|
jake_kohut
|
read my profile
sign my guestbook
Name: Jake
Country: United States
State: Missouri
Metro: St. Louis
Birthday: 8/15/1986
Gender: Male
Interests: I LOVE MUSIC: {{{ Goo Goo Dolls, Counting Crows, Dave Matthews Band, Relient K, Rufio, The Starting Line, Nirvana, The Get Up Kids, Homegrown, RATM, SOTY, OAR, Green Day, Richard Cheese, Rockapella, Jet, AFI, Thursday, Bob Dylan, Jimi Hendrix, Oasis, Choral Music, Silverstein, Enya, Beach Boys, Beatles, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Crosby Stills Nash &Young, SoCo, Sinatra, Gavin DeGraw, John Mayer, Ben Folds, Elton John, Billy Joel, and many others besides. }}} I'm a big fan of strumming on my geetar, plunking on the piano, Popular Science, intellectual conversation, and discussing US domestic and foreign policy. I also love reading. Go ahead, ask me what my favorite book is.
Expertise: Political Activism and Pirateism.
Occupation: Full-Time Student
Industry: Academics?
Message: message meEmail: email me
AIM:  kohutkohut
Member Since:
1/3/2005
|
|
|
The present is nothing
but a series of consequences.
There's nothing like an afternoon
of coming to your senses.
When all that's lost is minutes and hours,
paper and pages and wages and flowers,
it all comes down
to finding the right perspective.
| | |
| Since I last posted, I have:
Fallen apart.
Put myself back together.
Fallen in love.
Gotten hurt.
And now I'm in the process of trying to figure out exactly where I am and where I'm going.
For those of you who know me, forgive me if I have not confided this in you. For those of you who don't know me, forgive me this indulgence. Not that I need forgiving in the strictest sense, mind you -- you're the one choosing to read this crap. I was just being polite. =)
So, right now, it's this:
"It's nothing but time and a face that you lose;
I chose to feel it, and you couldn't choose.
I'll write you a postcard, I'll send you the news
from a house down the road from Real Love...
...live through this and you won't look back."
--"Your Ex-Lover Is Dead" by Stars
("Stars" video on YouTube)
vs. This:
"Long gone days are never so quick to fade.
It took falling away to fall on the same page.
Now all we see is bright lights that show
everything we need
and all there is to know
about letting everything go...
Step inside the lights beyond the shadow of our doubt."
-- "Bright Lights" by Carbon Leaf
Internal conflict and stuff... nothing I can't deal with. Yeah, yeah, I know it's pathetic to post self-indulgent crap like this where everyone can read it. But sometimes I just need an outlet.
Peace and love. Hope life finds you well.
| | |
| I read this
post recently and it almost gave me an aneurysm. Do people seriously
believe this? Here is what the post contained, word for word, totally
unedited content:
"You call me "Cracker", "Honkey", "Whitey" and you think it's OK.
But when I call you Kike, Towelhead, WOP, Sand-nigger, Camel Jockey, Gook, nigger or Chink you call me a racist.
You say that whites commit a lot of violence against you, so why are the ghettos the most dangerous places to live?
You have the United Negro College Fund.
You have Martin Luther King Day.
You have Black History Month.
You have Cesar Chavez Day.
You have Yom Hashoah
You have Ma'uled Al-Nabi
You have the NAACP.
You have BET.
If we had WET(white entertainment television) ...we'd be racists.
If we had a White Pride Day... you would call us racists.
If we had white history month... we'd be racists.
If we had an organization for only whites to "advance" our lives... we'd be racists.
If we had a college fund that only gave white students scholarships...you know we'd be racists.
In the Million Man March, you believed that you were marching for your
race and rights. If we marched for our race and rights...you would call
us racists.
Did you know that some high school students decided to make a club for
only the white students because the other ethnicities had them... they
all got sent to court for being rasist but the african-american,
latino, and asia clubs were not even questioned.
You are proud to be black, brown, yellow and orange, and you're not
afraid to announce it. But when we announce our white pride, you call
us racists.
I am white.
I am proud.
But, you call me a racist.
Why is it that only whites can be racists?
Repost if you agree.
Now watch, I'll be a racist for posting this - too bad!"
WTF, dude. I don't know if if that post is racist or just plain stupid. In any event, the poster himself declined to comment.
What, in God's name, does this even mean? Let me break it down for the
people who actually buy this nonsense. Minorities have it tougher than
whites. Deal with it. All of these things that you're talking about
(BET, NAACP, "black pride") all began as a response to social
inequalities and CIVIL RIGHTS INFRINGEMENTS that minorities, primarily
blacks, had to endure. So do not claim that you have a "right" to WET
(which just looks stupid, for one thing), NAAWP or "white pride".
Insofar as the court cases to which you're referring, those never went
to court -- they went before a school board hearing. The Million Man
March was a march for civil liberties, you dolt. Name the last time a
white was not allowed to vote in this country. And I KNOW you're not
going to assume that only blacks are allowed to celebrate Martin Luther
King Jr. Day -- white people can celebrate it, just like we celebrate
President's Day and Christopher Columbus Day.
Because you are in what we call a "majority". The majority of TV ads
are targeted at whites. Not because there are more white people in
America, but because whites typically have the most money. Black people
cannot buy a "flesh tone" band-aid. Whites were never enslaved (and I'm
talking about Caucasians, because the Jews have definitely been
enslaved more than once before) by blacks. The majority of CEOs in
America are white. More whites go to college. And insofar as white
history goes, yeah, we study white history all the time -- it's every
month BESIDES Black History Month. Think about it -- prior to the
Emancipation Proclamation, what could be said about Black History in
America? Hmmmm, enslavement. Well, that about sums that up. Pretty
short history, don't you think?
So don't tell me that you are "entitled" to some form of recompense
because you have been disenfranchised. Try watching "Friends" or "Boy
Meets World" or "Grey's Anatomy" or "The O.C." and tell me how many
people on those shows are of minority races. (And no, for the record,
I'm not saying that there are NO minorities on those shows -- but there
is a noticable racial disparity.) Most television networks that you can
get for FREE show a bias towards white culture -- blacks have to PAY to
get BET.
And YES, this response was written by a white person. I'm tired of other white people complaining about
how they feel disenfranchised. The only legitimate argument is the one
about college scholarships -- I think that those should be offered
based on a student's placement within socioeconomic strata, not racial
identity. But the other stuff -- yes, it is racist for whites to
proclaim that they need special treatment. Because whites are not as
heavily discriminated against as minorities, which is WHY MINORITIES
feel the need to empower themselves in the first place. Are you really
going to begrudge minorities the opportunity to have EQUAL rights? Face
it: if equality were a pie chart of the U.S. Federal budget, whites
would have the piece labeled "Military Spending".
| | |
| Okay, so I've been
thinking a lot about the Immigration Debate. The more I think
about it, the more I think both sides are arguing past the point rather than against
it. It's like the pro-choice/pro-life argument -- both sides are
arguing different cases, and the debate won't be solved for a long
time. However, we won't go into that. The point, today, is
the crisis facing illegal immigrants in America.
Kind of. Now I've heard it said that any idiot can write a blog
and claim that he knows all the answers. However, I'm not just
any idiot -- I'm me. And that's a horse of a different
color.
In any event, we shall resume the "point" (which is illegal immigration, in case you have forgotten).
The crisis in the headlines currently was sparked by a bill sponsored
by Bill Frist that would have made illegal immigration a felony.
When House Democrats voted to kill the amendment that would reduce the
felony charges to a misdemeanor (with the intent of killing the bill),
they inadvertently allowed the bill to pass into the Senate. The
Senate Judiciary Committee (which has more Republicans than Democrats)
has placed measures on the bill that would remove the felony status
(which includes a YEAR in prison) and clear the way for greater
integration reform, including a revised amendment to the Migrant Worker
Program, which will now issue 400,000 green cards a year. (SOURCE) [And yes, I intentionally picked the article from Fox, the most conservative network out there.]
Now, most Republicans will try to tell you that Democrats voted in
favor of felonizing illegal immigration. As I said, House
Democrats were trying to kill the bill completely -- unfortunately,
they were only able to kill the misdemeanor amendment, which makes
House Republicans' claims half true. Regardless, most politicians
on Capitol Hill are aware that immigration debate is turning more
liberal every day, and the Republicans know it. Everyone is
choosing their words carefully.
Here's my thing. I know that there is a right way to handle this
situation, and I think that most Representatives and Senators are
trying to find it -- revising the green card program while increasing
border patrols, increasing the amount of aid to English as a second
language programs, etc.. However, I would like to look at the
actual core issue.
Why are illegal immigrants coming here in the first place? A
stupid question, you might ask, but I think that there are more answers
than may at first appear.
1. In search of greater civil liberties
2. In search of better, higher-paying jobs
3. To get better education for their children
These are the answers I seem to find the most. Again, this leads
me back to my first question: why are they coming here? why
not fight for these things in their own country? Why not start a
revolution, like the Founding Fathers did when they were
"disenfranchised" by the British Crown? Why not fight back, like
Fidel Castro did? Ahh, the crux of the issue. Illegal
immigrants come to America because America offers these things freely,
to all citizens -- civil rights, public education, equal
opportunity. Naturally, these liberties are alluring -- to all
tax-paying citizens, these things are free.
But people who do not pay taxes should not get these things,
right? Do people who do not pay taxes, like illegal immigrants,
not deserve these rights? As easy as it would be to say, "Yes," I
do not even agree with myself. I want for all global citizens to
have these rights, because I believe that all men are "endowed by their
Creator with certain inaliable rights, that among these are life,
liberty, and the pursuit of happiness". This applies to all
people, not just Americans. Not just people with enough money to
pay taxes. Not just to people who happened to get a green
card. Not just to second-generation immigrants. Not just to
whites and blacks. To all people.
However... America has a working system that requires money to
function, and I think that people need to contribute to this
system. And I have met so many people whose parents were
immigrants who came here, worked hard, and established successful
families. But I do believe that many illegal immigrants come here
and expect for fruit to simply fall straight from the trees and into
their lap. And I have the same problem with Americans who do
this, because there are plenty of Americans in the Economic South who
simply expect to receive the benefits of the system
(welfare-sitters). So it really isn't an issue of illegal
immigration at all.
My problem is with anyone who claims that they are disenfranchised and
that they "deserve" compensation. Yes, sir/ma'am, you deserve
compensation. You did not receive the same rights that I did when
I was born in this country. I was born into a middle-class family
in the middle of the U.S.A., where liberty comes as free as minimum
wage does -- with hard work. I was born healthy in a country
where quality health care and medicine and hygiene are considered the
rule, not the exception. But guess what? I can't help
that. I can't help that I was born with these things any more
than anyone else can help that they were born without them. So
the headlines "Immigrants Demand Rights"... Why?
I do not mean, "why" as in "why do they want these rights,
lol???" I mean "Why" as in, "Why did they not demand these rights
in their former country of residence?"
Oh.
Why do they expect these things in America? Because America
provides them already? I could understand that, and I could even
agree with that. Except. Except for "Nuestro Himno".
I am not saying that I have an answer for this. I am looking for
an answer. I am trying to understand why they do not fight for
similar rights in their own country, when they demand them here.
And then they expect for the federal government to sacrifice its
sovereignty to accomodate those who claim that they are
disenfranchised. Because the whole argument is circular:
Immigrant:
"I come to America seeking new opportunities. I did not fight for
these opportunities in my former country because America already offers
them. However, the other things that America already has, like
immigrant quotas to preserve societal and economic status quos, do not
matter. The only things that matter are the things that I
want."
TO SUMMARIZE:
Yep, I argued both sides of the issue, confused myself, and now I need to consolidate my arguments.
- Illegal immigration is a serious issue.
- The U.S. government should increase aid to the migrant worker program, as a matter of creating a system with equal opportunity.
- Potential immigrants, in the same spirit of equal
opportunity, should be as willing to work for equal rights in the OWN
country as in THIS one.
I think that was what I wanted to say. And I'm also listening to a lot of Dashboard lately.
In closing, I am very frustrated with my post. Because I only
halfway said what I wanted to say, but I'm tired of writing about
it. This sort of thing is just easier to talk about. So if
you disagree with something that I wrote, please feel free to leave a
comment, because it's just too hard to argue with myself. So join
in the fun!
| | |
| Allow me to state, for
the record, that I love John Steinbeck. In my opinion, he is
probably one of the top five American writers. Some of my
favorite quotes:
"It doesn't matter that Cathy was what I have called a monster. Perhaps
we can't understand Cathy, but on the other hand we are capable of many
things in all directions, of great virtues and great sins. And who in
his mind has not probed the black water?" East of Eden
"All war is a symptom of man's failure as a thinking animal." Once There was a War
"In the hearts and minds of the people, the grapes of wrath were growing heavy for the vintage..." Grapes of Wrath
"Guys
like us, that work on ranches, are the loneliest guys in the
world. They got no family. They don't belong no place. . . .
With us it ain't like that. We got a future. We got somebody
to talk to that gives a damn about us. We don't have to sit
in no bar room blowin' in our jack jus' because we got no place
else to go. If them other guys gets in jail they can rot for
all anybody gives a damn. But not us." Of Mice and Men
How could Steinbeck NOT rule? I think he's awesome. That's all for now.
| | |
|
