In a story I wrote recently, I revised the phrase “as American as apple pie and baseball.” To better reflect Americans’ lackluster sentiment about baseball and the most fashionable tenet of our contemporary political culture, I coined the phrase, “as American as apple pie and the war on terrorism.” But the MoveOn political action committee, which is supporting war on terrorism opponent John Kerry’s run for the White House, is attempting to change the face of America, and in the process, restore the old similes used to characterize American identity in this election year.

That is, MoveOn.org is sponsoring bake sales across the country this Saturday in an effort to distinguish the fundraising tactics of the Democrats (little money raised the old-fashioned way) and those of Republicans (big money). Sure, there is something a bit humorous about this fundraising strategy. I’ll admit that it reminds me a bit of the kids in student council holding bake sales to raise money for various projects in middle school. But why did we quit holding bake sales once we came of a certain age and develop more “sophisticated” fundraising strategies? Many, whose parents would no longer do the baking for them, didn’t have the time or interest to learn how to become Betty Crocker. But I suspect that much of the reason we outgrow bake sales as a fundraising strategy is the minimal amount of profit compared to the amount of time it takes to bake and stand around selling our products. That being said, you’re probably thinking, “and that’s exactly why this is a waste of time for raising funds to help Kerry defeat an extremely well-funded Bush campaign …”

But I’m not sure that that is the case. When I received the email about the MoveOn Bake Sale yesterday afternoon, I skeptically checked to see if there were any bake sales in my area. There were none. I then checked again a few minutes later and 10 bake sales within 10 miles of my zip code had been organized. Some of them already had close to 40 volunteers for baking and selling. Some are scheduled for individuals’ homes; one is scheduled to be held at a local grocery store; another is scheduled to be held at one of the largest and most popular book stores in the city; and one is scheduled to be held at a popular restaurant. And there will likely be hundreds more like these held across the country. At the end of the day when the profits are totaled, I suspect that these bake sales will raise more than those we held in middle school. But even if they don’t, I don’t think fundraising itself is actually the point.

Rather the purpose seems to be to restore a spirit of innovation and entrepreneurship to Americans regardless of whether they’re CEOs or people who are just barely getting by in today’s economy. And in the process, the bake sales serve to forge a sense of local community among bake sale volunteers and like-minded customers at any given bake sale. And by scheduling these bake sales to occur on the same day across the country, this project unifies Americans committed to unseating Bush and alters the sense of hopelessness that many have in the face of the corporate stronghold on the political process. Is this a winning strategy? Only time will tell with regard to the presidential election. But as a strategy to bring communities together and change the face of America one apple pie at a time, it seems like a promising project.

On a related note, I encourage you to check out the National Women’s Law Center report on the setbacks to women’s rights in the U.S. during the past three-and-a-half years. You may be aware of some of the setbacks, but due to a dearth of media coverage on the subject, some of the findings just might blow your mind (as they did mine).

Laura Nathan-Garner

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A facile understanding of the meaning of diversity is troubling, as is the oversimplification of the issue of equality into a stark dichotomy of race and wealth.  

Walter Benn Michaels, professor of English at the University of Illinois-Chicago, declares in The New York Times that in their quest to increase the wealth of “cultural identities” in their student bodies, colleges and universities obscure the question of socio-economic diversity. Michaels claims:

Diversity, like gout, is a rich people’s problem. And it is also a rich people’s solution. For as long as we’re committed to thinking of difference as something that should be respected, we don’t have to worry about it as something that should be eliminated.

Michaels does make a valid point that socio-economic diversity is vital to creating a vibrant, fair, and stimulating educational environment. However, framing the issue of diversity in such stark and, if we were to believe Michaels, mutually exclusive terms — race or wealth — is abysmally unproductive. We — and certainly Michaels — must expand our understanding of what constitutes diversity without compromising our commitment to furthering, in concrete terms, the wealth of diversity in institutions of higher education. Absent of diversity — in its physical manifestations, its socio-economic context, and in diversity of opinion – even the best-intentioned education can only create a myopic world view that leaves students ill-equipped to respond to the needs of an increasingly multicultural society. Whittling down the concept of diversity to one of either race or socio-economic status is at best an anemic understanding of diversity.  

Mimi Hanaoka

The United States is now embroiled in an escalating hell of its own making; hundreds of Iraqi civilians are reported dead in Fallujah, the US-appointed Iraqi Governing Council is apparently livid that it was not consulted by the United States prior to the U.S. program to “pacify” Fallujah, and President Bush and the Coalition Provisional Authority have created a united front of resistance against the US-led occupation.  
  
While it is unclear whether the current cease-fire will produce a peaceful agreement, it is evident that Paul Bremer and the CPA instigated a disastrously violent chain of events when the CPA temporarily shut down al-Hawzah, a weekly newspaper run by Muqtada al-Sadr, a radical Shiite cleric in Iraq. In choking off a legitimate forum for political discourse by shutting down al-Hawzah, the CPA further angered, frustrated, and insulted a large number of Iraqis; frustration led to protests which, in turn, led to the current orgy of violence.  

Abdel Hady Abu Taleb, a journalist, demanded in Egypt’s state-owned Al-Akhbar newspaper, “How will the Americans explain to the world the joint Shiite-Sunni intifada?” How indeed will President Bush and the Coalition Provisional Authority explain to the world and to the families of the dead how the alleged victory in Iraq has disintegrated into an angry bloodbath? And what is to become of Iraq, given that President Bush is adamantly insisting on June 30 as the date on which the CPA will hand over power to a local Iraqi government?  

Juan Cole, Professor of History at the University of Michigan and author of Sacred Space and Holy War, which examines the history of Shiite Islam in Iraq, Iran, and the Persian Gulf, stated on April 10, 2004:

This looks to me like an incipient collapse of the US government of Iraq. Beyond the IGC, the bureaucracy is protesting. Many government workers in the ministries are on strike and refusing to show up for work, according to ash-Sharq al-Awsat. Without Iraqis willing to serve in the Iraqi government, the US would be forced to rule the country militarily and by main force. Its legitimacy appears to be dwindling fast.

Muqtada al-Sadr’s Friday prayers sermon, read by one of his aids at the Great Mosque of Kufa, sounds both increasingly prescient and like a clearly articulated battle-cry:

“I direct my words at my enemy, Bush … If your justification for the war on Iraq was Saddam and his weapons of mass destruction, then these issues are past, and you are now making war on the entire Iraqi people. I advise you to withdraw immediately from Iraq, otherwise you will lose the elections for which you are now campaigning, and you will lose your own people, and other peoples, as well … America is not confronting a popular resistance, but rather a genuine revolution.”

President Bush and the CPA, though lethally allergic to the idea of an Islamic society, need to reconsider what the new Iraq will look like, and they must reconcile themselves to the fact that it may be clerics — unlike the secular Baathist regime — who become the leading voices in a new Iraq.  

Mimi Hanaoka

I’ve always found it peculiar how people tend to praise statues and paintings of “healthy” — even plump — female subjects for their beauty, and yet beyond the museums, these same people  deem women whose body forms are similar to those artforms unattractive, fat, or a slew of other adjectives. How is it, I wondered, that we concoct this disjuncture between what we consider beautiful art and what we consider beautiful in the world around us (not that this isn’t art in some ways)?

Apparently, the residents of a small town in Tennessee are attempting to do away with this disjuncture. But now I’m left wondering whether it is best to acknowlege that we should be able to distinguish our opinions on bodies in art from our opinions on bodies in “the real world.”

In response to complaints about the classical-style, nude female statues at G & L Garden Center, the center covered the statues with two-piece sarongs. Apparently, doing so doesn’t just conceal the art. It also adds another layer to the art as the clothes alter the representation that people see and think about. Now many customers try to peek underneath the sarongs — which almost seems to suggest that people consider the statues to be no different than human bodies. Which, of course, begs the question: why do we continue to differentiate between artistic representations of the human body and the body itself?

Laura Nathan-Garner

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When I was perusing the Internet yesterday, something caught my eye. I don’t recall the exact phrase used on the BUST magazine homepage, but the terms “Lynne Cheney,” “erotic,” and “bisexual” were definitely in the mix. Both intrigued and skeptical, I clicked on the link, which took me to the following story:

Marcia Ellen Beevre
is BellaOnline’s Gay Lesbian Host

Sisters — A Book By Lynne Cheney

If you look around hard enough on the Web you find some humorous stuff. Everyone knows that our Vice President, Dick Cheney, has a lesbian daughter, Mary, about whom he rarely speaks openly even though the poor girl has to work for his re-election committee. But did you know that Dick’s wife Lynne, wrote a sizzling western novel called “Sisters” which is filled with hot, steamy stuff like lesbian love, prostitution and rape, and supports a sweeping pro-feminist agenda?

The protagonist, Sophie Dymond, is obviously bisexual as she makes love to her deceased sister’s former boyfriend (outside of marriage I might add), and doesn’t shy away from sex with women either.

Some excerpts:

The women who embraced in the wagon were Adam and Eve crossing a dark cathedral stage — no, Eve and Eve, loving one another as they would not be able to once they ate of the fruit and knew themselves as they truly were. She felt curiously moved, curiously envious of them. She had never to this moment thought Eden a particularly attractive paradise, based as it was on naiveté, but she saw that the women in the cart had a passionate, loving intimacy forever closed to her. How strong it made them. What comfort it gave.

The young woman was heavily powdered, but quite attractive, a curvesome creature, rounded at bosom and cheek. When she smiled, even her teeth seemed puffed and rounded, like tiny ivory pillows.

Let us go away together, away from the anger and imperatives of men. We shall find ourselves a secluded bower where they dare not venture. There will be only the two of us, and we shall linger through long afternoons of sweet retirement. In the evenings I shall read to you while you work your cross-stitch in the firelight. And then we shall go to bed, our bed, my dearest girl.

“Sisters” was penned in 1981. It’s hard to find a copy today, but Amazon says they will give it a shot for you if you want a copy. It’s been said the Repubos are buying them up to keep the 2nd lady from having to admit to this embarrassment. The Canadian publisher was going to issue a second printing this year, but when the Mrs. got wind of it she called it to a screeching halt.

Like most of the indiscretions of the Bush administration that they don’t want you to know about, “Sisters” will be kept from public scrutiny wherever possible. Odd. Don’t they think we know that Repubos enjoy sex too? Even lesbian sex? Like most women, thoughts about gay sex have obviously crossed this author’s mind.

So apparently, Lynne Cheney can write, and apparently, over 20 years ago, she published an erotic book. And we’re supposed to care … Not that I can deny my own intrigue. After all, I did click on the link, though the link title was not nearly descriptive enough for me to know that the article would merely offer a look at Cheney’s past.

Sure, I suppose that the fact that Cheney penned this book draws into question the Bush administration’s sexual agenda. It does demonstrate that, yes, people from all walks of life think about sex — and all varieties of sex, at that. But does it prove that she supports same-sex marriages or actually engaging in some seemingly taboo practices? Not necessarily. Is one’s fictional writing always equivalent to the writer’s version of reality?

Whatever the case is, I find both this story about Cheney’s book and the attempts by Cheney and Republicans to hide her authorship of Sisters from the public’s knowledge to be symptomatic of “politics as usual.” Of course, Cheney has a past. Strom Thurmond had a child with a black woman. Bill Clinton smoked pot. President Bush was a wildchild and an alcoholic until he “saw the light” on his 40th birthday. He may have even gone AWOL during his time in the service. Newt Gingrich had an affair. Hillary Rodham Clinton used to be a Republican during the 1960s, and many a politician has reversed his or her stance on certain policies. Guess what? Each and every one of us has a few skeletons I’m sure we’d prefer that the entire world not find out about.

Is this productive politically? I think not. Instead of unearthing tales about each other’s distant pasts, perhaps it’s more fruitful for the media, politicians, and people like us to acknowledge that people do change. None of us are born into the person we’ll be at the age of 60. Rather, the experiences that we have throughout our lives allow us to accumulate knowledge, form opinions, learn new things, have new experiences, and alter those opinions and perspectives.

So perhaps instead of simply noting that certain political figures have pasts that contradict what they preach, we should ask why they changed. What experiences did people like Lynne Cheney have that caused them to alter their beliefs? How is Bush able to justify sending thousands of young men and women to Iraq when he went AWOL during his military stint? What was it that caused Bush to “see the light” and find God when he turned 40?

We may not like the answers we learn; we may not agree with what those politicians did in the past or are advocating in the present. But by questioning the causes of these so-called flip-flops, perhaps we can begin to understand the similarities between political leaders and ourselves and make better, more informed policies based on the changes and reversals that enlightenment produces. Maybe then we could finally begin to do politics based on leadership abilities, life experience, and knowledge rather than mudslinging about one’s past, which almost no one in the political spectrum is immune to. At least not if they’re human.

Laura Nathan-Garner

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I’m writing this while listening to Air America Radio’s broadcast of Condoleezza Rice’s testimony before the 9/11 Commission. I write and erase multiple attempts to confront this spectacle.  I feel a dis-ease deep down inside of me, yet I am unable to give voice to this nausea.  In despair, I wonder what I, as a concerned citizen, can say when Rice’s defense has already been over-covered and spun well before she spoke a word in defense of the Bush administration’s actions prior to 9/11.  The one bit of knowledge that I am confident about is that each side is already lining up, eager to gain capital from this media event. Frustrated at the attempt to pierce the veil of secrecy or misdirection or noise, I try to think about whether it is possible in an age of cynicism to retain trust in our public servants.

This is doubly distressing for me because, at the same time, I am developing a writing course designed to facilitate student engagement with the upcoming presidential elections.  How can I expect my students to make meaning out of the swirl of data when I am devoting large parts of my life to informing myself about current events without clear results? I lack certainty! I am often confused! I know my reflective doubt is supposed to be a good sign in that I am avoiding the dogmatic certainty that often leads to abuses, but can radical doubt be the foundation for critical engagement?  Academia has skillfully prepared me to question all texts and positions. Grasping my hammer tightly, I eagerly assault all sacred idols and social illusions, leaving the mess for others to clean up. Perhaps in this time of secrecy and lies it is time to think about a reconstructive ethics?

Still stumped, I have to return to the basics.  What is it I see as a problem in our society?  What plagues my own thoughts? What would I like my students to learn?  What ideas can frame the beginning questions that might allow the imagining of new possibilities?  This nausea that pervades my being initiates a radical need to return to the etymological roots (rad-) of the words that might jumpstart my stalled intellect.

A framing concern for me — personally and professionally — is ecology as the study of the interconnectedness of beings in environmental systems of all types.  The root “eco-” originates from the Greek word oikos, which referred to an understanding of home, household, or more fully, our habitus.  Ecology, then, is the study or understanding (take that apart — the foundations of the ground below us that support our current position) of the world which we inhabit and the attempt to derive new meanings from the interconnectedness and interrelationships of life. The need for ecological awareness seem obvious to me, but the word has unfortunately been paired in an oppositional relationship to another dominating term — “economics.” While ecology derives its conjunctive meaning from logos (knowledge), economics draws its conjunctive power from nomos (law).  We have then in contemporary society a dualistic division of the concerns of these two important and powerful words. The study, knowledge, and understanding of our environments vs. the control, regulation, and management of those environments.  

Might a reconstructive ethics start here in a rapprochement of these two essential concepts for understanding the increasingly interrelated and interconnected global system?  Would the breaking down of these artificial barriers between these two major concerns of life allow for a fuller understanding of how we might restore a sense of justice, rights, and responsibilites? No longer would it simply be an issue of ecology against economics, or the market before our environment, or a separation of the human from nature.  

Still, Rice drones on in the background as our public servants take turns grilling her. Glaringly absent from our current politics is any concern about rebuilding or restructuring our world.  Instead, it is always a matter of attacking, retributio,n or punishment. We must isolate, preempt, and sterilize. We must be on guard, vigilant, and controlling. When will we begin to think about the foundations of our thought and ask if, in our origins, there may be flaws that infect our questions and proposals, stalling our efforts before they start and distorting the results beforehand?

thivai

William Hung is hoping to bang his way up the charts with his debut album, which was released yesterday.

The castoff from American Idol has been transformed into a pop icon despite a lack of singing talent.

Is it just his boyish charm and innocence that have captivated America? SFGate.com columnist Emil Guillermo says it’s the perpetuation of racial stereotypes that has catapulted Hung to the tune of more than 120,000 hits on a Google search.

Most anyone who watched Hung on Idol or downloaded the performance of “She Bangs” on the Internet knows he can’t sing or dance. Guillermo offers a plausible explanation for the William Hung phenomenon: Mainstream America likes to make people of color the butt of its jokes, and Hung fits the classic stereotype of the ineffectual Asian American male.

Hung has guts that go against the image he evokes in some people, and from all accounts, he’s a bright guy.

It’s just absurd to think that if Hung actually did have talent, he probably wouldn’t have a record deal, given the aversion of music labels and Hollywood to Asian Americans, particularly males.

chinoloco

Last week, I went to the New York premiere of an independent documentary that had taken three years of effort by three pro-Palestinian activists. Putting aside my admiration for the dedication of the filmmakers, I left the event with a feeling I sometimes have when in the presence of politicians. I couldn’t help but roll my eyes and feel the need to get out of there.

The film, titled “Until when …,” drew dozens of supporters, many of whom had to stand in the back of the room to watch the 76-minute documentary. The film featured interviews with the various members of four Palestinian families living in a refugee camp in the occupied West Bank. The filmmakers, director Dahna Abourahme and producers Annemarie Jacir and Suzy Salamy, originally conceived the film to examine the “right to return” concept. But the film also spent much time exploring the everyday lives of the families through interviews about their daily struggles. At times, the film was touching, at other times predictable.

Now I’ll get to what induced the eye rolling. During the discussion after the showing, a man asked why the film’s English subtitles said “Israeli” instead of “Jew” when the film’s subjects said, “Yahoud” (In Arabic, Yahoud means Jew. But the decision to use Israeli seemed to come from catering to an American audience, who might see the usage of the term Jew as anti-Semitic).

The man who asked the question said that “we” aren’t the ones who should be defensive. Presumably, “they” — as in the Israelis — should be forced to defend themselves. It seemed to me what this man really wanted to know was this: Just how activist are these filmmakers? Just how truly Palestinian are they? He wanted to question their political credibility. He seemed to want to know: Are these filmmakers radical enough to have membership in the Palestinian cause?

The three filmmakers had, presumably, not adhered to the rules of activism. The rules, of course, state that all forces should be marshaled for the purpose of defeating the opponent. Show no weakness; leave no gaps. His type of thinking, like that of propagandists, is a plague on diplomacy. But it raises an interesting question: Should a film like this have as its priority being political or just being art?

Vinnee Tong

Reportage is a function of market and readership, and while this is a natural development, there is certainly something unnerving about opening CNN.com and finding that the front page headline is not about the disastrous developments in Iraq, a reminder that we are living through the 10th anniversary of the Rwandan genocide, an update on Haiti or any other consequential piece of news, but rather, “UConn beats Georgia Tech for NCAA hoops crown.”

We are often separated from a variety of ideas, news, facts and opinions by the simple fact of the chasm of language. As a vehicle to help readers distance themselves from their solipsistic worldview that is circumscribed by language, The BBC Monitoring’s site culls reportage from various news media and translates the information from up to 100 languages into English. Today, one portion of the site conveniently gathers snippets and headlines from Arabic language newspapers pertaining to the confrontation in Iraq between the supporters of Muqtada al-Sadr, a Shia cleric, and coalition forces.    

If this great ether of the Internet can provide more than easy pornography and free music, let it be the opportunity to see the world through a different cultural, religious, intellectual and emotional lens.    

Mimi Hanaoka

When the Coalition Provisional Authority last week temporarily shut down al-Hawzah, a weekly newspaper run by Muqtada al-Sadr, a radical Shiite cleric in Iraq, I wondered if Paul Bremer was effectively driving those hungry for political dialogue increasingly towards religious centers.  Apparently he was.

Supporters of Muqtada al-Sadr today clashed with coalition forces in Najaf and Sadr City, a Shia enclave on the outskirts of Baghdad. It is possible and probably true that Muqtada al-Sadr’s followers would have engaged in violent conflicts with coalition forces regardless of whether Bremer had shut down al-Hawzah. However, it is certainly worth recognizing that it was only last week that al-Sadr’s newspaper was closed by Bremer and the Coalition Provisional Authority, and that the CPA’s rationale for closing the weekly newspaper was that it contained articles designed to provoke instability and incite violence against the coalition forces.

In silencing a potential forum for political discourse, Bremer has certainly failed to stem violence against coalition forces, and he has arguably driven those who desire a political voice even further toward religious centers and violence.  My aim is not to question the importance or impact of these religious centers, nor I am equating violence with religious centers.  Rather, I want to underscore the idea that by silencing a newspaper — a medium that America ostensibly values as crucial to political discourse and the dissemination of ideas — the coalition provisional authority is chocking off an avenue for democratically acceptable political involvement.  

Mimi Hanaoka