The evil empire and the good Christian from South Carolina

This is a story I heard today, 9/11/08, on NPR. Phillip Miles, a South Carolina pastor, was detained in Russia in February for bringing hunting bullets into the country, which, apparently is against Russian law. Although he is now free, Pastor Miles is on the air, and everywhere else, recounting his tale of unfair incarceration. He seems to think that US officials would greet with open arms a Russian (or any other foreign national) who entered the United States with live ammunition packed away in his luggage and a story about how these bullets were gifts for a friend.

Let's start at the top. The barely literate, poorly trained TA guards at our security points routinely pull out of line for special scrutiny women wearing unwire bras and men with knee transplants (and the documentation and scars to prove they've had knee surgery). However, the same brain trust allowed Pastor Miles to pack live ammunition in his luggage as long as it wasn't carry on. These are the same people who told me I could get back into the US from Mexico with the three wrapped and sealed bottles of Mexican hot sauce only to have said hot sauce confiscated by US officials who then disposed of them. And while doing this, they said, "The law in the US says you cannot pack these items in carry on." Too bad the people at the other end were ignorant of the US law, just as the people at the start of Pastor Miles flight seemed ignorant of Russian law.

It gets worse, because the charge was then upped to smuggling, which really got Pastor Miles' goat because, he maintained, this was a box of ammunition that could be purchased anywhere in the US--except he was bringing the bullets into Russia where the law is different. Pastor Miles was particularly incensed that no one spoke English, although he had visited Russia for a decade and did not speak Russian. Even after his six month incarceration, Miles did not have enough Russian to understand when his name was called during the trial.

Pastor Miles was shocked--and appalled--by his tiny, overcrowded cell, by the demand that he hand wash his own clothes (and the requirement that he dip each piece 10 times in the soapy, which he seemed to find onerous), and by the fact that his cell mates watched TV at all hours (and once had the never to watch some porn). Obviously, Pastor Miles has never visited, much less been incarcerated, in a US jail, so he may be excused for his belief that jails here are spacious and spotless. He was also surprised that unlike US justice, he was jailed for six months awaiting a full trial. Ahh, these novices.

It's unfortunate that Pastor Miles did not realize that brining live ammunition to another country is illegal. But it is and can you imagine how much hell there would be to pay if some foreign national brought a box of bullets into the US? Not that they would have to because, as Pastor Miles noted, you can buy bullets here in the US with little problem. "But sir, these bullets are for my friend who lives in Chicago, where bullet sales are restricted."

Pastor Miles, like so many Americans, somehow believes that the US Bill of Rights follows him wherever he goes--and worse, that as a Christian American, he is entitled to special treatment. "Yes, of course, I broke the law, but I am an American, and a Christian American, surely the law does not apply to me."

He did draw a three-year sentence but only served six months and, I suspect, will not be a welcomed guest in Russia for some time. Meanwhile, he is telling his tale of unfair incarceration (had he spoken the language, Miles could have figure out at one point that the whole matter would have been resolved with a bribe) without realizing that other countries have laws and customs (and languages) that we have to follow even if we are good Christian Americans and this has nothing to do with the left overs of Godless Communism but has a great deal to with American arrogance and the misguided belief that our laws apply everywhere.

Vice President Barbie

According to Karl Rove, having a unmarried 17-year-old pregnant daughter makes Sarah Palin more sympathetic to millions of Americans, presumably not  those Americans who would have cast stones had the pregnant daughter been Democrats, or just some body who lived down the street.  Sometime during her "abstinence only" lecture, Palin might have added that having unprotected sex is not the best choice for a child still in high school. Should McCain win, I hope Palin has a clearer line of communication with the military, or with whomever the vice president communicates. "Families are off limited," because the family in this case is White and Republican, can you imagine the field day Palin would have had if the unwed pregnant teen had been Obama's?

The Conservative Right, and maybe the whole right wing, agree with Sarah Palin that birth control is a form of abortion. Sarah Palin does not believe that women should have birth control and she believes that educating girls about condoms is wrong because it prevents them from becoming pregnant. Sarah Palin believes that if you are raped, even by a member of your family, you must prolong your agony by carrying to term and giving birth to a child of that rape or incest. She is also against helping pregnant women in any way. And she now has the power to make these beliefs law. Can you imagine what she will be able to accomplish as vice president or president.

Statistically, John McCain is more likely to suffer some catastrophic illness or die while in office than any of  the other candidates or the incumbent. That means that the United States will have a woman president, who, in this case, is the female version of our current Commander-in-Chief. Statistically, we now have a better chance of having a woman as president. And although Palin has compared herself to Harry Truman, that buck won't stop at her desk. When Harry Truman became president he had served as a judge and a US Senator, he had more than 40 years experience as a public official, a politician, and a businessman. Palin's comparison of herself to Harry is dishonest and uneducated, and maybe designed to attract those who are ignorant of their own history.

The Republican Party seems to think that a female, any female, is enough to attract the votes of disenchanted Clinton supporters. And they think that because they have nothing but contempt for women. Sarah Palin is the female George Bush, she is as sarcastic, she is as mean-spirited, she is as narrow, and she is as dangerous. She is a sideshow that pulls attention away from John McCain 's inability to understand the economic ills of this nation, much less propose a solution. The Republican elite have created a situation in which any criticism of Palin can and will be characterized as more proof of Democratic elitism. The Republicans have thrown Palin to the media wolves in an attempt to draw attention away from John McCain whose answer to our fuel crisis is to increase drilling for more oil--or maybe Palin believes that if she prays hard enough her God will replenish the Earth's depleted fossil fuel sources and all will be well for us and the oil industry.

All in the fragmented family

I was born into a working class family, white collar only because my dad had an administrative job at a university (so that we could obtain a free education), but blue collar in an economic sense. I have never felt the need to apologize for my upbringing or my ethnic heritage, although I do not think of myself in hyphenated terms.

We were different from everyone else in the neighborhood because we had a summer home--a cottage on a lake in a town known as the Blue Collar Riviera for Chicago's working class. Wauconda, then a farm community on a lake with cheap summer rentals--and my grandmother owned property on which a house was built by my dad (an in-law), uncles and various extended family members. We spent our summers there, although I often dreamed of going to a sleep-away camp, which we could never afford. Our summers were perfect, spent in the company of various cousins, watched over by various adult relations, in a then idyllic setting outside the city. I always knew when we reached Chicago city limits, the air pollution made us ill.

The house and land remain but my mother was not included as one of the owners in the will. Instead, she was left some property in the city, which was lost in a harbinger of what would happen to the summer home when all the uncles were dead. The property fight for the remaining city building was ugly. One cousin wanted to buy it and live in it, another, wealthier cousin wanted to buy it as an investment and eventually sell it outside of the family at a profit. Regardless of what the majority wanted, the wealthy cousin won the property and I knew then that unless I won the lottery, the Wauconda property was doomed once the last uncle died. And that has happened.

So what does this mean? Do I hang on to the past because I have no future? Do I need the cottage because it gives me a sense of my place in this world? Do I simply love it because I was once so happy there? Yes, the property will be sold and others will profit and that is the way of the world. But I feel poorer for it. My full name was inscribed in the concrete cover of the cistern for god's sake! The ramshackle place with it's many expensive peculiarities is part of my life. And I had hoped to be dead when it was sold. I feel again my dad's disappointment and hurt when he discovered that regardless of all the work he did on that place, he was not considered enough a part of the family to participate in ownership. I remember once when he had an opportunity to buy a smaller property nearby and turned it down saying, "Why do we need that when we have the big house?" Little did he know.

Someone once said of me that I'd be poor within a year of winning the lottery because I would give it all away. Yes, but I would have done what I can to ensure that that stupid house with its iffy plumbing would be kept together until there was no one left who cared--and that is only one generation away. People who claim that money does not buy happiness have enough money to make sure that their dreams and hopes become real.

I hate that they are selling that property. I hate that I cannot save it. I feel raped and robbed and left bleeding by the side of the road. This is progress and what happens when it steam rolls over the majority.

Nuts anyone?

Pity poor Jessie Jackson who was caught saying out loud what he really thinks when it comes to Barak Obama.  Nothing is more galling to Jessie Jackson that Obama's success. According to Jessie Jackson, white people are racist until they can prove otherwise. Only he can determine who is and who is not a racist, what is and what is not racist. Along comes Obama who claims that some of the problems are self-inflicted, who challenges people to take responsibility for their own actions, and who acknowledges the existence of racism but does not accept it as the reason form people's failure. Jackson has been nipping at Obama's heels for some time. And while he could never say it, no one hopes for an Obama loss as much as Jackson because it will be an affirmation that the old extortionist ways are best.