born into this mess
Monday, September 19, 2005
  Poem for Monday, September 19, 2005
Tears




by Allen Ginsberg


I’m crying all the time now.
I cried all over the street when I left the Seattle Wobbly Hall.
I cried listening to Bach.
I cried looking at the happy flowers in my backyard,
I cried at the sadness of the middle-aged trees.



Happiness exists I feel it.


I cried for my soul, I cried for the world’s soul.
The world has a beautiful soul.
God appearing to be seen and cried over. Overflowing
heart of Patterson.
 
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Wednesday, September 14, 2005
  how does it make you feel?
A Letter to All Who Voted for George W. Bush from Michael Moore

To All My Fellow Americans Who Voted for George W. Bush:

On this, the fourth anniversary of 9/11, I'm just curious, how does it feel?

How does it feel to know that the man you elected to lead us after we were attacked went ahead and put a guy in charge of FEMA whose main qualification was that he ran horse shows?

That's right. Horse shows.

I really want to know -- and I ask you this in all sincerity and with all due respect -- how do you feel about the utter contempt Mr. Bush has shown for your safety? C'mon, give me just a moment of honesty. Don't start ranting on about how this disaster in New Orleans was the fault of one of the poorest cities in America. Put aside your hatred of Democrats and liberals and anyone with the last name of Clinton. Just look me in the eye and tell me our President did the right thing after 9/11 by naming a horse show runner as the top man to protect us in case of an emergency or catastrophe.

I want you to put aside your self-affixed label of Republican/conservative/born-again/capitalist/ditto-head/right-winger and just talk to me as an American, on the common ground we both call America.

Are we safer now than before 9/11? When you learn that behind the horse show runner, the ..2 and ..3 men in charge of emergency preparedness have zero experience in emergency preparedness, do you think we are safer?

When you look at Michael Chertoff, the head of Homeland Security, a man with little experience in national security, do you feel secure?

When men who never served in the military and have never seen young men die in battle send our young people off to war, do you think they know how to conduct a war? Do they know what it means to have your legs blown off for a threat that was never there?

Do you really believe that turning over important government services to private corporations has resulted in better services for the people?

Why do you hate our federal government so much? You have voted for politicians for the past 25 years whose main goal has been to de-fund the federal government. Do you think that cutting federal programs like FEMA and the Army Corps of Engineers has been good or bad for America? GOOD OR BAD?

With the nation's debt at an all-time high, do you think tax cuts for the rich are still a good idea? Will you give yours back so hundreds of thousands of homeless in New Orleans can have a home?

Do you believe in Jesus? Really? Didn't he say that we would be judged by how we treat the least among us? Hurricane Katrina came in and blew off the facade that we were a nation with liberty and justice for all. The wind howled and the water rose and what was revealed was that the poor in America shall be left to suffer and die while the President of the United States fiddles and tells them to eat cake.

That's not a joke. The day the hurricane hit and the levees broke, Mr. Bush, John McCain and their rich pals were stuffing themselves with cake. A full day after the levees broke (the same levees whose repair funding he had cut), Mr. Bush was playing a guitar some country singer gave him. All this while New Orleans sank under water.

It would take ANOTHER day before the President would do a flyover in his jumbo jet, peeking out the widow at the misery 2500 feet below him as he flew back to his second home in DC. It would then be TWO MORE DAYS before a trickle of federal aid and troops would arrive. This was no seven minutes in a sitting trance while children read "My Pet Goat" to him. This was FOUR DAYS of doing nothing other than saying "Brownie (FEMA director Michael Brown), you're doing a heck of a job!"

My Republican friends, does it bother you that we are the laughing stock of the world?

And on this sacred day of remembrance, do you think we honor or shame those who died on 9/11/01? If we learned nothing and find ourselves today every bit as vulnerable and unprepared as we were on that bright sunny morning, then did the 3,000 die in vain?

Our vulnerability is not just about dealing with terrorists or natural disasters. We are vulnerable and unsafe because we allow one in eight Americans to live in horrible poverty. We accept an education system where one in six children never graduate and most of those who do can't string a coherent sentence together. The middle class can't pay the mortgage or the hospital bills and 45 million have no health coverage whatsoever.

Are we safe? Do you really feel safe? You can only move so far out and build so many gated communities before the fruit of what you've sown will be crashing through your walls and demanding retribution. Do you really want to wait until that happens? Or is it your hope that if they are left alone long enough to soil themselves and shoot themselves and drown in the filth that fills the street that maybe the problem will somehow go away?

I know you know better. You gave the country and the world a man who wasn't up for the job and all he does is hire people who aren't up for the job. You did this to us, to the world, to the people of New Orleans. Please fix it. Bush is yours. And you know, for our peace and safety and security, this has to be fixed. What do you propose?

I have an idea, and it isn't a horse show.

Yours,
Michael Moore
 
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of you folks up in this mess

I'll lean on you sometimes.
Just to see if you're still there
These feet can't take the weight of one,
much less two, so we hit concrete.

How were we born into this mess?

Jawbreaker, "Kiss the Bottle"

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why I am ashamed of my government

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clearance bin: bent robots
margaret cho fucking rawks
exploding dog
neil gaiman
indy media: you see it, you write it, we read it
in your face
memphis scene
michael moore
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que sera sera
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saturna: moms can be DJs too
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this imploding heart
where we're bound
white ninja comics
wil wheaton
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ryan adams
cory branan
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dixie dirt
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the faint
the glass
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jawbreaker
damien jurado
lucero
will oldham
bruce springsteen
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sigur ros
songs: ohia
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of love and other demons gabriel garcia marquez
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a true story based on lies jennifer clement
frida barbara mujica
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the amazing adventures of kavalier and clay michael chabon
taft ann patchett
drop city t c boyle
song of solomon toni morrison
strong motion jonathan franzen
a house for mr biswas v s naipaul
the last samurai helen dewitt
retrato en sepia isabel allende
the sun also rises ernest hemingway. ernest goddamn hemingway
de todo lo visible y lo invisible lucia etxebarria
bastard out of carolina dorothy allison
light can be both wave and particle ellen gilchrist
the last report on the miracles at little no horse louise erdrich
the onion girl charles delint
oblivion david foster wallace
underworld don delillo
for hearing people only:answers to the most commonly asked questions about the deaf community matthew moore
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the feast of love charles baxter
an unquiet mind kay jamison
the adventures of huckleberry finn
the adventures of tom sawyer mark twain
middlesex jeffrey eugenides
interpreter of maladies jhumpa lahiri
american psycho bret easton ellis
how to be good nick hornby
as i lay dying william faulkner
the book of joe jonathan tropper
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tiny giants nate powell
how to be alone jonathan franzen
diablo guardián xavier velasco
white teeth zadie smith
candy mian mian
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raise high the roof beam, carpenters & seymour: an introduction j d salinger
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amnesia moon jonathan lethem
motherless brooklyn jonathan lethem
a plague of dreamers steve stern
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lies and the lying liars who tell them al franken
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Travesti: sex, gender and culture among Brazilian transgendered prostitutes
Don Kulick

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black lodge video
burke's books
decleyre housing coooperative
hi tone cafe
live from memphis
digital media co-op
memphis flyer
metal museum
midtown food co-op
miz ellen's soul food
p & h cafe
stella


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