tumbroglio

assemblage of digital lint
reblogged from are2
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are2:

Maps — Yeah Yeah Yeahs

Definitely in the running for best song of 2009.

Miracles, Wonder, and Armageddon

It’s fun to read something like this fun little fiction the 1990-self talking to the 2010-self to point out how amazing and wonderful today is compared with 20 years ago (also via DF). (It’s not fun to think that 1990 was 20 freaking years ago! Geez. It doesn’t seem possible.) It’s true. We need to appreciate the good and wonderful things about our lives and our world and not just focus on the negative.

Of course, then there is the apparent truth that our president, this good president who is so much better than the last president, apparently believes he has the right to order the assassination of American citizens without charge, trial, or anything. Just because he, or one of his deputies, decides the person needs to die. That kind of awful makes those little wonders and good things in our world seem rather pale, doesn’t it? Especially when one of the “good things” is supposed to be this same president who thinks he has this power to play god.

This is part of what Dahlia Lithwick has called America’s “own special brand of terrorism-derangement syndrome.” If we label someone a “terrorist,” we magically make them not a person but something else, something to which we owe less than an animal, and certainly not something that has any rights. Lithwick quotes Adam Serwer to summarize: “This is the new normal for Republicans [and Obama, too, apparently]: You can be denied rights not through due process of law but merely based on the nature of the crime you are suspected of committing. “

Seriously?

Talk about awesome.

The first person who ever told me that happiness was work was this manic-depressive artist I knew when I was in my 20s. I was like, What are you talking about? Happiness just happens. That’s even the root of that word. How could it be work? We tend to think the same thing about love — it shouldn’t be work; it just happens. But it makes sense if we reframe what work is — that work is not necessarily toil, but attention and consciousness. I’m sure that this notion is contemporary in a way, especially from a feminist point of view. But it’s been kicking around for awhile. Certainly a goal of many spiritual traditions is how you can be in control of your own emotional reality despite what happens. Viktor Frankl, the author of “Man’s Search for Meaning,” talks about that a lot. In the middle of a concentration camp, amid all that suffering, what do you have control over? You have control over your emotional steadiness. Ariel Gore talking about her new book, Bluebird: Women and the new Psychology of Happiness
When you are ending one part of your life and beginning another it is a bit like changing lanes on a busy highway with a broken blinker, and you have to be careful every time you tug the wheel, because there are many moving vehicles that can hit you. It is dangerous to daydream, because changing lanes at such a speed takes all your concentration, and it is hard to slow down, because the traffic is thick and people will honk and then you might crash, so you have to know when to make your move and how to get your timing right.

Jonathan Harris . Feb 1, 2010

He’s just awesome at analogies.

But if we agree to be terrorized by the thought of using our institutions to protect us from terror, well, haven’t the terrorists won? I’m confused… . We shouldn’t be floored by anything anymore, because even formerly sane Republicans will do anything to undermine this president. Joan Walsh on Terrorism - Salon.com