Friday, September 14, 2012

ROW80 POST 61 - LIBYA, THE TATTOOED LADY


I am completely breaking routine here and I am going to be swift in this first part. I have posted nothing for ROW80 since Tuesday, September 11, 2012. I intended and was working on a post as regards my viola, Wolf. That has been postponed to I don’t know when. When the mood strikes me and it’s not now.

I truly believe that my mental health is very closely tied to my physical health, to the point that my physical well-being is almost entirely overruled by my mental. I’m strong physically and when I’m strong mentally, my body acts on command, whether autonomically, or when I move at will. But, when I feel that dystonia, or when things are not right, it goes to hell. I’m having a rough patch. I told you, my readers, friends and casual drive bys that I would try not to evaporate and try not to end up at the Funny Farm, again. I’m getting too old for this shit. I’m tired of starting anew and I want to try and accomplish something; not just a bunch of “Sound and Fury signifying Funny.” Well, that came out better than I thought; I’ll settle for that; just not “Nothing,” or hopefully, “Nothing’s” boring fat sister “Mediocrity.”

This past week has been one of stress, for everyone, I think. I’ve had a couple of weeks where I may have acted in haste toward a friend and just said some mindless things. We got that ironed out, but I hurt someone I cared about, and I like to think I’m not like that, at my advanced age (perish the thought; it’s NOT about me!) I’m wiser and kinder than that. Imagine my shock to find that I’m human after all!

The dystonia has rather increased because I feel in a rut rather with my writing. It just seems that I’ve gotten into this groove and it’s either, A) pick on Romney, B) bitch about the Bus, C) tell stories about my, (fill in the blank.) I’m picking on myself, now. I try to avoid ranting on about my health, because it just sounds so damned alarming, but, there it is, and here we are: whatever is going on caused me to have 2 seizures on Monday. This is pretty much how I’ve lived my entire life and it allowed me to have 2 careers at the same time and do them well; not world-class, but I have credibility. I don’t know any other way to live. I just live full-out, hell’s bells. It scared my mom to death. Writing has become the same thing for me and I am at the point where I need to pay attention and step back, once in a while. Fair enough.

The kind of hang-on-to-your-hat, all-circuits-firing that I am so, so terrified of. I never know if I’m going to have a heart attack or a stroke. My pulse has been high, about 120, blah, blah. Only 3 weeks until I see my neurologist; it took me 9 months to get the state of Florida to get off the ASSES and do something. So, I have about 19 more ROW80 columns and I will start another, again, just not as regularly. The reason I’m telling you this is because after this post, I am not going to be this serious again. I can’t do this. I take it to heart too strongly and what we have done to the Middle East is horrible, indeed. It’s too hard on me. So, I’m going to take it out of overdrive and write about puppies and kittens or just do cyber-vandalism for a bit.


I don’t have TV; I pretty much read the news desultorily, so I had to backtrack through HuffPo, the DailyBeast, and AndrewSullivan, via “The Dish” my go-to guys, but if I understand this properly, it goes like this:

Terry Jones, an anti-Muslim pastor in Central Florida tweeted and then apparently posted a link to a Youtube video portraying Muhammad as a drunk and… right there, I thought “Oh, JesĂș, that’s already asking for trouble.” A Muslim considers an image or portrayal of Muhammad sacrilegious and a gross insult. Why, oh why inflame people in that manner? There are zealots in every faith, in every culture, for every cause. What is it about certain groups that bring out the worst in people? Why did Nazis feel it necessary to shovel 6,000,000 Jews and 5,000,000 other people into ovens in Death Camps. This is not the total death count. I’ve seen the total estimated death count JUST for the Eastern Front from 1939 – 1945 at 55,000,000. The United States lost 450,000. Yet, here’s some fuckstick in Central Florida who thinks he has God’s Ear and is going to burn the Koran and prove a point. People wonder why I am so goddamned crazy. Well, I digress, but the point is this. We are brutal and evil and we are so, because we don’t even try to understand, we just brandish around a bunch of lies and misconceptions and think we have a cause. Now, back to our subject.

Okay, So, we have an asshole in Gainesville, who on September 11, 2012, has deemed it his “mission” to put on Youtube some really stupid video with jackholes wearing a bunch of fake beards and a lot of really shitty acting commit sacrilege and heresy and piss off a group of people, who, the Obama Administration has been working with. Some of them are actually GOING along with the ARAB SPRING, but it’s TOUCH and GO, because, these people don’t necessarily TRUST the WEST. GEE, I WONDER WHY??? (The capitals are mine.)

Said Asshole commits further assholery by answering when asked about his sense of responsibility for the attacks on the embassies and the death of Ambassador Stevens and other Americans, by commenting “I don’t think speech can be limited, to say OK, if I say this, then this could happen. I believe we absolutely don’t have that responsibility.” As Andrew Sullivan so rightly points out in his The Dish article, “I'm a free speech absolutist - but I'm not an anti-religion absolutist. I think a little respect for religions we don't share is something most Americans would think is precisely an American value.” Although I can’t really point to a shared analogy, I believe there is a shared value; respect implies responsibility. If you have no respect for your country or your faith, you sure as hell have no responsibility and are no shepherd. Jones needs to get his scurvy ass out of the pulpit. Note: in his article, Sullivan is referring to Romney. I applied the analogy here to Jones to make a point. I believe the principle is true. If I am wrong, please let me know. 

I hope I haven’t lost anyone on the logic trail. I know I get convoluted; blame it on the Jesuits. I almost fried my brain getting to this point. Right about here, the synapses started to blow. Because what happened next? Sure enough, the Mother Ship makes a (is it a one-way flight? I pray not) stop and drops off one Willard M. Romney, along with some of his fellow space aliens. Rombley then proceeds to huff and blow about what a complete mess the Obama Administration is making out of this attack by apologizing for a statement for a statement neither the White House nor the State Department made.

Color me huh? Romney is an even bigger tool and idiot than I ever thought. But since he was dropped off by the big Tuba In The Sky, what do we expect? Most of the GOP keep their yaps shut, with the exception of Donald Rumsfeld, Sarah Palin and that Reince Prebtensa (I just can’t figure out that name.) So, Will-Mitt is joined by a discredited Sec of Defense, Space Cadet and Unpronounceable name, who all escaped from the Mother Ship, when they booted the Romster. The rest of the GOP was silent; they either did not agree with Romney or had collective laryngitis. I’m not sure if there was any condemning going on. If I belonged to the GOP, I probably would have broken ranks, but since they all donated their balls over there to the Nutical guys, they’re quiet on matters they should be barking about. Damn! I shouldn’t even joke about this. But the GOP, Romneysham, the whole Circus-Zoo is just horrible. I can’t help it.

Lost in all of this is the fact that, once again, the Middle East is in turmoil. How banal and tame it sounds. Damascus, one of the oldest cities from Antiquity is rubble. It’s starting to look like Stalingrad did in 1943. There are other cities that are experiencing uprisings. People in al-Qaeda who stand to lose tremendous influence are taking advantage of this incident. Admittedly, this one thing is not the sole cause for this conflagration. Again, it is close to September 11, the “anniversary,” date and Jones knows how strongly the abjurement regarding any graven images. So, the deliberate act shouldn’t be lost on the U.S. What seems lost in all of this confusion and mayhem are the people in these Middle Eastern Muslim countries who have befriended the U.S., at great cost to themselves.

There are people who live in these countries who have counted on us to help. Who in good faith said yes, we want to have a democracy. We no longer want to have strongmen who steal our freedom and dictate and proscribe to us our liberties, if we’re allowed to have any at all. We want to raise our families in peace. We want to be your friends. We did something that may not be easily forgiven. We’ve befriended a country that has been looked at as our enemy. Some groups see you as an Evil, but we don’t believe that. We think you’re good. We want to help you, because we want to have some freedoms too.

On September 11, 2011, planes flew into the World Trade Center. Many people were hurt. Many lives were lost. People ran into the buildings at great cost to themselves. Many who went in to help did not survive. Some, who went to save lives, were visitors to the U.S. That does not matter. But this does. In the rocket attack, some Libyans ran to rescue embassy personnel from the shelled building and the mobs. More than 48 hours and several sources later, this is what I can piece together, 4 dead, 3 or more injured.

I have said that I will cry “bullshit” when I smell it, even if I spout it or think it. Originally, I saw 1 picture that shows 3 Libyan men carrying Mr. Stevens to the hospital and was told that was so by AP and their stringer. In doing my own research, I’ve run across at least 3 other sources, 2 of which are Arabic that could be depicted as “mobs.” So, I don’t know and the State department is not forthcoming. Still, it begs the point. Why be inflammatory during an “anniversary” period, much like April 19th is a time of heightened sensitivity, for Oklahoma City, which we recognize. Why do we even allow the loony asshole Terry Jones to spew his hate? Oh yeah, nvm. In the end, we’re held hostage by a man who has no conscience and no sense of responsibility even to his own flock, let alone his country. Jones has sown dragon’s teeth that are in fertile soil indeed.

I find the implications of this stunning, tragic and just beyond ultimate horror. If you want Evil, here it is. Let’s start in our own back yard and turn it right back onto our own. I’m so ill with this. September 11, 2001 wasn’t bad enough. We just can’t lance this boil of hatred and perversity, can we? So, here’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to finish my ROW80 commitment. I really want to do that. I think it’s the right thing for me to do. I will always and forever have Homeless Chronicles in Tampa. But I am sick, not so sick that I am going to die, but I am sick of all of this senseless grandstanding and total horseshit. So, I am going to take it to the next level.

I am ending this post with something I want to share that is so sweet. I never thought that I had an especially Oriental mindset, but I’ve gathered some readers from the other side of the world. Maybe, because I worked at Verizon and lived among Middle Easterners and I understand what they enjoy and how they think. I worked and was trained by several folks from India, Pakistan and everywhere else and had a great time. My September 11 post garnered me 1 comment from Gujarat, India. A very sweet comment. I know I have readers over there. I answered and told the poster to say hello to my friends in Mumbai. It’s bittersweet; why can’t we be nicer to one another?



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