blah blah blah. what's new? the 6 year nightmare end of the republic continues. my solace: even if the bastards tried to seize power at this point, the people would pitchfork them right into their welcoming, ignoble graves.

13 weeks since my last post. That's consistency. The VTech killer was a terrible writer. I know because I looked at his play today. Blech. Mr. McBeef? A colleague of mine today suggested he should have been smothered in the cradle...

I'm aggravated after having read comments blaming the victims at VTech written by a couple of right wing, keyboard "tough guys" at the National Review Online. God is obviously protecting folks like that because I've never once run into them personally. Hoo Boy!

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/01/12/ap/politics/mainD8MJRGCO0.shtml

McCain should know better. An example of how being close to power distorts self perception.

Every time I think about sending query letters, I want to puke. Guess I'll clean it up and go print one out.

We've now had to begin questioning how to treat this time of year when our child is sentient creature next December. guess I'll worry about it later.

I am posting for the first time in months. It is Christmas morning and I am working on my gospel quartet novel. Flubbed is as finished as it can get for awhile. The second one needs completing now

The point is to cause negative articles to appear when these names are googled. Since google uses blog links as part of its search criteria, enough links pulls these negative articles higher in the search--if enough people do the bombing.

Dirty Trick? So what?

Will it work? Does it matter? Shrug.

--AZ-Sen: Jon Kyl

--AZ-01: Rick Renzi

--AZ-05: J.D. Hayworth

--CA-04: John Doolittle

--CA-11: Richard Pombo

--CA-50: Brian Bilbray

--CO-04: Marilyn Musgrave

--CO-05: Doug Lamborn

--CO-07: Rick O'Donnell

--CT-04: Christopher Shays

--FL-13: Vernon Buchanan

--FL-16: Joe Negron

--FL-22: Clay Shaw

--ID-01: Bill Sali

--IL-06: Peter Roskam

--IL-10: Mark Kirk

--IL-14: Dennis Hastert

--IN-02: Chris Chocola

--IN-08: John Hostettler

--IA-01: Mike Whalen

--KS-02: Jim Ryun

--KY-03: Anne Northup

--KY-04: Geoff Davis

--MD-Sen: Michael Steele

--MN-01: Gil Gutknecht

--MN-06: Michele Bachmann

--MO-Sen: Jim Talent

--MT-Sen: Conrad Burns

--NV-03: Jon Porter

--NH-02: Charlie Bass

--NJ-07: Mike Ferguson

--NM-01: Heather Wilson

--NY-03: Peter King

--NY-20: John Sweeney

--NY-26: Tom Reynolds

--NY-29: Randy Kuhl

--NC-08: Robin Hayes

--NC-11: Charles Taylor

--OH-01: Steve Chabot

--OH-02: Jean Schmidt

--OH-15: Deborah Pryce

--OH-18: Joy Padgett

--PA-04: Melissa Hart

--PA-07: Curt Weldon

--PA-08: Mike Fitzpatrick

--PA-10: Don Sherwood

--RI-Sen: Lincoln Chafee

--TN-Sen: Bob Corker

--VA-Sen: George Allen

--VA-10: Frank Wolf

--WA-Sen: Mike McGavick

--WA-08: Dave Reichert

Happy Habeas Corpus Day!

I have slashed out 16,000 words. I will go under 100,000 tomorrow, I'd guess. This revision business is a pain in the ass. Number 11 will be the last big one, I hope.

As I read through Still River by Harry Hunsicker, I am happy to find that the book is a good noir/hardboiler. He addresses local political issues that I have been concerned about for years, such as the Trinity River Bottom fiasco in the making. He also, apparently, knows Waco, as he described a seedy full nude dancing club I went to once back in the early nineties. I'm glad it's a good book, since I have it on my extra credit list for my classes.

Today I am going to go haggle over a property price in Plano. We need another house, since we are about to be three instead of two. This house has problems, but it is the one my wife wants. I have to make a list of what's wrong with it, as well as tell the owner that the real estate bubble is freaking over. Prices will get cut by another 10 percent over the next year, is my guess. He hasn't been able to move this house for over a year, so I think he'll be somewhat compliant to my wishes. But who knows. He may tell me to fuck off with my lowball offer. If the gods will it, I will be victorious. If not, my wife will kick my ass.

I am reading Still River, by Harry Hunsicker. He's got a good hardboiled voice. I've had the novel a few months, ever since I bought it at the Will Clarke reading, but I'm just now into it. The cool thing is that it is making it easy for me to plot up my novel. Since my book is hardboiled parody, lifting plot lines is a must. Harry's book has a good plot line, so ripping off episodes is fun and harmless, since they'll be unrecognizable to anyone in the context of Flubbed. I'd feel bad if there weren't only 36 possible plots, but Georges Polti provides plenty of absolution...

I don't want to journal. Nevertheless... I have already added another 5000 words to this book, after I'd cut 5000. And I still have another 5-10,000 words to tie up all the plot strands. Blech. This is taking entirely too long. I hope the publisher is understanding, since his request for the manuscript is now going on three weeks.

There's been a shift in my classes in the last twelve months. The conservatives are shutting up. They are outnumbered and discredited, it would appear. In some of our discussions, I don't have to be the one to address ridiculous conservative talking points. My little lefties do it for me, which is a nice change from a year ago. Of course, the lefties don't mind when I address their ridiculous talking poiints. This change in political climate is heartening. The episode that makes my point happened tonight.

We watched Fight Club last week and discussed nationalism, fascism, violence, mindless following of crazy leaders, and the big question: Is terrorism ever justified? This is, of course, a trick question, and an answer is not what I was looking for. What I got was some reasoned debate from young lefties and a disgruntled ex-military guy. There was only one "conservative" willing to trumpet Bushie talking points. His take on terror was ridiculous. He said that any violation of the law is a terrorist act. I didn't even have to respond, other than to tell him I thought his definition wasn't tenable. My other students did the work of destroying the ridiculous notion.

The main point is that most of the class recognized the fascist tendencies demonstrated in Fight Club, and they took it directly to U.S. current events. I didn't have to do a thing but ask the right questions. The kids are cynical and suspicious of this administration. Again, I say, this is heartening. I do not believe an "October Surprise " is going to work, short of suspending elections. This is a remote possibility, but a low probability event. I am going to bed tonight much more optimistic than I got up this morning.

The "compromise" by Warner, Graham, and McCain is a disaster. Should that bill get passed, and it looks like it will be, habeas corpus will have been stripped out of the Bill of Rights. The clock is ticking out on the opportunity for a stemming of the presidential/imperial power grab in the U.S. Democrats must take both houses in November if the U.S. as I know it is to continue to exist. If that doesn't happen, the Torture Compromise might face the constitionality test at the Supreme Court. It would truly be the "last chance." Once habeas corpus goes, we are back to the pre 1200's where rights are concerned. That will be absolutism in the U.S., and it doesn't bode well for a continued existence of the U.S. in its current form. The predictions by some, of a North America broken into 6 seperate, antagonistic regions, is looking more and more likely to me. I thought it would take another 50 years, however.

The confirmation that the U.S. is now operating in Iran in preparation for an attack is more bad news.

However, I've written in a new scene for my novel and cut some more. I do not know where the new scene is going to take the plot. I do know that Eugene will have to deal with Tiffany Kelch much earlier in the book...

At the Flaming Lips concert on Saturday night, my friend, Jeff, told me about his two year old's taste in music. The kid likes certain songs from certain performers, such as Get Up, Stand Up, by Marley, and Legalize It by Peter Tosh. When Jeff plays other songs by these artists, the child claims that those songs are not by Marley or Tosh. Despite overwhelming evidence being shown to the child, he refuses to believe any different than what he has decided is the "truth."

Juxtapose the description of this childishness with what I heard on a radio show this morning. A woman was claiming that McCain, Warner, and Graham, all veterans and "experts" on military matters, are completely wrong in their rejection of the Bush-sponsored bill to legalize torture. She, a Nobody from Nowheresville, Nowherehoma, knows better than all the people who oppose her position, despite their experience and credentials. I then saw how those folks who are still clinging to obvious falsehoods and assorted delusions about the Idiot Prince of Crawford, Texas, are simply put, children. They may have grown up bodies, but their minds are those of near-infants.

This is an interesting phenomenon to watch, and I find it interesting that some on the opposite side also persist in it as well. It also reminds me of the mind of an alcoholic. Especially my own. Denial=Childishness?

Rambling nonsense, I know, but time to get back to regular journaling.

Bush is saying they'll attack us again. Like he and his buddies say every election cycle. I only hope it's more fear-mongering, and not a telegraph of murder and mayhem to come. Today's press conference was sad. He was bellicose and obnoxious, like me with a twelve pack of Guinness down the gullet.

I have finished my 8th revision, which was concerned with cleaning up grammar and syntax. I am forty pages into the darling cutting revision--number nine. So far, about 500 words are gone. Now the tough part starts. Backstory hacking...

I received a call this morning telling me that a writer friend had "pitched" my book at a writing conference in Hawaii. The agent wants to see a partial manuscript. After reading Jeff Herman, multiple submissions to agents is acceptable unless they ask otherwise. The rule is that you have to inform the agents who have your manuscript that others are also looking at it. I hope Ms. McClure makes a decision soon.

Maybe things are back to normal? I don't want them to go back to normal, as that would be droll.

Jon Benet Ramsey is no longer a dead little girl. Because of the sensationalist news media feeding frenzy, she has become a dark iconic object. I watched Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer last night. I hadn't seen it since a stoned night in 1990. It is bad and not so scary, but the obvious statements about television and violent entertainment are still relevant 20 year after the film was made. I could make the connection between Ramsey and the movie quite easily. Sort of like the eroticization of female on male violence in Charlie's Angels and Tomb Raider...or the inclusion of a gratuitous "male gaze" scene in the Sentinel.

I would like to see a mainstream, big star action movie made with a "female gaze" in the ascendency. That would make American audiences extremely uncomfortable, but I think that enough women and gay men would like it that the movie would do well at the box office. If the director had the camera focus on male crotches--stand in for the gaze of the female or gay protagonist, that would be hilarious. Bruce Willis as a homosexual tough guy...Brokeback Mountain has broken the ground, so to speak...

Self-hatred is the basis for other forms of hatred--racism, sexism, hatred of homosexuals, hatred of neighbors who put a different political yard sign up, and hatred of other religions. Before a human can hate others, that human must first hate themselves. This is why the growth of fundamentalisms of all religions is such a threat to the world. Any religion that tells its practictioners that they are "worms" and deserve "eternal hell" except for the grace of their particular Gods is a threat to humanity. Believing oneself to be an unworthy worm and despicable creature begets self-hatred--especially when an impossible moral standard (perfection) is placed next to this belief. The two ideas working in tandem create a logically fallacious negative feedback loop. I can't stop "sinning" because I am a miserable worm, and I'm a miserable worm because I can't stop sinning. Onward and downward it goes, and the emotions it creates are destructive. Self-hatred gets turned outward to the "others," and eventually wars get started.

This is perhaps an oversimplification, but I think it's a mostly valid model. How to get out of the problem? That's for another journal entry. I'm in France. France kicks ass. I think this country may be more "free" than the "liberty-loving" U.S. in some ways, but that's also another journal.

Today's email request calling the first 3 chapter of my novel is an exciting thing. Looks like Harry Hunsicker, Will Clarke, and Tim Miller are all correct in their suggestion that the key is to keep sending out the queries and not giving up on the process. While an agent looking at my book is not the same thing as signing a contract with an agent, and further, getting published, it provides a sense of validation that I have the ability to write publishable material...

My internal pessimist tells me not to get too excited, but DAMN, I am anyway.