Media diversity

'Liberal': we need to forge an international consensus and get UN approval so we can nuke Iran (or whatever the officially decreed Hitler-esque regime of the month happens to be).

Conservative: Screw the UN. Let’s nuke Iran now!

This is what passes for a diversity of voices in the mainstream media.

Making downtown Glens Falls a gated community

"When I give food to the poor, I'm called a saint. When I ask why they are poor, I'm called a communist." -Archbishop Dom Helder Camara.


So I was reading an article on PostStar.com. It reported on the brilliant idea some downtown Glens Falls merchants have of making people spend money for the glorious privilege of spending money at their stories. 


I made the mistake of reading a few of the comments. The stereotype many have is that the only comments on the PS website are from uneducated rednecks. This is not entirely true. 


Here's one rant: As an educated professional (whatever that's worth), here's my take on Downtown Glens Falls... note to Business owners and Diamond, you don't have a clean or respectable downtown yet. Sorry, but I don't wanna see welfare Tammy and abusive Tyrone with 6 kids smoking cigarettes and arguing in downtown. Out of thousands of dollars I've spent on food and entertainment in recent years, Downtown GF is lucky to have gotten 40 of that. 


That some judgmental rhymes with witch who describes human beings like pieces of trash to be 'cleaned up' doesn't shop here is no loss to the city. Screw her. How does her 'educated' self propose to 'clean up' downtown of these pieces of human refuse? Put a cordon around downtown where you have to show proof of a minimum $35,000 a year income before being issued a laminated snob card and then granted the privilege of entering?

Greens and media bias, Occupy and outsourcing police

A show on the excellent al-Jazeera English explored the question of whether the Green Party could influence this year's US elections. It's a sad indictment of our corporate media and its biases that the only mainstream media outlets that acknowledge the existence of the third largest party in the United States are non-American ones. In a related piece, NPR's Ombudsman explored accusations by American hero Ralph Nader that the public broadcaster ignores real progressives.

Speaking of NPR, it also pointed that just because that rumors of the Occupy movement's imminent death are greatly exaggerated.

Privatization of public resources, one of Occupy's main objections, have led to some disastrous scandals. The partial privatization of the military led to a variety of scandals with Blackwater including corruption, impunity and human rights abuses. The privatization of some prisons has led to Orwellian nightmares like Pennsylvania's Kids for Cash scandal. But a few people were making a lot of money out of these hideous abuses. So it's appalling, yet not surprising, that a few police forces in Britain are also outsourcing some of their public safety duties. Let's hope this reckless experimentation is short-lived and, especially, that it doesn't cross the Atlantic.

Who said it: Khamenei or Santorum?

Foreign Policy magazine had an interesting little quiz: quotes from Grand Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and former US senator Rick Santorum. You had to figure out whether the comments were made by by the leader of Iran's theocracy or the Republican presidential candidate.

Happy birthday Peace Corps

Today is national Peace Corps Day. In 2004, I wrote this essay (slightly modified since) in honor of Peace Corps Day. It's become a bit of a tradition for me to re-post it every March 1.

Moms and dads have their day. Old presidents have their day. So do labor unions and medieval saints. Soldiers have two official days plus numerous 'support our troops' rallies. Even bosses and secretaries have days, according to Hallmark. So why not Peace Corps volunteers?

Today is Peace Corps Day. It's the 51st anniversary of the day President Kennedy signed the executive order creating the Peace Corps.

Some people think the Peace Corps is a military organization. In fact, it's the antithesis. It's an organization which sends volunteers to developing countries to engage in such activities as teaching, public health, environmental management and small business development.

Volunteers receive a living allowance to cover their basic expenses and are provided housing, but are otherwise not paid. They received a modest readjustment allowance following completion of their service and a small (10 percent when I left) reduction in federal student loans. But they otherwise receive no further medical care or educational benefits. There is a small movement to obtain for departing volunteers benefits more similar to those received by those leaving the military, but it hasn't gotten anywhere.

The goals of the Peace Corps, according to the organization's website, are three:

1. Helping the people of interested countries in meeting their need for trained men and women.

2. Helping promote a better understanding of Americans on the part of the peoples served.

3. Helping promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of all Americans.

Suffice it to say, all three goals have been important since the organization was created but #2 seems particularly crucial in the era of post-9/11 random invasions. Though increasingly, it feels like a "one step forward, three steps back" routine.

There have been many books on "the Peace Corps experience" (which is about as broad a generalization as "the American mentality"). Nevertheless, some themes tend to be pretty common among them.

-Go to God-foresaken country with the expectation to save the noble savages.

-Learn that they are not savages and that they are noble/ignoble in more or less the same proportion as Americans.

-Sense of loneliness in a totally alien culture.

-Learn that life without TV/computer is not the apocalypse.

-Leave with the realization that you learned more than they did.

-Sadness when they have to leave their village/city.

-Transmit these themes interspersed with a lot of humorous anecdotes.

-Commentary on the impact of American foreign policy, French foreign policy and the IMF/World Bank may be included.



Common themes for volunteers who served in sub-Saharan Africa, as I did, are as follows:

-Annoyance at people who call you 'toubabou' (or whatever the local language word for 'white person' is); "My name isn't 'toubabou'," fumes the author. "My name is John!"

-Agitation that everyone wanted you to marry their sister/brother/son/daughter or get them a visa to go to America.

-Rage at the dichotomy between the fabulous wealth of the political elite and the overwhelming poverty of the masses.

-Observation to the effect that "[nationality] are so poor monetarily but so rich in spirit/culture/community."

-Elegies about how welcoming [nationality] are to strangers.

-A brief history of the country and the legacy of European colonialism.

-Maddening anecdotes about dealing with corrupt officials, musings on heat, mosquitoes and hygeine and comical (or frightening) travel stories.

-General commentary about "the African condition" may be included.


(And just so I don't sound like a snob, I included every one of these themes in my journal and letters home)


The best book I've ever read about "the Peace Corps experience" was George Packer's The Village of Waiting. It was a wonderfully written book in its own right. But I enjoyed it even more because, even though it was set in Togo and I served in Guinea, it was pretty much the story of my experience. Reading The Village of Waiting is why I decided not to write a strictly autobiographical account of my experience: it had already been done.

Update: Just a reminder that in the history of the Peace Corps, 279 men and women have died in service, at least one in every year (except 1986) that the Peace Corps has existed. A website has been devoted to them.

Why Catholics are losing faith in their Church

If you want to know why the Catholic Church in America is hemorrhaging members, check out this heartbreaking story. A Maryland priest recently denied a grieving woman communion at her own mother’s funeral because she lives with another woman.

While relentlessly protecting child rapist priests to preserve the Church’s reputation, it draws the moral line at giving communion to a lesbian at her mother’s funeral. It certainly has the right to do so but these kinds of priorities are exactly why the Church’s moral credibility has largely evaporated in this country and most of the western world.

Santorum's 'agenda for the Dark Ages'

GOP presidential candidate Rick Santorum reinforced his theocratic credentials recently by denouncing fellow Catholic John F. Kennedy's famous 1960 discourse on religious liberty. In it, Kennedy expressed his belief in the separation of church and state, said his first loyalty as president would be to America rather than the Pope and called on Americans to vote for or against him in his own right rather than solely because of his religion.

Santorum that JFK's speech "made him want to throw up, which should surprise exactly nobody who's been paying attention to the campaign or his political career.

Kennedy's speech was given at a time when anti-Catholic bigotry was quite common. Half a century later, anti-Catholic sentiment has virtually disappeared and been replaced with widespread anti-Muslim sentiment. Anti-atheist sentiment has increased as well.

Alternet has a piece about Santorum's five most extreme positions; it must've taken them a while to narrow it down: his 'Agenda for the Dark Ages'.

America has spent the last 10 years waging war against violent, pro-death religious extremists. It's a mystery why we'd then elect one for the presidency.

Update: apparently Santorum has denounced Islam as being stuck in the 7th century. I'm not sure why he said 'stuck.' That's still several centuries ahead of whatever Santorum believes in.

Moderate Republicans still exist

I keep hearing people say moderate Republican politicians are bordering on extinct. That's not true. It remains quite numerous. They are just now called Democrats.