On Display at the Museum of Poetry

The Museum of Poetry has put a poem of mine up. One of my first quarantine-inspired works.

Ok, I'll Confess...

...I have a poem in the first issue of the Confessionalist, an online zine that collects "poems written at 3AM when the rest of the world becomes static." All well and good. However you'll have to do a little scrolling and a little digging to find my work. Think you can do it? I hope so. While it's not at the bottom of the issue, the poem is called "At the Bottom Quantum." Don't overdoes on verse on the way down.

A Poem About Social Media, on Social Media

Another poem of mine at the Rye Whiskey Review. Enjoy the old picture of me. Among the ways it's dated? I have a beard and I can;t fit into that suit anymore. I can't really fit into any suits anymore, except my birthday suit, if I hold my breath.

Part IV: Dear God No

This is the penultimate installment of my series on the Democratic Primary. Previously, I gave an overview of the general field as I see fit, and then proceeded to discuss the general camps the candidates fall into. So far, I’ve withheld my “endorsement” as it were. That’s not to say I don’t have a preferred candidate, I do. However I think it’s important to explain my views, reasoning, and standards before finally saying who I back. It helps to explain the “why” behind my choice. It isn’t about the personality, it isn’t about the optics, and it isn’t about the narrative. It isn’t even about the vague concepts of “electability” or “normalcy.” It’s about the policy I support first and foremost. Okay, the overall direction and structure of the Democratic Party is important too, but that’s tied up in policy as well. What good is it to restructure and redirect the party without an aim to effecting its positions?

Before I explain who I support and why, I want to discuss who should absolutely not get the nomination. There is a cluster of candidates who would be a step backward in nearly every way for the party. The previous essay introduced the concept of the Mountain and the Plain. To recap, visualize a convention hall. Near the front are gatekeepers and defenders of the establishment. In the rear, sitting above the proceedings, are the radicals, which I call the Mountain. In between these two groups is the Plain. The candidates of the Mountain want drastic changes to be made and the candidates in the front want to stop them. The candidates of the Plain want to negotiate between the two. I called the group up front Backset Democrats. You could call them candidates of the Dais as well.

But there is a group of people running who I think can’t even be considered that liberal. They are behind the Dais, if you will extend the metaphor. They are in the shadows of the Convention, refusing to acknowledge the Plain, let alone the Mountain. Their issue isn’t necessarily one of ideology. The trouble is they don’t really have much of one, which means they uphold the dominant thinking of our time without even understanding why they believe the things they do. Money explains a good deal of their positions and why they are men of style and no substance. Yet even the style they affect is one that is dull and uninspiring. Nominating the men who stand in this position would be a disaster down ballot, not to mention for, you know, human civilization.

So, who are these shadowy figures?

John Delaney
Tim Ryan
John Hickenlooper
Joe Biden

This cadre of candidates includes three people with very little shot of winning the nomination and the candidate who is currently at the top of the polls. I know it may seem strange that the most disastrous men running occupy these two extremes of viability. But this is a strange bunch of candidates. They think Trump is an anomaly and the major problems facing this country are matters of rhetoric and civility. The current state of the Republican Party doesn’t register with them and they’ve forgotten what happened during Obama’s presidency. The Rich aren’t to blame for our problems either. These men believe in bootlicking for the ruling class and bootstraps for the rest.

Maybe some of these names can be swapped out with the Backset Democrats. One of the things that makes the Backset a little bit better is that they are younger, more diverse, and occasionally have a new insight or idea. They may be Neoliberals, which at least means they have something “new” to them. The above mentioned men are Metaliberals. Their positions are abstract like metaphysics, and again, they are falling behind the center of the party. Unfortunately thanks Biden, there is an overwhelming amount of funding, press, and endorsements held by this faction.

Why would nominating these candidates be a disaster as I keep saying? Overall, they are out of step with the party faithful in an era where turnout is more important than appealing to some fabled center. They have no vision for combating automation, climate change, and wealth inequality. On all other forms of inequality they seem to be just as clueless. They back the American imperial project wholeheartedly and at home seem to have no issue with the carceral state. Specifically? Let’s start with the first three. John Delaney is the product of gerrymandering in Maryland, and calls himself “a solutions-oriented moderate.” Tim Ryan ran against Nancy Pelosi because he thinks she is too far left. A former aid to Jim Traficant, Ryan is shaky on abortion rights and wants the nation to practice mindfulness to solve its problems. Finally there’s Hickenlooper who is in the pocket of the fracking industry. Oh, and he opposed marijuana legalization, which may or may not have something to do with being in the brewpub business.

These three candidates don’t merit much further discussion. They are polling around 1 percent each at best in the polls. On average, they’re more likely to reach 1 percent together. They are not a threat to Sanders, Warren, Harris, or any of the candidates whose politics seem to deal with the reality of America as it is rather than the misremembered dream of what it once was. That’s why it’s important to focus on Joe Biden.

The former Senator from Delaware and two-term Vice President is currently leading in the polls. He was also leading in all the polls taken before he announced, which was a little presumptuous of the media. It’s hard to say how strong this support is or what accounts for it. It’s safe to say it’s mostly nostalgia at this point, a desire to return to the Obama presidency. Since Joe Biden ran with Obama, it’s easier to see how voters link the two together. Hilary Clinton made appeals to those who missed her husband’s time in power, and Biden is making a similar appeal. Of course, Hillary was always a much stronger candidate on her own than Joe ever was. She did win the popular vote in the 2008 primary, whereas Joe went nowhere in his runs back in 1988 and 2008.

That’s why the high level of support Biden needs to be treated with skepticism. It could very well implode when punctured by the appropriate scandal or screwup on the debate stage. It could also change based on something Trump does. I think it’s highly sensitive to the strength of the economy. There’s an increasing risk of a recession every month we get farther away from the end of the last one. When the economy goes south, Biden career defending financial interests might not look so appealing to the primary electorate.

Then again, nostalgia may carry the day for Joe like it did for Argentinians and Juan Peron in the 1970s. It certainly seems to carry him around very much in his everyday life as well. He seems to pine for a time when a senator could be friends with a segregationist then pal around with lobbyists and fundraisers, without anyone giving him flack for it. We don’t have many previous elections to go by when judging how strong this nostalgia factor is. There have been candidates campaigning on normalcy (Harding and Eisenhower) and candidates who made appeals to a mythic past (Reagan and Trump). But they never represented a previous era of politics so strongly in their person. The closest I can think of it Hillary Clinton in 2008. Her run, in part, represented a return to the glory years of the late 1990s after the tragedy of Dubya.

Yet, even with her run against Obama, she could make a legitimate case that a vote for her was moving forward. If nominated, and then elected, Clinton would’ve been the first female President (a feat that would’ve been no less true if she was elected in 2016 as well). Joe Biden doesn’t have that kind of historical feel behind him. A vote for Biden only means a change in so far as Trump isn’t president. There is no sense of the future about him. He’s all about the past, a walking historical reenactment. He was yesterday’s man in 2008, when he floundered in the primary and was raised from a political dead end by Obama. He’s like LBJ in that sense. Successful in the senate but unable to reach national office on his own, LBJ depended on JFK to give his career the boost it needed to get him into the White House.

Okay, it also depended on Lee Harvey Oswald, Jack Ruby, Sam Giancana, Fidel Castro, and the Hunt Brothers as well.

Could Biden surprise us all and pull a turn like LBJ? I suppose it’s possible. It’s possible Trump is a secret Marxist accelerationist too (who else has ever made Capitalism look so bad?) People often forget that while he was a standard New Deal Democrat in economics, socially LBJ was still conservative. He watered down Civil Rights legislation in the Senate, when he couldn’t defeat it’s passing outright with other Southern Democrats. Once he became president, LBJ became our most left-wing president. He expanded the New Deal, passed Civil Rights and Voting Rights legislation, and opened up immigration. Biden might decide that Washington is worth embracing mass politics.

It would be an impressive turn. Biden was an opponent of desegregating schools via busing. He opposed abortion until the 1990s. He authored several punitive crime bills that disproportionately oppressed communities of colors. Biden even clashed with Elizabeth Warren back in the day over bankruptcy legislation, that made it harder for families to discharge medical debt. His foreign policy record is abysmal too. He voted for the Iraq War, the Patriot Act, and increasing military budgets. To give credit where it’s due, he authored legislation to fight violence against women (Fight? Combat? Destroy? I wish there was a stronger word I could use that isn’t itself violent). However, he did put in an exemption for backrubs and hair sniffing. Oh yeah, and his treatment of Anita Hill helped put Clarence Thomas on the Supreme Court.

Despite all that he could be the candidate who ends our wars abroad, repeals the Patriot Act, closes Guantanamo Bay, passes healthcare for all, demilitarizes the border, kills Taft-Hartley, brings back Glass-Steagall, recognizes Palestine, opens up full relations with Iran and North Korea, takes us off our carbon addiction, or at least makes progress to all these goals. Then again, I remember when people thought Obama was going to do some version of this as well. Back then, it made sense to project on him. He didn’t have a record. Biden does and that record is bad. Bad for a Democrat even in 2008, bad for the Democratic Party today, and bad for America and the world.

Biden could certainly beat Trump, despite the fact he’s more of a subsidiary than a candidate. However a victory against him isn’t necessarily as guaranteed as people make it out to be. The Republicans will use his record against him too. Now, Trump has done worst than Biden but that doesn’t matter. The party in power (and conservatives by and large) can always be hypocritical. It’s not fair, but it’s true. They’re not the ones trying to change things. Everyone else who is a Democrat, a Liberal, a Progressive, or a Leftist is. As a result, the people hold them to a higher standard. One can’t think of Trump’s crimes and character flaws canceling out concerns about Biden. Rather, Biden’s issues will put a damper on his criticism of Trump. This is especially bad if you’re trying to appeal to voters in the “center” which is Biden’s whole strategy.

It’s this reliance on the center that also makes his nomination problematic. Elections today are determined by turnout and inspiring people to vote. Clinton’s loss in 2016 is more about the collapse of the Obama coalition since 2008, than any other factor. She failed to boost Democratic turnout and as a result fell short of victory. Now, if we didn’t have an Electoral College she would be president. It’s true her numbers in 2016 roughly matched Obama’s in 2012. But you have to play by the rules of the elections we have, not the rules you want (you wouldn’t run for Prime Minister of America, would you?)

Now, Biden could still win with this strategy. There’s another important issue with it though. It will impact down ballot races, where motivating the base is especially vital. The Democrats need to hold the House, win the Senate, and capture state houses and governorships. Otherwise, any attempt to pass legislation or appoint judges is dead in the water. And no, Republicans won’t change after Trump is defeated. Remember how we thought that happened after McCain lost in 2008? Or Romney in 2012? It didn’t happen then, and it won’t happen after 2020. The Democrats need an inspiring candidate who will bring out voters loyal to the party in all races. Trying to win over moderate Republicans means only that you end up with more divided government. They will vote against Trump and for every reactionary ghoul in other races.

Once in office, Biden will almost certainly side with capital against labor, and with growth against the environment. Joe Biden thinks he can compromise with Mitch McConnell over Supreme Court judges and the Planet Earth over Climate Change, I don’t know which is more delusional. As a result, he will burn all bridges of working-class support leading him and the Democratic Party vulnerable as the crises of late stage capitalism literally heat up. A Biden victory in 2020 most likely means another GOP sweep in 2022, and the possibility of a competent fascist getting elected in 2024. Maybe it’ll be an Ivanka Trump/Stephen Miller ticket, or Tom Cotton/Steve Bannon.

A Poem in RAW That's Thoroughly Cooked

RAW Journal of the Arts has published a poem of mine in its first issue. It's about Brooklyn before I ever really knew Brooklyn, also when I was still obsessed with Ted Berrigan.

Big Windows on the World

A surrealist, post- or pre- or sub-apocalyptic vision is at store for you with my latest published poem, "Memorial Park," available for reading at Big Windows Review. I think it's the first poem I've linked to that involves sports. Hence the new label "sports," or as the rest of the world calls them, "tags."

Tomorrow night's there's a reading in my neighborhood, Ditmas Park. Okay, technically the read is in Kensington, but the spirit of the series is Ditmas Park. It's tomorrow at 8PM at Hinterlands (they have no website, so just Google it). Mermaid Witch Joanna C. Valente will be reading.

Come Get into the Tub

With the Hot Tub Astronaut. Two poems of mine are in it.

I am a Former Person

Because I have two poems in Former People.

If you want something more experimental, then check out Jeffrey Grunthaner's work at FOLDER.

A Poem In Response to a Photo

I published a poem at ArtVilla called Light Somewhere. It was inspired by looking at this picture of Evelyn McHale, who fell to her death from the Empire State Building in 1947.

In Bed with Gore Vidal: A Book Review

In Bed with Gore Vidal: Hustlers, Hollywood, and the Private World of an American Master

296 pages

Riverdale Avenue Books

Thanks to the Simpsons, Gore Vidal is one of the first public figures I ever knew was gay. In one episode, Lisa and marge have this exchange:

Marge: Well, did you call one of your friends?

Lisa: Hah! These are my only friends: grown up nerds like Gore Vidal, and even he's kissed more boys than I ever will.

Marge: Girls, Lisa. Boys kiss girls.

            Fans of the show know that John Waters played a gay character who befriended Homer, while Jay Sherman spilled the sexual orientation beans about Harvey Fierstein in another episode. But the reference to Gore Vidal stood out more to me. Strange how such a remark can make an impact. Perhaps because Lisa’s comment touched on a physical aspect of male same-sex relations, or maybe it was the shot of Gore’s yellow cartoon face on one of his books, looking masculine, marvelous, and tough. The show’s use of Gore Vidal brought home two points to my young mind. Of course, I knew gay men existed but seeing Vidal meant that gay men could be famous authors and that his gray hair meant they had been around long before I was born.

            However, reading Tim Teeman’s book one wonders if Gore Vidal actually did kiss that many boys. In Teeman’s portrait, it seems Gore would have preferred mouths to be used for other functions, and that they do so quickly. Through this exhaustive and thorough sexual biography, we learn that Vidal often readily embraced physical intimacy, but had trouble opening himself up emotionally with anyone, including his partner of over fifty-plus years, Howard Austen.

            Yet, Gore Vidal would have approved of the way the Simpsons identified him, by the act of kissing boys rather than by an orientation towards them. One of the surprising revelations of the biography is that Vidal never identified himself as gay, despite the general public’s willingness to categorize and accept him as such. In his view, there were no homosexual people, just homosexual acts. Therefore, everyone was bisexual, perfectly capable of same-sex and opposite-sex attraction. This position, widespread before the nineteenth century, put him outside the mainstream of both American society and the Gay community. Unlike a writer such as Burroughs, Vidal did not even embrace a label such as “queer” and while rejected attempts to be labeled a “faggot.”

            But there was a downside to this self-declared independence from sexual categories, which Teeman thoroughly documents. Because Gore refused to identify as a homosexual, he did not lend his fame to the cause of gay rights. Occasionally he would donate to certain organization and fought against sexual puritanism in his essays. But he remained largely absent from the fight, which grew more noticeable once the AIDS epidemic hit America and claimed the life of one of his nephews. While Gore was attentive to his family members’ needs in private, in public he was weary to find a common case with such controversial figures as Larry Kramer and his ACT UP organization.

               There was an emotional cost to this attitude as well. Despite being out in a physical sense, when it came to his feelings, Gore was still deeply closeted.  Sex for him was about dominance and superiority (and of course orgasm) more than any expression of a deeper commitment. While he didn’t care if people knew he had sex with men, he took great pains to let everyone know he was the one doing the fucking. Gore was always a top, never a bottom, and stressed this.  As a result, he missed out on the potential for genuine emotional intimacy and this affected his relationship with Howard Austen, who the book depicts as a long suffering companion, a victim of Gore’s withholding. They were partners but had a largely sexless relationship during that time. As the book explains, Gore felt that he could live together with a friend but not a lover, only to realize how dear Austen was to him before it was too late. In heartbreaking detail, Teeman relates how Vidal broke down at his partner’s death in 2003 and subsequently never recovered from the loss.

            One aspect of Gore’s sexuality the biography investigates is his assertions of bisexuality. He did not claim it as an identity or orientation, but rather a description of his sexual life. It only made since to describe himself as such, since he did not identify as either gay or straight and wanted people to believe he was perfectly open to sex with men and women. Yet nothing in Teeman’s research suggests he was as flexible as he claims. While there may have been a sexual encounter or two with women early on in his life, after the publication of his novel The City and the Pillar, Gore seems to have only had same-sex relationships. Despite ample opportunity to sleep with women, including several Hollywood starlets, Vidal instead sought after the company of men, particularly male hustlers in Italy, whose willingness to sleep with him for money while dating women only further reinforced his views about the inherent bisexuality of all people.

            Of course, one cannot blame Gore for the position he took. As those who are interviewed in the biography stress, he was a product of his time and his class. Homosexuality was illegal when he was born and gays were viewed as weaklings in every sense of the word. Gore came from an aristocratic background and was expected to take a leading role in the country’s politics as his grandfather, a senator from Oklahoma, had done. However, Gore’s sexuality stood in the way. There were other factors as well, but he would bitterly claim to the end of his days he would have become president if it was not for the issue of who he slept with. It makes sense he would try to downplay any notion of orientation and was in full control of who he was attracted to. But his extensive experience with prostitution and his penchant for Latin male pornography reveal otherwise.

            Much of his reaction to the sexual politics of his era can also be traced to Jimmy Trimble. Jimmy was a classmate  who Gore claimed was the love of his life to the very end. According to Gore, the two of them fooled around physically and shared a deep bond which was shattered when Jimmy was killed in World War II, an event which probably shaped his anti-Imperialist stance as much as his sexuality. The first part of the biography delves into the mystique of their relationship and contrasts Gore’s claims of intimacy with denials from Trimble’s family. Gore’s continuing attachment to Jimmy is no mere speculation. He was always willing to talk about his attraction to him and  how he could never love anyone else. Unfortunately, he did so around Howard, who was both pained and annoyed by the mention of the young man’s name.  He would make a jerk off motion behind Gore’s head whenever his partner brought it up and often brought Gore’s discussions to an end with a repeated refrain “Oh Gore, basta basta with the Jimmie Trimble!”

            While depicting Gore’s struggles in a sympathetic light, Teeman’s book does not shy away from the dark side of his character and the cost his emotional denial took on him. Vidal extrapolated his own desire to be sexually flexible and saw bisexual and homosexual romances behind every relationship between two men in literature and history. At the same time, Vidal internalized certain aspects of homophobia. His family hatred against a certain kind of effeminate gay man made him enemies with anyone who embodied those traits, such as Truman Capote. Thetwo famously feuded on and off for close to thirty years.  Besides these mental gymnastics, projections, and compartmentalizing, there were also years of heavy drinking and a mounting paranoia which led Gore to reverse his will at the end of his life. Convinced his family was out to get him, he revised the terms so Harvard University, which he never attended, would get the bulk of his estate.

            There is also the issue of how old Gore’s sexual partners were. While it is certain he enjoyed encounters with males in their late teens, there were rumors he slept with adolescents who were much younger. Gore was particularly worried that his arch nemesis William F. Buckley had information related to these encounters. However, Teeman can only guess about what he knew, since Christopher Buckley found his father’s file on Gore after his death and promptly threw it away without giving the content inside even so much as a curious glance. Complicating the picture was Gore’s early involvement with a fundraiser for an organization , part of which evolved to become NAMBLA. Gore defended his presence there years later by pointing out that he was unaware of what the group would become and that at the time he was giving money to help a cause devoted to liberalizing laws between teenagers and older men, though not children. Others claim the meeting was directly responsible for founding the group, despite what Gore contested.

            This back and forth between the sources and Gore Vidal himself is one of the more frustrating aspects of the book.  Since the subject is the sex life of Vidal, a lot of outrageous claims can be made because the acts occurred in private. Some of the most notorious statements do not involve Gore at all, but rather allegedly gay actors in 1950s Hollywood. They come from Scotty Bowers, who wrote about his time supplying closeted stars young men and women in his memoir Full Service. Unfortunately the veracity of his claims is often suspect and he has a history of retracting them.  Gore Vidal approved of his writing, but I doubt Katherine Hepburn, Tyrone Power, and Charles Laughton would.

            Besides the issue of contradicting sources, the book can be confusing at times, since there are dozens of characters who come and go through the text and one forgets their relationship to Gore, particularly those in his family.  His mother remarried and through this union, he gains a set of half and step-siblings. A glossary of names might have been helpful. In addition, the chronology of the biography becomes warped in several sections since Teeman tried to order the book thematically.  A great deal of context is lost this way.  However, In Bed with Gore Vidal remains a fascinating read, in no small part because of the complex personality at the center of it, a man who had wealth and fame, and yet was never satisfied in his private life. 

The Princess and the Pea

Read a poem of mine up at the Blue Hour. It's about playing dress up.

Well, it looks like the year is closing out. 2012 is about to give way to 2013. Who knows what the year will have in store for me? There are some publications lined up. I have that to look forward to at least. There will be substitution jobs. Real jobs? I don't think they make those for people like me any more.

Louis H. Berman of Annapolis, Maryland Is an Idiot

Sometimes I read a letter to the editor at the Washington Post and suffer a minor attack of apoplexy. Unfortunately since I cannot go to a doctor for a cure and the apothecaries are all closed, I must turn to the next best substitute for leeches: a blog post. Louis H. Berman's letter here, buried away in the paper like a hateful jewel, is today's culprit. In a few spare paragraphs, Mr. Berman asserts the following about what's wrong with the Millennial Generation and while he spouts nonsense, in the process he reveals what is most wrong with the United States: namely that we have become a country willing to believe the most absurd and malicious lies about our fellow Americans. In sum, this is Mr. Berman's "argument:" 

1) Millennials are spoiled and lazy 
2) This is the fault of the Baby Boomers 
3) However, the reason for high unemployment is still not their fault.  Even though they were not in charge of Wall Street when it wrecked the economy, blame falls on the Millennials instead.
4) There are plenty of jobs for Millennials but they are too spoiled to find one. 
5) Millennials are supposed to "learn something" from their parents (who spoiled them in the first place) about what being in a real workplace means. 

I think Mr. Berman needs to go back and actually read the classifieds and want-ads some time. Sure there are plenty of jobs, but many require several years of experience and a decent portion of what do not are unpaid. Try looking for entry-level work Mr. Berman as I have, for multiple companies, in several fields, in different cities. It might be better than just talking out of your ass to tell the damn kids to get off your lawn. Now, you may claim that the Millennials are just too spoiled to take minimum wage, which was supposedly good enough for the folks of your generation. Remember that minimum wage was good enough for all of you because it was higher. A minimum wage job today pays less now when adjusted for inflation. Also, you may not know this because higher education used to cost a lot less, but many Millennials have college debts and need to earn money so that they can pay them off, debts they incurred in the first place so that they might not have to work for minimum wage all their lives.

I'm going to be generous Mr. Berman and assume you are not being motivated by spite, but rather an adherence to the just-world fallacy. In your view, unemployment is high because people are lazy and spoiled, especially young people. I hate to break it to you (who am I kidding, I enjoying enlightening you), but there are not enough jobs to go around. Roughly speaking, there are 3.5 unemployed people per each of the much vaunted job postings you discussed. No matter how many skilled people apply for a position, they are not all going to get it in this economy. The same applies even if they all decide to take minimum wage jobs. Have you been following the news? 44% of minimum-wage workers have either attended or graduated from college. I think we can safely assume they are not waiting out for their dream job. Their dream job is having a job. Mr. Berman, these attacks on a generation are a red herring, especially when you consider long-term unemployment rates among the Baby Boomers. But I guess they must be lazy and spoiled too, because of how the GI Generation raised them. 

This economy sucks. Period. Blaming the unemployed does nothing except possibly make you feel like unemployment could never happen to you. You seem to view joblessness as something that only exists for other people who must have done something wrong. Mr. Berman, this is a fallacy and an insult to the millions of formerly hardworking Americans who have been laid off in the past few years, and all the Americans of all ages, races, creeds, and classes who want desperately to work. Many of us loved our jobs before we lost them. Many of us have taken what we could find in the interim, only to lose those jobs as well. Many of us are the victims of discriminatory hiring practices that make it difficult for the unemployment to get work. Many of us graduated in the middle of a terrible market and could never get a leg up. Many of us have put having families on hold. Many of us have put owning a house on hold. Many of us avoid seeing our friends and family out of poverty and shame. Many of us go to bed every night praying for either a miracle or to be allowed to die in our sleep. 

And here Mr. Berman, is where I am going to engage in the same kind of attacks that you have, employing (see what I did there?) both the ad hominem and the gross generalization. Now, I am not doing this because it helps my argument, but because it is fun. You sir, are a dumb asshole. Unfortunately, you are not alone. The audiences of the GOP debates were filled with your ilk. You do not have any facts to back your assertions up, relying instead on worn-out narratives that have been applied to every previous generation. Despite setting yourself up as some sort of expert, you offer no real solutions to the problems you decry either. You lack any long term vision and fail to grasp the structural issues we are mired in. On top of this, you are callous. You are mean. You are judgmental even though your previous ignorance shows you have no right to claim any sort of capacity for judgment. 

Now if you were smart and an asshole, you would at least have enough self-interest to be worried about the true causes behind the problem of persistent unemployment because it affects you. Instead of spouting off against the usual suspects guilty of the usual sins, you would have some intellectual curiosity about several real solutions. If you were dumb and kind you might not grasp the nuances of the situation, but you would at least have nice things to say to those who are suffering. Of course, it would be best if you were both smart and kind, but I am willing to settle for the other two options if it keeps you from writing another letter to the editor at the Washington Post ever again. 

Come Under the Shadow of This Red Fez

And I will show you something different, I will show you a tale from a tub.

"You Carried Losses With You..."

Watching John Berryman in 1970 is even more depressing than Jack Kerouac's last interview.