In a discussion of whether we have free will — we don't —I suddenly became fascinated with the imaginary possibility that we could decide our physical beings, pretty much the way we can design an avatar.
I would give myself my overall body as it was when I was somewhere between 17 to 23: thinner, more limber, more easily renewed of energy and vitality.
Then, what if I had the ability to change coloring? I could literally make my skin green with envy or red with anger, look a reflective albino pale if I was crossing a street at night or greenish if I was trying to surprise someone (for something like a birthday, at a picnic.
The color toggle could apply also to hair and eyes. I could be blond or redheaded and have those blue-green-gray irises that change with the mood.
To improve on the present body, I'd make myself permanently and invincibly immune to the common cold and STDs.
And, hey, while I'm playing, maybe I could design some “template” appearances that I could change in and out of, like a suit.
Just imagine what you could do ...
Saturday, July 03, 2010
Thursday, July 01, 2010
Socialism isn't ... and is ...
Since forever and a day the Democratic Socialists of America has embodied to me, largely because of my admiration for founder Michael Harrington for picking up from the ruins of the old Socialist Party, the only kind of U.S. socialism I could abide.
Like Harrington, I chucked Catholicism, but not its social teachings, on which I grew up. Of course, I was growing up in Latin America, with a foot in the USA, and liberation theology blowing through the Catholic schools and seminaries just as U.S. soldiers committed atrocities in Vietnam.
The singular “Other American,” as a biographer dubbed Harrington, wrote a book that set off the spark that led to the War on Poverty, in which — despite Ronald Reagan's cynical quip — poverty was rolled back, from 19% to 11% in less than a decade, a feat never repeated. Poverty today in the USA hovers at a little more than 12%.
Yet socialism isn't really about poverty, but the economic order. In all socioeconomic systems conceivable, there will always be those who have less than everyone else — although not necessarily in as abject and degrading a manner as we know poverty today — and those who have more than everyone else — albeit not the stratospheric wealth we know today.
Socialism aims to reorganize the way society goes about waging the human struggle for survival, so that everyone participates, as an owner, in deciding how all the available resources are used. We can, of course, all be as stupid together as the present elite.
Wouldn't you rather make your own mistakes than suffer those of Wall Street or the Pentagon?
Socialism is not — Lenin be damned — about setting up a police state. Nor is socialism about setting up a comfortable bureaucracy for some to claim to represent workers as they play golf with the bosses, nor much less about championing the issues raised by our particular sexual or ethnic identity, nor even about “reforming” anything, be it the money-clogged electoral system or the inequitable and wasteful medical system.
In a real socialist society democracy we would all get a chance to make sure there was more butter than guns, for all enough butter and bread, and — as the women of Lawrence, Massachusetts, sang nearly a century ago — roses, too.
Like Harrington, I chucked Catholicism, but not its social teachings, on which I grew up. Of course, I was growing up in Latin America, with a foot in the USA, and liberation theology blowing through the Catholic schools and seminaries just as U.S. soldiers committed atrocities in Vietnam.
The singular “Other American,” as a biographer dubbed Harrington, wrote a book that set off the spark that led to the War on Poverty, in which — despite Ronald Reagan's cynical quip — poverty was rolled back, from 19% to 11% in less than a decade, a feat never repeated. Poverty today in the USA hovers at a little more than 12%.
Yet socialism isn't really about poverty, but the economic order. In all socioeconomic systems conceivable, there will always be those who have less than everyone else — although not necessarily in as abject and degrading a manner as we know poverty today — and those who have more than everyone else — albeit not the stratospheric wealth we know today.
Socialism aims to reorganize the way society goes about waging the human struggle for survival, so that everyone participates, as an owner, in deciding how all the available resources are used. We can, of course, all be as stupid together as the present elite.
Wouldn't you rather make your own mistakes than suffer those of Wall Street or the Pentagon?
Socialism is not — Lenin be damned — about setting up a police state. Nor is socialism about setting up a comfortable bureaucracy for some to claim to represent workers as they play golf with the bosses, nor much less about championing the issues raised by our particular sexual or ethnic identity, nor even about “reforming” anything, be it the money-clogged electoral system or the inequitable and wasteful medical system.
In a real socialist society democracy we would all get a chance to make sure there was more butter than guns, for all enough butter and bread, and — as the women of Lawrence, Massachusetts, sang nearly a century ago — roses, too.
Thursday, June 24, 2010
Bravo, President Obama!
Watching President Obama speak in the Rose Garden yesterday, I was transfixed by the way he finally grasped the staff of stern, paternal, take-charge leadership. What he did in response to civilian vs. military bickering had the substance of presidential timber.
Whatever one may think about the military intervention in Afghanistan or the Rolling Stone piece (click here) about General Stanley McChrystal, no president should allow the public appearance of disunity at the highest levels to persist a moment longer than is practically necessary.
It sends the wrong message to friends, critics, tagalongs and enemies.
Obama knows full well that not everyone agrees with his policy, jot and tittle. As an intelligent man with a sense of humor, he probably even chuckled at some of the juvenile antics of McChrystal and his staff as reported in the magazine — I certainly did.
But, at present, Obama isn't a private citizen with an expansive intellect: he is head of state in a republic that persists in the historical tradition that people in uniform follow the civilian political leadership, do or die.
Everyone needed to know he is willing to bite the bullet and assume the command that we, the people, placed in his able hands.
Among those who needed to see this were voters like me who were disappointed Obama didn't show such mettle to bring about real reform in health and finance.
Obama's alleged friends also needed to see this: from his self-important band of national security staffers in the White House, to the spineless marvels pretending to lead the Democratic Party in Congress, to the men and women in that den of contracting thieves known as the Pentagon.
Include also critics such as such as the Sunday TV talk show second-guessers, the clueless Republicans, the appallingly undereducated tea-partiers and, yes, the self-inflated windbags such as David Brooks and Charles Krauthammer.
Count among the tagalongs the governments of France and Canada, European businesses, bowing Asian "allies" ready to stab in the back anyone who dares expose themselves that way and the leaders of the Israeli client-state who think they can go it alone.
Then there are the enemies, from the obvious ones in the Middle East, such as Al Qaeda and buddies to the enemies of the United States comfortably ensconced within our borders, less obvious but as venomous, such as BP, the oil industry as a whole, the protection racket called the insurance industry and so many others among the few and the corporate.
All take note: President Obama won't take any more childishness.
Still, I would hope Obama can find a quiet place for McChrystal doing the black ops at which he excelled (which match my prescription as explained here).
Also, I do hope that he shows the same mettle in domestic matters where conflict just as deadly as Afghanistan is going on.
Whatever one may think about the military intervention in Afghanistan or the Rolling Stone piece (click here) about General Stanley McChrystal, no president should allow the public appearance of disunity at the highest levels to persist a moment longer than is practically necessary.
It sends the wrong message to friends, critics, tagalongs and enemies.
Obama knows full well that not everyone agrees with his policy, jot and tittle. As an intelligent man with a sense of humor, he probably even chuckled at some of the juvenile antics of McChrystal and his staff as reported in the magazine — I certainly did.
But, at present, Obama isn't a private citizen with an expansive intellect: he is head of state in a republic that persists in the historical tradition that people in uniform follow the civilian political leadership, do or die.
Everyone needed to know he is willing to bite the bullet and assume the command that we, the people, placed in his able hands.
Among those who needed to see this were voters like me who were disappointed Obama didn't show such mettle to bring about real reform in health and finance.
Obama's alleged friends also needed to see this: from his self-important band of national security staffers in the White House, to the spineless marvels pretending to lead the Democratic Party in Congress, to the men and women in that den of contracting thieves known as the Pentagon.
Include also critics such as such as the Sunday TV talk show second-guessers, the clueless Republicans, the appallingly undereducated tea-partiers and, yes, the self-inflated windbags such as David Brooks and Charles Krauthammer.
Count among the tagalongs the governments of France and Canada, European businesses, bowing Asian "allies" ready to stab in the back anyone who dares expose themselves that way and the leaders of the Israeli client-state who think they can go it alone.
Then there are the enemies, from the obvious ones in the Middle East, such as Al Qaeda and buddies to the enemies of the United States comfortably ensconced within our borders, less obvious but as venomous, such as BP, the oil industry as a whole, the protection racket called the insurance industry and so many others among the few and the corporate.
All take note: President Obama won't take any more childishness.
Still, I would hope Obama can find a quiet place for McChrystal doing the black ops at which he excelled (which match my prescription as explained here).
Also, I do hope that he shows the same mettle in domestic matters where conflict just as deadly as Afghanistan is going on.
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