It looks like Spring may finally have arrived in Illinois; the ladybugs are crawling everywhere, squirrels are randy, and the lilac in the yard is beginning to bud.
Time for a spot of spring cleaning, perhaps, but – oh, dear – a glance around the old homestead reveals a bit more than a scrubber and hot water is required. Paint and wallpaper are definitely needed in abundance to replace the faded, jaded, character of the front bedroom and kitchen.
I used to be a dab hand with a paintbrush, and wallpapering came naturally, so all that’s required is a few tools to accomplish the task. There’s already a scraper and paintbrushes tucked away in the garage somewhere, but the one thing we don’t have is a pasting table.
A good table is vital, otherwise your paper keeps slipping all over the place when you try to paste it.
A trip to Lowes produced nothing but a blank stare from the assistant, who obviously had no idea the wallpaper in their decorating compartment required anything to stick it to the wall.
Menards was similarly dumbfounded.
“Paste tables? Sorry, we don’t have a computer department. Have you tried Radio Shack?”
What do they know?
Why am I driving all over town? The internet always solves my purchasing problems.
A quick Google, and there it is: “Paste Table with Plywood Top – £14.99”[1]
What could be easier?
Hang on, why is that a ‘pound’ sign? Oh, Blast! It’s a UK website.
Paste Table with Plywood Top - £14.99
Thirty minutes later, after trawling through eBay, Google, and half a dozen other search engines, I found the only website in the US selling a similar paste table. Almost breathlessly, I clicked on the link.[2]
Wallpaper Pasting Table - $419.00
HOW MUCH!?!
Okay, now admittedly it’s got an aluminium frame and steel legs, but can that justify over twenty times the price? As a special concession they offer free shipping. But then, to add insult to injury, I noticed it was ‘DISCONTINUED”.
“Excuse me, Mister man-at-Lowes, but I’ve come to return these six rolls of anaglypta wallpaper.”
Now, where’s that scrubber, and a bucket for the hot water?
If you plan to start the week with a smile on your lips and optimism in your heart, then don’t read this article. On the other hand, if you’d prefer to be realistic, and know when the time is right to bend over, put your head between your legs, and kiss your arse goodbye – read on.
Often, the news no-one wants you to know about is best located away from the great national tomes like the Washington Post or the New York Times. Small, provincial newspapers around the world have some the sharpest, keenest, journalists. They’re usually young, and out to make a name for themselves.
Hence, it was to the Scottish Herald and Rob Edwards that I turned my computer mouse this weekend, and a story that should, frankly, turn your blood to ice.
In the last post I wrote that one of my pet hates today was politicians. They’re supposed to be representatives of the people, but that’s no longer their job. Instead, they now serve much more powerful masters than John Doe or Fred Bloggs.
Long before the events of 9/11/2001, a plan was devised to conquer the world. At the heart of that plan was subjugation of the Middle East. Certain nations in that region were troublesome to the US and if it were to take control of the region armed force would be required to contain these errant governments.
One of those nations was Iraq, but the real obstacle to Middle East domination was Iran.
There was no way an army could march into Iran overland. Saddam Hussein was in the way, and while he held no love for his Iranian neighbors, he’d not welcome US army boots on Iraqi soil.
9/11/2001 provided the perfect excuse to invade Iraq, get rid of Saddam, and install a puppet government. Now, there are American army boots in Iraq, and Prime Minister Maliki is in no position to dictate how they’ll be used.
The island of Diego Garcia lies just south of the Equator, slap in the middle of the Indian Ocean.
It was secretly leased to the British by Mauritius in the 1960’s, and the whole population of the island was forcibly expelled, all 2,000 of them.
In 1971, the US began building a huge airbase on the island. Many of the aircraft that bombed Iraq, both in 1991 and 2003, flew from Diego Garcia.
Now, according to Rob Edwards of the Scottish Sunday Herald, Diego Garcia is about to become active once more.
The US government signed a contract in January to transport 10 ammunition containers to the island. According to a cargo manifest from the US navy, this included 387 “Blu” bombs used for blasting hardened or underground structures.
Experts say that they are being put in place for an assault on Iran’s controversial nuclear facilities. There has long been speculation that the US military is preparing for such an attack, should diplomacy fail to persuade Iran not to make nuclear weapons.”[1]
What is happening at this moment is unnervingly reminiscent of the events just prior to the invasion of Iraq, back in 2003. The unanswered question is: can America sustain an attack on Iran, given its military commitments elsewhere?
According to Dan Plesch, Director of the Centre for International Studies and Diplomacy at the University of London and co-author of a recent study on US preparations for an attack on Iran, they can if they flatten Iran from the air before committing troops on the ground.
They are gearing up totally for the destruction of Iran. US bombers are ready today to destroy 10,000 targets in Iran in a few hours.”
Plesch thinks Obama may decide it’s better for the US to strike Iran, rather than have Israel do it first.
The US is not publicising the scale of these preparations to deter Iran, tending to make confrontation more likely. The US … is using its forces as part of an overall strategy of shaping Iran’s actions.”
The US war machine is once more grinding into action. The ‘plan’, drawn up by that right-wing think-tank known as the ‘Project for the New American Century’ a decade ago is still on the table. The PNAC was publicized as ‘dead in the water’ after Iraq. The truth is it’s still very much alive.
George W Bush dreamed of instigating a war with Iran – part of his imaginary ‘Axis of Evil’ – but the Iraq conquest took too long. Now, it’s left to the next President of the United States to instigate ‘Stage Two’.
The face on the marionette may have changed. The puppeteers have not.
My pet hates today are politicians and Howard Jacobson.
Okay, we all hate politicians; I’ll just find the end of the queue. But what, you may ask, has Howard Jacobson done to incur my wrath?
The answer is, he spent a week watching American television, then had the nerve to write an article in the ‘Independent’ suggesting British media companies could learn something from it.
Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m not defending British television, it is pretty awful, but if you remove the tons of American crap that’s broadcast in Britain, some of what’s left isn’t too bad.
Jacobson’s initial impression was similar to mine, when I first came here seven years ago:
It seemed dire at first. I would channel hop and get only ads, interminable ads, whichever button I pressed, except on the Public Service Channel where I’d have welcomed an ad to break the tedium of the worthiness.”[1]
His saving grace turned out to be a cartoon:
Mine, [favorite program] while I was there, was King of the Hill, a cartoon less overtly anarchic than The Simpsons but subtler in its satire and more subversive sexually.”
Whatever turns you on, Howard. Frankly, if I’m going to watch subversive sex I prefer real people rather than computer-generated caricatures, but just call me a pervert.
The true turning point for Jacobson must have been the Fox News Channel. Admittedly, Britain has no substitute for Glenn Beck or Bill O’Reilly. Personally, that fact helps keep me sane when I accidentally switch on just as either of those two insane corporate puppets is sounding off on yet another subject they know sod-all about.
“Only in America,” muttered as a prayer of thankfulness, is a phrase oft whispered Chez Adams.
For Jacobson, the ability to channel hop between the loony right of Fox and the equally obnoxious left of MSNBC is hugely exciting:
……the constant rubbing at the itch of opinion becomes infectious for the reason that it’s passionate, witty and leisurely.”
He obviously misses the point. While politically opposed media channels are shouting their messages from the rooftops, no-one’s putting them together and forcing a debate that can assist voters to make rational decisions.
It’s the British TV debate he seems to find unacceptable:
…….no one is interrupting – that curse of English broadcasting: the hectoring interrupt – except in the sense of wanting to do battle, and a battle is not the same as an interruption. Some horrendous things are being said in America about Obama, about the state, about the fear that socialists are coming to steal people’s furniture, but the argument is being had out vociferously and voluminously – for that’s the other side of the bigotry on some channels, the amount of counter-bigotry on the others. Our neatly edited current-affairs programmes are more elegant, but they don’t allow for the roar and rage of opinion in which America revels.”
What Howard Jacobson has failed to realize during his pathetically short sojourn in this land is that there is no argument. No debate. Fox rants its far-right viewpoint; MSNBC raves to the left, but they never sit down facing each other and thrash out the issues on American television. Admittedly, each side is, indeed, ‘vociferous and voluminous’, but there’s never anyone on hand to stand up and say, “STOP! You’re full of shit. Here’s what I think we should do.”
Here’s the truth about the American media and political debate, Mister Jacobson: the corporate elite of America have, by the clever manipulation of the media outlets, split the US populace into two camps. Never the twain shall meet, other than to stand on opposite sides of the street at election time and hurl insults at each other.
In between the media’s political ranting and raving they serve up generous helpings of bloodshed and violence, so-called ‘adult’ cartoons, and inane quiz shows that involve much audience participation in the form of unbridled hysteria, all liberally dosed with a plethora of advertisements for obesity-causing fast food, prescription drugs for invented illnesses, and a whole host of enticingly useless items created for the sole purpose of clawing your hard-earned dollars from your sick, obese, little fist.
When you’ve lived in America for seven years, rather than visited for just seven days, you come to realize that.
Incidentally, ‘King of the Hill’ is networked throughout the UK. It’s a part of the ‘tons of American crap’ I mentioned earlier, that is broadcast on British TV.
NB: If you still want to know why I hate politicians (even more than usual) this morning, you’ll have to wait for the next post.
