and say, “Look at the rack on that whore over there!” I wouldn’t even say it about an actual prostitute. It just seems too harsh a word to describe these hard-working women of the street. But I gladly use the word to describe a no-good, conniving, candidate for governor. I use it to describe a friend of mine who craves recognition, too. I call him an “attention whore.” Hell, I even call my nephew Noah a “greedy little grenade whore” because he hogs all the explosives when we play Call of Duty. Want to know who else I call a whore? The California branch of the National Organization for Women (NOW), that’s who.

When asked about Brown’s staffer’s comment, California NOW President Patty Bellasalma affirmed that “political whore” was an “accurate statement” about Whitman. But after receiving a shit-ton of criticism, she changed her tune and declared it “hate speech against women,” which makes Bellasalma something of a public-relations floozy. Because it can only break down one of two ways: Either she always had a problem with it but, for political reasons, defended the Brown campaign anyway, or she never had a problem with it but said she did to appease her peeps. Either way, she pimped out her worldview for a few extra tricks, which brings us to the third definition:

Whore: noun. 3. a venal or unscrupulous person.

And there you have it, a slam dunk. Not only does the third definition make no mention of gender, but, also, the word “venal” exactly defines Whitman’s alleged track record (Venal: adjective 1. willing to sell one’s influence). Therefore, if Brown’s opponent unscrupulously trades exemptions on pension reform for votes, I can freely call her a whore without apology. If I absolutely had to apologize for something, I would apologize to prostitutes, for lumping them together with a shameless hussy like Meg Whitman. She makes them look bad.

Originally Published in San Diego CityBeat
10.27.2010

When President Barack Obama gave a speech last month that was written for the school children of America, certain politicians and pundits threw a fit.

Jim Greer, the Florida GOP chairman, called the speech “liberal propaganda.” Fox News commentHater Glenn Beck said the president’s goal is the “indoctrination of children.” The list goes on.

And what were these detestable messages being propagandized by President Obama (or, as I call it, prObamaganda)? Do your homework, stay in school, apply yourself—you know, the kind of ideas that could destroy a society should they ever catch on.

Recently, a video was posted to YouTube showing educators in a Burlington, N.J., elementary school teaching students a song about President Obama: “Mm, mmm, mm! Barack Hussein Obama. He said that all must lend a hand, to make this country strong again. Mmm, mmm, mm!”

Well that really irked the righties. They saw it as a direct result of Obama’s address to students. Many compared the video to the youth-targeted propaganda of such fascists and despots as Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot.

I, too, found the video a tad disturbing. For one reason, anytime you have kids in groups of four or more reciting creepy incantations, you’ve got a potential Children of the Corn situation.

Seriously though, the conservative politicians and pundits are correct. Of course the kids are being indoctrinated. It’s all indoctrination. The speech, the pro-Obama songs and just about everything else they do or teach in every school in every city in the world is, by definition, indoctrination: “To teach, or inculcate; to imbue with learning”— that’s what indoctrination means, and isn’t that what the education system is? A giant indoctrinatorium designed to train kids how to behave in our society and instill within them enough cultural wisdom to give them a fighting chance as they move on to adulthood?

Indoctrination, in and of itself, is not necessarily a bad thing, and expressing outrage over it is just another red herring designed to befuddle the substance of the argument — which is not whether it’s right or wrong to indoctrinate children but, rather, what are the appropriate doctrines to indoctrinate them with in the first place? This is what we should be talking about. This is the substance of the discussion. Of course, the substance will never be discussed because you have to be a blithering imbecile to believe that staying in school and trying hard are inappropriate doctrines to indoctrinate children with.

Since critics can’t bitch about the substance of the indoctrination, they bitch about the act of indoctrination itself. Because the game isn’t substantive critique about policy. The game is to criticize the president at every turn, for any reason, even if you have to invent a reason — hence Indoctrination Outrage Theater.

When Michael Steele, chairman of the Republican National Committee, saw the Burlington school video, he sent an e-mail blast seeking donations to help stop the prObamagandizing of the children.

“Dear Fellow Conservative, I’m so outraged and stunned by [this video] that I had to share it with you…. It is the indoctrination of our nation’s greatest treasure — our children.”

Wow! Coming from a Christian conservative crucifix hugger, you’ve got a lot of nerve bellyaching about child-indoctrination. Wasn’t it you and your pals who wanted to post the Ten Commandments (proGodaganda?) in every public schoolhouse? How dare you portray Obama’s “Stay in school” message as propaganda when you tried to post the Holy Mother of propaganda posters on the classroom walls? Haven’t you heard? Not everybody wants their kids brainwashed to believe in an invisible man in the sky who protects us from harm and takes sides in wars and World Series. Spare us your indoctrination accusations, Mr. Chairman, because you religious fundies wrote the book on brainwashing.

I mean, c’mon: Remember the Sabbath!? Have no other gods!? Don’t speak the Lord’s name in vein. Don’t masturbate. Don’t use condoms. Believe in only one holy Catholic and apostolic Church. Gays are an abomination, and so is shellfish, and so is John Denver. The Pope is infallible. Say your prayers. Grace the collection plate. Go to confession. Get baptized. Get confirmed. That’s some seriously hardcore indoctrinatin’ right there.

Now let’s look at the doctrines promoted in both the Obama speech and the song that it inspired.

In the song, there are basically three lines that sum up the messages: Everybody must lend a hand / Equal work means equal pay / Make sure everyone gets a chance.

In the speech, the message was: Stay in school and try hard. That’s pretty much the whole of it: equality, empathy, diligence and effort. So tell me, between prObamaganda and proGodaganda, which is more appropriate for a schoolhouse? Which is least likely to offend? Which seems less like the creepy, cultish type of mental manipulation that people think of when they think of indoctrination, when they think of a commune of Armageddonauts luring their son or daughter into some jizz-soaked compound and brainwashing them with outrageous ideas about returning messiahs and approaching end days? It’s not even a contest. So cut the crap.

Ed Decker
10.15.2009

Originally published in San Diego CityBeat

I always recoil at how many awful, patriot-type songs people allow into their Fourth of July barbecue iPod mixes, especially when there are so many great anthems to choose from. This year was no different. What follows is a list of songs commonly heard on Independence Day. I will analyze each and determine whether you should include or exclude them from your barbecue playlist next year.

“God Bless the USA” by Lee Greenwood (Exclude): This song is a perfect storm of sub-mediocrity: It’s got a bland melody, mundane vocals and syrupy lyrics, such as this line, which would make better jelly-donut filler rather than a song lyric:

“I would gladly stand up next to you / and defend her still today / ‘Cause their ain’t no doubt I love this land / God bless the U.S.A.”

Question: If Lee Greenwood would “gladly” fight alongside our soldiers, why hasn’t he done so in any of the four wars during which he’s been of legal fighting age? I guess when he says “gladly,” he really means, “drag me kicking and screaming?”

I’m just saying.

“Have you Forgotten,” by Darryl Worley (Exclude): The lyrics are an attempt to validate the Iraq war:

“Have you forgotten / when those towers fell?”

Have I forgotten? Yeah, sure, dude, I forgot. Remind me, please, which towers were those again? When did that happen? Oh yeah, now I remember, World Trade Center on Sept. 11, duh. Know what else I remember? I remember how the attack was used to justify a bullshit war. I remember how it was used to strip our rights and expand the power of the Bush administration. I remember how it was used to justify torture. And I remember how it was used by dozens of lazy songwriters to evoke a cheap emotional response and sell tons of records.

“Blowin’ in the Wind” by Bob Dylan (Hell yes, include!): This is the Everlasting Gobstopper of protest songs because it doesn’t identify which war or act of oppression it defies—only a subtle call for peace, integrity and good will in general, which makes it timeless.

“Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue” by Toby Keith (Hell no, exclude!): Lyrically speaking, you can’t go two lines without running into one of those gushy, excessively patriotic, flag-wavey buzzwords or phrases, like: “Salute,” “Old glory,” “Uncle Sam,” “The eagle will fly,” “Mother freedom,” and about halfway through it, you’re thinking, Hey, Toby, while your down there, why not just go ahead and blow U.S.?

He also brags about America’s response to the 9/11 attacks:

“Soon as we could see clearly / through our big black eye / Man, we lit up your world / like the Fourth of July.”

If Mr. Keith was referring to the innocent citizens of Afghanistan and Iraq,” then, yeah, we lit them up pretty good. However, if he meant al-Qaeda—the sumbitches who actually attacked us—well, then, not so much.

“Back in the USA” by Chuck Berry (Include): Considering the plethora of ways America has shit on blacks, if a brotha can still sing its praises, well, then, there must be something good about it.

“America” by Neil Diamond (Toss up): This is actually an otherwise excellent song about America being a beacon for the oppressed. But then he starts reciting that whole “My country ’tis of thee” routine, and, before you know it, bratwurst and beer are bubbling out your nose.

“Song of the Patriot” by Johnny Cash: (Exclude): As much as I love Johnny Cash, I have to say no because it’s an anti-flag-burning song. There should never be an anti-flag-burning song on your Independence Day mix. The right to torch the Stars and Stripes—also known as “free speech”—is one of America’s greatest principles. As Country Dick Montana once remarked, “Because we may burn our flag is reason enough not to.”

“Born in the USA” by Bruce Springsteen (Include): Self-deprecation, introspection and personal responsibility is what America is, or should be, about—not to mention that the song rocks. Even Ronald Reagan knew that, though he didn’t quite understand it. Play it loud!

“This Land is Your Land” by Woody Guthrie (Hell yeah, include this mutha!): It was written as a response to the gawd-awful “God Bless America” (Exclude), which Woody thought was “unrealistic and complacent.” And he nailed it. “This Land is Your Land” is a realistic portrait of America’s beauty and elegance against an backdrop of ambivalence and greed. It should be on your mix several times. Start with the Woody Guthrie version, then go to Pete Seeger’s. Later that night, when everyone is starting to get boozy, play the Mojo Nixon rendition to kick them in the ass.

“Philadelphia Freedom” by Elton John (Include): When a gay man can sing America’s praises, you know there’s got to be something good about it.

“Full Metal Jackoff” by Jello Biafra and D.O.A. (Include): There should always be at least one angry, frenetic, America-hating punk-rock tune on your Fourth of July Barbecue Mix. May I present “Full Metal Jackoff”? This is a song that is or was:

1. Specific for it’s time: “The folks might get just a little upset / if they knew where that dope comes from / From Columbia, to the Contras, to our Air Force bases / where we trade it for guns.”

2. Relevant today: “Wall Street or Crack Dealer Avenue /The last roads left to the American dream.”

3. Relevant for years to come: “As the noose of narco-militarism tightens ’round our necks / we worry about burning flags….”

And, it rocks like a brick in your face. Play it late at night, when the party needs a little pick-me-up.

Originally published in SD CityBeat

Ed Decker
7/8/09

“I am not a citizen of the world. I think the entire concept is intellectual nonsense and  stunningly dangerous!” —Newt Gingrich

Wow, Newt, you really are a retard.

Now, it should be noted that I do not intend for the word “retard” to be insulting to our mentally handicapped brothers and sisters (Newt gives retards a bad name); rather, “retarded” is meant in its truer, original sense, as in, “regressive,” “stunted” and / or “expressing non-progressive thinking or behavior.” Because that’s exactly what this is—yet another flailing neo-conservative, detached from power and still clinging to the same, goonish, approach to global affairs that nearly ruined us in the first place.

“I am not a citizen of the world.”

What a stupid, pompous, myopic, protectionist, exceptionalist, isolationist, elitist, egotistic, narcissistic, regressive, recessive, rootin’-tootin’ retarded thing to say.

First of all, Newt, by definition you are a citizen of the world. You may not be a willing citizen, but you are most definitely a citizen. And this notion you have, that Americans should only care about Americans and everyone else can suck your salty jowls, well, the entire concept is intellectual nonsense and stunningly dangerous.

Think it through, man. Unless you’re planning to move to Venus anytime soon, you will remain a citizen of this planet. Doesn’t it make sense, then, to be positive, productive and engaged since what happens in the world affects you, your family and your country?

Newt, dude, didn’t you know? The world is a neighborhood. Not that you know anything about neighborhoods being that you probably live behind barb-wired walls with gun towers, tire spikes and three-headed hell-hounds poised to gnash the throats of any Girl Scout interlopers who wander by. However, for the rest of us, who live in regular houses on regular streets, we have these things called “neighbors,” and we know the value of having and being a good one.

We know the value of having and living near a well-maintained homestead, with a trimmed yard and clean sidewalk. We know the value of living near the kind of neighbor who always has a cup of sugar to loan, smiles when you pass them on the street and plans their keg parties with regard for those who have to get up for work the next the morning. We know it’s much better to have and be that kind of neighbor than to be the miserly old grump whose yard is overgrown with weeds, hogs two parking spaces with one car and yells at any kids who hit a baseball onto his property. But this miserly old grump is exactly who Newt Gingrich wants America to be in the world neighborhood, and, by God, thanks to the Bush administration, that’s exactly who we are, because when that ’tard was in office, the whole freaking planet hated our guts.

“I am not a citizen of the world.”

This mindset also goes to the heart of the Guantanamo problem. I was having an argument the other night with a friend of a friend. His position was that the detainees don’t deserve American rights, such as due process, habeas corpus and the rest.

“So you want to give the guys who plotted 9/11 the same rights as American citizens?” he asked. The question is the reddest of herrings. He’s equating al-Qaeda with law-abiding American citizens. That’s the wrong comparison. The right comparison would be: “So you want to give accused foreigners the same rights as accused Americans?”

The answer to which is, “Yes. Duh.”

Dick Cheney said the same thing: “The Obama administration wants to give terrorists the same rights as U.S. citizens.”

No, fucknuggets, listen! We’re saying that it’s wrong to incarcerate people—whether accused of terrorism, murder, racketeering or rape; whether they live in America, Iraq, Afghanistan or on Venus—without proving they did anything wrong!

Seven years. That’s how long some of these people have been rotting in that hothouse. Seven years without access to lawyers, courtrooms, due process etc. But, hey, they’re not Americans, so why should we care?

The great Irony of Newt’s comment is that he unknowingly insulted Ronald Reagan, the reigning hero of the Retardlican Party. In a 1982 speech to the U.N., he said, “I speak today as both a citizen of the United States and of the world.”

Say what you want about President Reagan, he did at least one humongously awesome thing during his tenure. He was instrumental in bringing down the Berlin Wall and ending the Cold War, largely because he had much of the world behind him. To extend the neighborhood metaphor, it was as if the miserly old grump had finally gone too far and erected a 50-foot, razor-clawed, blood-dripping effigy of Freddie to frighten all the children, and Reagan calmly gathered all the neighbors, marched over to the miser’s house, and shouted from the sidewalk, “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down that scarecrow!”

Oh, Newt, Dick, George, don’t you see? It didn’t work. The American people—and the world—rejected your boorish worldview, and because of that, you were stripped of power. Had you played nice a little, had you listened and talked more than you tortured and warmongered, you might still be in power. Of course, it’s your stubborn, egotistic mindset that blinds you to that fact. So you cling to your old, wrong ideas and never grow or change, which makes you a bunch of retarded retards.

Originally published in SD CityBeat

“All of them, any of them that have been in front of me over the years…with a great appreciation for the press, the media.” (Sarah Palin, when asked to name a newspaper she reads.)

Never have I heard such duplicitous poppycock in the political arena as from vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin.

This is the woman who claimed to have foreign-policy experience because she can see Russia from Alaska, said the causes of global warming are unimportant to the solution and insulted Joe Biden for being old (um, hello? John McCain, hello?) and then spun it as a compliment.

The unabashed balderdash that spews from this particular pig’s painted lips makes Dan Quayle look like a thousand Mensa men conflated their sperm in a lab, injected it into the cryogenically preserved uterus of Madame Curie and gave birth to a disembodied brain.

When Sarah Palin speaks, she embarks on these meandering yellow-brick-road soliloquies that make Dorothy’s trek look like a quick trip to the EZ-Mart. Just watch and listen as Ms. Palin skips through the Magic Forest of Misdirection, ambles across the Poppy Fields of Gibberish and traverses Bridge Disingenuous over a moat of bullshit to enter Cliché City to see the Wizard of Ostentatious.

Take this quote on foreign relations: “When you consider, even, national security issues with Russia as Putin rears his head and comes into the airspace where do they go?”

And don’t you just love how she’ll be babbling like a baby with special needs for two minutes and then, out of nowhere, land on a talking point with clarity and authority, as if the baby suddenly stopped babbling, swatted his bowl of hated strained beets onto the floor, and said, “No justice, no peace,” in the voice of Sam Elliot.

The manner in which she speaks is so, at the same time, revolting and fascinating, that I started wondering, what would it be like if everyone in our daily lives spoke like Sarah Palin? I think it might go a little something like this:

Hot Dog Vendor
“I’d like a hot dog, please, no relish.”
“Hot dogs are, they have, it takes time to make, time to cook, boil hot dogs. Barack Obama wants to surrender to the terrorists.”

General Practitioner
“So, tell me, Doc, is my cirrhosis a symptom of binge drinking? Should I stop?”
“We really don’t need to waste our time figuring out the cause here. Whether your liver is shot because of your behavior or whether it’s just the natural aging process, that’s just looking backward.”

“Cool, so I can keep drinking then.”

“You betcha!”

Job Applicant
“What qualifies you to work for us?”
“From my home, I can see a billboard with your company’s logo on it.”
“Huh? What? No, I’m asking, which jobs have you had that prepared you for this one?”

“Having competent maverick employees like John McCain is important to the success of any company.”

“But what jobs have you had?”

“I have worked in many jobs. From bottom-type jobs all the way up to top-type jobs, again, the jobs at the top–the big important jobs–those are the jobs I like best.
“Please, man, just name one job. Any job at all!”

“Let me get back to ya.”

Girlfriend
“You scumbag! You cheated on me! You are a scum-sucking scumbag from Scumtopia!”

“Well, that’s pretty negative, especially since you cheated on me as well?”
“No, no, it’s nothing negative at all. I was merely pointing out your scumbag qualities, which, uh, again, scumbags are important. They hold the scum. If there were no bags for scum-holding, all the scum would be pouring onto the streets, and in our homes, again, the home is essential. Family values. Energy independence. Children with special needs.”

Acquaintance
“See any good movies lately?”

“I’ve seen all of them, with a great appreciation for Hollywood, for filmmakers.

“Like which?”

“All of them, any of them that have been in front of me over the years.”

“Jesus, Bill, why are you being so evasive!?”

“No, really, that’s the name of the movie, All of Them, Any of Them that Have Been in Front of Me Over the Years. It’s about a female sex addict.”

Lawyer
Brrring, brring. “Hello, Mr. Dawson, I just got my legal bill in the mail. I don’t understand some of these charges, like the Anti-Terrorist Fee, the No Surrender Per Diem. And what the heck is this Maverick Bonus?”

“In the great history of the American justice system, Barack Obama wants to surrender to the terrorists.”

“But what is the Maverick Bonus!?”

“It is the extension of, having to do with, the important Constitution legal fee, which is plus six. Do not testify if you don’t have a rock to write with.”

Christian
“I’m thinking about becoming a Christian, Annie. Can you tell me more about your religion?”

“God had a son with special needs. His name was Jesus. Jesus was a maverick carpenter. He would make bizarre furniture–like coffee tables with no legs. Nobody would buy Jesus’ maverick furniture so he had to sell wine. Jesus had Magdalene stomp grapes. Afterward he would suck her toes, which made him drunk and do parlor tricks, like walking on water, which was dangerous, so he died on the cross. Pontius Pilate wants to raise your taxes.”

Ed Decker
10/15/08

This was the case about whether the Geneva Conventions apply to prisoners held at Guantanamo Bay. The Bush administration argued that the Gitmo detainees were not, technically, prisoners of war and, therefore, not eligible for Geneva protections.
At issue in the case was habeas corpus, the requirement that the government show legitimate reason to detain someone. Thanks to this ruling, the prisoners of Guantanamo Bay have come another step closer to receiving the same legal protections as you and me.

Fukken-A!

Now, I really hadn’t planned on writing about this decision. It seems so utterly obvious why Guantanamo Bay detainees deserve due process; I just figured it would be argued, re-argued and over-argued a million times in the opinionsphere before I could ever publish a single word about it.

Instead, I watched and listened as the right-wing blubbermongers blubbered on about how the court’s decision puts the rights of foreign terrorists above the safety of Americans, that terrorists aren’t deserving of habeas corpus because of their heinous actions and that the decision will cost American lives because the terrorists will all stampede out of Guantanamo like horses running from a burning stable.

So I waited for somebody on the left to respond with the obvious retort, but nobody did: Not Olbermann nor Abrams nor Maddow nor Huffington. Not Stewart, nor Colbert, nor Behar nor Whoopi. Not Donahue, Franken, nor Triumph the Insult Dog (Et tu, Insult Dog?) And certainly not Colmes, of Hannity and Colmes fame, the show I was watching that made me finally decide to write this column.

Oh sure, the lefties made lots of other arguments, like that denying Geneva Conventions destroys our rule-of-law credibility, that trial-by-military-tribunal raises separation-of-powers concerns and that, as Alan Colmes said, this decision does not let the terrorists run free; rather, it merely asks the government to prove its cases. All of those are excellent points. But nobody pointed out the obvious reason, the ultimate reason–the reason for which all the other reasons exist as to why the prisoners of Guantanamo Bay deserve equal protection under the American legal system, which is this:

Innocent until proven guilty. Duh!

This is Constitution 101, people. It’s not about the odiousness of the crime you are accused of; it’s whether you committed it in the first place that matters. That’s why we require the judicial branch of government to prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt using due process.

Remember due process? Habeas corpus, Miranda rights, jury of one’s peers, probable cause, immunity from cruel and unusual punishment and the equal-protection clause, which is founded on the idea that all men are created equal–not just Americans. Oh, and how about the right to a speedy trial? Is it too much to ask to not have detainees rotting away in Guantanamo Bay for six years before the government decides to try them?

Due process, man. It’s not just a series of loopholes designed to let criminals go free because we love criminals so much we want to marry them. Due process is the idea that laws and legal proceedings are fair, that the government cannot arbitrarily deny a person’s rights to life, liberty or property and, as with the Hamdan case, that the executive branch can’t round people up and throw away the key simply because doing so aligns with its agenda.

I have no doubt that at least one person in that Gitmo hellhole doesn’t deserve to be there. Probably even more, when you consider why, when and how they were collected–during the fog of the Afghanistan war, by teenage soldiers who were scared shitless and receiving faulty intelligence from mercenary informants looking to make a buck.

And if I’m wrong about this, then fine–prove it! Prove Salim Ahmed Hamdan is a terrorist. Prove it the right way, the fair way–the American way.

On the afforementioned Hannity and Colmes episode, I heard guest John Kasich say this: “It’s astounding to compare a [terrorist] to a United States citizen. To say someone who engineered 3,000 deaths on 9/11 should somehow get the same rights as an American citizen, it’s insane.”

John Kasich, as you can well see, is a blubbering baboon.

Of course you can compare terrorists to Americans. It’s like comparing apples to fruit bowls: Terrorists are people who commit atrocious acts, and Americans are people who live inside the arbitrary borders of America.

Terrorists can be Americans, just as easily as apples can be in a fruit bowl. In fact, Americans like Tim McVeigh, Ted Kaczynski, Jeffrey Dahmer, Sam Bowers (Imperial Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan), Eric Rudolph (“The Birmingham Bomber” of abortion clinics), Klebold and Harris (Columbine) and Muhammad and Malvo are all as despicable as the people who orchestrated 9/11.

Is Kasich saying these American terrorists are more deserving of due process because they’re American? What kind of cowshit is that? What does it matter if they live inside the arbitrary borders of the United States? What does it matter if they were rounded up during a war, or during a police action, or during a goddamn clambake? What does it matter how evil their crime or how many killed? What matters is if they did it.

Innocent until proven guilty.

I know, I know, it’s a phrase so often repeated that we’ve become desensitized to its value. However, contained in this one sentence is the ocean that is our Constitution. Perhaps that’s why nobody’s mentioned it yet, because sometimes you can’t see the ocean from the boat.

Or maybe it has been mentioned and I just haven’t heard it. All I know is, when I was lying on the couch watching Colmes getting his ass kicked up and down the studio by Hannity and Kasich, well, I had to speak up. I couldn’t take the chance that this discussion could continue without it being said somewhere, by someone. So I’m saying it now: A person is innocent until proven guilty. If that concept is fair and right for us, then it’s fair and right for all.

Ed Decker
6/25/08

Spreading democracy?

I remember the first time I heard those words. It was during President Bush’s 2005 inaugural address: “It is the policy of the United States to seek and support the growth of democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture…. We’re spreading democracy.”

When I heard that, I thought, Uh-oh! Spreading democracy? That’s pretty scary. It sounds a lot like when he used to say, “Freedom is on the march.”

Um, Mr. President, dude, freedom isn’t supposed to march. Freedom is supposed to tiptoe, so as not to trample the freedom of others. Same thing with democracy–it’s not something you’re supposed to spread. Nor should we grow it, promote it, export it or install it. Call it what you will, but it all amounts to the same thing: imposing our preferred governing style onto somebody else.

Our president says he wants to spread it to “every nation and culture.” Not only is that rude, but it’s stupid, too.

It’s rude because whether by election or revolt, only the citizens of a country have the right to decide what type of government shall preside over them. And it’s stupid to assume a democracy is what every nation and culture needs, especially those in the Middle East. We have to stop applying our Western sensibilities onto a Mesopotamian mindset. It’s like trying to use Monopoly rules to play Go-Moku.
Remember the saying “You get the government you deserve”? That seems true enough. But I think it’s also true that you get the government you need. Meaning, if you require a strict, authoritarian government to keep an unstable country from splintering apart–then a strict authoritarian government is what you will get.

The point is, Democracy is not one-size-fits-all. It doesn’t apply to everything: It doesn’t work in team sports. You never see a baseball manager taking a poll when he believes he needs to bring in a new pitcher. It doesn’t work in the military, either. You can’t have soldiers voting on whether they should charge the hill. The Japanese would still be bunkered atop Iwo Jima if that were the case. No sir, you get the government you deserve or need, and we have no right or expertise to decide for others what that might be.

I’m reminded of a Discovery Channel documentary I saw recently about pirates. Apparently, pirates, specifically the 17th-century corsairs of the Caribbean whom we see all the time in books and movies. Apparently, these pirates were part of a democratic entity. It’s true: The captain was elected. They had separation of powers among three branches of government.They revered a Constitution-style document called The Articles of Agreement. And they voted on all issues pertaining to the ship and crew. The only time the captain ever assumed dictatorial control of the ship was during battle.

Isn’t that fascinating? Pirate ships were democratic institutions? It seems so unlikely. Pirates were outlaws. They were murderers, thieves and rapists. They had scary-sounding names like Blackbeard, Black Bart, Tortuga and, my favorite, Eric Bloodaxe (a Scandinavian pirate, actually). They were experts at the art of torture. One of their methods was to strand a man on a sandbar with nothing but a flintlock and a bullet leaving him to make a choice between slow death or suicide.

Pirates were just these beastly, smelly, inhumane terrorists of the sea who also happened to be down with due process. Which just goes to show–there’s nothing inherently virtuous about a democracy any more than there’s anything inherently immoral about totalitarian rule.

It’s not which system of governance you choose, but how you apply it that matters. Granted, it is easier to abuse a dictatorship than it is a democracy. Dictators don’t have term limits or separation of powers. But it is entirely possible to be a righteous dictator, the kind who cares for the well-being of his citizens, strives for peace, feeds the homeless and loves puppies, jazz music and long walks on the beach. It’s also possible, conversely, to have a democracy that taps your phones, reads your e-mails, tortures you, detains you indefinitely without access to counsel, wages illegal wars, politicizes the Justice Department and uses fear and propaganda to control the masses. Hmm, I’d even bet there’s an example of that kind of democracy existing right now, out there somewhere, across the brine perhaps, some renegade ship controlled by a swashbuckling buccaneer named Captain Blackbush, with his First Mate “Icepick Dick” Cheney, Rove the Rapscallion and all the rest of their mateys who wage unnecessary wars for no other reason than to assume permanent dictatorial control of the ship.

So spare me this “going to war to spread democracy” noise. You can’t spread the seeds of democracy with a cannonball. Even if you truly believe democracy must be spread, then don’t launch missiles–launch an advertising campaign. Must we always be so barbaric? Just buy television and newspaper ads. Rent billboards that say things like, “America: Bringing you democracy one waterboarding at a time.” Or how about, I don’t know, just letting Iraqis vote on whether they even want democracy? I can see the pamphlet now:

Proposition 52: “Do you want the U.S. to come in, drop some bombs, break a bunch of buildings, kill a ton of people and install its form of government? Vote ‘Yes’ or ‘Hell Yes’ on Proposition 52.

Hey, I’m not breaking any news here. This shit should be obvious to everybody: Going to war to spread democracy? Talk about missing the point. The only acceptable way to spread the kind of democracy that’s worth spreading is to be the best damn example of it we can be. Everything else is hypocrisy.

Ed Decker
11/14/07

Probably by now you’ve heard of the U.S. Army veteran named Jim Broussard who recently cut down a couple of flags above a Reno bar because the bar owner (a Mexican-American) was flying a Mexican flag above the Stars and Stripes.

When Broussard heard about this abomination, he marched down to the Cantina El Jaripeo and–with television cameras rolling–cut down both flags. He tossed the Mexican flag on the ground, raised the U.S. flag to the camera and blurted, “I’m Jim Broussard, and I took this flag down in honor of my country.” Then he ranted for a few more moments and ended by saying that the bar owner would have to fight to get his flag back.

Now, it is true that the flag code prohibits flying the U.S. flag below any other.

Naturally, there has been much discussion about whether Broussard’s actions were patriotic or criminal, but I think an even better question is, “Should flying another flag above the U.S. flag even be illegal in the first place?”

The United States Federal Flag Code was drafted by the American Legion in 1923 and adopted by Congress in 1942. The regulation that Cantina El Jaripeo violated was from Section 3(g), which states that flags of two or more nations “are to be flown from separate staffs of the same height.”

Some states have penalties for breaking the flag code while others do not. However, all states consider it as law. And that’s the part that creeps me out. The fact that it’s a real true actual law is just a little too Heil Hitler for my liking. Not to mention how a lot of these laws are just plain silly, like Section 4(b), which states that the flag should never touch the ground (to which I ask, what’s wrong with ground? Ground is cool) and Section 2(b), which commands, “The flag should be hoisted briskly and lowered ceremoniously” (to which I ask, must there really be a law about which adverbs should describe my flag raising and lowering technique? Can’t I raise it judiciously and lower it lovingly? What about wildly and affectionately? If I raise it kookily and lower it drunkenly, will the flag police take me away? How about frantically and passionately? Fearlessly and dramatically? What gives?).

Then there’s the first line from Section 4, which requires that the flag be shown respect at all times. Oh, man. There should never be laws that require you to respect something or someone. Respect is earned, not legislated. You want to know how to ensure that people respect the flag? By making it safe and legal not to; by having enough faith and confidence in your country to let people treat the flag however they like–let them burn it, tear it, wear it, trample it, eat it, bury it, smoke it, suck it and shit on it if they want. Allow them to do these things to the flag and, by and large, they will not.

Don’t get me wrong, I believe the flag code should be observed by government agencies–at schools, post offices, firehouses and the like. And the code is great for military-types and regular Joes who want to respect the flag properly. It just should never be a crime not to, especially when it comes to dissent. If you don’t want people to burn down the actual U.S.A., then you damn well better let them burn up the symbol of it. So they can have an outlet to say, “Hey, there’s something I don’t like about America!” Then, when you come across a person who is disrespecting the flag in some manner, whether by burning, inverting or–gasp!–flying another flag above your precious flag, you can just say to yourself, Hmm. Must be something he doesn’t like about America, and then continue walking along your merry way because, in the end, a person should be able to not like something about America if they want, and they should be permitted to say so.

It’s called speech and it’s supposed to be relatively free.

Not that I think the cantina owner intended to disrespect Old Glory. It seems obvious that the man was displaying his affection for both countries but, since he’s from Mexico and probably loves Mexico most, he flew the Mexican flag on top. That’s cool. I get that. It should be perfectly acceptable for somebody to love their birth country more than the one they live in and, again, it should be perfectly OK to say so.

But Jim Broussard the bully doofus decided he was going to steal the bar’s flag and vandalize the other, which is just unbelievably fucked. Even if he did have a legitimate beef with the bar owner, tossing the Mexican flag on the ground like a piece of trash was an affront to all Mexicans: The ones in Mexico and the ones right here–the ones who obey the law, who pay taxes, who serve in the military. The ones who fly our colors respectfully. The ones who are just regular upstanding American citizens who would never in a million years storm onto your property, steal your shit and taunt you into a fistfight like a playground terrorist.

Hey, Jimbo, if you want to ensure that every Mexican-American in Reno starts disrespecting Old Glory, just keep treating them the way you’ve been treating them.

Jerk.

During an interview with Neil Cavuto of Fox News, Broussard gave this as the reason for his actions: “It is important to me, above all, that our country remember to be patriotic.”

Above all? Patriotism? Really? That’s the most important thing? Hmmm, what about, oh, I don’t know, reducing crime? Fighting bigotry? What about protecting the environment? How about solving some real true actual problems like the shrinking of the middle class or the collapse of the dollar? What about Britney’s kids? Oh, Lord God in Heaven, who shall look over them?! What about working on all the shit that’s wrong in this country to give us something to be patriotic about.

Patriotism? Pffft! Just like symbols, patriotism is empty calories. Devotion to your country is not nearly as important as helping your country become something worth your devotion. No matter how hard you try, no matter how many laws you enact, no matter how many vigilante patriots you enlist, you can’t make people love the flag if they don’t love the country, and fatheads like Jim Broussard are making this country increasingly difficult to love.

Ed Decker
10/17/07
American Flag Hall of Shame
Mike Gallagher interviews Broussard

The exhausting debate over whether the phrase “Under God,” belongs in the Pledge is a potent distraction from the real problem with this thing. The real problem with the Pledge of Allegiance is that we have a Pledge of Allegiance in the first place.

“I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America.” The whole thing seems a little Orwellian for my taste: The systematic programming of American Youth, the assembly-lining of an idea, the pressure to conform – it’s all there. What’s worse, we are asking children to pledge to an entity about which they know very little: These kids know nothing about foreign policy, nothing about history, or war, or death. They don’t even know the words of the pledge.

When I was a kid I thought the line “And the Republic” was “Amanda Republic.” I didn’t know who Amanda Republic was and why I should be pledging allegiance to her but I made the pledge anyway because that’s what was expected of me.

So how can we ask children to make such a powerful, eternal, pledge of allegiance with those unknowing child-brains of theirs? It’s like tricking someone into signing a contract before he/she has read it. I know one thing for certain: if I knew about America then what I know now, I’d be like, “Whoa Teach! Slow down there! – You want me to pledge whatchima to whozit now? Sorry, I don’t know anyone named Amanda Republic and I’m not signing anything till my lawyer gets here.”

But that’s not what happens. Because children are these wonderful, malleable, idiots who will memorize, recite, and believe anything you tell them. Then that kid grows up to host his own talk show, and he’s yapping on the air about the importance of some asinine childhood pledge he never understood, and never came to understand, and he’s getting all thin in the throat about how he loves that Pledge sooo much without ever truly understanding what a keg of bullshit the Pledge of Allegiance really is.

“And the Republic, for which it stands”:
A thinking man can not take this pledge. Even if you concede the point that our government is fair and right and good, you can’t account for what the government might become. Governments change their personalities. Good rulers go bad – driven mad by fear, despair, and supple young pages. What if America suddenly started dropping our radioactive turds all over the globe simply because we enjoy the sound of splintering glass? Will you support it then? You made a pledge son. If a pledge ain’t forever, then it ain’t worth the spit you say it with.

This is the essence of the fascinating paradox that is the Pledge of Allegiance: To truly devote yourself to your country you must revolt when it misbehaves. That is the ultimate act of patriotism. And it doesn’t matter a good God damn what promise you spake in class some 30 years ago, when you were just a little twit.

“One nation, indivisible”: Ok, let’s see, 75 percent of polled white Americans believed O.J. was guilty, while 75 percent of polled blacks believed he was innocent. Like Hell, indivisible. You want divides, we’ve got divides. Step right up. How about that grizzly no-man’s-land between those who support the Iraq war and those who rue it? How about Indian reservations? Oh, we’ve got divides all right. How about the generation gap, the gender gap, the gay Gap? How about the cold war between the classes? You want divides? Please. America is a veritable Divides-R-Us.”

“Under God”: In 1954, The Knights of Columbus successfully campaigned to have Under God (UG) added to the Pledge. Even though religion is the Grand Canyon of all divides, they selfishly placed UG smack in the middle of the very sentence that was trying to sell all that “unity” ca-ca in the first place.

. . . With Liberty and Justice For all: With the “All” meaning, “All” Americans – except of course for Muslims, Buddhists, oh, and the homos, and atheists, and anyone else whom God hates. Those folks can all go to hell.”

Maybe ye who desire UG to stay in the Pledge of Allegiance believe the aforementioned souls shouldn’t be allowed to stand under the nurturing umbrella of the Republic. Maybe you’re perfectly comfortable with the religion divide. Fine, but at least admit a divide exists. Then stop bitching at me when I state loudly and proudly that I will never take your pledge. Because you haven’t included me – the Godless one — and because, frankly, I’m embarrassed to be an American right now.
I’m embarrassed about this war into which we’ve lurched. I’m embarrassed how we squandered nearly all of our goodwill.

I’m embarrassed that we incarcerate drug users.

I’m embarrassed that our police shoot the mentally ill.

I’m embarrassed that we hang or electrocute human beings on purpose.

I’m embarrassed that we built this country atop the grave of the natives.

I am embarrassed over our rampant narcissism.

I’m embarrassed that we hated France for disagreeing with the war.

I am embarrassed that Nora Jones beat Springsteen for “Album of the Year.”

I am just flat out embarrassed.

Speaking of France, here is a country that knows how to compose a pledge. Take this minimalist dandy from the French Revolution: “Liberty, equality, fraternity.” That’s it baby. Three simple words: No bull, no fluff. Just the real deal. Now that’s a pledge I can say with a hand on my heart.

EJD
3/05/03