Author: hankkalet

Hank Kalet is a poet and freelance journalist. He is the economic needs reporter for NJ Spotlight, teaches journalism at Rutgers University and writing at Middlesex County College and Brookdale Community College. He writes a semi-monthly column for the Progressive Populist. He is a lifelong fan of the New York Mets and New York Knicks, drinks too much coffee and attends as many Bruce Springsteen concerts as his meager finances will allow. He lives in South Brunswick with his wife Annie.

Putting his foot down?

I’m watching the Rachel Maddow Show and listening to Seymour Hersh talk about the AP report that President Obama has rejected all Afghanistan war options currently on the table. Hersh says the president has finally put his foot down, after having given the generals carte blanch to create a plan — which meant big war plans were likely to be pushed.

The AP report says that the “main sticking points appear to be timelines and mounting questions about the credibility of the Afghan government” and that the president “wants to make clear that the U.S. commitment in Afghanistan is not open-ended.”

This is better news than I — and many others who oppose an expanded war and who want the U.S. to scale back its military presence — expected. But it is not enough.

We continue to approach the Afghanistan question with an imperial mindset, one that starts with war and ends with war and dismisses any options that do not involve war. We’re not deaf to other possibilities, but actively and aggressively dismissive — including to complaints by the people on the ground we say we’re trying to help.

And in doing so, we ensure that the rest of the world distrusts us.

Toodleloo, Lou, not sad to see you go

Lou Dobbs … don’t let the door hit you in the buttocks on the way out.

Doggie diaries: The story of Rosie and Sophie Trouble-making tricksters

Sophie may look angelic, at least sitting by the front door before we leave for work, but don't let it fool you. She and her sister have been in rare form.

They've been digging in the yard and rolling in the loose dirt, spreading the soil around the house and forcing to strip the bed. It seems like we do that at least twice a week these days — why did we ever let them up there?

And they've learned to open the closet, which they've done a half dozen times today, stealing an umbrella and using it as a chew toy.

So, don't let those big eyes fool you.

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Illusory matters

Chris Hedges, author of the important Empire of Illusion, spoke tonight at Labyrinth Books in Princeton, offering a somewhat dark outlook on the direction of the nation, which he views as steeped in illusion and unwilling to face the reality of what has happened and is happening.

The national meltdown — the erosion of the working class and destruction of our manufacturing base, the gambling by the financial sector which packaged and repackaged debt, sold it and created an ugly and unstable Ponzi scheme, our decaying environment and the growth of corporate power and American empire — has created conditions that are ripe for fascism.

The cracks in the illusion can “propel people into this level of desperation” and a “profound personal and economic despair sits at the center of fascist and totalitarian movements,” he said.

Our corporate culture — which “perpetuates a never-ending childishness, an infantilism” — robs everything of its moral value. We have a cult of self, have lost all sense of community or shared sacrifice or understanding that we are all heading toward the same ends. Everything is commodified and, “when everything is commodified, a society commits collective suicide.”

the price of fame

What's brand worth? Apparently quite a bit. The purses are on sale for $149 — regularly $329, That's obscene.

For $150, I could get a new Blackberry or a DVD player.

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