"...it's not the training to be mean but the training to be kind that is used to keep us leashed best." ~ Black Dog Red

"In case you haven't recognized the trend: it proceeds action, dissent, speech." ~ davidly, on how wars get done

"...What sort of meager, unerotic existence must a man live to find himself moved to such ecstatic heights by the mundane sniping of a congressional budget fight. The fate of human existence does not hang in the balance. The gods are not arrayed on either side. Poseiden, earth-shaker, has regrettably set his sights on the poor fishermen of northern Japan and not on Washington, D.C. where his ire might do some good--I can think of no better spot for a little wetland reclamation project, if you know what I mean. The fight is neither revolution nor apocalypse; it is hardly even a fight. A lot of apparatchiks are moving a lot of phony numbers with more zeros than a century of soccer scores around, weaving a brittle chrysalis around a gross worm that, some time hence, will emerge, untransformed, still a worm." ~ IOZ

May 1, 2011

Theater for Idiots

Bin Laden dead. Let's see if Obama can contain his glee, if he'll go for somber elan, or smirking celebration.

Just in time for the imperial elevations of Panetta and Petraeus, and the full kick in for Campaign 2012* and the coming dronification of the Homeland.

And for the last act in the restoration of mercenary stoogery soldierly honor, what a moment. Or some shit. Already the talking 'eads is nattering on about "sacrifices for something memorable, not in vain, achieving victories against Osama bin Laden and the forces of terror, turning point in global war on terrorism, defining a generation, a new period of Arab democracy beginning, war against fear has great triumph, closure, optimism..."

Going to vomit now.

FUCKING UPDATE: Just heard some douche (MSNBC) say that the US possession of Osama's body (totemism anyone?) was a "moral blow" against terrorism and resistance to the US. Anyway, killing Osama will stop the War on Everything like Magic Johnson's continued survival has stopped the transmission of HIV.

FUCKING DAMNED UPDATE: "I determined...my direction...I made clear we would take action in Pok-Ee-Stonn...I...I...I..."

Obama is reveling in it, with all the douchebag fratboy arrogance one can expect.

MSNBC airing live feed video of theater goers standing outside White House, draped in flags, chest bumping (for real, I kid you not), cheering. Idiots. I hate you. May you all get herpes of the eyes.

Talking heads singing praises of special forces (death squads, anyone?) as they air abovementioned footage. Between royal weddings and royal assassinations, I think I've stomached my last draught of civilization's poison...

Barry McCaffery..."JSOC are...sheer magic...most dangerous people on the face of the earth..." Whoops. Drug czar slipped his script.

So many waving, draping flags at Lafayette Park. Cagey entrepreneur?

OTHER SHIT:

Crowds of thousands chanting in major US cities - "USA! USA!" Waving flags. Getting all jingo. You understand why an observant person cannot put any faith in revolution? The spectacular works because it taps emotions. It works because people identify with their rulers and the ruling schema emotionally, and make it real for themselves.

The project of civilization can only careen towards its catastrophic impact with the immovability of the Second Law. There's no reforming it. There's no hijacking it. There's no salvation inside its confines. There's no salvation without. Civilization is the organization of people into captured populations, and that organization rests upon an educational, religious and political imprinting of minds which is well nigh impossible to eradicate. One dead man - a single symbolic battlefield execution - has moved more people to get their jingo on than a million dead** moved the same populations to put their bodies in the breach.

Fuck the human race. The comet cannot come soon enough.

(Christ - Brian Williams just equated this single killing with VJ day and the dropping of the Bomb on Japan in reply to Maddow gushing that "America...we...accomplished" something great and tremendous today.)




* - this, for wavering liberals. Birthers, Republicans and glibertarians already have an out: it was the soldiers who did it. Bammy was just along for the ride.

** - Iraq

19 comments:

JM said...

"ust heard some douche (MSNBC) say that the US possession of Obama's body (totemism anyone?) was a "moral blow" against terrorism and resistance to the US. Anyway, killing Obama will stop the War on Everything like Magic Johnson's continued survival has stopped the transmission of HIV."
Oh my, Freudian slip,eh?

David K Wayne said...

If you ask me, they held his corpse in cold storage for a few months/years, waiting for a manufactured 'challenge' like the one from collagen combover man. Hey presto! Feelgood Mayday cover story. Probably upping the killing in Libya while Mr. and Mrs. Patriot shake their flags.

The kind of PR mastery that won him the election in 08.

JM said...

You said Obama not Osama in the quoted paragraph.

Randal Graves said...

Fuck Obama. He was supposed to wait until September 11 before wheeling out the corpse. No sense of TV cliche, this one.

Anonymous said...

Jack I share your frustration. The cruise missile liberal maddow gushing about accomplishment during one of the biggest propaganda orgies of recent memory is hilarious. Who needs fox news when you can have msnbc/cnn/etc. I blessed this historic day with a new collage.

Jack Crow said...

Heh, that's a yummy typo, JM - but no slip. Just human error. Or, barely human, in my case.

I'll fix it, just because.

Wayne, I'm tempted by the idea that Bin Laden's body has been held in escrow. I'm not sure it matters, though. Dead four years ago, dead last night - the damned fools are still celebrating.

Randal, might have been too obvious.

Dr. G, great point about Manning, over your way. I want to say that this re-awakens my murdered sense of outrage, but it doesn't. The opposite, really.

Some small hope though: my ten year old, just a few minutes ago, said, "Who cares?" and then turned on about the only tele worth watching. Sponge Bob.

Jack Crow said...

I'm not peddling a conspiracy - but it is amusing to watch grown ass adults hooting and hollering and getting their jingo on, to the relentless commentary of unquestioning corporate news, about an execution for which no one, not least of the all the Preznit taking credit, has offered proof.

It's too easy, this business of distracting Americans.

davidly said...

One need not peddle conspiracy. But before one can even theorize conspiracy, someone says something like, "Oh great! The conspiracy theorists are gonna go crazy!" That should be food for thought.

Either way, it is what it is. Patriotic celebration of summary execution and burial. That's conspiracy enough.

Jack Crow said...

davidly,

It's certainly possible that the wetworkers held BL in lieu of a good public moment. Or that they saved up his kill moment for the same.

I just don't think it matters.

It doesn't matter who dropped the towers, in the same way that it didn't matter which officials knew what and when about the Baader-Meinhofs, or how deeply compromised November 17 really was.

The spectacular use of events really doesn't require much in the way of connection to fact, anymore.

Conspiracism won't hurt Obama any more than it damaged Bush. In fact, it probably helps by capturing and penning resistance inside of byzantine and illogical paranoia.

Jack Crow said...

Also, do you mind giving a gloss on your last post. I can only read French, and poorly at that?

davidly said...

Sure. The wordplay doesn't work so well in English, which is why I didn't do an English verion (Google translate works, but as is often the case, it sometimes leads one to read the opposite of what's intended).

Briefly (or not):

The title "Birth Certificate of the Sausage Factory". The subtitle "Ist ja Wurst!" means literally "it's sausage" but is a way of saying that something makes no friggin' difference.

I use a semi-fictional account of the history of the chili cook-off as the basis for an allegory on left-right politics as they relate to birtherism, as it were... in "Once upon a time" mode.

This American tradition began ironically in Texas, then a republic of its own. Pesky Mexican. America likes chili. Offers Texas statehood. Texas says sure, gets bigger pistols. America gets the Rio Grande.

The chili cook-off spreads throughout the land (except Vermont, who find it stupid (link to Vermont separatists)). Cincinnati loves chili. Thinks they got a great recipe. Texans think it's watery and bland. But the meat merchants don't care one way or another. They sell meat.

Festering in the land are those who don't care for the meaty dish. Vegetarians. Meat merchants don't care, as long as their ideology is kept in check. Which it is.

For veggie chili dishes don't have a prayer at the cook-off. Meat eaters rule (or gladly allow themselves to be ruled). For the meat merchant offers an abundance of product (in addition to the Texas and Cinci varieties, one can even enjoy chili on a Chicago dog).

A lot of vegetarians are aware of the irrelevance of the origin of the chili, though. Texas, Illinois, Hawaii, even Kenya - it doesn't matter. The main thing is that people are meat and the meat merchant is a butcher.

Jack Crow said...

Gratis, davidly.

senecal said...

Do they have photographs of the body, with any evidence that links it conclusively to the present? Or did they just dump the (whatever) and expect us to take their word for it?

zencomix said...

On July 4th, 1902, Teddy Roosevelt declared "Mission Accomplished" for the Indian War waged in the Philippines. The genocide continued for another 10 years or so, and not much has changed since then.

Jack Crow said...

Sen,

Don't know. Said they confirmed it with DNA tests, since they had bin Laden family DNA on record. Not sure it matters. People believe he's dead, and that Obama did it.

Zen,

Not for nothing do they continue to code name "enemies" with Indian names, name their aircav death machines after vanquished tribes, and refer to Iraq and Afghanistan as "indian country."

K. Ron Silkwood said...

So, why isn't the body touring the country and serving as the centerpiece of a million parades? And since we need not be afraid anymore, can all those TSA hacks be fired?

Jack Crow said...

From the vantage of power, no body (with some sort of verification) is much better than parading one around. A paraded body is a lightning rod. A buried body is a baraka cult in the making.

TSA hacks aren't going anywhere.

Jim H. said...

Ever read Homer? 'Member Achilles dragging Hector's corpse around the walls of Troy behind his chariot? Yup. This isn't quite that.

Smirking arrogance? Triumphalism? That was the hallmark of the previous admin. 'Member Saddam et fils.

This one will be a more tasteful reveal, at the behest of fist-banging deather 'Pigs. "Had to do it, folks. Didn't want to release the pics of dead man OBL, but the birthers demanded it—just like my silly long-form birth certificate. Why won't anybody believe me? Is it because I'm _______." (fill in the black)

Oops, there's a Freudian for you.

Jack Crow said...

Jim,

That's my take, too. My exact read, in fact. I don't buy into the eleventhy dimensional chess master thing. It's just a real obvious play against a group of unimaginative paranoids.