Story: Mondays
The sun was shining when Jack drove to work. Thirty half-conscious minutes of traffic and, coffee in hand, he'd make his way to the main building of the facility where all employees were required to enter through security. It was a stupid system that really offered only modest security - anyone really threatening could circumvent the system quite easily. He never quite understood how a rent-a-cop who earned nine or ten dollars-per-hour could be expected to risk his or her life to protect anything.
He chuckled to himself as he walked up to the building, taking note of the fact that there were no people around. He had a strange sensation that raised the hairs on the back of his neck. ‘This place is normally crawling with people at this time in the morning,’ he thought. He recalled a few days ago when it took him nearly thirty minutes to make it through security with all the people waiting. They had even gone so far as to make him empty his coffee cup before entering that time, as “the metal cup could be hiding something dangerous.” He had really laughed at the suggestion, but internally seethed at the ridiculous abuse of power by the security guard. ‘I guess you have to do something to justify your existence,’ he thought, ‘even if it’s making a ridiculous show of your less than apparent value.’
Jack approached the security desk with the baggage screening machine and noticed the guard was slumped over the desk; he appeared to be sleeping. Jack spoke to him loudly, “hey, this can’t be that boring of a job.” The guard did not respond or move. Jack reached over and tapped him on the shoulder – still no response. Jack gave him a shove and the guard fell off his share. He walked around to the other side of the desk and checked his vital signs only to discover that the guard was dead. There was no blood or anything, but this was far from a normal occurrence. Somewhat alarmed, Jack entered the building to phone the authorities.
Upon entering the building he noticed that other people throughout the building were slumped over their desks as well. The air in the building did not appear to be foul – a bit stale, but not foul – so Jack slowly made his way through the building. ‘If it’s a biological weapon or something, would it have worked this fast?’ he thought. ‘More importantly, who would attack a small bank processing facility?’ It all seemed very strange. He continued walking around noticing smartly dressed people slumped over or sprawled out on the floor.
‘Can this really be happening?’ he thought. He pinched himself really hard and the pain in his forearm was enough to tell him ‘no, you’re not dreaming!’
He continued walking through the building to the sound of machinery humming and the absence of any human sounds. He shouted, “Is anybody there?” There was no response.
He slowly made his way to his supervisor’s desk. Mr. Snowdon was a large man, and reminded Jack of Jaba-the-Hut from the Star Wars Trilogy. He had a way of rolling around the office in his desk chair, rather than getting up; a habit that destroyed several chairs and caused much humor throughout the building. A loud and belligerent man, Jack had found the easiest way of dealing with him was in being up front about everything. He looked at Snowdon who was now slumped back in his chair like a dead animal. Jack leaned over his desk and said “I’m going home, I’m not feeling well.”
With that Jack slowly walked out of the building and got back in his car. He drove the short distance back to his home – taking note of all the other vehicles on the road, and the people taking care of their business – and climbed back into bed and slept.

OpEd: The problem with leadership today.

Listening to NPR the other day I was struck by a report I heard regarding the sign “Mission Accomplished” that was made to hang on the deck of the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln when President Bush made his carrier landing one-hour out of San Diego. The fact that the sign hung as a backdrop meant little or nothing to me, but the blame game that followed disgusted, and disgusts me. Apparently this sign was attributed to military personnel on the carrier in their zeal to celebrate the U.S. victory in Iraq. After confirming that the sign was, in fact, not made or posted by any military personnel but by a White House advance PR team, President Bush attributed it to an overzealous White House staffer. Upon further questioning, the White House went on to attribute the “idea” to military personnel.

It seems to me that this type of behavior is symptomatic of society today. Rather than own up to their mistakes – and make efforts to correct them – this White House has taken to attributing any and all errors to other people or agencies and doing little, if anything, to correct their blatant, bordering on illegal, actions. ‘It wasn’t the White House that mislead the American public about Iraqi threats prior to the war, it was the CIA.’

This countries leadership, at once claiming the need for moral and ethical behavior from the populous, has shown an extremely poor if not dismal example – from Dennis Kozlowski and Bernard Ebbers, to Martha Stewart and Sam Waksal, to Jack Welch and Nick Grasso – of serving the public interest beyond the contrived PR photo op.

Morality and ethics are not merit badges you pin on your chest as you strive to make the proverbial eagle scout of life. There is a situation referred to by sociologists called “the tragedy of the commons,” in which too many free-riders [non-contributors] have a way of ruining societal good, or in our case the good of society, for everyone. While one may argue that the above leaders are contributing to the economy. This argument is deeply flawed as they also degrade the society that supports that economy. Once the populous accepts the axiom that “you have to look out for yourself,” then the common bonds and freedoms that make this country great are truly lost. If one has to pay for civility then no one benefits, least of all the wealthy that will have to pay an ever larger burden, while the society-at-large simply suffer.

This country needs real men, and women, building a society that everyone can live in; not simpering sycophants – smiling impassively in front of the cameras while lying, cheating, and, or stealing – claiming “morality and common good.”

OpEd: “The liberal media”
I’m aghast at the media coverage of the Kobe Bryant rape trial. It used to be that the alleged victim’s identity was protected. Today, not only is the alleged victim’s identity not protected [she was recently named in a tabloid newspaper], but the case is being judged in the media as well. A recent Reuters news release quoted Bryant’s defense team “claimed that the woman may have had sex with two other men before and after her encounter with Bryant.”
I may not be an attorney, or even a judge, but I can definitely say I’m more than irritated that this statement was in a Reuters news release. It is not news! The victim’s sexual history has no bearing on whether or not she was raped.
While we often hear about “the liberal media,” it is very seldom that we have a definition of the term “liberal” – given or provided in a generous and openhanded way; lacking moral restraint; associated with ideals of individualism especially economic freedom, greater individual participation in government, and constitutional, political, and administrative reforms designed to secure these objectives [Merriam-Webster]. What this tells us, is that the true definition is ambiguous at best.
What we see going on in the press today is far from “liberalism,” but more akin to extremism. Let us not leave the case to a judge and jury to decide, but play it out in the media by demonizing the victim and championing the sports figure the better to sell newspapers and magazines.
If the media has ever been liberal, it is so in the economic sense – that it freely reports and manipulates popular culture in whatever fashion best serves its economic interests. In the current age, media companies are the worlds largest conglomerates and profit enormously by pushing whatever agenda improves their annual financial statements, truth or justice be damned.

OpEd: Eyes wide shut
The definition has never been clearer to me than after having read a recent article on the agricultural trade gaps of the developing world. We go forward, we go back. With one hand the western world pledges assistance to the developing world [$50 billion], and with the other they offer subsidies to their own agricultural producers [$320 billion] artificially reducing production costs and effectively marginalizing or eliminating competition.
This marginalizing or elimination of competition has two costs – primarily it costs the consumer more to buy products in a market where a monopoly is held, and secondly it forces the competition, usually foreign peasant farmers, to essentially work for nothing.
While the American public may ask, “what does this have to do with me?” A solid case can be made linking increasing security concerns [i.e. terrorism] with the growing dissatisfaction with the western world’s economic policies. Essentially, millions of people kept impoverished through deliberate manipulation of the world economy by the west are reaching a breaking point.
Critics may assert the importance of maintaining our own economy and the need to support our own producers, but this argument rings somewhat hollow when faced with mega-corporations, corporate crime, obscene wealth, overindulgence, and obesity – all paint a vivid picture of irresponsibility in the extreme.
What is desperately needed is dissemination of information the consumer can actually use. Mr. or Mrs. Consumer deserves to know that their government is blocking trade with other countries so they can pay higher product costs and support government cronies in big business. Is this likely to happen? The western world continues to increase telephone density, add television transmission [200+ channels], increase bandwidth on the Internet, and expand pulp media to niche markets – and yet we remain in the dark regarding issues of paramount concern. Eyes wide shut!

OpEd: The music debate...
Mike is a 12 yr. old middle school student who excels in math, plays baseball and videogames with friends, and is currently being charged criminally [currently a misdemeanor] for exchanging music through a peer-to-peer file sharing program. If his story sounds a bit ridiculous, you might want to pay closer attention. His story is not uncommon – it might even sound familiar to those of us who used to make audio cassette recordings of our favorite musicians.
In a chat room on AOL our unfortunate youth made a friend – the modern day equivalent of a Pen pal – who happens to live in Switzerland. His friend turned him on to a German band called Ramstein, whose music he was assured to enjoy. Not a “thief” by nature, our youth went to his local music store to buy the cd and was informed that since the music was an import he would have to pay 30% more money and wait 4-6 weeks. Irritated, Mike accepted the situation. One week after his order, Mike received a call from the music store telling him that the cd was backordered and would now take 6-8 weeks for delivery. Aghast, Mike cancelled the order, went online and downloaded 70% of the cd within one hour. He is currently facing charges under the Copyright law for file sharing of copyrighted music.
While the Recording Industry Association of America [RIAA] would like to make their case for tougher Copyright laws about the artists getting paid for their music, that argument rings hollow when one considers how much the artists actually get paid – if the music sells less than half-a-million copies [$17.99 x 500,000 = 8,995,000.00] the artist does not even break even – in comparison the new head of the RIAA recently signed a contract for a one million dollar-a-year salary.
If you feel like you’ve missed something, you have. The RIAA's [and other similar industry bodies] reactions are frenzied and outlandish because they can see the beginning of their end. Historically the relationship between musicians and the music publishers was a mutual dependency. The artists were needed to create the music, the publishers to distribute and market it. Both were necessary to move enough “product” to make the process profitable. The advent of the net, CD burners, MP3's etc. is that the publisher is no longer necessary to distribute the music.
Half the RIAA justification for being in the loop has effectively disappeared. Considering that they take the lion’s share of the sale price of a CD to cover costs and profits, there is plenty of incentive for artists and music lovers to come up with an alternative solution to the marketing of music. If such a solution occurs the RIAA's last justification for being in the loop disappears. When that happens, even given their size and control over the market, their disappearance is a foregone conclusion.
Not surprisingly the industry is using everything they can lay their hands on to scare the average consumer away from it. Everything except offering the consumer what he wants: immediately available music at a reasonable price. Unfortunately, like the old world monopolist organizations that they are (e.g. the beast) their chief weapon is government intervention because they no longer have anything substantial to offer. Imagine what would happen to any other industry where the producers threatened their consumers?
The copyright thing is a smokescreen, piracy is a negligible threat. They're fighting to maintain control, and for their survival.

Excerpt from Complexity by M. Mitchell Waldrop

Indeed, said Langton, by taking this bottom-up idea to its logical conclusion, you could see it as a new and thoroughly scientific version of vitalism: the ancient idea that life involves some kind of energy, or force, or spirit that transcends mere matter. The fact is that life does transcend mere matter, he said - not because living systems are animated by some vital essence operating outside the laws of physics and chemistry, but because a population of simple things following simple rules of interaction can behave in eternally surprising ways. Life may indeed be a kind of biochemical machine, he said. But to animate such a machine "is not to bring life to a machine; rather, it is to organize a population of machines in such a way that their interacting dynamics are 'alive.'

OpEd: Words...
A recent televised press briefing found Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of Defense, debating the meaning of the word “quagmire” with a CNN correspondent, who posed a question referencing the word in relation to our current situation in Iraq.

Instead of answering the question – yes or no – the Secretary of Defense sought to extoll his professorial knowledge in a ridiculous debate over the generally accepted meaning of the word. Ultimately the definition was conceded to the correspondent, after a dictionary was produced, and answered by the Secretary with a flat one-word answer, no.

This example is indicative of a misguided style that seems to permeate this administration, from Jr. at the top all the way down. The “I know better than you” style, while entertaining, is often a symptom of a deeper ill, that of one inclined to believe their own hype. At times laypersons may argue the merits of the perception vs. reality debate – is perception reality? – but this argument does not necessarily translate into votes. Let’s understand the situation: money garnered for electoral campaigns, opinion polls, and lack of opposition – all do not indicate a strong position.

If the 2000 Presidential election is any indication, it should be plainly clear to everyone that money spent on elections does not translate into votes. Based on the FEC website of money collected as of July of 2000, Jr. raised three times more money than Gore and did not win the popular vote. I will not get into the chaos of the Florida system, but suffice to say that if the supreme court had not voted to disenfranchise voters the current administration would be different.

The administration being what it is – and following its present course – one would get the idea that the American public supports it judging by the most recent Gallup poll following the State of the Nation, where the President received a 61% approval rating. While a sample of American households may be used for such a survey, the survey does not necessarily imply that said sample is representative of American households. According to the latest news on unemployment [its highest level in nine years], and other news stories of segments of the job market that no longer qualify for unemployment benefits and have discontinued their search for work [thus no longer counted in the unemployment numbers], one might get the idea that the “approval rating” from the “representative sample” in the Gallup poll is not necessarily representative.

More than representative samples, a distinct lack of voter initiative should be most telling of political power. When people have no choice of whom they support, the process has surely weakened. Judging by the opposition, namely the democrats, and their failure to define a position on many political iniciatives it becomes apparent that the biggest casualty of the current situation is real political choice. This lack of political alternatives could very easily translate into the appearance of political support.

The administration fails to take note of their real position of riding high on a wave of silence. Lack of political debate does not imply popular support. Donald Rumsfeld’s comments suggest a swagger that his fellow administrators don’t necessarily merit, and further indicate a gaping opportunity for a politician to offer the choice so desperately desired by a majority of voters.

Today's Quandry:
Listening to NPR this morning I can't help but feel like a foreigner to this world. What's going on?
I was listening to a review of the new Charlie's Angels movie, and then a commentary about a new play about politics.
In reference to the Charlie's Angels movie, the critic was talking about how over-the-top the picture was. It had very little content, but not for all the talent that went into it. The critic was bemoaning the fact that it was a picture that just tried too hard with stunts, camera angles, technical wizardry, etc. - but lacked the real content of a story or a plot. The movie sought to celebrate feminine empowerment, but tried to do so as if it could be accomplished through a music video. There was no unity of any kind, just three individuals with three stories that happened to be told in the form of a movie with the same title.
The story of the play on politics had to do with the marketing and sales of politicians, and how incestuous the whole thing has become. One side is trying to anticipate the moves of the other side, whom they know, while trying to direct a candidate who doesn't necessarily believe the hype that they are trying to sell.
Seems like there is so very little true creativity in the world. It used to be about novelty - trying something not done before, now it's all about technical perfection divorced from humanism.
Can't help feeling like I'm trapped on rewind - with each play things just get more and more intense, technically perfect, and yet stale at the same time.

Op-Ed: Business as usual, not!
It would appear that the battle of PR has started in the dispute of Unix vs. Linux computer software. [Re: I.B.M.'s Opponent in Suit Criticizes Linux Advocate, NY Times, June 18] The central premise of this dispute is intellectual property rights, and at the heart of this particular article is a statement by Linus Torvald, the original developer of Linux, who states "I do not look up any patents on principle because (a) it's a horrible waste of time and (b) I don't want to know." The background of this statement, which is not included in the article, is the very important 1992-93 lawsuit between Unix System Laboratories and Novell vs. the University of California at Berkeley [UCB] over this very same issue. According to opensource.org, the court ruling in that case, which established the basis of Mr. Torvald’s response, was that there was so very little of the original Unix code in the version disseminated by UCB that the case was untenable.

What is more important to the present argument however, is a much older encounter, that of the old guard business model of closed door development and licensed ownership versus the new model of nonproprietary ownership and cooperative innovation. The battle being waged is not merely about the intellectual property rights brazenly asserted by SCO – the current owner of the original Novell version – in it’s suit against I.B.M., but the future of software innovation, and computer technology as a whole.

The old guard business model, pioneered at the beginning of the past century, primarily consisted of individuals or corporations independently funding and developing competing products for commercial use. At the heart of this schema is a winner take all mentality, wherein one seeks to dominate the market and dictate product standards. While this schema may have served itself well during the industrial age, it is anathema to the information age, where standards must be agreed upon by multiple developers to establish baseline uniformity as a standard from which to innovate from. The suit launched by SCO would have us return to the old days where development is limited and innovation is stifled; where tech companies are forced to compete against one another and use differing computer standards, to the detriment of consumers. The avante guard, on the other hand, has taken the requirements of the information age to heart, witness stodgy, old I.B.M.’s conversion to the growing cooperative model. The benefits of cooperation are such that all “tech” companies can essentially use the same standard and evolve in a manner that keeps technical innovation away from monopolistic bottlenecks.

This “same standard” means that companies can share in research and development, and individual hardware producers are not beholden to any one software developer, ultimately resulting in cheaper and more reliable products for the consumer. The old guard model, on the other hand, would merely concentrate chaotic power – through constantly shifting technology standards – in the hands of a few individuals, or corporations. While some may argue that this older model allows easier understanding of near limitless possibility, it is precisely this limiting which threatens our technological future. The ability to mass produce technology requires a dependable, same standard to allow for longer production cycles, which would be shortened to allow for production of multiple, or ever changing, standards if we were to revert to the old guard model.

Ultimately what this case needs is a clear message to those who spill the proverbial “hot coffee” and seek to collect monies for injuries allegedly suffered. The new cooperative model is far too busy solving real technology issues than to deal with questions already settled, vis-à-vis the Berkeley case. The situation of SCO’s failed business model should not open the door for after-the-fact lawsuits.

Exerpt from "Politics and the English Language," George Orwell 1946

In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible. Things like the continuance of British rule in India, the Russian purges and deportations, the dropping of the atom bombs on Japan, can indeed be defended, but only by arguments which are too brutal for most people to face, and which do not square with the professed aims of the political parties. Thus political language has to consist largely of euphemism., question-begging and sheer cloudy vagueness. Defenseless villages are bombarded from the air, the inhabitants driven out into the countryside, the cattle machine-gunned, the huts set on fire with incendiary bullets: this is called pacification. Millions of peasants are robbed of their farms and sent trudging along the roads with no more than they can carry: this is called transfer of population or rectification of frontiers. People are imprisoned for years without trial, or shot in the back of the neck or sent to die of scurvy in Arctic lumber camps: this is called elimination of unreliable elements. Such phraseology is needed if one wants to name things without calling up mental pictures of them. Consider for instance some comfortable English professor defending Russian totalitarianism. He cannot say outright, "I believe in killing off your opponents when you can get good results by doing so." Probably, therefore, he will say something like this:

While freely conceding that the Soviet regime exhibits certain features which the humanitarian may be inclined to deplore, we must, I think, agree that a certain curtailment of the right to political opposition is an unavoidable concomitant of transitional periods, and that the rigors which the Russian people have been called upon to undergo have been amply justified in the sphere of concrete achievement.

Excerpt from Complexity by M. Mitchell Waldrop

Take water, for example. There’s nothing very complicated about a water molecule: it’s just one big oxygen atom with two little hydrogen atoms stuck to it like Mickey Mouse ears. Its behavior is governed by well-understood equations of atomic physics. But now put a few zillion of those molecules together in the same pot. Suddenly you’ve got a substance that shimmers and gurgles and sloshes. Those zillions of molecules have collectively acquired a property, liquidity, that none of them possesses alone. In fact, unless you know precisely where and how to look for it, there’s nothing in those well-understood equations of atomic physics that even hints at such a property. The liquidity is “emergent.”
In much the same way, says Anderson, emergent properties often produce emergent behaviors. Cool these liquid water molecules down a bit, for example, and at 32 degrees fahrenheit they will suddenly quit tumbling over one another at random. Instead they will undergo a “phase transition,” locking themselves into the orderly crystalline array known as ice. Or if you were to go the other direction and heat the liquid, those same tumbling water molecules will suddenly fly apart and undergo a phase transition into water vapor. Neither phase transition would have any meaning for one molecule alone.
And so it goes, says Anderson. Weather is an emergent property: take your water vapor out over the Gulf of Mexico and let it interact with sunlight and wind, and it can organize itself into an element structure known as a hurricane. Life is an emergent property, the product of DNA molecules and protein molecules and myriad other kinds of molecules, all obeying the laws of chemistry. The mind is an emergent property, the product of several billion neurons obeying the biological laws of the living cell. In fact, as Anderson pointed out in the 1972 paper, you can think of the universe as forming a kind of hierarchy: “at each level of complexity, entirely new properties appear. [And] at each stage, entirely new laws, concepts, and generalizations are necessary, requiring inspiration and creativity to just as great a degree as in the previous one. Psychology is not applied biology, nor is biology applied chemistry.”

Op-Ed: We could at least be honest about Iraq.

What might historians say about the “preemptive measures” in Iraq fifty or one hundred years from now? While the public relations campaigns for tyranny and WMD were certainly powerful they fall short of the real story. The real story is twofold: quashing the roots of terrorism and addressing the looming energy crisis. Taken together these issues underlie the real reason for “regime change” in Iraq.
Global terrorism, at least the likes of which we saw on Sep. 11th, stems from differences in religious as well as political views. In the U.S. the two are separate, whereas in the Middle East they are one. It is a mistake to assume that Muslims hate American’s for some religious or spiritual reason. The reality is that the people are banded together in groups, or tribes, of “the faithful” to support whatever political cause. The larger issue is that the U.S. is the biggest world power involved in the Middle East and by attacking the U.S. these terrorists gather support for their cause while potentially destabilizing ongoing political relationships.
It is important to note that a large number of these particular terrorists, and their financial sponsors, originated in Saudi Arabia, our “ally” in the Middle East. Wahabism, one of the most extreme sects of Islam that allied with the Saudi monarchy in the 20th century, dominates much of the socio-cultural values within the Saudi kingdom. This unstable alliance enabled the union of the territory of Arabia by the house of Sa’ud but also limits political, as well as religious, dissention within the realm. Unfortunate for the U.S. is the fact that twenty-five percent of the world’s oil reserves are within that realm and any efforts to pressure the Saudi political structure towards reform are likely met with tension over oil production.
As we are currently dependent on oil as our largest source of fuel for production of electricity and transportation, our relationship with the Saudis, despite their unwitting support of terrorism, is a necessary evil given the inconsistency of other sources. What the recent California energy crisis made apparent to federal officials is the necessity for conservation or new sources of generation and production. Outlined by the president was the need for rapid expansion of the energy grid – from exploration to production to generation, clearly the latter.
Given the enormous capacity of the Iraqi reserves, it should not surprise anyone that we would desire a “regime change.” Had Saddam been quick to comply with UN mandates and provided a consistent source of oil production, any change would have been unnecessary, though not impossible considering the regional political impact. Saddam did not comply, however, and “preemptive attack” was decided upon. By securing U.S. control of Iraqi production through whatever “coalition approved” regime, we have essentially removed Saudi resistance to political pressure, as we are now capable of securing consistent production elsewhere.
While environmentalist might argue, and rightly so, that conservation is undoubtedly a better way to handle the energy crisis, the proverbial cat is already out of the bag. Like it or not, we are a target, and terrorists are already active and supported. If we chose to use our financial strength to fund alternative energy sources, in addition to conservation efforts, we might reduce our dependence on oil, but not our position on the world stage. Our prominence makes us a focus for attack not because of some instinctive hatred, but because rallying “the faithful” around a common cause gains support for extremist agendas.
One might also contend the lack of coalition support from our European allies, for action in the Middle East, should make us reevaluate our position. To this one need only observe the growing differences in worldview. Currently the largest NATO participant, the U.S, surprisingly shoulders the majority of the European defense budget. The smaller European portion of the NATO budget allows them to fund alternative energy sources as well as conservation efforts. As such, our European allies are naturally reluctant to ally themselves with a target, not to mention reaping comparatively small benefits to the U.S, who would, and does, ultimately wield power in the Middle East.
Today, post-regime, we are in a unique position. If we were to remove ourselves from Middle Eastern conflict, we are not simultaneously removed as targets. While energy conservation is obviously a better option for dealing with our looming energy demand, it is not necessarily the most viable option for diminishing our risk of terrorism, not to mention quenching the public’s insatiable appetite for automotive monstrosities. Obviously a fine line must be tread between developing alternative energy sources and providing for our National Security, but at least we could have an open discussion of the real issues.

Regarding a recently published Op-Ed in the SFGate.

Editor – Regarding Adam Sparks’ opinion piece [“Demos: Out of Touch, Or out of their Minds?” May 20th]: This article is deliberately misleading. To begin, the argument for war has, to this day, yet to be substantiated. Do we have clear evidence of WMD? “New World order” notwithstanding, the war on Iraq has not eliminated the terrorism it was supposedly undertaken to achieve; witness the bombings in Saudi Arabia and Morocco. Despite the interesting comments of the emir of Qatar, who recently landed his country a multi-million-dollar military installation, democracy in Iraq or anywhere in the Middle East is a fallacy. Witness Afghanistan, still dependent on U.S. military support, is experiencing a resurgence of the Taliban regime in some parts of the country. Although incorrectly cited, the Senate has confirmed the majority of the President’s judicial nominees. The fact that a handful has not is evidence that the system works, as it should. Top rated nominees does not imply non-partisan. Regarding vouchers, citation of a city dependent on federal funds and politics is hardly a case. Demos aside, if Bush does win fifty-states in the next election it’ll be the lowest voter turnout in history, most disgusted voters choosing to abstain.

James began salivating as he watched the coffee delivery boy arrive with the coffee and donuts. The meeting proceeded as usual but James wasn’t hearing anything once he caught a glimpse of the donuts.
“Obviously we’ll have to revamp the product line,” said Bob.
“Not to mention the marketing promos that are already in production,” groaned Sandra.
James was catatonic. All he could hear was “wonk, wonk, wonk, wonk, wonk.”
Everyone began to make their way to the coffee and donuts and James noticed that there was only ONE jelly donut. As Dan was about to put it on his plate, James sprung into action and leaped over a chair to tackle him. “Oh no you don’t,” he said as he grabbed the donut and started eating it. “To the victor go the spoils of wa...” he said as he spit out the food in his mouth. “This damn thing’s stale,” he said falling into his seat.

“What the fuck are these pansies doing outside MY building,” roared General Forzas looking out the window of his office. “Don’t they know it wasn’t my idea to go to war?” he exclaimed.
“Sir, I believe they think they can influence the government’s intention to wage war,” said his adjutant.
“I know what the fuck they think,” he raged. “But how do you convince them that the army is just a political tool?” “Ours is not to determine policy, but to enforce it,” he huffed feeling a tirade coming on.
His adjutant sat passively.
“You know, sometimes I just don’t get it,” he exclaimed. “Protest all you want, that’s what we fight for,” he said “but don’t protest the military because we don’t determine policy.”
“Sir I believe it’s supposed to send a message to the Capital regarding their political decisions,” said his adjutant matter-of-factly.
“Don’t get me started on those morons,” he exclaimed while pacing the floor. “Those halfwits would just assume the military covered the globe remaking it according to their twisted ideals.”
‘An instrument of foreign policy,’ he thought as he fumed. He thought of all the battles, both public and covert, that he’d waged for business interests in the name of “foreign policy” and he began to feel sick.
“I have to be honest, I’m glad the people are becoming more aware," he said profiling his reflection in the window, "Imagine the day we don't send men to their deaths needlessly,” he said as he exhaled forcefully.

“You mean to say that this has been going on for centuries?” said Ahmed incredulously.

“Well, science and technology have changed considerably, but basically yeah.” replied St. John, his closest aid.

“But how can this be? We are an educated people, yes?” inquired Ahmed scratching his head.

“Education does not presume educated sir,” said St. John.

Ahmed looked out the window of his corner office. The city was magnificent. What a testament to their intellectual capacity – and yet, he had to wonder. In the distance the ocean gleamed an azure blue, and he felt his heart sink as he affirmed in a whisper “right.”

"It rained that day," said Rob as he stared out of his office window.

Upon arriving at work John placed his coffee on the desk and contemplated his day, ‘It’s just more of the same.’ He stared at the mass of technical wizardry on his desk and thought, ‘we’ve evolved a mind capable of creating something like this – liquid crystal displays, gigabytes of data, streaming information – yet how many of us actually produce anything, let alone understand the marvels that make our lives work.’
Frustrated, he banged his head on the desk. Another team-member walked over from the adjoining cubicle and asked cheerfully “is everything ok over here?” “Yeah, everything’s fine,” replied John. “I just dropped some data reports on the desk.”

Matt eased his car onto the freeway. The day finally over, the bumper to bumper traffic was not a welcome sight. He gritted his teeth and shouted, “Mother fuckers!”
Expecting the worst he eased the seat back and turned on his radio to hear the latest news. It was more of the latest talking heads waxing on about politics. Listening to the news he couldn’t help talking to himself. “I must be dreaming.” “Are these guys really that far out of touch?” “Hello? It’s the economy stupid!”
He nodded his head thinking of the program earlier in the day when they were talking about charitable donations and the fact that the least charitable city was Hartford. ‘Fuckin Hartford’ he thought. ‘Could you find a wealthier city?’ ‘President Bush’s targeted tax cuts’ he thought as he rolled his eyes. “By some friggin miracle we’re going to generate economic stimulus by giving money to people who are naturally cheap?” ‘There’s a friggin guy with a clue!’ he thought.
‘I guess people really are that gullible’ he thought as he looked around to all the “safer” sport utility vehicles that crowded the highway. He began to reconsider himself. ‘It really doesn’t matter what the message or the product is because all it really takes is the right sales,’ he thought. “These Mother fuckers are stupid enough to send their children and grandchildren to their deaths to support their right to drive a vehicle that gets less gas mileage then the car they drove twenty years ago” he shouted. He turned the radio off and shook his head laughing to himself at the insanity of it all.

Pt I.
Andy sat on his milk crate smokin a butt listening to the speakers play a muzak version of some 80’s hit. He hated this job. A microphone broke through the noise, “cleanup in aisle five.” Andy smirked knowing they’d come looking for him even though he was on a legitimate break this time. Five minutes went by and sure enough, Matt walked up to him and asked if he was going to respond to the cleanup. Andy grunted, “yeah, I was getting to it,” and muttered under his breath “asshole.”
He grabbed his cleanup cart and headed for the aisle in the nearly empty market. He hated this job. There amidst some marketing specialist’s wet dream was the modern day equivalent of blitzkrieg. One of the spaghetti sauces had fallen off the shelf and detonated on the floor like a 500lb. bomb in a shopping mall. Andy stood there and stared at it for a few minutes quietly amused. There was Ragu everywhere. One of the shards of glass had cut a bag of pasta on the facing aisle and there were pasta shells all over the floor mixed with Thick’n Tasty. Andy cursed himself for having used his last legitimate break. He just wasn’t getting out of this one.
He pulled the broom and dustpan from the cart and walked down the aisle. He was about ten feet down the aisle when he felt as though he were caught in a rubber band that had reached its tension level. As this seemed to be the kind of joke some of the guys would play, he looked around to see who was messing with him. He felt confused to see there was no one around. All at once another jar of sauce leapt off the shelf and hovered in the air in front of him. Andy looked to either side of him to some invisible spectator to confirm that he was seeing what he was seeing. He knew there wasn’t anything hallucinogenic in his cigarette, at least not that he’d put in there. The jar of sauce crashed to the ground and exploded as Andy covered his face to protect him from the glass shards.

It was cold that day. Bob could tell without having set foot outside as his knee often bothered him in the inclement weather. Thinking it better to remain indoors today, he decided to clean out the basement and repair the wall where the movers had broken the plaster. In the basement, amidst the clutter of the room, he began to move boxes away from the wall and readied his materials. ‘This room will make a good office,’ he thought. He approached the wall with his hammer to tap around and find where the beams lay underneath the plaster, so he’d know where to cut his piece of replacement gypsum. He tapped around but didn’t hear the dull thud normally associated with a beam, as he should have heard every 16in. A bit puzzled by this, he decided to just expand the broken plaster and have a look inside. He took the hammer and used it like a poker to jab a bigger hole in the wall, and as he did so he was overcome by a horrendous odor emanating from within. He grabbed his flashlight and shined inside. Behind the cobwebs and dust in a hollowed out section of the basement retaining wall was a body. Bob jumped back and fell over some boxes at seeing the clothed bones covered in dust. He screamed “Holy Shit!” and ran upstairs to call the police.
The department sent the usual battalion of photographers, analysts, and detectives. Along with the police, the local newspapers arrived. Bob was a bit confused about the media being involved, as he hadn’t phoned anyone other than the police. He looked over at the pot-bellied police officer talking to the reporter and smirked to himself, ‘not much glory at the donut shop in this town.’ Meanwhile, the technicians brought the body out of its resting-place in the wall and inventoried everything. Of particular note for Bob was that in the victim’s hand was a gold chain with a word which spelled, “Bitch.” Bob was very confused by this. ‘It seems so unlikely that anyone would willingly wear something like that,’ he said to himself. He had seen people wear all sort of things, but something about this struck him as odd – and he said as much to the police detectives who nodded condescendingly. The detectives and technicians finished their preliminary investigation and sealed the room pending further investigation. They assured Bob that it wouldn’t be more than a couple of weeks, which seemed all right with him.
The rest of the evening – disregarding the day’s events – Bob was distracted. ‘Why would anyone wear a necklace that said “Bitch,”’ he thought. ‘Yeah, ok people wore all sorts of things, and for some people the moniker actually fit, but there was something very strange about this,’ he continued. He began to dwell upon it. He called his friend Michael and inquired as to the strangeness of this happening. Obviously Michael was floored at hearing of a body being found in his house, but he had nothing to say regarding the jewelry.
Days went by and then weeks. The police eventually wrapped up their investigation, which had very little, if anything, to do with the jewelry. Bob, however, was plagued by this inconsistency. He troubled over it endlessly, when late one night as he prepared for bed the answer came to him like a bolt of lightning. He knew the answer. And with that, he brushed his teeth, climbed into bed, and slept soundly

Edward sat at the table enjoying his machiato while Clarice looked over the tourism brochures. The whole situation seemed so surreal to him. The machiato was delicious, but he was annoyed. His large hands had trouble managing the small cups, which seemed little larger than shot glasses. ‘Why can’t they use cups with decent handles?’ He thought to himself. Almost in the same breath he answered, ‘because this ain’t America and not everyone has the same values, let alone the same size hands.’ He smiled. Clarice looked at him wondering what he was thinking. She said, “what’s that smirk about?” He responded, “it’s nothing.” She looked quizzical and then smiled and went back to studying the brochures.
He mused over the scenery, which was really incredible. It reminded him of the California coast in some ways, up near Marin. She did this to him. She brought out that side of him that he enjoyed so much but rarely had time for.
Presently she said, “we should rent scooters and ride down to the beach.” He thought ‘here’s another example.’ He smiled and said, “that would be shporty,” using their intimate language.
As they loaded up the scooters and took off down the coast road he saw the Mediterranean in the distance and felt himself bubbling inside. There she was riding alongside. He was alive.

Diego gazed out the window as the bus rolled passed Eighteenth Street. He hated it when the bus was crowded. He looked down at Eugenia. She looked adorable with her confused morning face, like a child half-awake. His mind rushed back to the time before, when he felt adrift. The bus lurched forward in traffic. Through some sort of miracle they found each other and now he found himself contentedly sharing his life with this anomaly. He couldn’t imagine himself without her. It was as if they were separate halves of the same orange – each piece fragrant and colorful yet incomplete. A passenger squeezed past him towards the rear exit. He wondered if she knew how much he adored her as his focus wandered back. She just continued to stare straight ahead, as if transfixed by some distant point. He laughed to himself as he remembered the first time that he told her that he loved her – she had the same confused expression. He broke from his reverie suddenly and tapped her shoulder. “This is our stop,” he said. She looked up and smiled. They made their way to the rear of the bus and descended together.

It's all about Ho Ho's!

Ok... so the story begins with our dashing hero forgetting his wallet at home and not realizing it till he's at the bank near work, fully 30 min. away. Ok, so he can live without coffee in the morning [barely], but he has to pay for parking. D'oh! 'When are they going to have the stinkin E-Z Pass for the parking lot,' he wonders. 'Now THAT would be useful,' he says to himself.

They say that everyday we are bombarded by thousands of marketing images, which undoubtedly jibes well with our inherent desire for STUFF. I believe it was Buddha who said, "life is desire and suffering." Is it possible to say that we are genetically predisposed to the treadmill of desire? Or, is that a nurture issue? Anyway... more to come...