stuart noble's blog

Postmodern Pastoral: a rouge non-consumer with 500 kilos of apples

Mon, 19 Oct 2009 18:06:13 -0700

With my father-in-law's help this morning, we harvested 500 kilos of apples from our coveted Belle de Boskoop tree. Tomorrow we'll have our annual supply of pure, unmolested apple juice! I say unmolested as I've been thinking a lot about how corporations basically control our entire food chain and how our humble garden provides small yet meaningful spaces of resistance at the margins of our predatory economic system. Plus, I finally got around to reading Joe Bageant’s Dear Hunting with Jesus.

I'm too busy, and mostly too tired to log online these days, much less write blog posts. Don't know when I'll get around to the next one either but here goes...

The exhaustion stems mostly from the unbelievably tiresome task of being a “stay-at-home dad” with our 6 month old. When she does this, like today, I get a little work done. Walnuts, check. Potatoes up before the frost, check. Finish siding the house, check. Replant the blackberries, not yet. Prepare for next weeks lecture that's been on my calender for four months, oh hell no. So I'm "working" tonight.

more after the break

I check my email about once a week, if that. I hardly have time or energy to read a book, especially after all that heavy duty cramming for Ph.D. research grant applications a few months back. And I can't remember the last time I actually completed a movie from start to finish before passing out on the sofa. Auchentoshan has got my back tonight! But I finally figured I should start reading more than wonderful Julia Donaldson stories to my two year old so I grabbed some "light" reading from the library. Actually, I reserved it through the national public library system (which includes university libraries!) which mailed Dear Hunting from the Royal library to our little podunk branch in the sticks-- free of charge. Every book anywhere in the country is available to anyone with a library card in the country. And if it isn’t in Denmark then they'll borrow it from one of their Scandinavian neighbors and send it to me. Oh, those fucking commie, socialist, Nazi bastards! What will they think of next, universal health care? So, we do have a few systems where the social contract isn't based on some Hobbsian dog-eat-dog free for all. But the freakonomic neo-liberals are definitely here! And outside the well established social democratic institutions, privatization and consumerism order our lives here as well.

My wife asked me, “what the hell are you reading” after looking down at the title she reads it out loud, each word slow and deliberate; Dear Hunting with Jesus: Guns, Votes, Debt and Delusion in Redneck America. “This doesn’t look like the typical academic crap you read.” I say, “just some light reading.” And Bageant’s style is light, and tragically witty too. But this is heavy stuff, like David Harvey in Redneck drag. Camilla was not amused. So she says, “hey, my uncle says he heard you’re giving a presentation next week to the local Rotary Klub.” We live in a small town. “Yeah, how did he hear?” “He’s a member, he’ll be there.” She says he’s looking forward to my talk on “Obama and US/Danish foreign policy.” I'll be making most of it up over the next few days. Then she says I should really get in good with them because they fund all the exchange student programs to the US for the local high school kids. She’s obviously thinking ahead. But I don’t need my kids doing an exchange student program to the US. I figured summers with their uncle in Texas, an Austin bartender, should give them all the cultural exchange they’ll ever need. Besides, most of the European kids who've done the exchange trip tell me horror stories of being stuck with fundamentalist Christians or no dancing Mormons, or worse. A summer with Uncle Scott could save the kids from such a risk. He could tell them stories instead of our own born again Catholic childhood over a few cold Shiner Bocks at his Congress St. bar. Mama aint hearin it. Fuck, I gotta do this damn gig.

After Camilla walked on, I surfed over to Bageant’s blog, thinking I might pick up a rhetorical bomb to throw out at this group of unsuspecting civic business heroes next week. Instead, I got sucked into today’s “letter to Joe.” I didn’t find anything too clever to add to my PowerPoint presentation. However, reading his pessimistic reply to Carol’s gloomy letter our garden, and this morning’s apple harvest came back into focus. Bageant doesn't hold out much hope for social movements or grassroots politics. But he does offer a theory of resistance:

However, I do believe that rediscovering the natural self and truly discovering that there is a whole wide world outside the national hallucination liberates the individual and pokes a stick in the eye of authority. Admittedly a small one, but if there are enough of them. A liberated individual does not consume very much, nor succumbs to the sales job that permeates our consumer society, and therefore does not own or purchase very much. Nor pay many taxes, since he or she does not need to earn anything near the national average, being the worst kind of rogue imaginable by the state -- the rogue non-consumer.

This is as good a reflection as any of my philosophy (and desire) of colony gardening and its potential for liberation. As Ralph Waldo Emerson said in Self-Reliance, "Society everywhere is in conspiracy against the manhood of every one of its members." It’s the kind of Thoreauvian economic logic I strive for at brief interludes during the day but forget once I’m home, falling asleep to re-runs of Camilla's Desperate Housewives. Yes, I too am in danger of becoming a desperate housewife! What would would Emerson say about that? I know Thoreau disapproves. I’m probably as consumer rogue as Sara Palin’s lipstick. But hell I’m trying. And the man aint gettin a dime of juice money from me this year! Resistance is not futile.

Michael Jackson as Angels in the Architecture

Wed, 08 Jul 2009 04:45:47 -0700

"A man walks down the street
It's a street in a strange world
Maybe it's the Third World
Maybe it's his first time around
He doesn't speak the language
He holds no currency
He is a foreign man
He is surrounded by the sound
The sound
Cattle in the marketplace
Scatterlings and orphanages
He looks around, around
He sees angels in the architecture
Spinning in infinity
He says Amen! and Hallelujah!"

-Paul Simon-

Michael Shaw linked to this image 6 hours ago tweeting, "When you hear that MJ, like an angel, literally permeates the air in LA...the banners are the least of it." Yes, Amen! And wasn't this what Paul Simon was getting at with "You Can Call Me Al"? Angels in the architecture of the city of angels.

I'd mostly stayed away from any media coverage of Michael Jackson, hearing about his untimely death while visiting friends in Copenhagen. Danish TV 2 news has been running virtually uninterrupted "news coverage," not even picking up the Sara Palin stories which momentarily competed for attention in the US market. But last night the wife and I saw most of the Hollywood memorial spectacle. I prefer just listening to his music, particularly tracks off of Thriller, one of the first albums I ever bought. But last night, another song came to mind, one which I hadn't seen at all referenced by media, family and politicians contesting the right to position the meaning of Michael Jackson's public memory.

While simultaneously half watching the Staples Center Show and surfing You Tube last night I tweeted, "Media et al. devoured MJ to the end. Most appropriate would have been a Thriller from that casket performance of Scream."

I'm plannin' on playin' Palin next.

Photo: Jae C. Hong/Associated Press/ NYT via Twitter.
Originally posted at America Adrift

Postmodern Pastoral: Independence Day

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 06:27:56 -0700

Today is a fine day to introduce Stuart's new twice-monthly column, "Post-Modern Pastoral. ~spk

As an expatriated US citizen, the 4th of July has become ever more problematic every year as I continually rework who I am and how I fit into America. And how America fits into me. Identity, I've discovered, is a process, a renegotiation with myself and the people, places, and ever changing contexts around me. I'm not the same man I was a year ago, let alone 10. And so too has the meaning of Independence Day shifted for me over time. Today I feel independent, though I'm not really. I'll get to that later. But I'm privileged in this here world. I'm White, male, educated, and I live in Denmark.

As most of you know Sean Paul was up here in my little postmodern pastoral neck of the woods before returning back to the land of sprawl. He invited me to write about the garden, "kind of like Don's Sabbath eve series," he said. No thanks. Can't do it. That would require a degree of candor and personal honesty that I simply can't muster. It's damn hard work separating the bullshit from the real shit. Americans, and increasingly the rest of us, our chin deep in bull shit.

More after the jump.

I'm also terribly busy. No, active. Busyness implies both work and stress. I have neither at the moment. Since finishing my graduate degree I became a father for the second time and began working in (retreating too) our colony garden. I also have several small money earning gigs just under the radar, enough so that we can enjoy small luxuries like ice cream at the harbor or a weekend in Cph. Its enough for now. My wife is happy and so am I.

Today I took the day off from building and gardening. Not to celebrate July 4, but because I finished roofing yesterday and my back is killing me. It's also damn hot here too. It aint goddamned hot, or the "Africa hot" as Matthew Broderick's character in the film adaptation of Biloxi Blues would say. "Even Tarzan couldn't take this heat!" But we're hanging around the lower 90s which is real warm for these parts. Warm enough for swimming at one of the Storebælt beaches which is where the kids are now. I'm joining them after this. This evening at the garden Camilla will dig up new potatoes and pick arugula for dinner. Sebastian will pluck strawberries for desert. Sean-Paul unfortunately didn't taste our wonderful strawberries as he left before they had fully ripened.

But questions of identity and patriotism continue to challenge me. Even the word expatriate is loaded with meanings and questions about who, when and how one relates in the world as a citizen. The word seems utterly devoid of the human or the natural. When SP was here he got to experience our roof christening after setting the last roof rafter. In keeping with local tradition I hoisted a Danish flag over the roof, along with a wreath a neighbor gave us, made from hedge branches and flowers. I told Sean Paul that it felt a little weird hoisting that flag. He thought it was "cool." It was both. But weird certainly not because of any lingering US nationalisms. Its cultural for me. I may be making Danish roots but I'm still Texan and... American. At least that's what my passport says. That's what everyone notices in my fat accent when I speak Danish. So even simple symbolic acts like hoisting a Danish flag or not celebrating Independence Day resonate.

Independence Day? From what? Who participates in "democracy" and who is left out in the cold? I don't think I'm alone at the Agonist, whatever your birth certificate says, in feeling overall pessimistic about the future of the American experiment and the global ramifications of its neoliberal new world order. It's difficult celebrating "American Democracy" these days when all we've really got left is the movie. Robert Gibbons writes that this is Unique to America. I'm cheered up at least.

But I sure miss my family and friends back home. And I want to echo graham's sentiment. The world is complex and so are we. And the garden is mostly where I try and work it all out. I'll also try and share my thoughts from the garden here from time to time. Wishing you all a happy 4th of July as you gather with your family and friends today, wherever you are in the world; pat, expat, repat, or nopat. And try and stay cool!

Re-reading automobile politics as cultural text

Sat, 02 May 2009 03:52:53 -0700

This is an inter-blog rescue of sorts I wrote reflecting on two posts by Steen Christiansen, a contributing writer at America Adrift. An assistant professor of English at Aalborg University and one of only two Danish libertarians (that I know of), he describes his research as, "working mainly on cultural transformations between high and low culture, investigating how these entities intersect and inform each other. Continuing within a cultural materialist methodology, I’m particularly interested in cultural resistance and how narratives help shape these variant forms of resistance." I'm not in the habit of cross posting work here but I thought this short piece, along with the links to Steen's very interesting and entertaining two articles would be appreciated here at the Agonist, particularly in light of yesterday's news about Chrysler's "financial re-organization."

Yesterday evening (gmt + 1) Danish teevee news live fed President Obama’s announcement that Chrysler will head into bankruptcy protection. Can anyone tell me if the CNNization of Danish news along with its increased obsession focus on live "breaking" coverage of D.C. political intrigue is merely a figment of my imagination?

A few weeks ago, thinking about the ubiquitous global financial “crisis,” particularly the massive gap between how the Establishment framed Detroit and Wall Street, I asked Steen if he’d write a follow up to his excellent post, “The Big Three Killed My Baby.” In light of yesterday's news I wanted to re post that piece, along with his recent article, "Motor City is Burning," which he graciously agreed to produce for us.

In both articles Steen explores musical arrangements as social criticism aimed at the American automobile industry, namely management of the top three automobile manufactures. The first looks at the song, "The Big Three Killed My Baby," from Detroit band The White Stripes' 1999 debut album. His recent post, examines MC5’s 1968/69 cover of John Lee Hooker's 1943 song “Motor City Is Burning."

Taken together these pieces, fascinating on their own, represent an important and critical dimension of a very real crisis in Detroit and across America. They reflect upon deep cultural attachments not only to the automobile, but to the politics and economics of the automobile industry. Steen summed up what's at stake thus, "So, once again, the fate of Detroit is closely tied to the industry and there is reason to believe that The Big Three will drag Detroit (and other cities) down with them."

Obama's address, though riddled with some progressive ideas, calls to protect the working middle class, and a green energy future, also revealed a regressive business as usual approach to handling Detroit. Consumerism as well continues to hold a central position within D.C. thinking, articulated by Obama in his address. Michael Shaw certainly didn't miss the consumption narrative's redeployment yet again with this terrific catch from a NY Times slide show. I also appreciated the way images 10 and 11 are sequenced. To continue picking on the Times, I personally felt that this image, leading the article, "Chrysler Files to Seek Bankruptcy Protection," serves as the quintessential visual narrative of how the establishment frames our automotive socio-economic discourse. Pretty clever dontcha think?

So what is likely to be the outcome of the current auto bail-out for Detroit, America, and the rest of the world? I trust historian David Nye will again have something important to say. But the latest headlines taken with Obama's statements lead me to imagine a continued stream of great Motor City music for Steen to analyze. Unfortunately for average Americans it will sound like more blues.

"Employees and customers watching President Obama’s announcement at Lochmoor Chrysler Jeep in Detroit. In bankruptcy, Chrysler will be able to cancel some of its dealership franchises."

(image: Paul Sancya/Associated Press, NYT)

Framing Obama: Inauguration Day

Mon, 19 Jan 2009 23:01:23 -0800

This image was one of the more ridiculous examples of corporate media's role in placing Obama's presidency within right-wing and neoliberal narrative frames. The illustration accompanied Jon Meacham's much contested Newsweek cover article which asserted the difficulty of governing as a liberal in a (supposedly) predominantly conservative America. Here, the myth of the silent majority continues to be wielded as an ideological weapon against liberalism. Published several weeks before the November 4 general election, Newsweek had already anointed Obama president elect and began visually framing his coming presidency as "ideologically centrist." "Pragmatic" has sense replaced centrism as the narrative du jour among the elite Washington press corps.

Continued after the jump

Thomas Frank's WSJ column (h/t David Sirota) lays bare the underlying motivation behind non-ideological centrism and pragmatism in its contemporary context:

"The real-world function of Beltway centrism has not been to wage high-minded war against "both extremes" but to fight specifically against the economic and foreign policies of liberalism...And centrism's achievements? Well, there's Nafta, which proved Democrats could stand up to labor. There's the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act. There's the Iraq war resolution, approved by numerous Democrats in brave defiance of their party's left."

The image is even more problematic as Obama, with his back to the viewer, is presented as an unknown quality who must triangulate between Nixon and Reagan. That's quite some center.

Take these two covers of Time as exhibits b and c. In 2006 (shown left), after very significant Democratic Congressional victories, "the center is the place to be." On the right is a not-so-subtle representation of the 1994 Gingrich lead "Republican revolution." Here, no caption was needed.

Today, as the world eagerly awaits the historic inauguration of Barack Obama as the 44th President of the United State, these images reminded me of the deeply contested power plays which are embedded throughout visual political culture.

Of course, mainstream media are not the only actors vested in framing Obama's presidency. Although publications like Time and Newsweek contribute significantly to political visual discourses in both physical and virtual public spaces, other social and political actors contest these narratives and offer their own counter-frames. Obama himself has played a large role in presenting himself as a pragmatic post-partisan centrist. But it is difficult to read Obama's own visual communication as he is often simultaneously framed within various, often competing narrative traditions

Robert Hariman, co-author of one of the seminal books on the role of Iconic photography in democratic culture, has an interesting related post from yesterday (cp'd at BNN) titled, Visual Histories: Framing the Obama Presidency. He begins by examining "the insertion of Obama into one of the stock scenes of the visual history of the Kennedy presidency."

The presidential inauguration is a time of new beginnings, but it cannot avoid comparisons with the past. Indeed, a time of transition places a special premium on the past. Speech writers, pundits, retailers, and ordinary citizens have been trying out various comparisons and narratives to place the historic event in its proper perspective. This attempt to make sense of collective life includes notable images as well.

This practice can be seen through the numerous placements of Obama in the context of previous presidents also including Reagan, like the image above, Clinton, FDR and most often Lincoln. But it was the final image that Hariman discusses which provides many timeless metaphors about American political and cultural renewal, appropriate to the historic moment of today. Whatever ideology ultimately guides Obama's presidency, there is also one undeniable and very significant difference between this image and its historical counterparts:

"Renewing America’s Promise at the back of a railroad car is nothing less than a commitment to using whatever works to sustain American democracy. All this is possible, of course, because the black man at the back of the train will be the president, not the porter. Now that the oppression that also was part of that old order can be discarded, renewal through restoration can begin."

This article is cross-posted at america adrift: Transatlantic Perspectives on America

Voting in the Clouds

Wed, 05 Nov 2008 13:37:26 -0800

This is the lead image currently online at the NYT. I love how this shot, voters at Woodland Elementary, perfectly serves as a metaphor for the Obama campaign. Here we see six older voters in multicultural technicolor mirror the stylized picket fence painted on the wall. A group of small children run across the foreground of the mural. They are somewhat obscured behind the voting stations. This is not their day after all. They play while we participate in democracy. Though they play in the background they are in the forefront of our thoughts. We can imagine what the children are running towards. They are running towards the future. Our eyes look up to the sky where a clock hangs in the clouds as time stands still for the next 12 hours. These voters, like that fence, are all that separate those kids from their dreams.

Photo: Chang W. Lee/The New York Times

Whither A Maverick?

Wed, 08 Oct 2008 06:41:43 -0700

Rolling Stone takes a hatchet to McCain's utterly false "maverick" image. The title sets up a clever double play, simultaneously discrediting the narrative and referencing McCain's increasingly childish behavior;

Make-Believe Maverick

A closer look at the life and career of John McCain reveals a disturbing record of recklessness and dishonesty

Dishonest. That's almost calling him a liar. Robert Grossman's brilliant illustration reduces and captures the sad caricature that is quickly becoming the template. All the facts have been available public record since, well duh. But the corporate media isn't typically interested in facts. It's all about the narrative. Drill baby drill! Well this well is finally tapped. I'm coming around to the idea that the elite press has come to the simple conclusion that their money is simply safer under an Obama administration. But let's not discount the tremendous, tireless push back work that takes place in the blog-o-sphere and the terrific work done by real maverick journalists like Cliff Schecter and Brock and Waldman. Not to mention, McCain's own free-fall campaign has been its own worse enemy. Hearing Sara Palin go on and on about "a team of mavericks" just doesn't have that authentic "mavericky" feel now does it?

But the Washington Press Corps' willingness to accept this framework has been the glue that held this tall tale together. Neal Gabler's confessional in the Times last March, "The Maverick and the Media," revealed what political activists in the blogosphere have long seen as blatantly obvious;

IT is certainly no secret that Senator John McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, is a darling of the news media. Reporters routinely attach “maverick,” “straight talker” and “patriot” to him like Homeric epithets. Chris Matthews of MSNBC has even called the press “McCain’s base” — a comment that Mr. McCain himself has jokingly reiterated. The mainstream news media by and large don’t cover Mr. McCain; they canonize him. Hence the moniker on liberal blogs: St. McCain.

Accompanying the Rolling Stone ten page article is a video titled, "Five Myths About John McCain" and two accompanying articles, The Double-Talk Express and Mad Dog Palin: The Full Story. Try puttin' lipstick on that.

Tim Dickenson's piece is particularly noteworthy because he starts out by challenging the keystone of the entire maverick mythology, McCain's POW experience in Vietnam. He begins with an encounter between McCain and another ex-POW, Air Force lieutenant colonel John Dramesi. Dickenson sets up the contrast between these two and their respective experiences as "an honor gap."

Like many American POWs, McCain broke down under torture and offered a "confession" to his North Vietnamese captors. Dramesi, in contrast, attempted two daring escapes. For the second he was brutalized for a month with daily torture sessions that nearly killed him. His partner in the escape, Lt. Col. Ed Atterberry, didn't survive the mistreatment. But Dramesi never said a disloyal word, and for his heroism was awarded two Air Force Crosses, one of the service's highest distinctions.

He continues with a conversation between the two men which further draws into question why McCain has had a free pass all these years. Five years later McCain would leave his crippled wife for the young Beer heiress. Again, this information has always been available but the press has simply ignored it.

"I'm going to the Middle East," Dramesi says. "Turkey, Kuwait, Lebanon, Iran."

"Why are you going to the Middle East?" McCain asks, dismissively.

"It's a place we're probably going to have some problems," Dramesi says.

"Why? Where are you going to, John?"

"Oh, I'm going to Rio."

"What the hell are you going to Rio for?"

McCain, a married father of three, shrugs.

"I got a better chance of getting laid."

Yeah, there's a guy putting country first. But it's not just Rolling Stone. On October 4 the NYT ran a story, "Who You Callin' a Maverick?" about a real maverick from my home town no less. What's key in this story is the (re)association (by the press that is) of liberalism with patriotism.

“I’m just enraged that McCain calls himself a maverick,” said Terrellita Maverick, 82, a San Antonio native who proudly carries the name of a family that has been known for its progressive politics since the 1600s, when an early ancestor in Boston got into trouble with the law over his agitation for the rights of indentured servants.

This was a local history I was unaware of and the "gobbledygook" was a funny bit of trivia. But I immediately recognized the meta-theme and so will you. This local San Antonio story can be seen as microcosm of the Republican reactionary war on Liberalism which took shape under the Nixon/Agnew "Southern Strategy:"

Sam Maverick’s grandson, Fontaine Maury Maverick, was a two-term congressman and a mayor of San Antonio who lost his mayoral re-election bid when conservatives labeled him a Communist. He served in the Roosevelt administration on the Smaller War Plants Corporation and is best known for another coinage. He came up with the term “gobbledygook” in frustration at the convoluted language of bureaucrats.

Then there was John Heilemann's recent piece in New York Magazine which has been buzzing around the internet, "How McCain Lost His Brand: From maverick to crank in an instant."

As both a media figure and a human being, Matthews is sui generis—and yet what made his comments so remarkable was how unremarkable they were. In the past several weeks, the shift of press-corps sentiment against McCain has been stark and undeniable, even among heavies such as Matthews long accused by the left of being residents of the Arizonan’s amen corner. Jonathan Alter, Joe Klein, Richard Cohen, David Ignatius, Jacob Weisberg: all former McCain admirers now turned brutal critics. Equally if not more damaging, the shift has been just as pronounced, if less operatic, among straight-news reporters. Suddenly, McCain is no longer being portrayed as a straight-talking, truth-telling maverick but as a liar, a fraud, and an opportunist with acute anger-management issues.

It may be too early to claim contemporary conservatism has died as a hegemonic force in American public discourses. But after eight years of horrendous neo-conservative pillaging of the state, and thirty years of a Republican culture war, a renewed sense of a patriotic liberal spirit seems to be rushing in to the void. Or perhaps that's just my wishful thinking.

Illustration by Robert Grossman/ Rolling Stone

Looking into the Financial Abyss

Wed, 01 Oct 2008 04:09:32 -0700

During this latest "financial crisis" there have been some fascinating images which communicate possible alternative narratives to the daily press stories. The image above from this NYT article particularly caught my attention. Here, despite whatever giveaway, formerly known as the bail-out, "rescue" the Senate may approve on Wednesday, the message in this photo seems clear. We are facing the abyss. Not only are we looking down the cliff but from this angle, we've already walked out past the ledge. This is the moment Willie Coyote realizes he's about to take a free fall into oblivion.

I also appreciate how all those electric green symbols on the giant electronic ticker are cascading down to the floor were there are more wires, screens and computers than human beings. This theft was not created by machines, but it is the machine that's been employed for all those "complex" unregulated investment instruments which lie at the center of the "crisis." The Matrix thus serves as another appropriate metaphor (borrowing from Baudrillard) as the "code" merely supports the illusion of stability.

More after the jump, click on image for better resolution.

I'm drawn back to a scene from Don DeLillo's Cosmopolis in which the protagonist, a billionaire Wall Street speculator converses with his "Chief of Theory." At one point in the conversation his theorist says, "We are not witnessing the flow of information so much as pure spectacle, or information made sacred, ritually unreadable" (p 80). Earlier in the conversation she states that, "Money has lost its narrative quality the way painting did once upon a time. Money is talking to itself" (p 77). A paragraph later she continues:

"And property follows of course. The concept of property is changing by the day, by the hour. The enormous expenditures that people make for land and houses and boats and planes. This has nothing to do with traditional self-assurances, okay. Property is no longer about power, personality and command. It's not about vulgar display or tasteful display. Because it no longer has weight or shape. The only thing that matters is the price you pay...The number justifies itself" (p 78).

Is this what Bush's Treasury Secretary Paulson told Congress when asked about the number, seven hundred billion dollars? Congress (and the American people): "Why do you need that much money? How did you come to that figure?" Secretary Paulson: "I know its very difficult for all you untrained economists to grasp the complexity of it all. But you see, the number justifies itself!"

I can't know the complex, inter-dependent, and highly subjective process that went into this photo ultimately finding its way to the pages of the New York Times. But neither painting nor any other art form has "lost its narrative quality." Even right now, where money is just "talking to itself," art is still talking to us. "We" ultimately don't suffer from a lack of alternative narratives but a lack of meaningful political power.

Just over twenty two years ago Paul Simon released his album Graceland, an album which has never found itself in "the old stack." Six years into the Reagan financial revolution (aka the beginning of the end of the regulatory state) Mr. Simon clearly saw the writing on the wall. In 1986, the first track on Simon's album illuminated some of the simple truths that DeLillo would visit in Cosmopolis and Justin Lane asks us to consider in the photograph above.

I dedicate this song to Secretary Paulson, "the boy in the bubble."

And I believe
These are the days of lasers in the jungle
Lasers in the jungle somewhere
Staccato signals of constant information
A loose affiliation of millionaires
And billionaires and baby
These are the days of miracle and wonder
This is the long distance call
The way the camera follows us in slo-mo
The way we look to us all
The way we look to a distant constellation
Thats dying in a corner of the sky
These are the days of miracle and wonder
And dont cry baby, dont cry
Dont cry

Image: Justin Lane/European Pressphoto Agency

The New Yorker Obama cover revisited

Fri, 18 Jul 2008 01:03:12 -0700

Recently here at the Agonist we've had a few lively discussions about recent false media narratives created around both Barack and Michelle Obama. See for example Forgiven's, Machiavellian And The War of Words and my Presto, Uppity Angry Black Woman!

I know not everyone was convinced of our arguments. Fine. Let me make clear however that my purpose is not to provide partisan defense for Obama but to criticize the media and shed light on what I regard as deeply rooted racist, misogynistic and certainly anti-progressive and anti-democratic undercurrents in American culture.

On that note, for some historical perspective which compares the New Yorker cover to Bret F. Harte’s 1870 “Plain Language from Truthful James” poem see Rune Christensen's “The Heathen Obama”? The limits to satire in American politics.

rikyrah of Jack and Jill Politics has a terrific article which addresses the image as well as some of the deeper contexts to Michelle's unenviable position. As part of the guest series at Open Left see Update: Michelle Obama as Racial Rorschach Test

Michael Shaw provides an excellent deconstruction of the image here,The "What" Of What's Wrong With The Barack Osama New Yorker Cover. Shaw's analysis is important as he looks beyond the obvious surface communication and finds discourses which communicate some of the false narratives we've been discussing here.

So let me know what YOU think. And just to leave this post on a high note, THIS is satire.

Raymond Federman Frenzy

Wed, 25 Jun 2008 08:07:40 -0700

Since the early 60s, Raymond Federman has been one of the most important American writers. His highly experimental fictions in works that bear such titles as Take It or Leave It, Double or Nothing, and The Twofold Vibrations, he has explored cultural and personal memory, invented intricate narrative strategies, and above all has given readers an experience that exceeds the ordinary. Creating situations that make one really think and really laugh is a tall order for any writer. But Federman did it. He is one of the few writers to truly have achieved this.

One of our contributors at the Atlantic Community, Camelia Elias, has just released a wonderful collection of essays on Raymond Federman. This open source web publication includes four scholarly articles and some previously unpublished texts by Federman. Federman, who just turned 80 is also a blogger.

For more, including links to the free download see, Federman Frenzy. Feel free to leave any comments for Camelia at the link. I'd like to arrange an online discussion with Federman so if anyone else is interested, stop by and let us know.

The Fox News John McCain Election Wanking HQ

Mon, 23 Jun 2008 23:29:33 -0700

The only US cable and/or broadcast news I ever see comes from online sources, usually clips or segments provided as evidence on media criticism sites like Media Matters or Crooks and Liars. I was watching one such clip embedded to this post at C&L, David Broder wanks away on the McCain Town Hall meetings that Obama turned down.

Well, Broder or any other rightwing "centrist" wanking for McCain isn't anything new or unexpected, especially not the Faux News wank fest seen in the video clip in the above link.

At approximately 2:15 the video cuts from one wanking fest to another, located in the "Fox News Election HQ" revealing something ,if not unexpected (it's Fox after all), then perhaps new.

More below the fold

As many of you know, I'm interested (and concerned) with how images are employed by the media and other actors to reinforce political narratives. It's the politics and semiotics of political images and icons. So this recent example of Fox propoganda might be described as logo cross branding.

McCain's logo is of course a single military star and he's branded himself and his campaign in an overall not so subtle militaristic theme. Even all those flags on his website emphasize the star. Stars are everywhere in McCain's visual presentations. There's already been a fair amount written on both McCain's and Obama's campaign branding so I won't elaborate here. See for example a piece I wrote in March, Postmodern Presidential Branding.

Click on images to enlarge

So back to what caught my attention. This so called Fox News election set looked to be unashamedly and outright endorsing John McCain through its visual messages. Looking at the Fox video clip the first thing I noticed is the name, "America's Election HQ." Not head quarters but the abbreviated HQ as is common practice in the military. Then there's the large screen with the words "Strategy Room." But the real kicker is just behind the pundits left shoulder there is a massive singular virtual star complete with that bizzarre Fox animation stuff (I don't know what else to call it) that continually animates the star, the McCain star. As the camera pans over to who else, Karl Rove, the actual McCain logo with his name flashes on the screen behind Roves right shoulder.

Curious for more, I went to Fox's online "Election HQ." You'll notice a star frames each side of the words in their logo. Then there's all those stars against a blue backdrop, not completely unlike the cropped flags on McCain's website. There's also this "Military One Source" button right next to the search box, consciously adding to the military theme. For added bonus in this screen shot there's a huge photo of McCain with a huge McCain headline. And given McCain's recent faux environmentalism I find the "Clean Coal" advertisements ironic if not intentional.

Ok, this was a little lite on analysis, I'm pretty busy these days. But it didn't take much to see the overt symbolism everywhere. With all the over the top McCain endorsing I wonder what I'm missing. Does Fox even do subliminal anymore or is it all right there on the surface? What have you noticed in regards to Fox News cross branding their programs with overt McCain symbolism?

Presto, Uppity Angry Black Woman!

Wed, 18 Jun 2008 19:00:17 -0700

Michael Powell and Jodi Kantor published a piece of back-handed journalistic work in today’s newspaper of ill record, "After Attacks, Micelle Obama Looks for a New Introduction."

Never mind that the premise of the article’s title is completely false and misleading. The hiring of Stephanie Cutter as Michelle Obama’s chief of staff is about managing communications and providing defense against right-wing attacks. Michelle Obama is not looking for a new introduction.

In it, they paint Michelle Obama as the “Angry Black Woman” quoting such irrefutable sources as “Conservative columnists” and a “blogger who supported Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton.”

The article begins, “Michelle Obama’s eyes flicker tentatively even as she offers a trained smile.” See the “multi-media slide show” “Mrs. Obama’s Journey” for visual representations of Michelle’s trained (read phony) smile.

In Madison, Wis., in February, she told voters that hope was sweeping America, adding, “For the first time in my adult lifetime, I am really proud of my country.”

Reverend Wright?
More below the fold

Of course the story is a story because they decide to make it a story. It’s so obvious but then Powell and Kantor reveal why, “Cable news programs replayed those 15 words in an endless loop of outrage.” Outrage? The cable news programs are outraged.

Barack Obama often blurs identity lines; much of his candidacy has seemed almost post-racial. Mrs. Obama’s identity is less mutable. She is a descendant of slaves and a product of Chicago’s historically black South Side. She burns hot where he banks cool, and that too can make her an inviting proxy for attack.

Here she is folks, the “Angry Black Woman.” If Barack can slip through as “post-racial,” certainly Michelle should not they imply. Post racial itself is such a loaded and oppressive term. For Whites it only implies a “post-racial attitude,” seeing past color. For Blacks it implies constructing an identity that looks and feels post-racial (not so Black). Of course, the once post-racial Barack Obama candidacy has only “seemed almost post-racial.” Powell and Kantor suggest he hasn’t pulled it off. They’re not convinced that he hasn’t alleviated enough of his Blackness. And Michelle? Her “identity is less mutable.” Did they really write that? Again, in Powell and Kantor’s world, the construction of a Black post-racial identity is about muting the appearance of Blackness. And Michelle is just too Black to do so because she is “a descendant of slaves and a product of Chicago’s historically black South Side.”

“She burns hot where he banks cool, and that too can make her an inviting proxy for attack.” Thanks again for the invitation. Who’s the proxy here I wonder?

The subtext blared through my screen. They didn’t need to spell out the words ANGRY BLACK WOMAN. But why not,

The caricatures of Mrs. Obama as the Angry Black Woman confound her, friends say.

Add a little dash of misogyny;

But the 44-year-old woman known even to friends as The Taskmaster sometimes speaks with a passion unusual for a potential first lady.

Presto, Uppity Angry Black Woman!

Perhaps a majority of Americans would have been ready to elect either a Black man or a White woman president. But certainly not a Black woman. And the idea of an Uppity Angry Black Woman First Lady who doesn’t know her place together with an Almost White Enough President was evidently the narrative of today’s paper of ill record.

And that was just page one of the article.

Kyoto could cause permanent gas price increases

Wed, 11 Jun 2008 00:10:57 -0700

"Are you somewhat upset about gas at $2 a gallon and looking forward to lower prices? Well, just remember that the Kyoto Protocol (to combat a hypothetical global warming), avidly promoted by the Clinton-Gore administration, would raise prices even higher - on a permanent basis.

As disclosed by The Washington Times, an internal memo of the Energy Department blamed much of the June price run-up in the Midwest on the rigid regulations of the EPA. Supplies of gasoline became tight because of the EPA requirement for the Chicago market, starting on June 1, for "reformulated" gasoline (blended with ethanol distilled from corn). Refiners ended up with having to supply different formulations for fuels for different areas to meet EPA rules. With no flexibility to swap supplies and with refineries operating at peak capacity, just one pipeline breakdown or one refinery fire would then cause supply shortfalls and price spikes."

The "expert", S. Fred Singer for the Washington Times
"Oil price spike with no peak in sight"
August 11, 2000

Permanent $2 a gallon gas under the Kyoto Protocol! Don't we all wish. And I almost forgot all about the "crisis" in "peak capacity."

And here's another walk down memory lane. Anyone remember this "failure"?

Rock Pioneer Bo Diddley Dies at 79

Mon, 02 Jun 2008 12:41:53 -0700

NPR.org, June 2, 2008 - One of the fathers of rock 'n' roll died Monday at the age of 79. Bo Diddley was born Ellas Bates in Mississippi and grew up in Chicago, where he played guitar on street corners before being discovered by Chess Records. He leaves behind a sound that helped build a musical movement.

What made Bo's music so unique? I don't know exactly but if I had to assign to it just one adjective it would be, crunchy. Yeah, what a wonderful crunchy sound.

Stop the Runaway Legislation!

Fri, 23 May 2008 02:57:07 -0700

Bloomberg News reports (via Huffington Post) that Billionaire and Corporate Overlord Carl Icahn says, "Obama would be a terrible U.S. President!"

Sigh. Maybe Obama would be a terrible president.

But Icahn is full of the same load of right-wing garbage, throwing out the same tired corporate talking points we've unfortunately become accustomed to;

"Obama would probably go on a ``huge spending spree'' that ``the country can't afford right now.'"

Does he mean "huger" than the one Bush is on in Iraq? This crap is to be expected, and much worse.

But Icahn shows his true disturbing colors, displaying his absolute disdain for democracy.

Even worse, Icahn said, would be a Democratic president with a veto-proof supermajority of 60 Democrats elected to the Senate.

`Runaway Legislation'

``It would be devastating,'' he said. ``Then you couldn't stop runaway legislation.''

Runaway Legislation? Is that the new Orwellian doublespeak to describe the democratic legislative process?

Subtext. Let's not let a little thing like democracy get in the way of our corporate agenda. When Icahn said "you" just who was he speaking to anyways?

Does anyone really believe that a Democratic administration with a supermajority Senate would do much in the way of curbing corporate power? Absolutely not. But perhaps, some semblance of a democracy may remain if the Republicans aren't in power during the next few years. See Ian's latest post for example.

That's just unthinkable for Icahn and all his pals. The past years have apparently not been profitable enough. But when I think about Naomi Klein's latest piece in Rolling Stone it all starts adding up to some very frightening prospects.

There's a word for this kind of corporatist, right-wing ideology.