The Search, part III

Searches of bags by New York City cops, which began on 21 July after the London Tube was bombed a second time, are being argued in a case brought by the New York Civil Liberties Union (link to NYT article posted below). The NYCLU argues that the searches are a violation of the 4th amendment, and should the NYCLU lose the case, it will be the first time (that I have heard of, at least) a judgement goes directly against the Constitution of the United States and favors, as I see it, the tactics of intimidation and fear that the federal and New York City governments are trying to pass off as necessary evils. I was willing to go along with this farce for a while, as nothing pleases me more than letting cops know they are full of it and that they are nothing but losers someone picked up off the street to become cops. This is true because only a handful of New York City cops know what the hell they are on the force to do, and this is proven time and time again, whenever we hear of some hapless cop just shooting someone and saying that he saw the suspect draw a gun that was never there to begin with.

It turns out that the subway searches, just over three months old, have not revealed anything, not a dime bag or even a pen knife. Meanwhile, kids are getting shot in Brooklyn over basketballs and such and the guns continue to flow right on up I-95, the main thoroughfare for weapons imported from the dirty South, and over the George Washington bridge, and as far a i know, nobody has been that concerned with those things. Another thing that makes the subway searches a complete waste of time is the fact that the local government and the cops have been extremely half-assed about them, as I have said before. Funny, if I gave a half-assed performance on the job, I'd get fired (that is, if I worked in a normal place, which I don't, for better or for worse). I did a half-assed job in school for a while there, and I got the shit kicked out of me by my parents and teachers. Why is a half-assed response to terrorism of all things in any way acceptable? If the fuckers in Government are going to make stupid rules and say they are for the common good, then the rules should apply to everyone, everywhere, all the time, and due action should be taken ALL the time. Not just when law enforcement feels like doing their job.

In my opinion, the City better get its shit together before they go argue against the Constitution. But what do you guys think? Will there be a judgement against the Constitutional right of every American to privacy? Or will suspicion rule the day?

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/01/nyregion/01search.html

En Paz Descanse

Yesterday, I was looking at the alumni pages for my lovely high school, Washington International School. Of course a lot of memories came flooding back, and I realized that most of those people, I don't really care to see anymore. True, a lot of them are doing really well, and I'm so proud that I went to school with these people who turned out so good. But that doesn't mean I want to talk to them again. I don't hate them, although I did have a very strong distaste for some of them back then. We just never had anything in common, and besides, we were all so damned fickle and all of us felt above each other at one time or another. Pretty twisted times, but I had some very good ones as well.

I went to the page for the class two years behind me, of '96, to see what this one kid was up to, but when I got to his name, there was the word "deceased" written below it. At first, I thought it was a typo, a very cruel one. Then I believed it and hoped that his death was not a violent one and that it was due to some illness he had, which is still tragic, but for me, less tragic than something violent. I very loudly said "No way!" right in the office, and one of my colleagues heard me and asked me what was up. I told him what happened, and he said "I'm very sorry to hear that", and silly me couldn't even be gracious and say thank you for the condolences, as I was still in shock with my mouth gaping open and eyes wide. I called my friend Khi to leave word to call me back to tell me what she knew about this, as she was in this kid's class, and she told me that Eliuth, my friend although we were never close, had fallen in with a bad crowd and had gotten stabbed in Silver Spring going on two years ago.

Eliuth was your typical punk. At least that's how he looked. Totally street, and not in that good of a way, like one of those kids sitting on a milk crate in front of the bodega eating bear claws and drinking 40's all day. And I guess eventually he did become a punk who got himself invovled with the American/Salvadorean gang, La Mara Salvatrucha, or MS-13. But he was nicer and way more human than a lot of people gave him credit for, and more so than a lot of other people WERE back then. He was a hip hop head, in the truest sense of the word, and sometimes at lunch, we could be seen nodding our heads to the new joints of the day. He introduced me to Grand Puba, as well as many others, and that was what started our friendship, which ended up being too short, as he left WIS after 9th grade, my 11th grade. Khi told me that Eliuth was a WIS "lifer", just like her, and that they had grown up together, and coincidentally enough, she had just been looking at pictures of her class when they were little. Now Khi had a hard time in school. She wasn't the most beautiful motherfucker (although she sure as hell is now) and was pretty awkward for a while, and of course the other kids didn't help. She told me that once, when she was carrying a pile of books and kept dropping them and all the other kids were laughing at her, Eliuth came out and helped her, even though he was part of another, cooler crowd, and y'all know how the division lines go. That was in 4th grade, and it showed the character and the class that he eventually took with him to the grave. Anyway, I forgot exactly how I met him, but I do remember he was really a beautiful person, and one of the only people from school I actually wanted to see again.

Eliuth, I bet the sounds up there are great, my friend, please tape some of it, will you? I'll see you when I get up there. Until then, rest in peace!

Guatemalan indians refuse aid

This is the type of headline you will see most if you go to Google and search for "where to give aid to Guatemala". Of course this continuous implication that Guatemalans, and all Latinos, for that matter, are dimwitted berrinchosos enfuriates me. This is most certainly not the time for the gringo media to keep pushing false ideas and rhetoric. As for aid to the victims of the storm, there are two sites to go to to offer support, and one of those seems quite questionable to me, which is why I did not post it. By the way, the UN still hasn't gotten its shit together with regard to helping Guatemala, focusing instead on Pakistan, which of course is a worthy cause, but the attitude of my employers so far is probably the most frustrating thing I've encountered here yet. If you go to the website of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, you will find the Pakistan tragedy emblazoned on the front page, while Guatemala's tragedy lies somewhere in the back pages if it is there at all. UN staff have acces to the UN "News Centre", and I did see some updates there about aid from the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, UNICEF and the UN Population fund being rushed to the region, but even that highllighted El Salvador instead. I had to actually go to the Americas section and scroll down about three articles before I got to that one.

I just want to make clear in this posting that Guatemalan indians are refusing aid from the country's military because they very understandably have no confidence and/or trust in them, for it was that establishment that routinely massacred indians during the civil war, and it is the government that has for decades pushed policies that perpetually subjugate them. Honestly, would YOU readily accept assistance from the very people who traditionally have been violently opposed to your existence and that of your people?

Columbus Day

This is a post that I should have written yesterday, but I was all bent out of shape about what all is happening in Guatemala and the sheer lack of any mention of it at the United fucking Nations. The UN is, however, giving $60,000 to El Salvador for the victims of some volcano that erupted there (as if the whole of Central America is not riddled with active volcanoes that blow smoke and erupt almost daily) and $30,000 to Costa Rica for God only knows what. Small potatoes, I know, but talk about misappropriation of funds.

Columbus Day is a disappointment. First of all, I want you all to know that I came in to work yesterday quite proudly, whereas some of my "Latino" co-workers whined about not getting the day off, and I wasn't about to school them. As Latinos, they really should recognize already that Columbus Day is a "celebration" of the decimation of a culture whose only fault was that it surpassed that of its conquerors and stood as an obstacle to their need for world domination.

I feel bad for Italians who take so much pride in the holiday and the little parade that comes with it, which of course is the bane of my existence not only for the premise but for all the traffic patterns it disrupts (I don't drive, but hell, I am a commuter and able to sympathize with the plight of my comrades). If Italians are so keen on destroying the myth that they are all Mafioso murderers, why not stop playing themselves celebrating death and destruction? Not only that, but Columbus was a traitor to Italy by going over to Spain and letting the Catholic kings get credit for his work, which was really getting hopelessly lost and then founding an empire by default. Why can't Italians instead celebrate Marco Polo or something? Marco Polo did a lot less harm, as far as I know. He just stole the noodle idea from the Chinese and brought it over to Italy and called it pasta. Everyone loves pasta, so why not celebrate that? Even though I'm on a no-carb diet, I could definetly get behind that.

Just a note.....

.....on one of the things wrong with Guatemalans and Guatemalan-Americans.

I went back to Guatemaltecos.com, which I consider to be a sort of an alma mater which I dropped out of for the sheer frustration that was in it. Well, two of the three reasons for my departure are still at it, fussing and fighting and dancing around the subject at hand, choosing instead to ridicule others surely to impress themselves and their audience, which is quite captive on that site as most Guatemalans are chismosos anyway and love a good dog fight. Anyway, the very same guys are the ones at it, and they are saying the very same things, about freedom of speech and other freedoms that they avail themselves of while refusing to let others do the same lest it make them look bad. I saw some discussion of serious topics going on that had just degenerated into an "I'm entitled and you're not" scenario. That is not only counterproductive to discussion, but it makes Guatemalans look like a bunch of disorganized and argumentative heathens, which of course feeds into the existing stereotype. Speaking of the stereotype, it has also come out in the news that the survivors of the floods and mudslides are fighting each other for food supplies, as they haven't had any for close to a week. I can find no problem with that since it is in human nature to try like hell to guarantee yourself and your people survival. But those of us who live the high life, comparatively speaking, have no reason to step all over each other just so we can outshine everyone else.

But what bothered me most, and I mean no offense to the gentleman who runs the site for he cannot possibly tell his forists what to discuss, nor should he, is the lack of real discussion of the flood/mudslides. There are two discussion threads on that topic. One has one response to it and the other has maybe five or six, and four of the posts are to report problems in posting. I saw much more discussion about who gets to say what when and where, and about the lastest Guatemalan singer-songwriter. Of course it's OK to discuss frivolities like the latter subject, but I'm sorry to say we have bigger fish to fry these days. That's something that always disappointed me about the Guatemaltecos.com site. Some of those people are flojos, lax. They don't have anything relevant to say.

I started the day upset at the lack of coverage in the United States of the tragedies going on as I write in my country. Now I am upset at the lack of coverage the tragedy has gotten among Guatemalans themselves.