If there was ever any doubt in anyone’s mind that the U.S. has been an obstacle to peace, it’s certainly gone now. It’s kind of appalling to watch the world grope for a way to accommodate George Bush’s and Ehud Olmert’s 
preconditions for a cease fire in Lebanon. As foreign ministers and diplomats haggle at the U.N., people continue to die in the Levant. Israel attacked a hospital in southern Lebanon, capturing what it described as Hezbollah fighters but what a Hezbollah parliamentarian said were civilians, several of whom were in their 50s. The Hezbollah guy challenged Israel to show the people they captured, but quite frankly, the same demand might be made regarding any of the thousands of detainees Israel holds without charge. Now the IDF is pursuing a push up to the Litani, strafing little fishing boats south of Beiruit, while Hezbollah is promising to respond by targeting Tel Aviv.
This would be a real good time for everyone to stop the hostilities, don’t you agree? Well… even if you do, George Bush doesn’t and neither does the Israeli government, not just yet. Their determination to attain political objectives through wanton violence differs from the tactics of Bin Laden only in scale – Dubya’s attack on Iraq dwarfs the 9/11 death toll by an enormous factor, and Olmert’s war against Lebanese society has the potential to do the same. The Bush administration’s craven insistence that this is somehow going to lead to a better Middle East underscores the contention that this is a deliberate escalation of hostilities and yet another war of choice in that troubled region. Now Dubya’s off for a ten-day break at his ersatz ranch in Crawford, Texas, there to hack away at scrub with various power tools as a small army of secret service men try to look like ranch hands and talk into their cufflinks. I suppose if he’s going to sit on his hands, he might as well do it there. (How like Nero’s fiddle is Bush’s chain saw – scratching away tunelessly as the empire burns.)
Even as the middle east is drenched in blood (Iraq, of course , continuing its slide toward the total anarchy Bush terms “freedom”), there was also time enough to crow about Fidel Castro’s health problems, as the key Bush constituency of Cuban exiles celebrated in Miami and major news outlets pondered what Washington’s “options” might be. My hometown newspaper ran an interesting little chart that compared various socio-economic statistics in Cuba and the U.S. – a comparison in which Cuba fared quite well, actually. Pretty remarkable when you consider the difference in available resources and the fact that Cuba has been under embargo for decades. Far more instructive would be a similar comparison between Cuba and, say, Guatemala or Honduras, since that is the model that America’s political culture would like to see Cuba adopt, post-Castro. Troubled as Cuba’s living standard is, it’s not anywhere near as miserable as that of its neighbors, whose economies are totally supine to U.S. economic power. Even so, the press opines how Cuba is a “nation ripe for economic change” and how its “enormous pent-up consumer demand” and 97 percent literacy rate make “Cuba’s workforce… hungry to work and full of potential.”
Perhaps someone should ask the Cubans in Cuba whether or not they want the Guatemalan model for economic misery. While they’re at it, they should ask the Iraqis, as well.
Oh, Crikey! I had no idea you were standing right behind me (virtually speaking, of course). And here I am right in the middle of blowing a fairly salty spaceman joke. Stand-up is not my long suit. (Actually, I don’t have a long suit. Kept tripping over the excess pant-legs, quite frankly, so I cuffed the bastards.) Actually, that last aside is kind of how this joke is supposed to go, so now I’ve really blown it. No matter. I’d really much rather talk to you than this impromptu crowd of acolytes that has materialized around me. And when I say “materialized,” that is precisely what I mean. Here on the planet Omicron Rigbox, the natives move by molecular dissolution and refabrication, so they’re always appearing and disappearing at unpredictable intervals. Damned unnerving, if you ask me.
Andromedans kept requesting David Bowie’s “Ashes to Ashes”, and we did a kind of cobbed together version of the song just to shut them up. Before we got to the end of the number, old captain fishbowl had gotten hold of one of the Andromedans and was attempting to choke the fucker to death. (In vain, luckily, since Andromedans have three necks. Though, strangely, only two heads.) Punches were thrown. Mayhem ensued. When bottles started landing on stage, we took our leave. 
Not a quality experience, you’ll readily admit. I, for one, had thought we’d moved beyond this sphere of performance venue long ago. Sadly, posi-Lincoln has proven a bit of a disappointment as a tour promoter/booking agent. (He’s beginning to make the man-sized tuber’s cracker cousin look competent by comparison.) The guy is just too ready to say yes when an offer comes his way. He’s got issues, frankly… and I’ve neither the time nor the inclination to work through them with him. (Trevor James Constable is taking a crack at it as we speak, applying some kind of Reichian device I cannot even begin to understand. It reminds me of that glass booth people climb into at a casino where they try to grab $20 bills that are being blown around them by a fan. Disgusting. 
of firepower both in Lebanon and in Gaza. One would think that this might constitute a breach of the Arms Export Control Act since both civilians and non-military infrastructure are being targeted, but honestly… what law is there in times such as these?
directed against Hezbollah alone. The fact is, the broad nature of this military campaign is itself an implicit recognition of the fact that Hezbollah is a deeply integrated part of Lebanon’s Shi’ia community and its political/social landscape. No amount of U.S.-supplied munitions will make Hezbollah go away. Israel is simply laying the groundwork for a more virulently anti-Israeli sentiment in Lebanon and elsewhere in the region. This, too, resembles U.S. policy in Iraq. Just like the people of these stricken countries, we will be living with the consequences of these wars of choice for decades to come. It is likely that future jihadists will make no distinction between those who execute our military policies and the quiescent millions back home who blandly allow the killing to continue.