I’m in the donut hole of a major depressive episode. Sorry kids, but writing through this kind of fog is difficult. So posting will be sporadic at best.

In the mean time- Glen Greenwald is talking about Blue Dog Dems (or DINOs) and how for the first time ever congress is less popular with the party that elected it than it is with the minority party.

Huhmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm I wonder why that is (No, actually I don’t).

In 2000, Naderites warned about the two parties becoming so alike as to eliminate any real choice between them. I think they were wrong in 2000, but I think they are dead right now. I look at my current available choices for president and I don’t see either McCain or Obama as people who will do a single damn thing to improve my life, my child’s life, or the lives of my friends and neighbors. I look at my choices for governor and I see the same thing.

I don’t know what it will take to wake the Dems up from this Republican-lite zombie state. But I am a parent, and I know that rewarding bad behavior encourages bad behavior. Voting for either McCain or Obama would be like giving my kid a video game for not cleaning his room because at least he didn’t make it more messy.

We voters are the parents of this country. It is our responsibility to set it back on the right path when it has gone wrong and to reward it when it has gone right. We forget that sometimes. We get so caught up in the competition and the arguing between each other (like moms and dads on the verge of divorce) that our neglected child goes off and does things like break the constitution or steal candy from all the other kids in the UN sandbox.

It is time for some tough love for our politicians. No money, no votes until they get back in line and do what they are told. Both the major parties are acting like spoilt children who know their overworked, overstressed, underpaid parents haven’t got the willpower to deal with their screaming fits at the end of the day. Little Georgie has been bullying everyone. Little Barry want to spy on everyone and has been picking on all the girls. Little Johnie obviously hasn’t been studying his geography.

While I am generally not one for corporal punishment, the entire government needs a solid spanking and a time out, and November is the only time any of us overburdened parents will have the chance to do something about these belligerent children.

Perhaps what we really need is the Supernanny

When things are really bad, like now, this sort of cloudiness comes over me. I go from insomnia caused by worry and fear to hypersomnia, or over sleeping. It’s nicer in dreams than it is awake. I’d rather be in my head than out of it, and sleep is one of the best excuses for not coming out into the world.

I once had a therapist who thoroughly didn’t get this. She thought that spending so much time in my head might actually be a good thing for someone who wants to write. But it’s the opposite really. Writing takes a kind of defenseless honesty, and this fugue is neither defenseless nor honest. It’s the brain’s reaction to continuing hopelessness. When there is nothing to hope for and no way to change circumstances, my brain fights back by creating perfect worlds inside itself where I can get lost. Perfect worlds don’t make for compelling fiction. There is no conflict. That’s the point. Peace.

In my head is the perfect house. I can tell you every detail, from the worn silver gray of the wood floors to the most useful arrangement of the kitchen cabinets. The house itself is walled off from the rest of the world by the tall bushes in the garden, safe and private and free from the noise and distractions of neighbors and landlords who want their rent money. The phone doesn’t ring with bill collectors. The fridge is actually full of food, something that hasn’t happened since last Thanksgiving. In real life I dream of filling up the fridge, then worry that as soon as I did the power company would shut us off again and a month’s worth of groceries would be lost.

Sometimes I get tired of the house and instead I go adventuring. In my head I have gone to Florence and Greece and Barcelona and Buenos Aires. I become obsessive in packing strategies (not that different from real life actually) but I plan out the perfect travel wardrobe. I imagine being able to stretch out in first class on airplanes and walking among 3000 year old ruins in shoes that never hurt.

So Kid (who has developed his mom’s insomnia) and I have been spending our wee hours watching Dr. Who online.

After seeing an episode tonight where Donna’s mom says something to her about how Donna’s “Not going to change the world by yelling at it” and then Donna proceeds to yell, Kid looked at me and said “Mom, she’s like you.”

Now you know. I am spending my days trying to change the world by yelling at it. And if I have to be compared to one of the fabulous companions, well, Donna isn’t a bad choice.

Soopermouse likes to torment me with the many many ways Europe has a better social safety net than we do here. I know it’s all a ploy to get me to pack up and head overseas (and it’s working)but I totally thought I should share some of the back and forth we do in chat all the time.

Quelipoth: there you are
beeeeeeeeeeeeeep
me: Im only kinda here

Quelipoth: are you ok crazy lady?
me: meh
Quelipoth: thats a no :(?
me: well yeah
Quelipoth: ok wazzup
me: we’ve got about 14 bucks to get through till the 8th
Quelipoth: fuck me 🙁
dont you have pound shops?
me: yep
yeah, but they don’t ever sell anything for a dollar really
Quelipoth: boo
our poundshop sells 2-3 tins for a pound
me: stupid england
Quelipoth: 10 pounds yesterday_ 16 eggs, 3 400 grams tins of fish, 2 loaves of breadm 3 tins sweetcorn, one jar pickled gherkins
and some fig rolls
me: we spent that much and got macaroni and cheese
and sausages
Quelipoth: your country sucks bolox
me: yep
Quelipoth: 7 pounds of sliced steaks £5
me: fuck me with a chainsaw
Quelipoth: thats at the butchers, its more expensive at supermarket
me: we don’t have butchers here
Quelipoth: we do. when we’re very poor we get packs of meat flakes, 2 pounds for 1.15
throw them in stew
me: meat flakes
bwahahahaha
Quelipoth: what>?
me: meat flakes is a very funny phrase
we don’t have meat flakes here
Quelipoth: when they cut off the nice slices of steak, there are meat flakes remaining.
nice quality
me: ahhhhhhhhhh
yeah we don’t have those
Sent at 10:44 AM on Thursday
Quelipoth: shame on you. do you have a market?
me: no- I scrounge for groceries in the street by begging hapless passers=by. Of course I have a market
Quelipoth: an open air farmers and fishermen market?
me: yeah- we have those. A rather famous farmers/fish market is here actually

Quelipoth: is it expensive?
me: the problem is that not all the stalls accept food stamp cards, and you never know till they are about to ing you up
Quelipoth: ours take only cash
me: which still leaves me out. It’s 14 bucks in food stamps that I’ve got.
Quelipoth: you wouldnt get them in fod stamps here, you would get income support
and child support
me: I’d have to be a citizen
Quelipoth: and rent support and council tax support
rezident
me: legal resident
Quelipoth: i got a travel pass: £1/month on all buses
me: yeah- I don’t have that
Quelipoth: your country sucks balls
me: that’s part of the problem. I don’t even have bus fare
I get some rent assistance, $286 a month in food stamps, and healthcare. Thats it.
Sent at 10:54 AM on Thursday
me: I’m totally blogging this, btw
Quelipoth: does your kid get meals and free rides to school?
Sent at 10:58 AM on Thursday
me: yes, but it’s summer and he’s home so our food bill is much higher.
Quelipoth: dont you get summer activities tickets for him?
me: Nope
When he was little, I got scholarships for summer daycamps so I ended up only paying like $75 a month (still high when my income is zero) but now that he’s 13 there is nothing for him
Quelipoth: up to age 14
they have pool and some skills training
me: thats cool. Kid loves to swim and there is a pool down the street but I can’t afford the fees
Sent at 11:03 AM on Thursday
Quelipoth: they have activity classes that kids can choose based on their preferences, like computers, languages, history, geography, small farm
me: small farm?
Quelipoth: its an activity centre
me: do you live in the boondocks?
Quelipoth: yeah, they take care of small animalsliek rabbits and hamsters
me: ahhhhhhhhhh

I think ending on small farm animals is the way to go.

So we lost Pandagon to the pink Obamabot ghetto, but Punk Ass Blog has gotten massively awesome since Pandagon was lost to the hive mind.

From Quin comes this brilliant little gem of an entry titled Master of Jiu Jitsu about why both McCain and Obama are vying for warmonger in chief, but McCain is the only one being honest about it.

In the short term, McCain would be horrifying. If McCain tries to kick ass and take names on the ground in Iraq, the cycle of violence escalates, more terrorists are created who fight the US occupiers, the US retaliates even more forcefully, prices (especially gas) escalate wildly, and suddenly a breaking point is reached where the US must pull out because they simply CAN’T pay for it anymore. So, maybe a light’s at the end of the tunnel, but that tunnel goes through Hell and back.
Now, one thing Obama definitely has is impressive managerial chops. I have no doubt that he will be a far more talented Imperial Overseer for Iraq. In the short term, I suspect Obama’s stewardship would result in a lower rate of anti-American retaliatory violence, which is good if that’s all you care about.

But Obama might very well be worse in the longer term. The Dems (of which Obama is just the latest runner to catch the baton in the relay) have figured out a winning strategy for how to keep this game going — the game, of course, being to please the military-corporate interests who are their most meaningful, powerful constituents. The Dems essentially continue to advance the Project for a New American Century while fooling people into thinking they oppose it the whole time. Though I doubt they think of it in those terms.

Go read the whole thing.

A Must Read, Must Memorize, Must Use guide for how not to be a privileged asswipe.

And I have just one thing to add, but with a story first.

I have two friends, one an overeducated white guy who is the very definition of white male privilege. Now he tries very hard to be an ally, but sometimes even the best intentioned are blind. Friend number two is your average white woman (well not average- I think she rocks the casbah). Both friends are frequenters of a little party in the desert called Burning Man. Well call them DG ( guy) and CJ (gal).

DG was telling em a story about the topless ladies only bike parade that happens at Burning Man every year and how the women who ride in it are all empowered and happy. It’s an awesome experience of freedom and self expression and no one ever gets bothered or cat called or any of the normal bits of everyday violence we girls have to put up with in the rest of the world.

Sounds a bit like Nirvana huh? I’ve always said that we’d know we were really equal when a woman could pass out stark naked at a frat party and not get raped or molested. If DG’s view of the event is true, then we are closer than I thought.

So I talked to CJ who actually rode in the bike parade. Now CJ is by no means shy or retiring about nudity. She’s done the local Freemont Solstice Parade naked bike riding thing with no qualms. So being nude in public is no big deal to her. I asked what she thought of the Burning Man experience.

And from how she described it, you would have thought she and DG were at two separate events. She hated it. There were all these drunk dudes along the route catcalling and making nasty comments. She said she would never ever ride in it again.

Privilege means never having to see things you don’t want to see. DG wants to believe that there are places where women aren’t harassed. He wants to believe that patriarchal ownership of women is something that he (and people he chooses to associate with, like fellow Burners) don’t participate in. So he didn’t see that women were being harassed. It didn’t enter his consciousness. He didn’t have to see it because it didn’t impact him in any way.

CJ, on the other hand, did have to see it. It was directed at her after all.

Back to the checklist and the whole point of this story.

I have often ended up in arguments with people (men) over the harassment issue. I have been told things like “I just don’t see it” or “This is a progressive place, those things don’t happen here”. Once while trying to explain to a group of guy friends that catcalling is NEVER actually used to get a date- I asked each and every one of them if yelling at a girl ever got them the girl. They had a million excuses why it didn’t, but none of them ever admitted that getting the girl is not the actual point of catcalling. They just don’t see the broader problem. They don’t have to. (same thing is true of racism, btw. These same progressive liberals in a blue blue city don’t acknowledge that Seattle is just as segregated by race as Mississippi was in the 50s).

So when you are listening to someone with less (or no) privilege tell you about their experiences, believe them. It’s easy to not see what we aren’t confronted with. Think of privilege as being red green color blind. You may not be able to see the difference between stoplights, so you have to trust someone when they say they can see it.

Continuing in my movies you should watch (but not before bed) theme.

Teeth.

Seriously. OMFG. I’m not a big fan of gore, but this movie is totally worth it even if you have to watch a bunch of the scenes with your hands over your eyes while you peak out of your fingers.

You all may have noticed the new add in the corner for Galavanting magazine.

Guess who is responsible for this awesome little gem of travely goodness?

Kim from Religiarchy!

I love to travel. I even usually like airplanes (shocking, I know). I read RickSteves.com like some people read Perez Hilton. It’s a happy little sickness I have.

So having a much more hip and savvy mag for us adventurous girls makes my little heart go pitter patter. And who knows, maybe Kim will even let me tell my story about being cursed by a Mayan woman in the jungles of Mexico.

So click on the ad link and give them some love. (I am paid for the ad, but not for the clicks and even if I wasn’t paid I’d be gushing like a school girl).

I was musing on this after reading about this creepy dude who thinks it’s totally cool to snap pics up a woman’s dress on a bus and then post them online.

It was the “If she didn’t want anyone looking she shouldn’t have worn a skirt” comments that got me started. But what about women who don’t wear skirts? Wasn’t there endless fascination with Hillary’s pantsuits?

I was once sitting at a bus stop on a Sunday morning. I was heading off to pick up the kid from a sleepover. I am not a morning person so I was doing my best soccer mom impersonation- yoga pants, a baggy sweatshirt, hair in pony tail and no make-up. For who knows what reason, this totally slutty get up made some old dude in a beater think I was a prostitute. I didn’t realize that the MILF fetish had gone so far as to now include streetwalkers, but who knows?

So what can we wear that will let us be left alone? The head scarves and long skirts that the Muslim women in my neighborhood wear don’t work. They still get harassed. The super modest dress of the FDLS women doesn’t work. They still end up as someone’s 3rd child bride/rape victim/ domestic slave. Women in Saudi Arabia who cover everything get chased by desperate men in cars.

Maybe, just maybe, what we wear doesn’t matter. Maybe harassment of women has nothing to do with whether or not we invite it by our style of clothing. Maybe there is something else going on here, like perhaps the patriarchal ideal that all women in public spaces are public property.

We will know that we are safe when a woman could be the Naked Cowgirl of New York and not worry about being raped and when using the subway doesn’t require nerves of steel and the willingness to have some dude rub his crotch on you. Until then, it doesn’t matter what we wear. It’s not about that.