I was going to rant about the election, but instead I’ll just miserate that I got 3 parking tickets in 9 hours. I went to a friend’s to help dig her out of two years of fiscal denial, impressing myself with my organizational skills (how is it that we can do that for others but it’s so hard to do it for oneself?). In some kind of karmic point-proving, I managed to get her affairs in order while ignoring the parking restrictions on the street where I parked. Got home at 4 in the morning and slept through my alarm and found tickets on my car and my boss’ truck. $120 bucks out the door. I’ve been in a funk pretty much all day because of it, too.
In many ways, this has been just tragic, and I can’t begin to appreciate the difficulty you must be experiencing in your life right now. And I can understand how a lot of people in the world actually hate you. It couldn’t have come at a more volatile time.
I’m gonna talk straight to you. You’re had, Swaggart-style. There will be no redemption for you in anything you say. Only in what you do. Now before you think I’m dogging you, I’d like for you to hear me out.
‘Cause I know that people are complex beings. We have dark sides to us (what I believe my churchin taught me is our “sinful nature”, or as the Jungian would say our “shadow”).
And one of the things I felt was missing from my churchin growing up was acknowledgment that it’s always there. It can’t be repressed into non-existance. In fact, I believe that simply repressing rather than acknowledging and managing it leads to really big problems. Can I get an Amen from you or maybe some other priest who’s had sex and/or addiction issues?
I’ll tell you, too, I’m pissed. I’m pissed that you pounce on gays while being a “liar and deceiver”. I’m pissed that you’re yet another example of corrupted institutions. Government. Church. All the things I grew up believing in. The things so many people in my generation believed in. I’m pissed my lefty, atheist friends will see this as just one more example in a long line of fraud draped as religion. I’m pissed that having conversations about Godwith someone now necessarily means having to talk about corruption and illicit deceit. Well, it was like that before you, but now…
I had to say all that, ’cause it’s true. And, I also feel compassion and am doing my best to feel love for you. Love for your children and your wife, who must be absolutely in hell right now. Understanding temptation and succumbing to it. Understanding owning that. NOT understanding the blatant hypocrisies. Not at all.
You need to cash your chips in, post a farewell letter to your website and move to Brazil. Avoid cameras like the plague, and in fact, spend the rest of your life doing what I think Jesus would have you do – go and heal the sick, minister to the poor. Maybe save some actual lives and let someone else save the souls in that 12 million dollar church you built.
Sedition, as defined by Dictionary.com is inciting discontent or rebellion against government. What’s the line between sedition and protest, then? Clearly the framers intended with the Bill of Rights to ensure that government must not constrain basis, “inalienable” rights, which vested in the people the right to engage in debate and compromise to allow an orderly, functional society in which people could pursue their happiness. Ahh…
Watched “V for Vendetta”. I definitely got the “A for Agenda” in the film, and also got the intent to provoke thought, and doing so by basically telling what amounted to a true story, fictitiously modernized.
Remember, remember the Fifth of November… It’s a story about a guy (literally, his name was Guy Fawkes, and his story is actually connected to how we got the word “guy” in English) who tried to kill the king and blow up Parliament in 1605, exactly 401 years ago. Caught with matches in his pocket near 1800 pounds of gunpowder (enough to level parliament and blow out windows in a 1k radius). Brought to the king’s chamber, and by Executive Order was tortured for relevant torture, confessed, and was then executed. His conspirators were waiting in the countryside to insight riots and foment revolution. Had they been successful, there probly would have been massive retaliation against Catholics (the King was protestant, Fawkes, Catholic) and a protestant absolute monarch would have been installed and Britain’s history would have been recharted. Gotta love Wikipedia.
Anyway, what struck me about the story was a) the parallels between massive discontent about the president, b) the parallels between executive orders for torture, and c) the whole monarch thing…
Anyway, got thoughts about that? Is protest = sedition? Where’s the line?
Got back last night from performing at a candlelight vigil on the Capitol steps in Montgomery, Alabama. I can’t even begin to put into words how amazing the experience was from landing Friday night to wheels up on Sunday.
I was invited to perform at 16 Candles For Soldiers, a demonstration of support for our troops and calling for their return organized (almost entirely) by a 16 year old Alabama girl (“Pint-sized Peace Activist Stages Protest In Montgomery“). I got to support a really amazing kid with vision and passion who took action.
At the vigil, I invited the people attending to light candles in silence, remembering the lives lost in Iraq and Afghanistan. I read passages from Dr. Martin Luther King’s “Beyond Vietnam” speech (which contained one of my favorite MLK quotes: “the arch of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice”). And…
I got to do this just a block from his Dexter Avenue church, (where the bus boycott and civil rights movement was launched), just after sunset, with a rich blue starry Southern sky and hundreds of candles flickering while a group of loving men, women and children hold silent vigil for the heroes who’ve died in this travesty of a war… to sing the national anthem on those steps and to sing Semper Fi to the guy who stopped in his pickup truck to listen… and all of it possible because of the passion and commitment of a 16 year old girl from Alabama.
I saw a sign in the Atlanta Airport next to one of the many insanely-overpriced restaurants. Said “Proud To Be An American”. ‘Bout sums it up, though mine’d say: “Pissed Off But Still Proud To Be An American”. That’s me, the pissed off peace-and-justice lover.
To: Steve Wynn Date: 10/18, 5:22 PM Re: Putting your foot down
Mr. Wynn,
I’ll bet your heart’s a bit crushed right now, having forever altared a priceless work of art. I’m certain you’re summoning your best poker-face for the onslaught of scorn and derision. But keep the painting. Hire the best of the best to preserve it as much as possible, and put it on display for people to come see at your hotel. None of the pictures on the web have a photo of the rip, by the way.
I suggest that you, Mr. Las Vegas, turn this into an opportunity to cement your place in history as one of the world’s greatest collectors, not to mention increase inbound cash traffic to your empire.
The fact is, Mr. Wynn, that painting is timeless, and will be regarded as one of the best works of our era’s most important artist. Picasso changed our perspective. You are now anchored in the story of this piece of work, which will last and appreciate long after you and I are gone.
The question is, what will your legacy be? That you made a lot of money and owned a lot of paintings?
I’ve been seeing a lot of This guy Sacha lately. Mostly as Borat, the meme/movie that I think is going to be profoundly successful if for no other reason than Cohen’s uncanny ability to reveal truths about being human. I won’t go into what a genius I think Cohen is, but I’ll just say that I can’t stop talking like Borat. Is Nice. I Like. I’ve been an Ali G fan since finding his video’s online (prior to HBO, which I don’t even get anyway). But Borat keeps showing up- on Yahoo!, in banner advertising, and on the background on soccer games. And everytime I see him, I become using languages of like Borat.
Anyway, I’ve been incredibly busy lately, managing to get all of it done and done well, I think. I’m pleased, anyway, and I haven’t gotten any feedback to the contrary.
I’ve started a second gig with CivicActions. I’m returning to business of internet. I like. My last gig in web services was finding shelter from the dot-com blowout managing the interactive department at a lifeless b2b advertising agency in San Francisco in 2000. It was my second or third Omnicom gig. Probably a good job for someone who’s passionate about the ad business. I’d say I fall into the “fascinated/disgusted” category more than “passionate” about consumer and b2b advertising. I appreciate a well executed campaign, but it’s not something that gets me up in the morning.
A few weeks after 9/11, I was laid off a few days after being directed to lay off my entire staff. To be fair, I’d been trying to let them go since I’d arrived in an effort for our interactive offerings to be sophisticated and elegantly designed – characteristics not found my motley and genuinely nice department. But they were hired during the boom days, when the last place on earth anybody with rockstar talent wanted to work was in a b2b advertising agency. They were all really nice people, for sure. I liked them personally, but their skillsets were undeveloped, really. I hope they’re all doing well for themselves. Funny, I haven’t thought about that gig for a couple years at least. It was painful, really.
Being laid off less than a month after 9/11 was… well, it sucked. Anyway, I pretty much decided I didn’t want to work in the tech business anymore. Now here I am again. Old habits are hard to break. Specifically, a passion for seeing the internet being used to make a positive difference in the world.
Our clients at CivicActions are all non-profits and projects that we believe are important in “the big picture”. I’m not selling high-speed routers or data storage solutions. I’m selling community organizing tools and grassroots campaigns to stop genocide, encourage civic participation, save the environment and end corruption.
Feels good to be contributing to “The Cause” in yet another way, and in this case, a way that is actually sustaining me. Being a totally virtual organization means that I can do my work anywhere in the world. Which I plan to be doing.
I’m definitely still enjoying my work with my employer (I’m a contractor w/ CivicActions), doing leak investigation and construction project management. I love the work, my boss and so far every one of our clients. The new gig complements the first rather well, in my opinion. Although it is making me a little crazy with details and scheduling. I forgot all about meetings, weekly deliverables and such.
At the end of the day, though, it’s paying my bills and keeping the computer turned on, which means I can make more music.
Senator Obama and Governor Newsome P/VP 2012. The newly revitalized Democratic Party nominates the first African American presidential candidate in history, bringing to an end the tyrrany of prejudice. They have exactly 11 months to run the country, at which point, the world is totally and utterly destroyed.
If you make your way to the next post, you’ll read a comment I made a while ago about Bush’s speech last night. And actually, I take it back.
What I really want to say is that you can’t ASK the country to become united. It takes leadership. And that’s what’s so disappointing about THIS Republican administration.
Our nation desperately needs leadership. The White House is occupied by an incredibly media-savvy team of ruthless people who have brilliantly managed to more or less control the media under the guise of thriving capitalism (how would you like your media consolidated today?)
This is not whinery. It is statement of fact. We need leadership. Yeah, NEW leadership, but right now, I’d settle for some old-fashioned Eisenhower-style leadership. Someone who’s seen the evil effects of war. Someone who’s proven his capacity for waging it successfully, perhaps. Someone with vision.
What is the Bush (and apparently the Republican) vision for America and for the world? Like I just don’t get it. They keep spending all this money and time defending the war, instead of sharing the vision. Y’know, LEADING.
IF YOU’RE SO BIG ON LEADERSHIP, WHY DON’T YOU SUPPORT OUR PRESIDENT?
I live in what I presume to still be a democracy, wherein leaders compete for the support of the people. We each are free to choose how we want the country to go, and are honor-bound as citizens to protect it. And that’s what I’m doing.
I really, honestly believe that the New American Century vision of the world is bad for our safety, our livelihoods and our future. Rather than using the market forces of a global marketplace, the captains of the NAC force American dominance into the markets. Which is good if you’re a capitalist with tons of leverage to leverage. Not so good if you’re everyone else.
There’s no argument that capitalism as an economic construct is fundamentally a GOOD thing. Nor is there plausible that capitalism as we know it today has also proven its fatal flaws. Polar Icee Slush, anyone? And I’ll tell you this – cancer is not an affliction in the Bible, as far as I know (Correct me if I’m wrong).
At least he acknowledges that the country is divided. That’s a step, I suppose. Fact is, though, it’s a false offer – “Put aside your differences of opinion and do things our way, (which, btw, is completely absent accountability or compromise)”.