Got You in My Sights.

I heard a lot of rhetoric yesterday, and as usual, find myself unsatisfied with either end of the argument spectrum.  Here are my thoughts, if you care. If you don't, I won't hold it against you if you don't read it.


My fellow liberals: the guy who shot the congresswoman was crazy. From what I've seen of his digital footprint, he was seriously mentally disturbed. Sarah Palin didn't convince him to fire those shots. He did it because he was crazy.


In the next couple of days, the media's going to be frantically searching for reasons why he did what he did. Just like with the Columbine massacre, they're going to keep digging until they find something they can use to desperately assign meaning to an inherently meaningless act. Since the target was a politician, a lot of them will stop when they see Sarah Palin's cross-hair graphic.   But liberals, if we say that Sarah Palin is somehow culpable in this tragedy, we are also saying that Marilyn Manson and Doom are somehow culpable for Columbine. We know better than this. It's tempting, I know, to hang this on Palin, because it gives us a reason for this tragedy, and a reason that makes someone we dislike look bad.  But the uncomfortable truth is there are no reasons. Dude was crazy. It's terrible, but there you go.


Now, my lovely conservatives (I still have some conservative friends, right?): it is beyond tacky for Sarah Palin to take down her cross-hairs graphic, and to post on Facebook "our hearts and prayers are with the family of congresswoman Giffords."  Because here's the translation of that statement:


"All of last year, when I was using an extended gun metaphor to appeal to my gun-totin' constituents, when I was 'reloading' and 'takin' aim' and 'putting them in the cross-hairs' and 'firing a salvo,' and 'keepin' in my sights,' I never meant someone should actually go out and shoot them!  All I did was call them enemies of liberty, traitors, communists, terrorists, people out to destroy our country, and then suggested we take them out!"


Now, keep in mind what I said to my liberal friends: Sarah Palin isn't responsible for anyone getting shot. But it'd be awfully nice if, now that we're living in a world where someone actually did literally put someone in the cross-hairs and take her out, that we'd stop talking about it metaphorically. That maybe we'd start talking about our political opponents not as frothing demons but as people who, just like us, want the best for our country, but disagree on what that best is. Maybe we could stop talking about politics like it's a combat zone, and talk about it like a partnership.


The war isn't liberal versus conservative or Republican versus Democrat. It's the sane versus the disturbed, the good-hearted versus the violent, the sensible versus the senseles. Yesterday, there were twelve casualties. So let's stop fighting in the ranks, okay?

All Is Quiet On New Year's Day.

As the clock struck midnight, I didn't review the last year in my head like I thought I would. Instead, it occurred to me that this is the tenth anniversary of the start of what I will now think of forever as My Last Shitty Year.

2001: the last year I spent single, lonely, miserable, bouncing from terrible job to terrible job, always broke, always starving for affection.  It began with the second half of my ridiculous attempt to make a living and/or become a rock star in Los Angeles.  I lived in a studio apartment with my cat,  had a fifteen-mile, hour-long commute to a boring dead-end job, and spent most evenings drinking alone at a karaoke bar, hoping my brooding would attract women. It didn't work.

So it was back to Phoenix, living with my parents again for a few months, a couple of temp jobs, another ghetto apartment. At least my attempt at selling cars for a living got cut short after 9/11 and a crisis of conscience, but quitting the salesman gig left me more broke than ever.

The end of 2001 was self-loathing and cigarettes, a couple of good friends trying to keep me sane, feeling somehow stuck and freefalling at the same time.

It's good to remember now, when the ceiling leaks in my awesome house, or I fight with my beautiful, wonderful wife, or my amazing child is being difficult, that there was an interminable amount of time where I was simply miserable with no hope of improvement. Before Jess began my life and saved my soul, before Kingdom of Loathing gave me a most improbable career, before I had a future, there was a vast, featureless expanse of gray. When I began 2001, I had no idea it'd be the Last Shitty Year.

Wonder what 2011's got?