confusion

Don’t really have anything in particular to talk about tonight but I wanted to put something up for the people who do check in regularly, so I will just ramble on for a while…

First of all: I miss my girlfriend. She asked me how I deal with it recently and the truth is I don’t deal with it. When I think about the fact that the last time I saw here was in June and the next time I will see her, if I am lucky is December I miss her terribly and I have to think about something else. Keep my mind on something, the problem is I have an over active mind and when I sit and read my mind starts to wonder off on it’s own and I don’t pay attention to what I am reading… I start thinking about missing C███████ then about how to get the money to go see her, which leads to thoughts on my upcoming job and needing to get an apartment but not having any money to make a deposit (I should get some money that GMU owes me soon and that will cover the deposit and first months rent.) All this leads me to remembering that I will not have enough money to afford a nice new 4Runner that I want—badly! All this is very depressing and I end up not knowing what I just read so I have to start it over but that’s annoying and I just put the book down, which explains why I have not finished Magic Mountain yet—been reading it for over a month! Anyway, I really miss C███████, and until I get a place and a phone I cannot even call her up and talk to her in person because my parents don’t make a lot of over seas calls so the long distance plan they have does not do over seas an they charge a fortune for the calls! Ahhh!! I hate being broke! I hate it! Must have money!

All this needing constant stimulation to avoid thinking too hard had driven me to watching news TV all the time. I see the same stories about 20 times a day… I watch the stock market ticker for fun and try to guess what the next move will be up or down (been easy—down, down, down with the stocks!!!!) Some interesting things have been on, Ken Burns Civil War was on last week—I watched it all. I love Ken Burns works, and now PBS is running a weekly show called Ken Burns American Stories on Monday nights. It’s a really good show, old one hour documentaries made by Burns and crew over the last twenty years. I like public TV.

Anyway, I think I will go to bed now.

P.S. How you all like the new website background images? I like then, the site is still simple but has a little something so as not to be too plain.

It’s all ‘ficiall like now ’cause I done Gradumacated!

That’s right! It’s only been seven months since I had classes but GMU, Syracuse and City finally got their collective acts together enough to arrange for my transfer of credits and I have officially graduated! The paper works says I was awarded a Bachelors of Science in Computer Science with Distinction on August 17, 2002. Ok who’s buying the Beer/Wine/Al-key and where is the party? Yea me!

Nelson Mandela is an amazing man but what the hell is he talking about? Apparently he said today that the reason the US is “challenging” the UN is because the Secretary General is black. What? Ok, George Bush is a fuck up, and this whole “war on Iraq” is, to say the least, a questionably fiasco, but I don’t think race has anything to do with him ignoring the UN—I think politics has more to do with it.

I agree with this;

“No country, however powerful it may be, is entitled to act outside the United Nations”

Then in the same interview Mandela said this;

“now that we have got the black secretary-generals like Boutros Boutros Ghali and now Kofi Annan, certain countries that believe in white supremacy, are ignoring the United Nations.”

But I really like this one;

“when the secretary-generals were white, we never had the question of any country ignoring the United Nations”

because I can’t agree with it, haven’t we always ignored the UN if we disagreed with what they said?

Racism is a problem in the world, and Mandela knows that as well as, or better than, anyone but screaming that someone (or a whole country) is racist everytime they disagree with someone of a different race IS RACISM, and it makes the world MORE RACIST, not less.

I got a Job! With Lockheed Martin in Reston! Yea me. Anyway more on that as it develops—I don’t know all the details yet! But this brings up an interesting thought: I want to live in DC, someplace hip, cool, happening, whatever you want to call it—someplace with stuff to do, things I can walk to. Ok fine, I know I am going to have to pay a little but I’m ok with that. The problem I have with DC is not the rent; it’s the politics! Forget the fact that DC cannot seam to elect a non-crack addict to it’s mayors office they don’t have any real power anyway… which brings me to the root of the problem.

The reason that the Mayor of DC has minimal power is because anything that requires money has to be approved by congress! And the real bitch: DC does not get a vote in congress! This has been a sticking point for DC’ers for years, in fact their license plates say “Taxation without representation” right on them. I’ve never really thought much about it, I have always thought it was wrong, but never cared that much. Now if I’m going to live in DC, and especially given the current state of politics I would like to have a vote that counts (not like those people in Florida!) I don’t care if they make DC part of Virginia or Maryland’s Congressional districts, but come on, that whole war against the British was about taxes and representation wasn’t it? Or did I miss something? You think anything would happen if I refused to pay my taxes and then handcuffed myself to something in the capital till then gave DC a vote? I mean anything besides me getting severally beat down, very skinny and fired? What do you think would get congresses attention on this?

The news is filled with commentators and guests talking about the speech Al Gore made a few days ago about the possibility of going to war with Iraq (note: It’s only a “war” if congress declares war which it has not done in the “war on terrorism”, and the military actions taken by the US have been taken under the War Powers Act which dates to the Vietnam war!) Rush Limbaugh said that he almost stayed home because he was so livid at Gore’s speech. One of Limbaugh’s callers called Gore un-American.

Un-American? Now this guy has a right to his opinion and to voicing his opinion. But I wonder how well he understands what being American and un-American mean? Dissenting viewpoints and open discussion of things are at the core of what is American. I mean, get over yourself. Say that you disagree, say that Gore is a flower child and should be ignored, whatever, but to accuse someone of being un-American because they hold a different point of view from you tells me that your emotions are ruling your words not your intellect.

As for the idea of more “war” in Iraq? I don’t like it, I think we need more Al Gores and Scott Ritters out there voicing concerns. I agree with what Scott Ritter is saying; that we need to send the UN Weapons Inspectors back in to Iraq, and if they are harassed or not allowed to perform their duties then, with the support of the UN we should take action. Then we have an argument grounded in an international forum. Today with Iraq telling to UN to bring back the inspectors and George Bush and Tony Blair saying, forget what Saddam is saying, we need to got to war now, it’s Bush and Blair that should like blood thirsty war mongers.

What really pisses me off is the politicalization of the war talk. Chaney saying that the dissenters are un-American, and that people should vote for republican candidates because they are pro-war on Iraq. It’s obvious that there will be no war till after the November elections, because the republicans think they can get more seats in congress on war talk. Bush will most likely hold off any military action as long as he can so he can drag any war and its aftermath out to the next presidential election. Politics as usual.