Combat Queer Online

A Confession

So, we're all real, real excited about Obama being president. I just checked CNN, and Barack hasn't quite gotten around to extending Veterans' Health Benefits to covering the costs of transitioning, but hey, I'm sure it'll happen any minute(The British did it, why can't we).

But something funny has been happening in the last twenty four hours or so since Obama officially took office. People keep asking me if I still have to go to Iraq. 

Yeah, I still do. Obama isn't pulling anybody out, isn't planning to have it over for another sixteen months. He wasn't just hiding a policy change in his back pocket until Bush had been safely returned to the wild. We've still got all the problems we had yesterday morning. Well, not all, I did finally get a better boss.

But here's the thing, and dear reader, I'll understand if you're a little horrified. Every time someone has suggested that I won't go to the sandbox, and I feel a tiny note of panic, like a single piano key being hit in an otherwise empty house. The idea of it being over without me having directly participated, it just, well, it terrifies me. 

Have you ever heard of the strangler fig? Is this amazing tree down in South and Central America. It produces these big, fat figs that all the birds love to eat, and after they gobbled a few fig they tend to poop in the tops of other trees. Well, in the first stage of the strangler figs life, it's looks like a vine. The fig ends out shoots that grow around and around the host trees, eventually reaching the soil and becoming roots. 

Over the years the strangler grows larger and larger, eventually killing the host tree.   

Now, what I was amazed by the first time I played in one of these trees was that even the fully grown ones are hollow. They're a giant mass of woody vines. You can climb right up the middle, and find these beautiful, wide, flat platforms of vines near the top where it's fun to sit and picnic and sunbath. Wonderful trees.

But I'm getting off topic.

My life, it seems, is like the strangler fig. For years it's been growing around this deployment. All the training the preparation, the putting things on hold... Even many of the relationships I've built have been built, at least partially, on this idea that I'm someone who's going off to fight. It's not a war I believe in, but it's something I feel like I have to do. 

The idea that that host tree might fall before my vines are strong enough to support themselves, the idea that I might go down with the war if it ends before I've gotten everything I need out of it... It scares me.

Now, obviously, this is a deeply selfish truth. There are around 700,000 dead Iraqi civilians who might otherwise be alive today if not for this war. If it could end this afternoon, that would be wonderful, a boon to humanity. That would be something worth celebrating for generations. I'm not going to pretend that it isn't monstrous that I am terrified by the idea to quick end to the war. It is awful, selfish, mean, shortsighted, but it's the truth.

I don't know what I would do, could do, if I wasn't going to war for the next year. I've given up so much to get ready for this moment. So much. 

All I can think of to do here is pray for peace, both in the world and in my own mind. One of the great blessings of prayer is that God understands that we are broken, and He will listen to us even when we don't know the right thing to pray for or the right way to pray. 

If it's your thing, please pray for the world also, and please remember us poor broken soldiers.   

We Got Away With It

I don't really know what else to say. So many people have already said so much about President Obama's inauguration, and I don't really know what there is for me to add.

For some reason, it makes me very happy that Joe Biden got to be president for a few minutes. Despite his regular craziness(which, let's face it, I enjoy) Biden strikes me as a hard worker, maybe not the most inspiring guy in the world, but one of the most loyal and devoted.I think he'll do a fine job, and I'm glad the ceremony ran a little late, allowing him that honor.

Rick Warren, well, he gave an Ok invocation. He tried. It was awkward, uninspired, it didn't feel like Warren knew what he was really trying to say, but, well, it could have been worse. He tried to be inclusive, and I'm willing to give any Evangelical points for at least trying. 

And Rev. Joseph Lowery, wow. He's prayer was amazing. As he was finishing, all I could think was, "Holy shit, we got away with this. Thank you, thank you Lord for letting us do this, thank you for letting us move into the future, and oh shit, we actually did it."

Obama Must Be Quaking In His White House

So, there's is a nine minute twenty four second interview with Ms. Palin up on www.howobamagotelected.com.

I'm going to watch it, and type my reactions to each shot AS THEY HAPPEN in the, uh, film. Of course, I'll pause it so I don't miss anything, and if I don't catch something, I might watch a shot twice, but, well, you can follow along AS IT HAPPENS. Woo:

-Really? Complaining about untrue rumors? Gosh, I can't imagine what sort of campaign would mainly survive on deeply untrue rumors.

-Yeah, bloggers. How dare they offer another perspective on the world they live it. And do it without revealing their identities. Good point Pitbull.

-Yeah, what it is that drives people to believe the worst. I mean, it's not like a politician would get up in front of crowds and repeat ugly, baseless rumors as her supports called for the lynching of the other guy. That'd just be craaaaazy.

-Boo hoo hoo, my family's a train wreck. Why did the media pay so much more attention to my train wreck of teen pregnancy and secessionism than it did to Obama's hard working, sucessful family? boo hoo hoo

-How dare the media point out that your grandkid's daddy was looking for a handout, and in doing so prevented you from illegally giving him the handout. It isn't faaaair.

-Man Palin, if you really thought that you shouldn't have gone back for more of the Katie Couric interview, and you were(and theoretically are) enough of a leader to run the most powerful country on Earth, shouldn't YOU have been strong enough to stop the interviews? I mean, otherwise, it sounds like you're nothing more than a follower.

-Awwwww, Katie Couric "edited" the film to make you look bad. Thaaaaat's what happened. Never mind that a second ago you said that you didn't feel like the interview went well, what it really was was that Katie Couric edited the film to make you look bad. Poor little you.

-KATIE YOUR NOT THE CENTER OF EVERYONE"S UNIVERSE I DON'T HAVE TO ANSWER WHY I DON'T READ BOO HOO HOO

-Um, so the reason that she couldn't answer simple questions about what she read was that she read publications, newspapers, and magazines. Wow. Want to be more specific? Oh, "USA Today(that's some hard journalism right there)" and the articleless "New York Times." I'm sorry, but Governor,  I think you're just naming things you might have heard of.

-MAMA GRIZZLY! Gonna eat Tina Fey. Also, Palin insistence that her daughters engagement is anything but political stage craft, or at the very least that it is unaffected by political stage craft, well, that's kinda silly. The fact is, the McCain/Palin jumped those kids on an airplane and shot them right down t the GOP convention. That campaign put those kids in front of the camera repeatedly. If you don't want the media to talk about something, don't put it in front of the camera. Look at Cheney's gay daughter, they kept her off the camera, and to a large extent out of the media. Had they paraded her up and down as a political dog whistle, well, the media would have been all over that.

-Man, Palin didn't watch Tina Fey's skits? Palin, apparently, was real, real bad at knowing or learning things. Everybody in America is watching Tina Fey and Palin couldn't be bothered to watch each skit?

Of course, it's far more likely that Palin's just being dishonest, so whatever.

-Yes, it says a great deal about society when one woman can be honor for her intelligence and wit, and another woman can be laughed at for her stupidity and dishonesty.

-Um, first, I think everybody, with the exception of Caroline Kennedy, agrees that Caroline Kennedy probably shouldn't be given this senate seat, and it doesn't look like she will. But this idea that there was "class bias" is interesting. As someone who comes from a poor, rural area, is related to lots of poor folks who live in rural areas, and who in enlisted in the US Military, I know folks from up and down the class spectrum. But, Ms. Palin, I think you and I have a slightly different understanding of class. You seem to think that lower class means stupid, poor, and incapable of making good decisions about sex. How dare you implicate such a large portion of America in your worthlessness?

-The media, the media, boo hoo hoo. See Palin, the reason Obama didn't pick you is that you are an idiot, a bad governor, and a criminal.  No amount of "media bias" is going to change those three facts. If Obama had tapped you for VP, the media still would have torn you apart, because, frankly, you have no business being VP>

-Oh Palin, during the campaign we *looked* at your record. It as a record of incompetence, fraud, and greed. Once again, your problem isn't that we didn't get to know you, you problem is that we did.

Mistress of the Universe.

I am the universe's mistress. No, dear reader, this isn't the post where I talk about being a whore, admit to a list of embarrassing and lusty misadventures. Nothing like that. I have no desire to use this blog as a place to talk about anything remotely relating to those topics.

No, what I mean is that I feel like the person who briefly brings some light, excitement, and joyful chaos into the world, but isn't built to last. No, whatever sparkle of wonder I bring lasts no more than a few weeks, months at the outside, but then fades into memory. It's interesting, it's fun to talk about, but it isn't concrete, it isn't lasting. 

I have flings with the universe, adventures. I go off and fight monsters, defeat Republicans, make discoveries, write papers, right wrongs, but then it's over, then I return to big blank space where I live. Of course, the universe takes care of me, like any ashamed husband with the wealth of the universe would. I always have enough provided to live. Every adventures leaves me with the resources to survive, survive in fine style really, in that big blank space until the next fling, the next adventure. 

Now, I'm about to start another affair, a steamy, flashy one no doubt, but an affair none the less. Like all affairs, it will feel real while it's going on, it will feel like it could last forever, it will feel like the person I become during it is the truest me possible, but in the end, it will be nothing more than another fling with the universe, another tryst that will end, and from which I'll return to my home void.

Maybe one day I'll stop being an easy adventurer, an experience slut, and I'll find a part of reality to settle down with, a life I can commit to. 

You never know what might happen.  

Furnace Is Out

So, I am very cold. The furnace at my house in Liberal Icebox has died, and it can't be fixed until tomorrow morning. Sadly, everybody I know up here is out of town. I am bundled up, ready to face the cold of the night. I considered a hotel, but eh, money, etc, and hell, I've done plenty of cold weather camping, and I'll survive fine.

Heat, I can deal with heat. Heat pounds on you, but cold, cold pulls you down. It grabs your fingers and toes, it makes you work five times as hard...

God, I hold the pipes don't freeze...

Family Business

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/12/26/bristol-palin-drug-arrest_n_153586.html

So, dear read, I hear you asking, "Combat Queer, why are you sharing this story with me. The campaign's over. Palin lost. Stop pointing out what a trashy place Wasilla, Alaska is."

But you, dear reader, are missing the point. Frankly, there' are lots and lots of places in America where stupid people get caught selling Rush Limbaugh's favorite pick me up. Frankly, Republicans buying and selling perscription drugs in small town America is about as American as corn syrup-laden apple pie, paying lip service to the civil rights movement, blindness to the dangerous of imperialism, or handing out small pox infected blankets to the indigenous people. It's a part of who we as a nation.

But you know what stands out to me about this article? There's a little snidbit toward the end, after the description of Bristol's mother-in-law's clever "coffee" gambit. 

Ah, here it is:

"The trooper's affidavit indicates that Sarah Palin's candidacy factored into the investigation, with state officials delaying execution of a search warrant until this month, when Johnston was "no longer under the protection or surveillance of the Secret Service.""

Oh my goodness gracious, what's this? Palin's candidacy protected a drug dealer, allowing her to continue to sell soul killing poison for several more months. I mean, it makes sense. Of course the right and proper use of the Secret Service is to protect drug dealers from arrest. That's just how things should be.

Seriously folks, seriously: Are Republicans capable of, or rather(I'll concede) is the Republican Party leadership capable of using power in ways that don't harm this country? Do they do anything other than try to benefit themselves while harming others? 

Seriously, I think I need an example of them doing something good. (And no, empty promises about abortion do not count, as they actually do more harm, rather than less) 

A Quick Reminder

Any time any tells you how good the soldiers in Iraq have it, how much the government is talking care of folks like me, well, keep this in mind:

http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/12/15/burn.pits/index.html

Notice, these burn pits are still in regular use. They're burning medical waste, plastics, feces, everything. It's right by the base, everyone breaths it. It is massively unhealthy. Long term, people die of lung cancer because of this mess.

And we're still using the burn pits over in jolly ol' Iraq. So just remember, no matter how many fucking yellow ribbon magnets you have on your car, "The Troops" are breathing shit in everyday that's killing them while you sit around back home and bitch and moan about how hard life is since you took out that third mortgage.

But don't worry folks, don't worry, the government promises, for realssss, that there's probably very little chance that burning plastic and medical waste is producing dangerous fumes. Shit, that probably why Bush has started recommending that needy families burn plastics and medical waste in their home to stay warm this winter! 

This disgusts me. How do we repay the young women and men who actually step up and enlist? How do we repay the soldiers who suffer to protect the spoiled, piggish civilians of this nation? We burn plastics and medical waste where they live, to ensure that even if they escape the theater of combat reasonably unharmed, they still get to die for this country.

I just, well, I fail to understand it. If a burn pit is safe enough for my friends at Balad, then it should be safe enough for them to pump air for the base, with an average percentage of emissions from the burn pit, onto the senate floor. If it's safe for the women and men at Balad to breath, then it's safe for the fine old folks of the senate to breath. 

If we're not all in this together, I got a problem.

  

Thank God This Waited A Month And Five Days

So, apparently just as soon as Obama got out of Illinois politics, it turned directly back into a cesspit of ridiculous corruption. That's right folks, Rob Blagojevich the Governor of Illinois has been arrested for trying to sell Barak Obama's Senate seat.

I... I almost don't know what to say. How do you respond when a high ranking politician spits directly into the face of the Democratic ideals that he's supposed to be defending? It's kind of hilarious. The FBI nabbed him now to prevent him from putting all these horribly corrupt policies into action. Blagojevich, for instance, wanted to redirect money from the casinos to the horse racing industry(I know, I know, corruption in the casino and horse race industries, HOW COULD IT HAPPEN?). That bill cost some deeply, deeply honest horse racing enthusiast $100,000. 

This is why I don't trust people who run for office. No matter how good their intentions are going in, once people get some power, they seem to realize that have great opportunities to improve their own lives and those of their families at the cost of the public. For most people, after a number of years, the temptation to take advantage of their position. I guess it's just human nature, but friends, I hate it. 

Power, it seems, is a very dangerous thing. If people don't have it, those who do tend to come in and do them weak some evil. If people have power, they tend to go do evil to those without it. How do people get enough power to prevent themselves from being oppressed without becoming oppressors themselves? How do we prevent oppression without creating opportunities for oppression?

Is this the place for the suffering servant? The individual who has access to power, but choses to live as one of the oppressed? How does that work? How can someone freely choose to be a suffering servant?

Sadly, There's A Difference

http://www.cnn.com/2008/LIVING/12/05/atheists.christmas/index.html

So, somebody stole an Atheists group's sign that had been put up beside a Nativity scene, and tossed the sign in a ditch. People are horrified at the theft, sort of. First, yes, it was wrong for someone to steal the sign. This America people, you can say whatever you like, and no one should stop you from saying it.

There is, however, more going on here than the silly theft of a sign. 

Now, lots of fine, fine people are atheists. Some have perfectly good intellectuals issues with the idea of an all knowing, all powerful, all good ultimate being, some just, in their heart of hearts can't find a spark of belief, some just don't know. There is, however, a group of atheists who are just as bad as, and potentially as much trouble as Fundamentalist Evangelicals. These are the Failed Fundamentalist Atheists. FFAs are pretty easy to spot. Between the ages of 14 and 22, many of them were ALL. ABOUT. SOME. J-MAN. They carried their Bibles *everywhere*. They knew they their relationship with God was like totally so much more fulfilling that any thing that they could ever have with another person, that like, like why would you ever even try to except to Share The Good News? They went to church, like, five times times a day. They knew that the Book was a word for word transmission of the Words Of God. They really felt bad for all the other kids their ages who weren't sharing that awesome bro-mance with our Lord and Saviour. They often failed to notice that the "Word of God" mentioned in the New Testament referred to Christ instead of their book. They all the hand motion to "Our God Is An Awesome God". More than anything else though, these kids absolutely knew themselves to be right.

But then, OH NOES, it all fell apart. Some of them even made it through their intellectually bankrupt Bible college before it all when to pot. See, for a great many people, it's impossible to believe all the ridiculousness that fundies hold on to. They make an idol out of the Bible and are always horrified when their idol turns out not to be the Lord. The faith of a lot of fundies is absolutely destroyed when they realize how small and hateful their idea of the Ultimate Reality was. And it's not just the faith in the Bible or God or Jesus that's damaged, but far, far worse, their faith the absolutely correctness of what they themselves think was struck a blow. And how do they respond? They turn into FFAs. The continue to believe that they understand the world absolutely, they just absolutely understand it in the opposite way. Many FFAs assume that all Christians believed the exact same way they did, and can hardy imagine any other way a Christian might believe. They, then, believe that all Christians hate them, and are out to get them. Buddhists, Muslims, and folks of other faiths are little better, but they save a special fear and hatred for the religion they came out of.  

Now, let's go back to the matter of the Atheists' sign. It reads: "There are no gods. No devils. No angels. No heaven or hell. There is only the natural world." So far, all fine and good statements of what any Atheist might think. But the sign continues: "Religion is but myth and superstition that hardens hearts and enslaves minds." That bit, I believe, is where the issue is. 

Now, I hear you out there in Interwebs land, I hear you saying, "But CombatQueer, by announcing the birth of Christ through the nativity scene, are the Christians saying that Atheism is wrong, doing exactly the same thing the Atheists are?"

Well, fine reader(who I hold close to my heart,) there's a difference. The Nativity scene is certainly setting out the Christians beliefs, and by saying there is a Supreme Being, they are de facto saying that Atheists are wrong. What the Nativity scene does not say, though, is "Atheism hardens hearts and enslaves minds." The Nativity scene is a statement of beliefs without an attack on anyone else's ideas or beliefs. The Atheist group who put of the sign, they couldn't imagine being able to state what they thought without also tearing someone else down.

Now, that lack of imagination may be familiar to you. Many Fundamentalist Evangelicals suffer the same inability to understand that a disagreement with a person, group, or religion is not an attack on or from a person, group or religion. To think think that a difference in religion, for instance, automatically implies an attack in one direction or the other, one must assume a whole lot. One must assume that she or he fully understands all the beliefs of each individual member of whichever religion the assumer feels oppressed by, and that every believer who believes X must also believe Y. 

Let's see what Freedom From Religion Foundation(the Atheist group that put up the sign) co-founder Dan Baker had to say: "It's not that we are trying to coerce anyone; in a way our sign is a signal of protest," Barker said. "If there can be a Nativity scene saying that we are all going to hell if we don't bow down to Jesus, we should be at the table to share our views."

If I understand Baker's point, he is saying that if people believe it is good to venerate the birth of Jesus they must also believe that "we are all going to hell if we don't bow down to Jesus." Now, that's a pretty arrogant thing to say. I love Jesus, that homeless man from Galilee who got lynched for standing up to the Man. I think it's a fine and good thing, if you want, to venerate his birth. We all need to be reminded to give up our power for the sake of love every once in a while. We all need to be reminded about the least of these. I don't believe, however, that everyone who doesn't "bow down to Jesus" is going to hell. Maybe it's just me, but Jesus seems a lot more subversive than that. 

But what I think and believe about Jesus are not as important right here. Baker's understanding that all people who believe in Jesus also believe in the harshest human ideas about sin and eternal punishment, well, it's just not something that stands up to inspection. When ideas like that come from? Well, Baker was an "evangelical preacher." From his bio on the FFRF website, you can see that Baker did whole thing, including going down Mexico way to try to convert Catholics away from the Vatican. 

Baker, it seems, has exchanged who form of arrogant know-it-all-ism for another. And that, in the end, is what this post is about. Look folks, if you want to be a Christian, be a good on. If you want to be a Muslim, be a good one. If you want to be a Buddhist, be a good one. And if you want to be an Atheist, for goodness sake, be a good one. 

But remember folks, remember, you do not know everything. You don't know everything one way or the other.

Hill-daug, Secretary of State

So, how do I feel about Hillary getting Obama's tap to be Secretary of State?

Frankly, I'm a little conflicted. Let's face, she was awful to Obama in the primary. Her using the Bill Ayers thing was monstrous. Her releasing the photo of Obama in traditional Kenya cloths was nothing more than a low race scare tactic. The best she could come up with the in the primary was to try to point out that Obama was black, and that blacks are mysterious and frightening, so maybe nows not the time to vote for one. Clinton's actions hurt the party, divided the party in ways that have still not been over come. Also, I never feel good about people gaining power just because they are family with other people who have power.(I'm looking at you Medici family!)

But... she did have some good ideas when it didn't come to attacking Obama. Eventually she came around and worked to get Barak elected. Also, she's always sorta fault for better healthcare for all Americans. Sure, she's never really succeeded, and sure she probably wouldn't have gotten her Senate seat in New York if it weren't for Bill, but hey, she kinda tried to do something for America, even if she failed.

OK, here's the deal. I don't really like or trust Hillary. Obama, however, trusts here enough to make her SoS. I put a lot of trust in Mr. Obama, and if he thinks she can do the job, well, I'll give her the benefit of the doubt.

At least Obama didn't try to put her on the Supreme Court.