May 2004 Archives

Just got back from Vegas this past weekend, and without breaking the code (what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas) -- it always leaves me a little off-kilter for the next few days. What a strange and artificial place, Vegas is. Its location is a metaphor for its existence. It was created in a desert, where there are no natural resources, no other local cities, no roads through the area, and really no reason at all to be there, other than the fact that things are legal there where they are not legal in most of the rest of the country. Now, there are lakes and pools and water fountains and 24/7 establishments, entertainment and sin of any flavor -- just because they can. If you were to take away the sin, the city would die. It's a shiny apple with a rotten core -- all Illusion and no substance. And yet, there are people who live there, make their lives there, raise their families there. There are real people who live in this unreal place.

Money makes the world go round, and Vegas is spinning on its axis at a thousand miles an hour. It's always fun to visit, but I really can't take mor than a few days there before I'm just ready to go home to my safe life.

I'm sure all of you are aware of the pictures retreived from Iraq showing the attrocities committed against prisoners by American troops. I had heard about these and have been following the hearings on the radio, and hadn't really had a good idea of exactly how bad these things had gotten until I decided to go to google and type in 'iraq prison pictures'. Let me tell you, I was shocked and dismayed at the level of humiliation and abuse that has happened by our hands. Where are we, Vietnam?! There is no way this could have been the isolated few soldiers that Rumsfeld is trying to play this off as being. For this level of humiliation to take place, there needs to be widespread participation or at least complicity, at multiple levels along the echelon. Good way for us to win the hearts and minds of our enemies, eh?

Get this bunch of jokers out of office, and pull our forces out of that country. It's the only way to save our face in the international community. Otherwise, the American people are backing and supporting these actions done in our name and with our authority.

Grrrr.