Happy Halloween (belated)

[trinityvixen]

Well, I, for one, had a fun time this weekend. Friday and Saturday, I dressed up as a zombie for my book club and a group outing to the movie "SAW." To my great surprise, my book club thought 'costume' meant 'mask' or 'clown nose,' and they pretty much had had me well pegged as either over-doing it or not doing it at all. Seeing as my costume consisted of me making myself pale with rather realistic (or so I flatter myself) bite marks all over, a torn t-shirt covered in fake blood (oh, the irony: it was a shirt from the Columbia blood drive), and topped off with more fake blood oozing from wounds and some black circles around the eyes....yeah, I'd say I was overdoing it. At least Michelle dressed up as Illyria from Angel, and Carrie let me put another bite wound on her forehead Saturday (I'd done one for her Friday, too), so it looked like she'd been bitten by me, which is pretty cool. Of the two of us, I'd always figured I'd be too prepared to be the zombie. I'd get bitten, sure, but she'd be the zombie first. I think her idea to go as Bush and Kerry would have been hilarious, but she refused to be Bush despite the fact that I'm taller, she grins more, I tend to go on and on and on when I talk, she has more prominent ears....you get the idea.

Despite the protests of some, "SAW" wasn't that bad. A bit ridiculous in the acting at points, but I felt it was pretty tense nonetheless, and it had a good twist at the end. Poor Carey Elwes. Man, has he let himself go. I guess I can't expect him to remain Wesley forever, but if The Princess Bride never gets old, why should he? Anywho, good fun, silly stupid movie, and dressings up. Ken also brought Inu-Yasha, which, eventually, I swear I will get through, and thanks Ken again for it.

It was a nice counter-point to the earlier part of the day where Pooch, theKathy, and I went to the AMNH for "The Frogs." When I get pictures (in three years, going by my average), I'll post. Mostly, the frogs fell into the 'OMG! SOOOOOO CUTE! I WANT ONE ALTHOUGH IT WILL CERTAINLY KILL ME IF I TOUCH IT!' or the 'that looks like a pile of crap' categories. There were few, normal-frog exceptions, but the memorable ones were the brightly colored kill-you-so-dead poison dart frogs and...well, the turd frogs. The turd frogs looked ridiculous because they looked exactly as I'm describing: imagine a water balloon lying on the ground and not that full of water, the pooling, rounded, squishy-ness of it, and you've got a couple of these frogs. There was also the obligatory gush over the froggie gift shop, though no purchases.

Saturday also heralded a true New York kind of story. We walked across the park from the museum (after deciding that, despite his hotness, Alexander Hamilton's exhibit would have to wait for another day), taking a winding, meandering path that eventually led us out to 72nd and 5th, where, about a 100 yards from the street, there were three large fork-lift pads supporting huge cardboard bins of, tah dah!, pumpkins! A park official or two were shouting that they were free, so we three drifted towards the bins. A little girl was being really cute and offering to wipe the dirt off them so we could carry them. Were they not as dirty, we might have taken as many as we could carry, but as was we took two each. TheKathy wanted Lisa to make pie, which, once we did some shopping, was possible. Except that Lisa made the seeds into a treat for people (not me, kept getting in the sockets where my teeth were), and theKathy worked on the pie past when we had to leave to make the movie. She made whipped cream, too, and it and the pie were very good and enjoyed the next day.

Sunday was meant to be a day-long marathon of movies. I got rousted at the new 11 am by an over-eager Carrie, and she, Ping, Michelle, and I watched Ju-on and Ju-on 2 on Lisa's computer. It seems that Ju-on 2 is rather like an episode of Sailor Moon: only about half of it was new footage. The first half was basically the ending of Ju-on, and when it reached the end of the first film, it kept going, less coherently, from there. Other than Arachniphobia and Bubba Ho-tep, the day mostly devolved into video games, which isn't exaclty Halloween-y, but we've played enough Eternal Darkness and watched House on Haunted Hill enough recently to make up for it. Plus, I intend to rent Dawn of the Dead, or at least watch it with my friend Liz C at home in the near future. Mm zombies.

Speaking of the unholy undead, a quote from Bush, stumping desperately in his last weekend: "I ask you, come stand by me. If you are a Democrat who believes your great party has turned too far left in this year, I ask you, come stand with me."

FAT FUCKING CHANCE, DUBYA. This party isn't too far left. It's center. That's good enough for me. Despite my rantings, I'm not actually that liberal. I believe in some conservative ideas, mostly those considered financially conservative, I'm not just a commie pinko liberal. I'm a moderate liberal who's just been pushed too goddamned far because my every attempt to be reasonable is taken as a sign of weakness, a lack of conviction, or worse, a mistake. It's wrong for me to believe what I believe, even when what I believe, nine-out-of-ten times, bears no consequence at all on the people telling me I'm a murderer, a sinner, a non-believer, a cynic, a brainwashed college kid. I'm tired of this arsehole telling people that liberal is a BAD thing to be, when from his point of view the idea of a woman working a job, considering contraception let alone abortion is a monster and sinner, where people who want to devote their lives to each other for the rest of their years are destroying the sanctity of marriage, and people who question any of his ideas are liberals. Sure, if you're as far right as George W. Bush, just about everyone is a liberal. So, now I'm just a liberal, and no more moderate about it. I look forward to a time where I have the luxury of apathy, of hugging the middle course and not having to defend my views that fall on either side of the great divide. Because I believe they balance each other out and prevent me from aligning totally one way or the other. This president doesn't believe you can't be other than for or against him, so, naturally, I am against. For human rights, for human lives, for human freedoms, I stand against George W. Bush.

Cross your fingers, world. Tomorrow just may be the first day of the rest of our lives. It could also be the last day of hope for four more years, Heaven forfend.

Comments

[kimpire.livejournal.com]

Pictures? :)

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

When they arrive! Will get some digitals e-mailed to me, and will one day develop mine own.

[hslayer.livejournal.com]

I mostly agree with you on the political stuff. The party has drifted left since Clinton left, but not as far as Bush claims. It is kind of a shame even so, as a great many people still fit the "new Democrat" mold...socially liberal and fiscally conservative. Most people dislike abortion, but don't think it should be illegal. Fewer people support gay marriage, but almost none want to ban civil unions. And Bush's own party is saying he needs to stop spending money like water. Claiming things like (and I'm paraphrasing here, but not much) "It makes sense to have a deficit during a recession, but if there's a surplus during a boom, that money should go back to the people" or "It's the people's money but it's the government's debt" just don't play any more. The national debt is a national disgrace, and the entire nation knows it. I really believe that Bush's scare tactics are the only thing keeping him where he is in the polls. Of course, the apparent Democratic inability to truly unite behind someone doesn't help. I have a friend in Florida who was considering voting for a 3rd-party candidate this year. (Fortunately, he seems to have decided to go with Kerry, but only after learning that Kerry opposes the death penalty.) Of course it's also sad that Clinton is the only good candidate (regardless of how good a leader he was or the others would have been) we've had in over 2 decades. The South Park analogy of the Giant Douche running against the Turd Sandwich is frighteningly accurate.

Anyway, there isn't a lot of value in caring at this point. Everyone just needs to care enough to go out and vote tomorrow, and then sit back and see what happens.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

What I lament is precisely what you're mentioning here: the death of the nuance. It was something that really annoyed me in early ads attacking Kerry. It's part of the reason people find him so wishy-washy, and why they like Dubya's black and white world. Because it's easier to swallow the soundbite than it is to read up, do your homework, and figure it all out. I tried to explain to my uncles how this analogy relating taxes to who pays how much at a table of 10 for a $100 meal was an oversimplification of the facts, and I used maybe five e-mail paragraphs to do it. You'd have thought I'd written a textbook. The only responses I got back were "Jeeze, dayle, this is a looooong e-mail!" and the points I brought up were completely ignored.

No one wants to be 'i don't like abortion but am pro-choice,' which most pro-choicers are, in my opinion. It's an all-or-nothing on the right-to-life side. What they fail to realize is that no one is forcing anyone to have an abortion, but by making abortions illegal you're forcing women to have babies (or worse, to have dirtier, unsafe abortions). Choice is truly that, the option to do as you will. You can be pro-choice and be pro-life. I personally would encourage people not to have abortions, but I know I could not make them.

What Bush has done is take that kind of thinking, the pro-life, there-can-be-no-alternatives, point of view and run with it on every issue. If you're not for the ban on gay marriage, you're as much a sinner and awful ruiner of marriage as the next gay. If you don't support his spending, his restrictions on freedoms you are entitled to and those that have only ever been assumed (priveleges such as privacy), his wars, his reasons, you are thoroughly un-American. Whereas I have always thought to be American was to disagree, to play by majority rules, to voice dissent in hopes of fostering change.

Have the Democrats drifted left? Mostly, they've just drifted. Bush usurped and charged through, using 9/11 as his excuse, and the party rolled over and took it. They couldn't challenge him then, and they let him get away with murder, literally in this case, and not even the murder of the right guy. But does it matter? No. He's got the better tagline, the "mission accomplished," the "shock and awe," the "dead or alive." Frank Rich wrote about this, how we elect movie stars (sometimes exactly that) for President before we elect the smart guys. His column explains it better than I can, as does Maureen Dowd's from this weekend. She expresses the contradiction that no one addresses who supports Bush: why does it seem that every mistake he makes is part of the case for why he should keep his job? He failed at keeping us safe, so let's make sure he stays in power to...keep us safe?

Her column is great. I highly recommend it.

[hslayer.livejournal.com]

That kind of relates to something I saw on Good Morning America today. They sent two of their staff to a Kerry rally wearing Bush t-shirts and to a Bush rally wearing Kerry t-shirts. And although they said something about being treated the same in both cases, the footage told a different story:

At the Kerry rally, some woman yelled, "Fuck Bush and fuck you!" and some people with big signs tried to block the tv cameras' view of the Bush shirts.
At the Bush rally, the guy at the entrance told them that "This line is to get into the Bush rally, not France." And furthermore that "I wouldn't want you to get beat up by Americans." And then, not long after they did enter, were escorted out by a local sheriff.

So, insults and an attempt at preventing free tv time, as opposed to threats of violence and police involvement. And of course, as you point out, the implication that anyone who doesn't support Bush isn't really an American.

[wellgull.livejournal.com]

Just out of curiosity (not trying to start an argument here), how have you seen the party drifting left over the last four years? I haven't noticed, myself, but we probably just care about different issues...

[xannoside.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't say the party has drifted "left", at all. If anything, the main players in the DNC are very centrist. Rather, I would point out that the Rovian spin machine has simply been extremely effective in reducing the Democratic party to "safe topics": areas of difference that can be safely reprocessed by Republican propaganda to be something that many Americans find objectionable, such as turning "complex reasoning" into "flip-flopping". With the main DNC marginalized, the only progressives that you heard about taking a stand against the GOP were the radical lefties who freak out middle America as much as Pat Robertson freaks us out. And unfortunate as it is, thanks to our nation's history of sociopolitical misdefinition, both by accident and on purpose, most of America finds Christian fanatics a lot more palatable than "commies".

[wellgull.livejournal.com]

Mostly because they've not been as socialized to be adverse to them. But yeah, I agree with you -- perception is the name of the game here, and the Republican dominance of the media machine (both in terms of virtuoso skill and of ownership) is what's been driving so much of their continued dominance of the political scene...

[hslayer.livejournal.com]

It just seems like extreme fringe groups (or individuals) have been given a lot more credence than in years past. There's less talk of fiscal responsibility, paying down the debt, and the benefits of free trade. And it may just be because those actually in office are too busy trying to put the brakes on Bush's crazy schemes, but the voices I hear getting the most play are the likes of Michael Moore and others who were seen as fringe loonies not too long ago. More from activists and less from analysts.

I'm not blaming anyone for what I'm seeing - I really think it's by necessity. Fighting Bush (and the Republicans in congress) does have to be top priority, and that's going to involve a lot more leftist grandstanding. But I'd really like to see a Democratic president on tv again instead of a bunch of filthy hippy demonstrators.

I also believe that it isn't due to a change in the attitudes of the constituency. A thoughtful individual won the primary, after all, not a rabid nutjob. (No, that wasn't meant to be a Dean reference. I think that was total garbage.)

I definitely consider myself left-of-center, but that's primarily on social issues. I'm pro-choice, I don't see a problem with gay marriage, and I'd love to see more money go to education and health care, and less to corporate tax cuts. Aside from taxes (which I see as somewhat more of a social issue anyway), I'm fiscally fairly conservative. So I really reveled in Clinton-era policies, and wish Gore had been charismatic enough to win that popularity contest and continue them.

I'm rambling. I tend to do that online. I really think it's just a feeling aroused by who's being permitted (not even chosen, but permitted) to act as party spokespersons. The hatred of Bush is pushing them to be as anti-Bush as possible, and there may be a degree (a small degree) of throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

[ecmyers.livejournal.com]

I saw your handiwork on Friday night (re: the bite mark on Carrie's forehead). It was quite convincing. At first I thought maybe she had taken a tumble down the stairs again. But then I pegged her as another hapless zombie victim and waited for her to start to turn. She seemed okay on Saturday, so I guess it was just a false alarm.

[viridian.livejournal.com]

Psst psst. Is there an election day thingy going on at your place or what?

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

Yes, oh yes!

Right, will post straight away!

[fairest.livejournal.com]

Prominent EARS??? This means your death.

And the point of that particular costume was to dress up like Bush and Kerry and have a nice rousing fight. In addition to the sane, sound, and moral reasons not to want to dress up as the president, I didn't want to spend my Halloween getting beaten to a pulp--'cause you *know* I couldn't ethically have fought back. :-P

"And he has no *ears*. Is that part of your skin condition too, Zim?"
"....yes."

[kent-allard-jr.livejournal.com]

FAT FUCKING CHANCE, DUBYA.

Thanks. This and the rant that followed made me smile.