Thanksgiving Is Ruined

The Personal is Political. The Political is Personal.

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November 18, 2008
 
excavation, examination

To sort through some of the [news stories browsed /data preserved /links saved] during the past several years can feel like an ant-sized, personal contribution to the forensic examination of a continent-wide site of a horrific jet airliner crash.

(Although many of these stories now can feel like artifacts from a suddenly remote and incomprehensible historical era of collective hallucination and lunacy.)



One can find oneself asking:
what on earth happened?

how wide the scope of the destruction?

where to begin the repairs?

how to prevent future disasters, if even possible?

how close to home (feeling of personal complicity) will any comprehensive range of blame-attributing boomerangs, once sent forth, inevitably hit (ha! obvious answer)?

why did it happen and who was to blame   --?




an exhausting, daunting and depressing task



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The morning after the recent US presidential election, a gentleman published an item, voiced as if it had been penned the night before, that said in part:
To them I say, seconds will call upon you
in the morning. Tonight there are dreams to be thumbed through
before the complicated, awful business
of summoning beautiful particles after the horse is stolen.


(commentary here)


The above excerpt suggests that the "complicated, awful business" was to begin on 6th Nov. at the latest.




"particles" --


the word's appearance here echoes its use by the same guy
(and the much earlier use of its relative by a diffferent guy)

    33     years    earlier:

But most of all she loved the particles
That transform objects of the same category
Into particular ones, each distinct
Within and apart from its own class.



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some particles from only the past few years:
2/23/05: "More Than 1000 Whistleblower Cases Dumped" (PEER)

9/20/05: "FEMA's Almost All-White Leadership Plagued by Discrimination    Complaints" (DiversityInc.com)

11/13/05: "Civil Rights Focus Shift Roils Staff At Justice" (WaPo)

5/23/06: "Intelligence Czar Can Waive SEC Rules" (Biz Week)

7/23/06: "Civil rights hiring shifted in Bush era" (Boston Globe)

2/28/07: "The Political Profiling of Elected Democratic Officials: When Rhetorical Vision Participation Runs Amok" (ePluribusMedia)

12/1/07: "Business Lobby Presses Agenda Before '08 Vote" (NYT)

1/2008: "'Card Check' Takes a Hit" (from Labor Notes)

3/2008: "Vote Machine," on the hacking of the DoJ (.pdf) (from Harpers, by the great Scott Horton)





TiR excavated these from its notes on or around 11/6/08, but found them too depressing to formulate into a post at the time.







Which category or class would these particles fall into?

Maybe one with a label broadly drawn, something like, "Cleaning the Augean Stables (regulatory/administrative division)."

An alternative label might read "Unleash the GAO!"



Happily, the latter (& not them alone) are already on top of the story.




There are, can or should be numerous other categories.






Again: ant-like.