City of Legends

Yesterday I predicted John McCains‘ running mate…stating it would be a woman, with impressive Right Wing credentials, who has limited major political experience and is an effective communicator, telegenic, and with a reputation for aggressive positions.

I then said that it would be Ann Coulter.

I hit the tree but missed the target.

Meet Sarah Palin, the Governor of Alaska.

She’s in her first term as Governor, having risen rapidly from local politics largely on her get-tough-with-corruption attitude. She is a former beauty-queen contestant, young (three years younger than Obama and Coulter) and is opposed to abortion rights and gun control while favouring increased drilling for oil in Alaska.

She probably does not have rabies.

I pondered this choice, once it was revealed. I think she’ll be a strong addition to the ticket, but I can’t support her positions on abortion rights and Arctic drilling, so I remain steadfast in my decision to write in Hillary in November.

Nice try, John. Anybody else thinks she looks like a cross between Carla Gugino and Raquel Welch? Just checking. I saw a younger, beauty-contest era picture of her in which she bears a striking resemblance to a photo used by an ex’s ex on FaceBook a few months back, trying to create problems as he pretended to be a woman. It would have helped the illusion if he left the copyright notice off of the picture.

But, anyway, good strategic move, John, I am proud of you. This will be an interesting campaign.

I have been pondering the question of who John McCain will select as his running mate. It’s a tough one, but I had an epiphany as to whom he decided on last night and will be informing today that they are "the one".

Consider: He wants to pull the women’s vote in the face of shameful way the media and the Democratic Party treated Hillary Clinton, estimates show that about 10% of the women voters out there are up for grabs, angry and disgruntled. He needs a woman on the ticket to lock this in.

The Right Wing of the Republican Party will not accept anyone with less than "Right of the Planet Mars" credentials. This means he has to go for someone known for their stance and status in that area. A media celebrity with no doubt as to their loyalty to the Right.

Fortunately, because McCain has plenty of gravitas and cred already, he is not as constrained as Obama was in selecting someone with a major governmental resume. He can pick the best available athlete and ignore their resume.

Finally, he needs an attack dog, someone who is willing to go out, get dirty, point fingers, call people names and bash the living bejesus out of the Democratic ticket and, indeed, anyone who says anything nice about them. Rabies optional.

Oh, and you need someone who is younger and better looking, if only marginally, than McCain, to reassure the voters about McCain’s age.

Okay, young, female, rabid and Right Wing. Hmmmm…AHA!

Ann Coulter is the obvious choice. And think of media attention that would get. Yes, much of it would be questioning McCain’s sanity, but it would make a splash. She’s somewhat photogenic, she has media experience, she’s as Far Right as one can get without falling off the edge of the flat earth, she’s willing to attack anyone who gets in her way with a level of invective that is beyond insane and tasteful. And…

the notion of a Joe Biden- Ann Coulter debate just boggles the mind. I am sure Karl Rove would approve.

For those of you who live in foreign countries, under a rock, or only get information from Rupert Murdoch’s Fox News, here’s a quick check on the status of the current candidates for President of What’s Left After Bush Gets Through Screwing Things Permanently Up and Starting Wars with the Muslims, the Chinese and The Russians All At Once.

Barack Obama: Nice guy, Big smile. Will probably get the Democratic nomination. The question is whether the people with the real dirt on him wait until after he is nominated, elected or sworn in before they make their move. His wife is very lovely, but seems to be a little angry. Not quite She-Hulk angry, more like Martha Mitchell angry (for you old timers out there).

John McCain: Nice guy. War hero (although, to be honest, most guys become heroes by taking a hill against overwhelming odds, not getting shot down and forced to rot in North Vietnamese POW Camp that is substantially less hygenic than the restroom at the average service station). Trying hard to be a nice guy and keep the Karl Rove Mindless Zombies of the Right happy. Wouldn’t wish his job on an enemy. Would’ve been Republican nominee is 2000 if not for his own party playing the race-card against his adopted daughter. Bastards.

Hillary Clinton: Tough lady. Big smile. As usual, the more experienced woman who is in line for the job gets leapfrogged by a junior manager because he’s a guy and, in the end, we are more sexist than racist in this country. One in three minorities in this country do not get assaulted at some point in their life, just because they are minorities. One in three women do. I’m writing her name in on Election Day.

Joe Biden: May be named VP running mate to Obama so that rednecks can vote for a white guy. While I am on the topic, will someone explain to me why we allow people flying the Confederate Flag to get on airplanes? They are flying the symbol of an anti-American organization that took hundreds of thousands of lives in a treasonous action against this country. I digress. Hey, wasn’t Biden’s own campaign a decade or so ago derailed by a scandal about plagiarism?

Tom Ridge: May be named VP running mate to McCain so we have someone who doesn’t have to totally cave to the Religious Right on the ticket. Former head of Homeland Security, which still sounds to me like a department under the Politburo, not the US Government. (For the glorious Homeland…)

Evan Bayh: May be named VP running mate to Obama so that Hillary can’t gripe too much, as he was her 1st choice for dance partner. If there is a whiter man on the planet, he’s albino.

Bill Richardson: Nice guy. Hispanic, which may really confuse rednecks if Obama names him as his running mate. Amazing guy, hope he keeps the beard. Was a good friend to the Clintons. Note: Was. Endorsed Obama, may not get invited to the Clinton Christmas Party this year.

Mitt Romney: Too Mormon for the mainstream. Evangelicals who haven’t read the Constitution may throw a fit if McCain asks him to the dance.

Third Party Candidates: Laughing, insanely, here.

Just off the top of my head, in response to a friend’s request.

1. You never know what is going to happen next, so be prepared for anything and everything and learn to have faith in your adaptability.
2. I will be traveling abroad within the next two years.
3. Tales of the Amomancer will be my best selling book in my lifetime.
4. The longer I live, the more I value couer rage and passion.
5. George Bush will go down in history as one of the two or three worst Presidents of the United States.
6. As such… remains a most remarkable book, regardless of the irony of its very existence.
7. Most people who seem to be liars are not malicious, just gullible or assumptive enough to believe something not true that they heard or perceived.
8. I am going to have to learn to perform my music live. This scares me.
9. God has one wicked sense of humour. And isn’t afraid to roll it out, especially when you get cocky.
10. Brad and Angelina would make a dynamite Ant Man/Wasp team for the Marvel Avengers film.

No, it is not Kevin Costner’s speech from Bull Durham, but I wasn’t going for profound and sexy. Those lists I save for private conversations. By the way, when you have the time (this is even for you stalkers out there) head over to Amomancer today, it is getting a lot of new stuff, and the tagging proceeds.

We interrupt the sex and sorrow to release the new lyrics for Kitabu, jointly here and on the Amomancer blog. I sat down with my original lyrics, and threw them out, as they were woven into a tapestry of the other lyrics. Not the first time or the worst reason I’ve had to throw out lyrics, but annoying. I will probably get shot at for the "legacies of pride" line, but pride cuts both ways, those who have something to be proud of (Mandela, Tutu) and those who do not (Amin and Mugabe) but would puff out their chests anyway and take pride in their sickness.

I wanted something that captured the texture of Africa, as well as the turmoil and the complicity of silence, of indifference (no, I am not being metaphoric here) of the West. For better or for worse, this is what came.

Kitabu

land of dark and green and gold
where diamonds rise and weapons sold
become the arch for hot hearts cold
to the pain of a sullen midwife.
Africa! Mandela! Amin! Mugabe! Tutu!
legacies of pride and those who died
fighting for something more, inside.
where both fates and hates collide
in challenge to all new life.
Africa! from the Sudan to the Cape!
from the grass where rose our species
to the killing fields of the disease
of human greed and human need, please
let us not turn our backs on this strife.
Africa! Hadeda! Zebra! Elephants! Lions!
Jesus weeps for the slaughter and the pain
that falls in a dehumanizing rain,
and for our indifference, we wear the stain
as surely as the madman with the knife.
Africa! land of passion and hope and dreams.
land of passion and hope and dreams.
land of passion and hope and dreams.
a book as timeless as it is enigmatic.
but as beautiful as it is bloody.
and as worthy as any grace under heaven.

William F. DeVault. all rights reserved.
special thanks to Aubergine, for the inspirations.

 Within hours after successfully winning a rigged election that included the kidnapping and murder of supporters for this opponent and forced voting, Robert Mugabe has declared himself the winner in Zimbabwe and sent out the inaugural invitations (I bet they were pre-printed).

The world retches and, except for our concern for those who are directly and indirectly impacted by this thug and his pathetic regime, laughs at a comical figure of twisted and perverse evil, trying so hard to be a third-rate Hitler or Idi Amin.

He’s more sad, like a mad dog who you know is going to die soon, swallowing its own bile, but you still are concerned for the damage it may do to innocents around it.

I was pondering the final tracks for Evangelist last night when I stumbled through my drafts folder and hit a minor miracle.

It was called Kitabu, which is Swahili for "book" or "story". The original draft is unusable as my collaborator on it has absented themselves from the project and I am neither a thief nor a presumptive (vampire etiquette, remember).

But, in light of the abomination of Robert Mugabe and the fact that, although already socially attuned to that region, the past several months have personalized the chaos and dread, violence and deprivations of the African continent, often visited or magnified by the evil of corrupt men heading corrupt regimes, I decided I need to make a stand.

As such (heh heh) I will be preparing a final track for the Evangelist CD, entitled Kitabu, which will be a protest song about the corruption of the Mugabe regime and the moral cowardice of the West, which has been a silent partner to murder, rape and madness. I have stripped it down to my original words, and am writing additional stanzas, while enhancing the music, which was solely mine to begin with.

I will release it to the web sometime next week, and ask that those who can and will distribute it by whatever means they can.

The heat persists. I am slowly regaining my strength (the pain is pretty overwhelming, though) and decided to drag my sorry ass to the nearest computer to check in with all and wade through my email.

I found out the following, in short order:

• Some individual wanted to apologize to me for having been mislead as to a quotation from me (someone else had told them that they were the originator). Not sure what the quote was, but if they think that’s the only case of plagiarism of my work I have been apprised of, I have news for them. Nonetheless, very classy to apologize.
• I can get a much larger penis by trusting my credit card number to someone who uses stolen email addresses to advertise their drugs and who can’t even spell my name right.
• The lady in the poodle skirt has a very, very dirty mind. This is a good thing.
• Despite a semester of Russian in college, I can’t read Russian advertisements for porn sites.
• Selkes, by their very nature, are slippery.
• Karla still likes the Braves.
• Banks I have never even heard of insist on asking me to go to a third party site and enter my account number for them, along with my password, Mother’s maiden name and zip code.
• Some childhood friend has bought into the Obama = deep cover agent for Muslim extremists conspiracy theory.
• I typo’d "sewer" in an online interview.
• Viagra has hundreds of different official sites, all of which write me under different stolen email addresses.

So, all in all, I was (for the most part) better off staying in bed and moaning.

I am getting stronger and will fill everyone in on the upside of my trip as strength allows.

The weather forecast is 101 degrees in the San Fernando Valley today. I’m sitting in the San Fernando Valley, right now, hammering away on this keyboard…

I had a very nice exchange with the girl in the poodle skirt last night. It’s nice to have someone to talk to sometimes, I tend to get too far into my own head and it is a torturous path out.

I was sent a link the other day of a young man’s poetry who lists me as one of his influences. Someone warn this poor boy.

I am going apartment searching with my daughter, Peri, this afternoon. My spur of the moment vacation was well-timed, it seems.

I am actively writing while here, also evaluating aspects for the tour and the new CD. This is me time. Time for me to rebalance and adapt. I met one of the most beautiful woman I have ever seen in my life yesterday. The gentleman in the next hotel room over snores. Loudly, with a whistling finish.

I am, grudgingly, supporting Obama this fall. I like John McCain as a person, but some of his views trouble me. I would have preferred Hillary, but I guess the there’s more ingrained sexism than racism in some elements of our society, and the great dickless-with-dicks masses couldn’t stand the notion of a woman in charge, so when a young man with less experience asked for the promotion, ahead of her, they jumped at the chance. I know a lot of women who are expressing this thought.

It’s ironic, in some ways, Barack’s success is based on exploiting prejudice. I guess in politics, the acquisition of power is more important than what you had to do and who you had to get into bed with to get there. Sounds a lot like a lot of people I know.

It’s going to 101 in the Valley today. I think I already mentioned that.

It took more than one take (that’s an understatement), but after a long hard day being an essential cog in the American Military-Industrial Complex, I spent a substantial time yesterday putting the finishing touches on yet another track for Evangelist:

as linen frames your sleeping form (click on the title to read the poem at Amomancer)

Arguably one of the more erotic poems in As such… and I think we did it justice, just had to bleed off some over-emotional inflection in my voice (dammit) that rendered me all but inarticulate at a few points. (I asked my friend Thomas when I might expect this tendency to end when trying to read works about, er, from that book and he said "If you were human, a few months…you? Never. Get used to it." Bastard.)

But I finally got the takes I need (Yes, what you will hear when the CD is released is actually an amalgam of three different readings). It’s a short, acoustic piece, but it has a nice punch to it and will settle in well with its brethren. I have decided to set an arbitrary deadline of June 14th (Ann’s 10th anniversary clean date) for the tracks for the CD, so if Jazz and Jezika™ don’t get their assignments in by then, I will just go around them (I am patient, but not infinitely so, as some may attest).

I see where Hillary won Puerto Rico convincingly. Not that it will do her any good. The boys in the back room have decided that a woman’s place is not at the top of the ticket, being the prejudicial, half-wit, sexist, chauvinist pigs that they are. I think the Democratic Party is ricking losing the affection of about 50% of the electorate in one blood-curdlingly stupid move. Four more years of Republican rule. Not that John McCain is a bad guy, but his stepping up means a lot of the policies of quite possible the worst President we’ve ever had will be continued.

Back and shoulders are killing me, I spent most of the day yesterday helping Mark move…still much to be done this morning…will be taking some lumps for this.

Designed a completed cover for "The Compleat Panther Cycles" yesterday, in my spare time…it is incredible (to my tastes) let’s hear it, again, for photoshop…the model I was negotiating with in new York fell off the edge of the world. No word from her in two weeks, despite my request, twice, to be told when the books I sent her (signed and of some material value anyway) arrived. I am annoyed. I did manage to contact someone who is assisting her…but still silence. I don’t have time to wait for other people (I did it for seven years…no more!)

Will post a poem from the book later today, as well as do an audio blog post.

Very pleased to see that the grown ups in the Senate worked out a deal on the filibuster. There are still a few members of the Republican Party with some shame and sense of civic duty.