GIVE ME THE WIND, the water, and the touch of someone close. And give me stories. Stories of clear-eyed humans, of paths lined with golden wheat that sways in the sun, trod by brave souls undertaking important journeys.
ON SEPTEMBER ELEVEN, I cannot help but think of violence and tyranny for various reasons. Of course there is the obvious violence that tore apart Manhattan in 2001 and infected our reasoning and society with febrile veins of fear. But then, there are other tyrannies that found the date of September 11 a comfortable roost.
I CARRY THE HARD DARK WEIGHT of that day with me still. But it does not poison me, as the air of NYC did, sending me retching down the street with lungs seizing to expel the tainted air. Nor does it rest, or will it settle into muck, or septic sediment within my soul. That blast of toxin and heat has, instead, lit me on fire and blooms within like a tree of lightning.
WHAT USGOV is now doing to México by way of NAFTA and the overwhelming of México’s market by US-subsidized Agribusiness it does directly in other nations through coups and forced legislation. The Empire, in yet another shape, sprawls and burps and bleeds and chews up humans as it moves into its final phases.
A PROBLEM IN TODAY’S DIALOGUE is a blatant abuse of pronouns. WE don’t use them as WE should. Words as cloaks, words as shields, words as masks—Television language on full blast from the mouths of well-paid shillers, in-absentia killers, supergroomed elitists faker pill-popper death makers.
WE CAN NO LONGER IGNORE the war crimes that trail our national steps like a raging family of ghosts. Either we refute and condemn these horrific deeds through actions that bring justice, or we are become them.
IN A WORLD FAR AWAY and to the East, robot ships hover and fly over clusters of homes targeting the residents for a violent death. They lock in their coordinates and fire rockets down on Foreign Militants as well as innocents. An exodus of one million people flees from these alien robot killers and the attacking armies of Pakistan.
SOMETIMES I FIND IT DIFFICULT to advocate at length for things that seem common sense. I don’t know what to say to convince people that everyone should have air, or water, or love, or freedom of movement or a chance to give back to that which has nurtured them. I am never quite sure how to meet those who would oppose these things, either.
THE WAR ON DRUGS HAS RETURNED even though under increased militarization, drug production actually goes up, as does the body count, while the seizure of drugs decreases. All the facts in hand show, inarguably, that the Drug War model is a failed method of dealing with immigration—even though President Obama seems intent to resurrect it.
THIS WEEK, two comprehensive reports on the health of immigrant detainees were released by Human Rights Watch and the Florida Immigrant Advocacy Center. let there be no doubt that in the custody of ICE, immigrants are, literally, “dying for decent care.”
THE WORLD IS ALIGHT (and Twitter, too) with talk of Martin Luther King, Jr., and the inauguration of Barack Hussein Obama, and it has all caught me a bit off rhythm. Not that I don’t think it’s fantastic and exciting, of course it is. History is clearly being etched across our slate, and it’s amazing. Yet—
FOR EPISODE THREE of the XOLAGRAFIK Diaries (my new vlog series) I am putting out a call for your webcam/video (or audio) submissions/additions/contributions.
HOWARD ZINN: With an occupying army waging war in Iraq and Afghanistan, the military bases and corporate bullying in every part of the world, there is hardly a question anymore of the existence of an American Empire. Indeed, the once-fervent denials have turned into a boastful, unashamed, embrace of the idea…
THANKSGIVING is probably the most popular and earliest-given justification for invasion, murder, imperialism, occupation, and “othering” that we know of in this country. Even now in Iraq we hear fables fashioned on the same colonizer’s framework and it sickens. But Thanksgiving is Iraq, with its steaming platter of corpses. Iraq is Thanksgiving.
¡VIERNES! And we usher Friday in with a Psychedelic Palate Cleanser. No peyote needed! Continuing a recent tradition here at UMX, I offer you a double-feature YouTube in a mestizolicious manner of recognizing the duality that is (at least in my experience) at the core of human existence and perception.
House of Nezua
the XOLAGRAFIK theater!
