An Incalculable Loss
America suffered a tragic loss yesterday when Hunter Thompson took his own life in his home in Colorado yesterday. His was a voice that helped us understand what was important, and more importantly, what was not. When he started out in the late fifties, his radical contention that a journalist could tell an important story, could tell truth, even while being involved in the story itself, was unique and unfamiliar. His acerbic tongue allowed him to express anger and outrage honestly, without having to contive emotion out of bland journal-ese.
Sadly, I think I understand why he killed himself. How can a man like Thompson live in this place of greed, mindless idiocy and hypocrisy that we have created here in 21st century America? A place where we not only make our kids wear plastic safety helmets, we wear them too. A place where millions of grownups react like five-year-olds when somebody says the word "fuck". A place where, a full year on, we are still an entire society a-twitter over a glimpse of a woman's breast. What is this place? It's not my home. It's not the America I know, and I'm not so sure it's an America I can love. There was no room for a Hunter Thompson anymore.
What does it say about dialog, diversity of viewpoints, or even simple critical thinking, when there is no longer any room for a man like Hunter Thompson? I'm saddened, knowing that there will never be another story told in his raw, funny, HONEST way. But I can't help but think that he will be remembered somewhat as the canary in our coal mine. Whatever this bland marketplace is that America has become, it no longer could support a life like Hunter Thompson. It couldn't provide the emotional and intellectual oxygen that people like him require. Because it couldn't sustain him, it killed him.
Believe me, I understand. Sometimes I look around at the madness and hypocrisy and I want to scream "I HATE THIS FUCKING PLACE". And with every government lie, every Ken Lay that gets away with it, every poor soul tortured or killed in America's gulags, I hate it more. Americans have become sheep, following celebrities, worrying about obesity, fearing diversity and only hoping that at the end of the day it's those other people who are thrown in prison, allowing them another day of mindless fear.
America, and the world, is worse off without Hunter Thompson's voice calling attention to what we've become. The next time you're racing home in your SUV, trying to get home in time to watch "Survivor" on the television, stop for just a minute and think about what you used to dream. Think about what freedom and love felt like. Remember how you used to actually experience things. Hunter Thompson never stopped. He lived as long as he could, and when he couldn't anymore, he left us. Another shred of hope for us, torn away...
Freedom and Liberty? Not so much...
Main Entry:
free·domPronunciation:
'frE-d&mFunction:
noun1 : the quality or state of being free: as
a : the absence of necessity, coercion, or constraint in choice or action
b : liberation from slavery or restraint or from the power of another
: INDEPENDENCEMain Entry:
lib·er·tyPronunciation:
'li-b&r-tEFunction:
nounInflected Form(s):
plural -tiesEtymology: Middle English, from Middle French
liberté, from Latin
libertat-, libertas, from
liber free -- more at
LIBERAL1 : the quality or state of being free:
a : the power to do as one pleases
b : freedom from physical restraint
c : freedom from arbitrary or despotic control
d : the positive enjoyment of various social, political, or economic rights and privileges
e : the power of choice
These are Miriam Webster's definitions, not mine. And as you are probably aware, these are words and concepts used to almost embarrassing
excess recently by the Bush administration. He told us in the Inauguration speech, the State of the Union, and at every opportunity after the Iraqi elections, that our stated policy goal is to bring the gifts of freedom and liberty to the oppressed and downtrodden all over the world. The underlying subtext here is that we lucky Americans already enjoy all the benefits of freedom and liberty.
Now this administration is well recognized for it's baldface lies and manipulation of the truth, but this is something far more foul and disingenuous. Go back and read those definitions, then come back and explain to me how someone can so strongly and vociferously espouse those concepts of freedom and liberty and then specifically support an agenda that seeks to deny two honest, law abiding, tax paying citizens the right to privately and quietly marry the person they love. How can you be "free from arbitrary or despotic control", or even have "the power to do as one pleases" and be denied something so small, so universal, so unthreatening to society? It is OBSCENE for our political leadership to talk so boldly about bringing freedom to others when they openly and publicly deny it to American citizens. And the saddest part is they do this strictly as political pandering to the evangelical conservatives, to whom the teaching of tolerance and love of neighbor is criminal and unpatriotic.
It's bad enough to speak over and over about "Democracy and the Rule of Law", as Bush, Cheney and Rice are wont to do, when suddenly we are a nation that holds political prisoners indefinitely, without charges, without access to lawyers, courts, their families, or any sort of due process. It's even worse that we routinely torture them and deny them the most basic of human rights. For them to place the concepts of freedom and liberty at the forefront of their policy while rejecting the very accepted definitions of the terms fairly screams of their dishonesty and willingness to use lies to manipulate the people into accepting their agenda.
Mr. Bush, Mr. Cheney, Ms. Rice: I call on you today to either accept and allow true freedom and liberty for all American citizens or immediately STOP using the terms as they relate to foreign policy. Regardless of who voted for you, I can assure you we did NOT elect you to provide greater freedom for others than we have for ourselves.
How Much Longer?
America was attacked by Islamic Fundamentalist terrorists in early September of 2001. Over three and a half years ago. No attacks have occured since. In that time, America has invaded two countries, killed tens of thousands of people, imprisoned and tortured thousands more, and fundamentally changed our country and our culture forever. Our leadership, blinded by ideology and their own fundamentalism, continues to force major changes upon our society by the simple method of inspiring fear. Yes, we were afraid in late 2001. We didn't know what to do. How to react. We were afraid, we were stunned, we were angry. So they gave us Afghanistan, Iraq, the Patriot Act, the TSA, Homeland Security and no-fly lists.
Fast forward to February, 2005. They say we're at war. We have to spend all this money. We have to keep our troops in the middle east. We have to attack Iran. Why? The war. You know, the one against terrorism. I look around, this is not a country at war. They tell us to be afraid, and, grudgingly we fear. But what do we fear? We fear because they tell us we need to be afraid. When we're afraid, our criminal polictical leadership can force unpalateable changes in our culture, our society and our nation. I believe that it is this climate of fear, perpetuated by a radical ideologically driven regime, that is causing so much of the madness we are seeing. The fact that a nation of grownups should suddenly panic and lose all sense of balance and maturity when confronted by a woman's breast on our television. The fact that a radical conservative religious zealot can accuse a cartoon character of homosexuality and define the very concept of tolerance as a bad, dangerous, un-american characteristic. The fact that we were afraid to let an islamic pop singer into our country for fear that (what? They never said) he might harm us in some way.
I'd just like to come out and say it. I am not afraid. Will islamic extremists attack America again? I don't know. Maybe. Probably. They certainly can if they want--they'd be nearly impossible to stop. Is that attack likely to come soon? Is it likely to harm me or my loved ones. Of course not. I'd be more likely to get hit by lightning. We need to all stand up and say it to Bush, to Cheney, to Rove, to all of the thugs temporarily running this country. We need to tell them We are NOT AFRAID!! You no longer can coerce us into acting against our interests by telling us to be afraid. We are going to care about each other, about our economy, our schools and our future. It's a future that need not be based on fear, but on hope. When we are no longer in fear, no longer at "war", we can begin to see the damage they've done in the name of fear, but we will no longer be manipulated by fear.
Perhaps there is even a better strategy to this "war on terror" than tanks, bombs, guns and warfare. It certainly seems as if every approach the Bush Administration has taken to responding to the September Eleventh attacks has been counterproductive. The invasions, killing civilians, detaining and torturing innocents, all this has led to more terrorists who hate America and what we stand for in the world. And in a lot of ways, who can blame them? We have never been a fair broker in the world. We have always supported cruel, repressive regimes against the hopes, dreams and aspirations of their constituent populations. We have always supported Israel unfairly against the Palestinians. The Israelis could always say "The Palestinian Authority must do more to stop the violence" and never had to try to end the conflict or even be responsive to the needs of the non-israeli people they had power over. Maybe it's time to re think this whole approach to dealing with the world. Maybe if what we said and what we did were the same, maybe if our policies had some kind of consistancy, maybe if we actually used our immense power to do some good things for some downtrodden people, maybe then the extremists would consider us to be a good, honest reliable partner in the world. Maybe not, but really, what have we got to lose?
