As I came into work today, I was listening to a massive mix CD I created a couple of years ago. It has just a shade over 100 tracks on it. Just after I got on base, a song by the German band The Scorpions called “Winds of Change” came on; perhaps you know it. It’s about, well, the winds of change; specifically the winds that swept Eastern Europe during the fall of the Soviet Union. The song itself, while good, is not nearly the best I’ve ever heard, but it evokes something in me that is hard to explain. Allow me, dear reader, to try. Can you imagine experiencing such…liberation? Can you imagine seeing and hearing, nay – living!, events such as those described in that song? Can you imagine the cool breeze from winds such as those felt in Lithuania, Estonia, Georgia, Moldova and Armenia; how refreshing it must have been? You’ve lived under the yoke of tyranny and ineptitude your entire life, and in the road ahead, you glimpse endless possibilities never before presented to you. It’s difficult to put ourselves in that place.
Another song captures for me the feelings of that moment in time, which I think was one of the most significant periods in the last 100 years (perhaps much longer) but this one is sung from a slightly different perspective. “Right Here, Right Now” by the British band Jesus Jones describes those events as an observer, not as living those events as did someone in East Germany, but watching them. Again, the overwhelming rush of relief. Perhaps, people then thought, we needn’t live in constant fear of nuclear war. What a weight that was lifted. The exuberance. Watching the world wake up from history. These songs, perhaps, put the world into perspective a little for me. They make me feel good to be alive. It pains me ever so slightly that I missed out on the chance to be a part of the awe-inspiring power of momentous, leviathan-esque events such as those. I knew even back then that I was witnessing things of significant, but precocious as I may have been at 10, I couldn’t have possibly fully comprehended what was happening. Nevertheless, I am pleased that I can sit where I am right now and read about the August Coup of 1991 and be amazed at those times.
I wish I could fully encapsulate and explain in succinct terms how these songs move me; perhaps they move you too. Or perhaps you’re dead, or simply too numbed from countless hours of “Heroes” and “American Idol” to feel good to be alive; to be alive where you are, when you are. I hope these songs, or something else, makes you wake up from history.
Political Nausea (cont):
For as much as I despise about politics, it sure seems I write about it a lot, no? All the above warm and fuzzy feelings about change and being alive drain from me like the blood from a slaughtered pig.
A top advisor in the Clinton campaign thinks that Democrats should give more thought to Obama’s admission of drug use. He said that Obama’s “spotty youth” could cause trouble for him if he were to secure the Democratic nomination. I don’t see what this has to do with anything. At least Obama had the cajones to admit that he did drugs. Bill claimed he didn’t inhale. Come on. For one, you’ll be hard pressed to find a large number of people who didn’t experiment with drugs back then and even now. And most of them grew up to be responsible adults. It goes back to not being able to make mistakes and learn from them. This sort of stuff tells our children, “Why bother ever growing up, and growing from your mistakes? If you make any mistakes, you might as well forget about ever becoming anything. You will forever be held back by the foolish things you might have done in your youth, especially if you admit them and speak candidly about them.” Obama was stupid for using drugs. But the man rose above what could have been a life of being a punk. Shouldn’t that be something to sort of celebrate? Especially for liberals like Hillary? In addition to pointing out the hypocrisy of liberals, this tactic serves to show us that Clinton has no vision beyond attacking Obama. Why not tell me more about what she believe, what her background is, why she’d make a good president? Her entire campaign seems to revolve around “electability” and how Obama has none and she has it all. But people are generally stupid, and despite the fact that they themselves probably used drugs and made mistakes, they’ll believe that drug use and other mistakes 30 years ago make a bad person in the now, and they’ll not nominate Obama even if he is more qualified for the job.
Since I don’t want this, our beloved Morning Coffee, to turn into a chronic political missive (of which we have enough), I will try to avoid political issues, despite my overwhelming urge to comment on the insanity. However, I reserve the right to comment if I must.
American Anorexia in the Middle East:
I don’t normally quote large amounts of text in the Morning Coffee. I like you to taste what I’ve brewed, rather than another. I’m possessive like that, I guess. But a portion of Thomas L. Friedman’s recent article in the New York Times, “Losing Weight in the Gulf”, was simply too good to pass up. Friedman wrote the critically acclaimed book, “The World is Flat.”
“Growing up in Minnesota, one of my favorite things was going to the state fair each summer and watching the guy who would guess your weight within 5 pounds. If you fooled him, you won a stuffed animal.
Out here on the Persian Gulf, where small countries learn quickly how to survive large predators, they’ve developed a similar skill: They can calculate a country’s power within 5 pounds, just by looking at it. If they’re wrong, they end up as a stuffed animal.
Right now, the Arab Gulf states are all sizing up America, their protector, and are wondering just how much Uncle Sam weighs in the standoff with Iran — and whether it will be enough to keep Iran at bay.
The Gulf Arabs feel like they have this neighbor who has been a drug dealer for 18 years. Recently, this neighbor has been very visibly growing poppies for heroin in his backyard in violation of the law. He’s also been buying bigger and better trucks to deliver drugs. You can see them parked in his driveway.
In the past year, though, because of increased police patrols and all the neighbors threatening to do something, this suspicious character has shut down the laboratory in his basement to convert poppies into heroin. In the wake of that, the police declared that he is no longer a drug dealer.
“But wait,” say the Gulf Arabs, “he’s still growing poppies. He was using them for heroin right up to 2003. Now he says he’s in the flower business. He’s not in the flower business. He’s dealing drugs. And he’s still expanding the truck fleet to deliver them. How can you say he’s no longer a drug dealer?”
Sorry, say the police. We have a very technical, legal definition of drug-dealing, and your neighbor no longer fits it.
That’s basically what has happened between the U.S. and Iran — just substitute enriched uranium for poppies. Now, Bush officials are trying to tell everyone: “No, no, Iran is still dangerous. You have to keep the coalition together to get Tehran to stop enriching uranium.” But in a world where everyone is looking for an excuse to do business with Iran, not to sanction it, we’ve lost leverage. Everyone in the neighborhood can smell it — and it worries them.”
So clear a caveman could understand the issues. The article is, as you might have guessed, about our problems with Iran, specifically the whole NIE thing. The NIE has resulted in the total collapse of US leverage against Iran. Russia and China have been dreaming of a chance to quash the possibility of strict sanctions against Iran, and low and behold, they’ve got the chance, and we gave it to them. The perception is now that Iran poses no threat to anything. The problem is, they’re still running their centrifuges. “That is the hardest part of building nuclear weapons, and Iran is still doing it,” says Gary Samore, director of studies at the Council on Foreign Relations and former Clinton administration expert on proliferation.
Iran is still in violation of UN proliferation rules (enriching uranium, testing long-range missiles). Iran agreed to these rules. Israeli officials estimate that the Iranians will have a viable nuclear weapon by 2010 – which may seem like a long time from now. French President Sarkozy is still very skeptical and worries about war in the Middle East. This will not be the last you hear about this issue, from me or otherwise, I’m sure.
Word of the Day: Cacophony (noun): 1. Harsh or discordant sound; dissonance. 2. The use of harsh or discordant sounds in literary composition. When I think of Presidential elections, I think of a cacophony.
On This Day in History: The Council of Trent, a response to the Protestant Reformation, begins (1545). Read about it, it’s pretty interesting. Tellus, the Roman goddess personifying the Earth was worshiped on the Esquiline Hill in Rome, and a table was spread for Ceres, the god of agriculture.
“I follow the Moskva, down to Gorky Park, listening to the winds of change. An August summer night, soldiers passing by, listening to the winds of change…the future’s in the air, blowing with the winds of change.” – “Winds of Change”, Scorpions.
“A woman on the radio talks about revolution when it’s already passed her by. Bob Dylan didn’t have this to sing about, you know it feels good to be alive. I saw the decade in when it seemed the world could change in a blink of an eye. And if anything then there’s your sign of the times. I was alive and I waited for this: right here, right now…watching the world wake up from history.” – “Right Here, Right Now”, Jesus Jones.
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