Life And Death Of An Executive Order

Let’s pick one out of a hat, shall we? Aside from the underhanded hyperbole that Obama handed “cash payments” to Iran, there are some non-alternative facts to consider here:

In 2010 Obama signed the Comprehensive Iran Sanctions, Accountability, and Divestment Act.

Three Executive Orders were signed by Obama freezing Iranian assets between 2010-2011.

An additional Executive Order was signed by Obama in 2013, seizing more assets. The aim of the executive orders were to strangle Iran’s nuclear program.

Enter the talk-show buzz, “King Obama”, stage right.

By 2015 it was clear that Iran was at a stranglehold tipping point: either let go of nuclear ambitions or face a slippery slope towards collapse. That’s when the leading Western nations, including the US under Obama, agreed to a treaty that would keep Iran alive but in check. 

A collapsed Iran is a dangerous liability to the world. The rabbit hole that is Palestine, Syria, and Iraq is child’s play compared to the hell that the Middle East would become if Iran collapses. Which is why Western Europeans were so adamant about not strangling Iran to death by 2015. 

To be clear it’s not the US who would immediately suffer destabilizing consequences in that scenario: it‘s Europe. It always has been Europe. They already feel the fire of Middle Eastern volatility much more than the US does (aside from self-inflected US military interventions).  From refugees and overwhelming migration to terrorism, Western Europe always gets the proximity shaft. Obama was wisely aware of this, so he agreed to release the same assets he froze, on specific conditional terms. Ratchet up far-right hyperbole on “cash payments” made to the enemy by a despotic American king.

Are there ever any guarantees that a government does what they promise to do in a treaty? Of course not, everyone knows that. The history of the world is the history of broken treaties. Were there guarantees that Russia would cease nuclear proliferation? Nyet. And yet, no one in their right mind feels that a collapsed Russia would not spell doom for the world as we know it. If you don’t know what I’m talking about look up “nuclear weapons in the hands of Russian mafia”.

Should Obama have used the more democratic channel of Congress to unfreeze Iranian assets? Maybe. We have become a nation of “executive orders”, present commander in chief being no exception. Talk about a slippery slope away from our great system of checks and balances. 

To be fair: it’s not so much the number of executive orders, it’s the content of the orders. Executive powers discretion is first and foremost a privilege, not a divine right. More importantly, rubber-stamping by a hyper-partisan chamber of puppets is not exactly the bright beacon of democracy we were promised. Now is it, Founding Fathers...

If this trend continues we will be well on our way to joining the ranks of caliphates and banana republics. The implosion of the Fourth Estate is adding insult to injury, with party propaganda (foreign AND domestic) posing as “news”. It’s  “man the torpedoes!” when the opposing party does it. Blind-eye when their own party does. This is where alternative facts live. This is where the Republic dies. 

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Laugh It Up, Fuzzball

We went to see a very funny comic last night. I forgot how much true LOL is amazing therapy for the soul. So this particular comedian, Jeff Dye, was very funny. To me obviously, but no doubt to more than 80% of the comedy club. You can’t make everyone laugh, that’s just the way life goes.

Anyway, it had been a while for me at a comedy club, since last time a few years ago was a bust. But I’m glad I gave it a shot again, my voice is still hoarse from laughing so loud last night. Great humor transcends age, race, culture and gender. Probably among the most  difficult jobs on the planet, when you think about it.

Here’s a sobering takeaway for me from last night: when you’re politically independent you can have a hearty laugh either way. But my 50% conservative 50% independent table was experiencing a bit of a bipolar rollercoaster. When the jokes were poking the left the entire table was in stitches. Especially the conservative ones, hoots and hollers. But when the jokes shifted and poked the right the conservative half went quiet, a nervous laugh here & there. The independent half carried on laughing away like drunk hyenas (OK the “drunk” part is redundant, so, like hyenas.)

I don’t think we had any true liberals at our table, but according to Jeff Dye he’s seen the exact same reaction from liberals in cities across the country. Roaring laughs when the jokes poke the right, but suddenly uncomfortable when the dagger swings left. Dye is originally from Seattle, if that means anything. 

And then that it hit me. Laughter is a release for pent-up anger. Sure, pent-up other things too - frustration, anxiety, self-doubt - generally negative stuff. But at the end of the night negativity can’t stay. Well it can, but the more it’s trapped inside you the more it will lead you to a Vegas hotel window with an AR-15 in hand.

So laugh it up, fuzzball. While injustice anywhere is indeed a threat to justice everywhere, so is one-sided righteousness.  Work it out or let it go, the world is not here to babysit your anger.

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“I’m from Seattle, I didn’t know what a gun was till I moved away. But I remember when I finally fired one at a range... damn. Don’t mess with me fuckers, I have a gun!”

“Love him or hate him, we have never had a president as funny as this one. I mean, he has literally broken the mold of saying whatever he wants, and then saying the exact opposite. As in, ‘I never said that’. ‘Yes you did! Look, here’s the text you sent me saying exactly that!’ ‘That’s not my handwriting, fake news.’ “

- Jeff Dye

War And Indifference

The war does not have to start in the Middle East. It’s already at home in the US. The amount of hatred I have read floating from one political end to the other in our own country is a virtual bloodbath of character assassinations. Apparently two men, a current American president and the previous one, can do no wrong and no right at the exact same time. They’re like Schrödinger’s Cat: alive and “dead to me” simultaneously. I feel the dark side of the force myself when I think of one those two men, so I get it. I may pride myself into thinking that when all is said and done I don’t really “hate” anyone, but by then it’s too late. I have looked into the white of the eyes of the Dark Side. 

One thing’s for sure: that dark place we’ve been calling “hell” throughout the ages, historically without a real space, now has an actual GPS coordinate: our “smart” phones. A lit screen in our hands, where we morbidly click on that political land mine we can’t resist... our instant gateway to hell.

Spare me the “I just do it for the laughs” bit, cynicism is the fast lane on that gateway. Perhaps the “I never click on politics” camp are on to something, but it does not exempt them from Schrödinger’s Paradox. Most if not all still very much love to hate and hate to love our surreally morphing presidency. 

Finally there’s the “I’m not on social media” camp, who unfortunately don’t do a good job at hiding their contempt for it. Speaking of dead cats, you know what they say about curiosity. That’s their cross to bear. 

But there is one group who are on seemingly still waters, the kind that run deep. I can only think of them in terms of Ayn Rand’s “objectivism”. Initially a fan of Rand’s philosophy, over time I found her to possess one too many contradictions for my taste. But sometimes we just need to grow up and not shoot messengers, flawed as they may be.

In her book “The Fountainhead”, Ayn Rand’s central character and hero, Howard Roark, is having a brief conversation with Ellsworth Toohey, the villain of the story. Toohey was directly responsible for blocking Roark from a brilliant career in Architecture. In that brief exchange of words, Toohey asks Roark, “You can tell me what you think of me,” expecting to stir up hatred and bile. To which Roark coolly responds, “But I don’t think of you.”

That line has stayed with me since college, an influence on more than I care to admit. You might have heard some people say, the opposite of love is not hate: it is indifference. Intuitive enough, no doubt central to Ayn Rand’s philosophy. But if that’s true, then what is the opposite of hate? Therein lies our dilemma.

You can drag love back into the triangle, and try creating your own paradoxical reality. One where opposites are not perfectly symmetrical. The opposite of hate cannot be indifference, because indifference to hate only perpetuates it. Hate only has one absolute cure: love. Love only has one true nemesis: indifference. And so it goes, till you’re on your knees.

The opposite of peace is not war: it is indifference. Indifference to the armchair warriors and their cowardly cries of “nuke them all!”, or “death to all of infidels!” Indifference to those who run from  any and every fight, with their empty peace-hugging slogans. Because war does not automatically switch itself on straight from peace: it must first feed on the frenzy of indifference on its way to hell.

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“It's not given to people to judge what's right or wrong. People have eternally been mistaken and will be mistaken, and in nothing more than in what they consider right and wrong.”

― Leo Tolstoy, War and Peace

"How Much Is That Doggie In The Window?" - Ten Years Later

Ten years have passed since I asked myself the question one cold December day: How Much Is That Doggie In The Window??  Because, let's face it: man's best friend is high maintenance. Technically you can leave a cat home alone for two or three days, with motorized litter boxes, electronic feeders and what not. But not doggos, no sir. Not indoors anyway. Which begs the question: when the hell did we decide to bring them indoors full-time??

Humans have been obsessed from the dawn of time with where we came from, who brought us here, and why. While birthing and fathering was the closest we ever came to personally feeling the might of creation, we also realized that we could come close to that feeling with our domination over animals. Savage at first, we "humanized" that domination over the centuries (yes, I use the term "humanized" loosely). We narrowed it down to a handful of beasts. We saw it was good, and we called it domestication. Humane Societies were born, and therein shifted the paradigm: a delusion that "humanization" is actually what is best for animals. Because we're mighty creators. God's mini-me's. 

Leashes. Choke collars. Electric fences, shock collars. Muzzles. Tranquilizing medications. Obedience school. Pet grooming salons and spas. Gourmet pet food. Air conditioning, dog sweaters. And people thought Sting's "Every Breath You Take" was creepy? Oh, can't you see? You belong to me! Who's a good boy now?? 

Seriously though. I find it odd and ironic that when we finally admitted the twisted nature of our need to own people, whether it was slaves or "the little woman", we decided to turn our predatory ways instead upon our recently domesticated friends.

Barring domestic violence or Stockholm Syndrome, we don't force our human mates to stay in our homes. In the words of timeless wisdom: "Happiness is like a butterfly that sits on your shoulder when you stop chasing it". Chasing is a means to ownership. You chase something or someone you want to beat, perhaps own. Ownership is the heroin of material and trophy chasers, their addiction to the chase being the via crucis of a shallow existence. 

At the opposite end of that spectrum some are caught in an empathy quagmire. They want to fix every suffering, hug every pain, fund every cure. Now what's wrong with that, you ask? Not everything, of course. Save the intention, ditch the arrogance. Wolves were once noble mammals that took care of themselves. Evolution-forbid they continued down that path, without the aid of food chain masters in shining armor.

I remember the first time that Nikolai (Niko, now an eleven year old husky) bolted from the front door of his new home. He was barely one year old, and he ran. And there I went, chasing after him. I chased him because, well, I guess I thought I owned him. Oh, that's not what I told myself. I told myself he might get hurt. He would get lost, hungry, in trouble. I would be a bad owner, for not taking the appropriate measures. And who knows what "they" might think. They might think that maybe he ran for a reason. 

Niko was reportedly neglected or mistreated at least twice before "I rescued him" (cue in superhero theme music). Which means he had already ran twice. Even though I tried making his new environment as friendly and comfortable as possible, his survival instinct told him not to take any chances. But then again... who knows, perhaps his radar told him that my chasing after him was an endearing thing. Perhaps he thought, what the hell. Free food, free mortgage... eh, dogs can sell their souls too, right?

The more radical dog owners have been circulating memes of platitudes, putting dog above man. Dogs are noble, humans are bad. Dogs are the ultimate in unrequited love, we suck at it. Adorable, if it weren't disturbing. It's not self-effacing actually. Quite the opposite, it's self-serving. We are re-branding our blatant ownership of them with the ol' "putting the little woman on a pedestal" routine. I guess it is true what they say: can't teach an old human new tricks. 

Yes, wolves first approached humans, against their better instinct, when the least adapted to survive had all but given up hope. They were hungry, very hungry. But then it happened: in some planetary alignment moment, an amused campfire human decided to throw the wolf a bone instead of eating him. And just like that, the first PetSmart was born. A similar evolutionary path for cats, mind you, though they hang on to evolutionary independence in quite an impressive way. A cat can survive in human jungleland way longer than a dog. Because we actually de-wolfed the dog, while we have barely managed to de-claw the cat. Which essentially means, from an evolutionary standpoint, former wolves are now one hundred percent dependent on humans. How noble of us.

The last time I "owned" a cat (around thirty years ago), de-clawing was never questioned. It was something you did, because you worked hard for your expensive furniture. Within the last decade or so, de-clawing has become inhumane. Same fate for electric shock collars. An interesting moving target. Fresh from a race that has de-wolfed a relatively new species of animal - and is quite righteous about it. If you don't see that righteousness, try leaving your dog in a parked car for five minutes. Even if it's in the shade, window cracked, and you are literally not going to leave him there for more than five minutes. You could be taking him to a dog park, or to the vet. No excuse. Better call Allstate when you get back.

I realize now I asked the wrong question, ten years ago: I should have not asked, how much is that doggie in the window? The wiser question would have been, how much is that soul in the window? Because, religion aside, it turns out that animals have souls. And a soul is not something you own. You want to stop animal cruelty? Let's start first with the one by your lap, or on it. I did try something different with Niko, as imperfect as it was. I "collaborated" with him from day one on an open-door policy. No electronic fence, no shock collar. Yes, I had to run after him quite a few times. He must have found that quite amusing. And it also meant I had to have conversations with my neighbors about that policy. I was lucky, or perhaps my neighbors appreciated the courtesy of asking them, not imposing it on them. I will say, knowing that Niko had free will to come and go as he pleased, and always chose to return back to where he wanted to be, was quite a powerful bonding.

I get it, it's too late, too impractical for too many. Dogs that would get run over by cars if they had "too much" freedom. Or they would get into fights with other animals, or bite a human. I'm not casting any judgement on that. The more productive question going forward should be, what will you do different before you "own" your next dog? Because if there is one thing I still agree on ten years after I asked the doggie in the window question is that, in the grand scheme of things, that doggie in the window is priceless. You cannot own them, even if you think you do.