Corruption, Cronyism and Backroom Deals?

Democracy, it seems, has never fully penetrated into Nevada; there are, of course, great shows of democracy on issues that, after careful demographic and political research - such as various anti-gay, anti-smoking and other such vital issues of public concern - are seen to be a lock. But when it comes down to important political decision making that will affect and outrage every single registered Democrat in Nevada and give Faux News a chance to appear like a legitimate, impartial news source, a decision that obviously would upset and outrage a good 75% of the membership, that decision is made in private, by one unidentified party official and a Fox Network rep. And if there weren't "other valuable considerations" involved - hell, it would hardly be Nevada.

In Nevada, democracy only occurs when it will produce the "right result."

Now, you might well ask, "Where does Harry Ried stand on this matter?" That's a damn good question. Nevada Democratic activist Matt Stoller is one of them

Tom Collins, who is the Chair of the Party, apparently does not think that Fox News's partisan agenda is enough to warrant a reexamination of the debate arrangement, or even a real conversation about how the party handles the Presidential contest. In fact, it's impossible to find out who made the decision to let Fox News host the debate. As Michael Zahara said:

Regrettably, no one is owning up to this mistake and by all appearances,it was FOX that came with their Trojan Horse to those who made this decision. We simply don't know what the truth is at this point, and likely never will.

I'm less concerned with who is responsible and more interested in immediately relieving FOXNEWS of their participation in our partisan event and protecting our candidates and Caucus...

As I said before, none of us on the Executive Board of the NSDP, or the other states were in the loop on this. The outgoing Chair may have felt that he had the authority to act unilaterally, but many of us believe he should have consulted us. Trust that this decision very likely wouldn't have passed a vote of our E-Board, and would not have garnered the support of our State Central Committee here in Nevada.

What is needed right now in Nevada is the kind of leadership shown by Democrats like Michael Zahara. Senator Reid, the most powerful official in Nevada and a key leader in the national Democratic Party, is either part of these decisions or could substantively accommodate our legitimate concerns. At this point, he's simply being silent and evasive, just like the Nevada Democratic Party (this despite Fox News's constant and baseless attacks on his patriotism and character).

Please call Reid's offices and ask him to not legitimize Fox News as a neutral news outlet. If you are not in Nevada, use this number: 202-224-3542 / Fax: 202-224-7327

If you live in Nevada, use this number, which is restricted to 775 and 702 area codes: 1-866-SEN-REID (736-7343)

It's time to let Senator Reid know that we want him to act like a good Democrat and ensure that the candidate forum in August treats the Democratic Party and our Democratic leaders vying for the Presidency with the respect that they deserve. Treating Fox News as a neutral news outlet by letting them solely host this debate does not do that.

Profiles in Indifference

A long-standing policy of neglect and indifference creates a "perfect storm" for the Bush Pentagon.

Washington Post: Sandy Karen was horrified when her 21-year-old son was discharged from the Naval Medical Center in San Diego a few months ago and told to report to the outpatient barracks, only to find the room swarming with fruit flies, trash overflowing and a syringe on the table. "The staff sergeant says, 'Here are your linens' to my son, who can't even stand up," said Karen, of Brookeville, Md. "This kid has an open wound, and I'm going to put him in a room with fruit flies?" She took her son to a hotel instead. "My concern is for the others, who don't have a parent or someone to fight for them," Karen said. "These are just kids. Who would have ever looked in on my son?"

When the first congressional hearing about the care of wounded soldiers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center opens this morning in a campus auditorium, many eyes will turn to Lt. Gen. Kevin C. Kiley, who has served as the Army's top doctor since he gave up command of the hospital in 2004. The hearing will allow Kiley to explain why bureaucratic tangles and horrid conditions made life so difficult for outpatients at the Army's premier hospital, while also likely putting him in a position of defending his job.

Though members of Congress have called for Kiley to step down and take responsibility for the problems at Walter Reed, he has been spared so far.
Other leaders have not been so fortunate: Maj. Gen. George W. Weightman, the hospital's commander the past six months, was fired on Thursday, and Army Secretary Francis J. Harvey was forced to resign on Friday, in part because he appointed Kiley to temporarily take over Weightman's job.

The Army Times has extensive coverage as well - and often so tightly written, it's impossible to pull out a key graph without losing critical context. I offer a selection handle them with lead graph and link and the rest in the yellow link box below the cut.

Walter Reed woes bring turmoil at the top

The more than 1 million soldiers of the Army, deeply involved on two war fronts, suddenly find themselves serving under leadership tainted by scandal and in critical transition. Army Secretary Francis Harvey is out, pushed out the door by his boss, Defense Secretary Robert Gates.

Walter Reed chief fired; critics say more must go

When the Army’s top medical officer, Lt. Gen. Kevin Kiley, fired Maj. Gen. George Weightman on March 1 in response to problems with housing and medical evaluations of outpatients at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, it triggered one of Washington’s favorite sports — the blame game.

Walter Reed topic of five hearings next week

The Walter Reed Army Medical Center scandal involving the living conditions, medical treatment and retirement process of wounded combat veterans will be the subject of five congressional hearings next week, including one on Monday that is expected to include testimony from the hospital commander who was relieved Thursday.

I point out - again - that these issues are long standing, substantive and need an approach far more substantive than hand-wringing, head-rolling and committee investigations. However, potential solutions have the virtue of being fairly obvious.

But obvious need alone doesn't seem to have ever swayed the Pentagon - one more reason for taking the responsibility for veteran's health care away from them.

The comment of one authoritative veteran:

Read all Military Times coverage about Walter Reed Army Medical Center: Official: Gates fired Army Secretary (March 2) Democrats say Harvey’s ouster isn’t enough (March 2) Walter Reed topic of five hearings next week (March 2) Maj. Gen. Eric Schoomaker named new Walter Reed head (March 2) Committee subpoenas former Walter Reed chief (March 2) Walter Reed chief fired; critics say more must go (March 2) Army denies patients face daily inspections (Feb. 28) Walter Reed patients told to keep quiet (Feb. 27) Walter Reed soldier wins small victory (Feb. 27) Gates’ candor on hospital woes lauded (Feb. 27 Pentagon names members of Walter Reed panel (Feb. 23) Renovations underway at Walter Reed (Feb. 22) Wounded and waiting (Feb. 17)

Retired Brig. Gen. David Grange said it will be up to Vice Chief of Staff Gen. Richard Cody to provide steady leadership for the service while Harvey’s replacement and incoming Chief of Staff Gen. George Casey settle into their jobs.

“As the vice chief, he is going to be the steadfast leader in this period,” Grange said. “You really have to have Cody kind of holding things together.”

Grange said he was surprised to hear that conditions at Walter Reed had deteriorated so badly and said that in the end, Harvey is responsible.

“If you are in charge, you are accountable,” Grange said. “I’m sure they were not resourced the way they should have been.”

Grange said being wounded twice in the Vietnam War showed him first-hand that medical care for wounded soldiers is always neglected.

“When you are going to go to war, what never is financed is the second- and third-order effects like veterans benefits and patient care,” he said. “That’s always frustrated me. Having been wounded a couple of times and sent to [military] hospitals, ... you see a lot of things.”

It's an ugly fact of war that fatalities are a great deal less trouble and expense than casualties - and not just in terms of money, logistics and manpower. Dead heroes cannot embarrass the commanders responsible for their posthumous heroism. LIVING veterans, however, have a distressing tendency to criticise, to organize and worst of all - work hard to one day find themselves on congressional oversight committees interviewing other veterans who will not decently and loyally cover the asses of their superiors.

I suspect that it was no different in the Punic Wars than it is now; this is not so much a result of a US military problem as it is a problem of humans who are in the Military. Disabled, hideously wounded survivors are far less romantic - and far more depressing than Tombs of Unknown Soldiers. Soldiers cope with death rather well. The idea of spending the rest of your life pissing into a bag from a hole where the Unit Commander used to live is not nearly so easy to deal with.

This means that higher command spends a great deal of time Not Thinking about it, and when it comes down to a choice between something sexy - like Patriot Missiles, Aircraft Carriers or a next-generation gee-whiz asskicker of a fighter jet - routine care for vets and even current active members isn't even on their radar.

Oddly enough - I have a great deal of difficulty blaming them for that, since it seems to be a nigh-unavoidable side-effect of being in military service. As damnable and unforgivable as the outcome is, this is just as much a failure of general citizen accountability as it is of military duty.

Call me crazy, or socialist if you will, but to me, when someone steps up and takes on the duty of defending their country, the last thing they should ever have to be concerned about is having lived through it, only to find themselves living in a cardboard box under a bridge with rotting teeth and cirrhosis from trying to make the nightmares go away. They faced those demons for those of us who "had other priorities," like our Vice President. They deserve, at the very least, to be comfortably housed, well fed and cared for if their duties have left them incapable of anything more.

This is not charity. It is a solemn duty and a true moral obligation.

I believe that Kipling said it better than I a long time ago;

You talk o' better food for us, an' schools, an' fires, an' all:
We'll wait for extry rations if you treat us rational.
Don't mess about the cook-room slops, but prove it to our face
The Widow's Uniform is not the soldier-man's disgrace.
For it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Chuck him out, the brute!"
But it's "Saviour of 'is country" when the guns begin to shoot;
An' it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' anything you please;
An' Tommy ain't a bloomin' fool -- you bet that Tommy sees!

We need compressive medical and social services available to everyone in need - and I've made a libertarian case for that before and will again. However, before anyone in civvies benefits, we need to start here, and now. Today. Our military veterans have earned the right to be first in line, because our collective panic and hysteria PUT them on that line. This is absolutely a "no excuses, Sir" situation for all of us above the age of reason.

But, since we ARE pointing fingers at those who should have known, and could have done something but preferred to not annoy their superiors - why not fire the Commander in Chief? It is a matter of both symbolic and practical urgency that transcends politics as usual.

George Bush will undoubtedly veto or ignore anything implies accountability to those who have born the cost and consequence of his ambitions, while continuing to flail about in increasingly belligerent and dangerous ways. George Bush is in fact the single most easily addressed threat to our National Security. We need to impeach him and generally clean house in the Executive Branch so that come 2008 we may possibly be served by someone worthy of national and international respect - and with perhaps some due humility for the honor and understanding of the responsibility of an office that used to be referred to as "leader of the free world."

tag: veterans affairscasualties, vets, rehab, , common decency, accountablity, Walter Reed Army Medical Center, Surgeon General, Building 18, Lieutenant General Kevin C. Kiley, Kevin Kiley, universal health care, morality, ethics, impeach the president

Speaking of Potty-Mouths.

Here's a rhetorical question for you: Which is worse, using the "seven words you can't use on Television" - as defined by George Carlin, or committing the "seven deadly social sins", as defined by Gandhi?"

Coulter: I Would Talk About Edwards But “You Have To Go Into Rehab If You Use The Word ‘Faggot’”

Speaking today at the Conservative Political Action Conference, right-wing pundit Ann Coulter said: “I was going to have a few comments on the other Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards, but it turns out you have to go into rehab if you use the word ‘faggot,’ so I — so kind of an impasse, can’t really talk about Edwards.” Audience members said “ohhh” and then cheered. (Video on site)

Seeing this blonde turd in the soup of our great political discourse, I find it increasingly difficult to take the posturing of certain pearl-clutching hypocrites at all seriously. However, I'm willing to observe a potential compromise - they don't have to take as credible anything that contains one of the seven deadly words, and we don't have to take anyone who links to Coulter, laughs at Colter or buys Coulter's books serously. You are what you eat, folks - and in this case, politically speaking, I believe this boils down to "eat shit and die."

Not as a curse - as a matter-of-fact observation of fact; if you persist in eating shit, you will die. In this case, it's a viscerally disgusting metaphor for an even less appetizing reality.

tag: ann coulter, homophobia, seven deadly words, hate speech, potty mouths

Somewhere on the Self-Rightiousness Spectrum

If there's one thing that pisses me off, it's uninformed, judgmental self-righteousness - from anyone, about anything, even when I happen to agree. No, especially if I agree - because bigotry in my favor sucks away the moral force of a good argument.

I'm pleased to have a truly stunning example of a a bigoted idiologial self-congratulation society that does NOT involve politics, because perhaps then it will serve to illustrate just how universally ugly and stupid such things are. This should serve to nicely illustrate that the words "ideology" and "idiot" have a great deal in common.

I've been getting a sudden huge surge of traffic about the Pokez thing, and it appears to come mostly from a livejournal community called "childfree hardcore."

And just like many other varieties of net-bigot, they have set comments to exclude response from people who might have something to say that would make them question their own bias. Here's what I tried to say there. Since I can't correct them more discreetly in comments, I suppose I need to share it with the world.

Why? Well, here's one sterling example of the mindset:

So today I had some fucking annoying encounters with some moos. At the best buy in the mall, I was walking over to buy at ime card for World of Warcrack, and basically a flock of moos and their turds were congregating and discussing irrelevant shit, so it took them like 5 minutes to realize I had been standing there trying to get through even though I tapped them on the shoulder, shouted out HEY, EXCUSE ME, TRYING TO COME THROUGH for about 5 minutes straight. Then, I wanted to ask a best buy salesperson where to locate a CD disc cleaner, and of course some technology-retarded piece of shit moo didn't understand about how the shitty OS Vista works, so I had to stand around for like 10 more minutes waiting for the fucking bitch to ask her stupid questions while her kids were running around and generally being annoying.

Yeah, I hate moos and breeders who bring their children to stores and clog up the aisles with their filthy turds.

But these things were not what I was responding to:

THIS is: Overstars writes

But it's the principal of the thing and I will not be threatened out of my right to be of the opinion that this guy is an exaggerating bullshit breeder of a man who threatens lawsuits at every little offense and that I still sympathize with the waitress somewhat. Sure, whacking kids is wrong, but I understand the urge. Oh do I understand the urge.

Not only that, but the more I'm forced to read this case, the more I see how selfish people with children can be. This guy wants to take up the time of the police, the district attorney, and a nonprofit advocacy group for an *incident in a restaurant*.

Because they don't have anything better to do, of course.

I was unaware that the choice to be child-free granted the ability to read minds and motives. And "forced to read?" Fuck, kiddo, the next key is your friend. If you can't deal rationally with something on the net, move along.

Hey, it's what I do. It's one seriously effective tactic for not looking like a total putz in public, aside from the ethics of picking a stranger to pick on because you can present that situation in a way that will make you look good to your friends. It's not just unethical - it's 7th grade giggletwit unethical.

But I did try to inject some reason, not realizing that reason was unwelcome.

I'm getting hellacious traffic from here, so I figured I should say something. I'm the "another biased page". I'm not going to take exception to that, since I do have a bias - although it's slightly amusing to be accused of bias seeing all the bias here.

But that's cool too. As it happens, I have never bred, though I actually enjoy children - in controlled doses. :)

Nope, my bias comes, frankly, from being on the AS spectrum myself.

And second - although I think he should sue, I tend to be an unforgiving bastard: Someone else said why better:

Also contact a lawyer, because the restaurant's policy is against the ADA by a longfuckingshot.... As part of that, go into the restaurant sometime, and record all the time that nondisabled adults or kids are allowed to take a long time or be outright disruptive. I would bet she's one of those assholes that thinks it's okay to abuse someone because they look autistic -- the fact that we're the ones put through years of psychologically damaging "training" to hide what we are so people like THAT are more comfortable makes me really angry.

She's biased too. But it's a learned bias, and I second it. Even though I went through all this before autism at a level less conspicuous than non-verbal drooling and spinning was recognized, there was lots of behavior mod used on me, including school officials sicking the bullies on me so that I would "conform" and "fit in."

Meanwhile, Jay (dad) - whom I would bet to be on the spectrum myself - says this:

I'd still be OK with just 3 things from the Pokez owner: a written public apology for David, a statement that the manager was incorrect in his reaction then to support the waitress's abuse , and something (either staff training or personnel changes) to prevent this from happening again. But apparently the restaurant is claiming that we were asked to leave because *we* were rude (LOL.. we were actually reserved and probably the quietest table in the place that night, and I was incredibly polite-but-firm to the manager afterwards), and they are saying that it doesn't matter because David isn't really autistic because he can talk (?!?). Apart from them being utterly incorrect on both counts, even if David was a *neurotypical* child, that still doesn't somehow make it OK for the waitress to grab him and scream in his ear! (scratches head)

Sound like someone wanting to make a quick million at an insurance company's expense? Seems a lot more reasonable than I could be (or indeed would choose to be) under the circumstances.

Re: comments about "just sitting there:" For the longest time, I had just two speeds in handling confrontation - paralysis, or "assault with intent to kill." I'm still unclear how I made it through grade school without causing anyone grave bodily harm.

It took ten years of martial arts to give me some nuance. I've heard and seen enough over the years to realize this isn't just me - it's a combination of factors, both wiring and social that seem to affect a lot of autistic, PDD and Asperger's types. Generally, an apparent paralysis is a better response than the alternate.

Having said all this, I think it's more about her than the boy or his family. Reports of behavior like this regarding this one waitress go back quite a way. I think she's got her own issues, and because it's a family restaurant, and she's the sister, well, she gets cut slack she shouldn't get.

Were she my sister, she'd be on a cruise right now. I'd be babysitting her kids - and I'd be a little cautious about giving them back until I was sure that sanity had returned.

She just happened to pick the worst possible target for her drama, and that means it's not so much about kids or kids with autism as it is about Karma.

For her, it could also be pretty damn good luck, in the long run.

But as I said, responses from non-members are unwelcome. "Don't confuse me with the facts; my mind is made up" seems to be the summa logica of the group, and if it were not so very good an example for my point about the ethics involved - I'd just suck up all the nice free traffic with a faint smile.

I agree with Mae West about "bad publicity." "Just make sure they spell your name right."

But it's also symptomatic of something of real, cultural importance. This is the sort of mindless contempt and in-group tail-sniffing that allows people like George Bush divide and conquer. In other words, it's the sort of behavior no self-respecting freethinker should tolerate in themselves or in their company. It's no different in nature than the sort of vicious, mindless ignorance one hears over at Free Republic or Little Green Footballs. But my point is that this sort of behavior is human behavior -not just Republican behavior.

And just like it's possible to be ethical, and still be Republican, it's also possible to be Child Free and not be a self-righteous pinhead.

Do I object to the choice of being child-free? Hell, no! Frankly, I think folks who feel like this about kids should never breed, just as I feel than nobody should take on jobs or responsibility they KNOW they will suck at just to "fit in." I applaud and celebrate that degree of self-awareness, especially when it is against the tide.

I speak from experience, being raised by those too gutless and conformist to make proper choices based on their own self-understanding ain't a good thing for anyone involved.

And I surely do agree with much of what is said there, there are parents out there that are easily as idiotic as the example above - and with far wider approval of their mindless bigotry. (thanks to the group for these amazing examples of extreme majoritarian cluelessness.) I'm just not so willing to assume that the idiocy has anything to do with breeding or not breeding. I think it's pretty much the same as the idiocy shown in childfree_hardcore: self-righteous, mindless appeals to the pack. Same buttsniffing, different assholes.

Willow Dragon found these:

Baby found dead a a TN Christian College
http://www.wrcbtv.com/news/index.cfm?sid=6567 (watch the video)

but that led me to this...

Naked Classroom Spanking
http://www.wrcbtv.com/news/index.cfm?sid=6578 (there's a video for this too)

School officials in Prince George's County, Maryland are investigating a relative's actions in a charter school last week.

This after a woman walked into the school and spanked her nephew in front of his entire classroom.

Jane Watrel has more on this story.

"I asked him if something had happened and they said, oh you mean the whopping."

Paula Reitan couldn't believe her ears after leaving a school party at Turning Point Academy her daughter and three classmates told her how a fellow second grader was stripped naked below the waist and spanked by a relative in front of the entire class.

The first - Tragic irony at it's best/worst, depending on your personal biases.

The second: Just obscene. There's more, and I'll have more to say about it myself, because it's WTF on SO many levels.

And then there's this. Perpet says

The guy to whom the Duggars look for an excuse to continually churning out kids doesn't have any kids.

That's the wiki-article. You'd think the guy who discourages family planning of any degree would have actually lived the life himself. And he thinks Cabbagae Patch Dolls have demonic middle names and will cause you to be unable to conceive. If you need me, I'll be in the toy aisle.

The only thing that I have to say about that is that the facts are funnier than the presentation. Laughing more and bitching less means fewer wrinkles by the time you are my age. Besides, how many "breeders" take this maroon seriously? I assure you, nobody I would hang with.

This fellow isn't typical of even typically extreme evangelicals. He's a nutball - from an evangelical Christian perspective. So expecting reasonable behavior or any appreciation of irony is along the lines of expecting a cat to bark. He's a funny, tragic example of ... well, what he is. Which is about being a cult-leader and control-freak with very, very strange and silly ideas. It's silly to take it further than that, because whatever he says about what he's pretending to be for social cover is either a lie, or a symptom of his own delusional system.

This is my final bit of advice to the hysterically, abusively and cluelessly bigoted. Stop taking yourself and your ideas so seriously - because it's for sure, nobody worth taking seriously does.

Moreover, it's a mindset that makes it laughably easy to manipulate you into voting Republican, giving money to the 700 club or assaulting 80 year old ladies with 40-year old fur coats. Self-righteousness is like strong drink, and in the words of Lazerous Long, "it can cause you to shoot at tax-collectors - and miss."

Don't bitch about what's wrong with the world unless you are pretty darn sure you aren't a damn fine example of one of it's many symptoms.

Walter Reed: Another victim of the "Privitization Fetish"

The Neoconservative fetish for privatizing (eg, outsourcing to companies who support the Administration) has come home to roost again.

Even those who honestly support the idea in theory must be wondering how the theory failed to translate into practice. For them, I shall willingly supply the answer, one that generally eludes theorists of all ideologies.

"Human Factors."

Army Secretary Ousted - washingtonpost.com: "The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform issued a subpoena yesterday to compel Weightman to testify at a congressional hearing Monday.

The committee also released an internal Army memorandum reportedly written in September in which the Walter Reed garrison commander, Col. Peter Garibaldi, warned Weightman that 'patient care services are at risk of mission failure' because of staff shortages brought on by the privatization of the hospital's support workforce."

Or in other words, a large proportion of the support workforce at Walter Reed are not within the Commanding General's chain of command. Only one word for that, in my little green book:

Unacceptable!

It's unacceptable from a performance standard, obviously. It's unacceptable from a command perspective, and it should be damn well obviously unacceptable from a security standpoint; if I were a terrorist looking for a high-value but poorly secured military target, it would have to be Walter Reed. It has a great deal of symbolic value, it's packed with people and I will bet you money that damn near anyone can get a job with one or another outside contractors.

This, of course, neglects the other obvious means of access - joining the Army itself. But at least there are procedures that should limit that option - and limiting options is what security is all about.

Rep. James P. Moran Jr. (D-Va.), a member of the House Appropriations subcommittee on defense and a close ally of a leading war critic, Rep. John P. Murtha (D-Pa.), said Bush's new commission is too little too late. "He's the executive," Moran said. "This has been six years, and now six years later, after an awful lot of neglect, he's going to get around to putting a commission together, a study to tell him what to do. . . . I think he's feeling politically desperate."

White House officials said politics played no role in their decision to form the commission, saying that Bush is genuinely outraged by the conditions at Walter Reed and that he learned about them from the recent news reports. "Once the Walter Reed stories ran, there was a collective feeling in the building, and certainly from the president, that whatever reasons or excuses, it was unacceptable," said Tony Fratto, deputy White House press secretary.

Cough. Choke. Sputter!

First: Can you think of a more damning statement than "the President learned of this through news reports?"

Well, George, what DID you expect, given your habit of expecting the incompetent sociopaths who are willing to give you their personal fealty to perform up to the standards of those who have a professional grasp of reality and the resources to deal with it? What makes you think that they'd do anything other than blow sunshine up your ass, given your shining example?

Second:

Mission accomplished?

Lt. Gen. Kevin Kiley thought so. After the media tour of Building 18, the Army's surgeon general gave a news conference. "I do not consider Building 18 to be substandard," he said of a facility Priest and Hull found full of "mouse droppings, belly-up cockroaches, stained carpets, cheap mattresses" and other delights. "We needed to do a better job on some of those rooms, and those of you that got in today saw that we frankly have fixed all of those problems. They weren't serious, and there weren't a lot of them."

Kiley might have had a stronger case if men wearing Tyvek hazmat suits and gas masks hadn't walked through the lobby while the camera crews waited for the tour to start, or if he hadn't acknowledged, moments later, that the entire building would have to be closed for a complete renovation. The general also seemed to miss a larger point identified by other officials: Walter Reed's problem isn't of mice and mold but a bureaucracy that has impeded the recovery of wounded soldiers. [emphasis added]

This situation is utterly predictable, given George Bush's approach to command and consequences - or more to the point, his approach to those who take exception to his approach.

As a result, wounded soldiers who cannot be "recycled" back into combat have exactly as much "mission value" as a discarded MRE packet. That should have been apparent given the Administration cuts to funding for Veteran's health care, but for some, those dry facts were apparently a little too abstract.

This, however, is what those budget decisions translate into - a situation that does not even get a coat of paint until it becomes public knowledge.

One wonders what other indignities and shortfalls our troops have to endure on a regular basis because their needs and the needs of their families are being neglected.

But I do have an idea, and I think it's a powerfully GOOD idea. I think our state Governors, (or in some cases, Lieutenant Governors) with the support of their legislatures and their State Congressional delegations, should take the initiative in addressing this issue. Whether or not George Bush and the Pentagon is on board they should pass whatever State and Federal legislation is required to put competent, ethical and accountable leadership in place.

I would suggest that these facilities be placed in the hands of State Guard and Reserve units, supervised by people with both civilian experience and military rank and a decent regard for public opinion and their professional reputations.

This matter that is, very much within the moral authority of a state Governor and I doubt that anyone will grudge what monies need to be shifted, donated or raised to address it. I cannot see a real downside to the House and Senate giving such moral authority cover of law, either. Not for anyone of any party.

This is indeed a failure of leadership, at the very highest level and the leaders of the House and Senate, as well as the leadership of the various States need to realize that. Waiting for our current Commander in Chief to collapse under the weight of his own conscience bears an unacceptable price in human life and dignity, aside from being wishful thinking.

But it's well within the power of Congress to fix this, and fix it quickly, with a simple, two-pronged approach. The first is to reassert State's Rights in the matter of command authority over Guards and Reserves. Guards should NEVER be under the Pentagon's authority; Reserves should only be under that command when activated and deployed in time of war.

"In time of war" being "a state of war having been formally declared." The framers of the constitution - being wise and prescient folks - realized that large standing armies were problematic, and required the Congress to reauthorize the existence of any standing force once every two years. This has not changed.

Do we need a standing force? Of course we do. There are a lot of things our armed forces do that require that degree of commitment, and that level of professional competence, especially within the more technical areas. But it needn't be as large as it is, what it does need is a greater emphasis on training and maintaining the expertise of Guards and Reserves, while fostering and developing a relatively large cadre of experienced officers and noncoms.

The second fork is eliminate the entire redundant military health-care system. NOT specialized hospitals, particularly, and not the security of military staffing - but the clerical and record keeping aspects need to be rationalized in the same way civilian medical care needs to be, so why not address both at once?

The most straightforward way of assuring both quality of care and appropriate record-keeping is to enact universal health-care legislation. As the situation is fairly urgent, both politically and as a matter of practical reality, this is not a good time to "reinvent the wheel."

An entire proven software and administration infrastructure and exists in Canada and it works well. Despite what critics may say, it's not a particularly socialist solution, other than it being partially taxpayer supported. (Individuals do pay premiums and you can opt out in favor of private coverage - which is handled in precisely the same way.)

It will work fine whether or not the money is directed by the system from the DOD, the VA, the Treasury or individual insurance plans, and particularly in the case of Vets with both military and civilian coverage, this would vastly simplify matters for everyone. The truly important thing is the accounting, record keeping and cost-savings a single, secure, nationwide medical service delivery system can achieve.

Let's import it, and I bet it will save everyone involved - including the insurance industry - enough to pay for a much improved taste in beer, as well as a vast national sigh of relief that will translate into a great deal of political capital for everyone smart enough to get behind and push.



tag: impeach the president, impeach, accountablity, George W. Bush, Miserable Failure, Building 18, Walter Reed Army Medical Center, Kevin Kiley, Secretary of the Army, morality, ethics, rehab, health care, veterans, state's rights, military

Fuckin' A-MEN

via Shakespeare's Sister:

Because I prefer pottymouths to pearl-clutchers

Everything You Need To Know About Fox "News" in a Single Image: The Rude Pundit

The homepage of the Fox "News" website has the following as its top stories this morning: A story about the new sell-off on Wall Street. A story about proposed legislation in California to start savings accounts for babies, even if they are from the wombs of illegal immigrants. A story about a fall in the sales of rap music. And the money shot: a story about a 23-year old teacher arrested for banging a few 14- and 15-year old male students, an act generally known throughout the history of literature and film as "coming of age." And the smug fuckin' face of Dennis "Will Blow O'Reilly For Quarters" Miller.

There you go, Fox "News" lovers: pro-rich people, pro-has-been comedian, anti-minority, and very pro-sex story exploitation. Like there's no wars, no ongoing White House chicanery on intelligence and U.S. attorneys, no...fuck, no nothing but fluff, nonsense, and money.

Ayup, that's a pretty durn graphic truth. The Rude Pundit rocks.

It's better tor be obscene than absurd.

Gateway Pundit: "Seven words you can never say on television"... but which are said on the Internet. A lot.

Talk about potty-mouths.

The Net's not always a kid-friendly place; there is plenty of foul language out there. And of course, the blogosphere is no different.

But how different are the Rightosphere and Leftosphere when it comes to "dirty" language? Which side produces the most profanity-laced diatribes? Via Instapundit, I happened upon this interesting challenge from InstaPunk:

I propose an exercise to be performed by those who have the software and expertise to carry it out. The exercise is this: Search six months' worth of content, posts and comments, of the 20 most popular blogs on the right and the left. The search criteria are George Carlin's infamous '7 Dirty Words.' [Click this link for the list of expletives.]

And this is what I found, using what I deemed -- through a mix of TTLB and 2006's Weblog Award lists -- to be the 18 biggest Lefty blogs, and 22 biggest Righty blogs. (Not counting this one. :)) I couldn't account for the 6-month time period, and I even gave the Lefty blogs a 4 blog advantage. But it didn't make much of a difference.

So how much more does the Left use Carlin's "seven words" versus the Right? According to my calculations, try somewhere in the range of 18-to-1.

Yowsers.

Ok, let me get this straight: while THIS was happening, rather than chasing the story down and doing something to really support the troops, you were constructing methodology to count naughty words?

Words fail me. And aside from that, what's your point, fuckwit?

All this very precious pearl-clutching is utterly pointless in a quest for "civil discourse" if you do not also consider the impact on civil discourse of statements such as these: (via Instaputz)

Ohhh-kay. Let's do a trial run.

Putz: What we really should be doing is killing Iranian civilians. Heh.
Malkin: Exactly. And the NY Times publishers should be locked up for treason.
Denny K: Yeah! Let's hunt them down and find out where their kids go to school.
Coulter: My only regret is that Tim McVeigh didn't blow up the NY Times.
Misha: Forget the Times, I want the Supremes. Five robes, five ropes, five trees.
Lefty Blogger: You're all fucking crazy.

InstaPunk: See? The lefty bloggers are more hateful.

…[W]hy not run a few chapters of Mein Kampf or The Turner Diaries through your little Shrill Detector, and then compare those results with a Richard Pryor set from the '70s.

Idiots.

Now, I'm not a leftie - I'm just an uppity libertarian with not much respect for foolishness and a decent regard for semantics.

Therefore, I have something in common with Shakespeare's Sister The Rude Pundit and indeed The Ace of Spades.

A man-portable un-powered entrenching tool is a fucking spade.



More Vicious Left-Wing Mockery

tag: potty mouths, Hate Speech, pearlclutching, unintentional irony, , culture, morality, ethics

A Rebuke for the Miserable Failure

Shakespeare's Sister:

Scout Prime:

Bush will be in New Orleans today. A Rebuke of Bush is planned at 2pm. Via Humid City is the statement of rebuke from Katrina Survivors....

JOIN THE KATRINA SURVIVORS’ REBUKE OF PRESIDENT BUSH
2:00 PM THURSDAY MARCH 1
SAMUEL GREEN SCHOOL
2319 VALENCE ST.
(Near Freret and Napoleon)
NEW ORLEANS

New Orleans Needs Federal Aid, Not Presidential Photo-Ops.

Mr. President: Katrina Survivors Do Not Welcome You, We Rebuke You!

We live in a devastated city and you are a big part of the reason why it sill sits in ruins. Your administration has abandoned our children by savaging their public schools. Your administration has tortured our working class people by refusing to reopen the city’s public housing developments. And your administration is fully complicit in placing our uninsured in harms way by ruthlessly pursuing the privatization of local public healthcare in the aftermath of Katrina. And, finally your administration is guilty of sending our sons and daughters of to war for oil and empire just when we need them most to help us rebuild our community.

Mr. President, we, Katrina Survivors all, do not welcome you to our city, we rebuke you!
Sponsored by Survivors Village, United Front For Affordable Housing.

If you have a blog please consider posting this today.

Pass it on.

As widely as possible.

No Complaints, No Problem

BREAKING: (CNN) Maj. General George Wightman Relieved of Command; Army Surgeon General Lt. Gen. Kevin Kiley to take over command at Walter Reed. Or, rather, resume command over conditions that were the same on his watch as Walter Reed's previous Commandant.

The Army responds to reports of hideous conditions and contemptible treatment of vets at Walter Reed by punishing and silencing the vets! PHILIP RACUEL (pracuel) writes:

Soldiers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center's Medical Hold Unit say they have been told they will wake up at 6 a.m. every morning and have their rooms ready for inspection at 7 a.m., and that they must not speak to the media.

from the Army Times article

"Some soldiers believe this is a form of punishment for the trouble soldiers caused by talking to the media," one Medical Hold Unit soldier said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

It is unusual for soldiers to have daily inspections after Basic Training.

Soldiers say their sergeant major gathered troops at 6 p.m. Monday to tell them they must follow their chain of command when asking for help with their medical evaluation paperwork, or when they spot mold, mice or other problems in their quarters.

They were also told they would be moving out of Building 18 to Building 14 within the next couple of weeks. Building 14 is a barracks that houses the administrative offices for the Medical Hold Unit and was renovated in 2006. It’s also located on the Walter Reed Campus, where reporters must be escorted by public affairs personnel. Building 18 is located just off campus and is easy to access.

The soldiers said they were also told their first sergeant has been relieved of duty, and that all of their platoon sergeants have been moved to other positions at Walter Reed. And 120 permanent-duty soldiers are expected to arrive by mid-March to take control of the Medical Hold Unit, the soldiers said.

As of Tuesday afternoon, Army public affairs did not respond to a request sent Sunday evening to verify the personnel changes.

The Pentagon also clamped down on media coverage of any and all Defense Department medical facilities, to include suspending planned projects by CNN and the Discovery Channel, saying in an e-mail to spokespeople: "It will be in most cases not appropriate to engage the media while this review takes place," referring to an investigation of the problems at Walter Reed.

The Washington Post has been all over this, and everyone and their dog is jumping on board. The outrage is understandable, given the facts, it's hard to imagine how this situation is anything less than deliberate policy, originating at the highest levels of the Army and the White House.

Impeach Bush for the troops!

In 2004, Rep. C.W. Bill Young (R-Fla.) and his wife stopped visiting the wounded at Walter Reed out of frustration. Young said he voiced concerns to commanders over troubling incidents he witnessed but was rebuffed or ignored. "When Bev or I would bring problems to the attention of authorities of Walter Reed, we were made to feel very uncomfortable," said Young, who began visiting the wounded recuperating at other facilities.

Beverly Young said she complained to Kiley several times. She once visited a soldier who was lying in urine on his mattress pad in the hospital. When a nurse ignored her, Young said, "I went flying down to Kevin Kiley's office again, and got nowhere. He has skirted this stuff for five years and blamed everyone else."

Young said that even after [Lt. Gen. Kevin] Kiley left Walter Reed to become the Army's Surgeon General, "if anything could have been done to correct problems, he could have done it."

Heckuva job, Kiley!


tag: Walter Reed Army Medical Center, Surgeon General, Building 18, Lieutenant General Kevin C. Kiley, M.D, Kevin Kiley,

A few more good Pokez in the eye.

The Pokez story rolls on.

Off the top, best comment ever:

Also contact a lawyer, because the restaurant's policy is against the ADA by a longfuckingshot.... As part of that, go into the restaurant sometime, and record all the time that nondisabled adults or kids are allowed to take a long time or be outright disruptive. I would bet she's one of those assholes that thinks it's okay to abuse someone because they look autistic -- the fact that we're the ones put through years of psychologically damaging "training" to hide what we are so people like THAT are more comfortable makes me really angry.

And proof that Jay - the father, is WAY cooler than I am:

I'd still be OK with just 3 things from the Pokez owner: a written public apology for David, a statement that the manager was incorrect in his reaction then to support the waitress's abuse , and something (either staff training or personnel changes) to prevent this from happening again. But apparently the restaurant is claiming that we were asked to leave because *we* were rude (LOL.. we were actually reserved and probably the quietest table in the place that night, and I was incredibly polite-but-firm to the manager afterwards), and they are saying that it doesn't matter because David isn't really autistic because he can talk (?!?). Apart from them being utterly incorrect on both counts, even if David was a *neurotypical* child, that still doesn't somehow make it OK for the waitress to grab him and scream in his ear! (scratches head)

I can't think of anything more likely to cause me to commit a physical indiscretion, and way past the point where my "don't hit girls" programming would override my urges.

But this isn't about me and my imperfections and flaws - other than the obvious, that sometimes consequences are direct and other times they catch you flat-footed from behind. In other words, this is about ethics, what they are, why you should have them, and using this unfolding mess as beautifully horrible example of people who believed in their own "spin control."

Allow me to illustrate consequences:

Ducksnorts - dedicated to Padres Baseball, not autism (although there's probably no sport more suited to aspie fandom and autistic perseveration) says:

... I hesitate to mention this because it takes the focus away from baseball and the Padres, but a story on one restaurant’s treatment of an autistic child disgusts me (more here) to the point that I have to say something: I’m recommending against a place called Pokez (hat tip to San Diego Blog).

Who says:

Pokez, (and myspace) the venerable lefty hippy arty cool vegetarian-friendly Mexican restaurant downtown is practically an institution among the hipster set. I myself loved eating there back when I was working downtown.

Well, all is not well in Pokez-land. Here’s an allegation of an autistic customer being assaulted for not ordering fast enough: “Assaulted at dinnertime in SD”

And they got it here: (11 comments so far), and they got it here, (13 comments so far). Figure that LJ isn't a lot different than Blogger, and the odds of a comment are one in a hundred - to pick a number out of the air.

This is what happens when assholes insist on being assholes in the New World Disorder. People notice, and each person tells all their friends... and it can reach critical mass in hours, in exactly the same way as a nuclear reaction going critical. You just have to piss off one, wee tiny insignificant little neutron enough...

Well, the world-wide-web has made it impossible for "responsible authorities" to choose what you insignificant neutrons should or should not get radioactive about. And that has implications in the land of practical ethics and the situational morality of getting caught with your pants around your ankles.

Since nobody - not Dick Cheney and certainly not some waitress at Pokez can predict which neutron will choose to go feral, cannot control all the communications of everyone, everywhere, it's now getting to be very difficult to casually lie your way out of trouble, now that the group mind has a permanent, accessible and indexed memory that anyone can feed.

Now, as karma and consequence are sometimes distressingly imprecise, it's even more strategic to be careful, not just about your own actions, your own ethics - but those you happen to be around a lot. This appears to be what other Pokez people bitching about right now; how "unfair it is that they have to bear the consequences of the actions of people they supported at the time.

And you know how much complaints of that sort are worth.

Therefore, we all have a great interest in what ethics are in a practical sense. That's what I write about, most often, and I could not ask for a better illustration of the consequences of operating (as Pokez seems to) outside of the bounds of accepted ethical standards. Or in the words of one
Yelp review:

"Good For Kids: No"

Shame on them. Their snotty service and bad attitudes from the servers went TOO FAR and look what they got themselves into.

I hope Cynthia, the waitress in question, resigns immediately.

Ethics are all about behaving rightly in all situations. It's more than morality. Morality is about proper behavior in particular, common situations, and while morals should also be ethical, it's not wise to bet on that if you value your karmic balance. If you prefer to go without any mystical component; people expect a certain ethical standard of certain places and certain people in particular situations, and if those expectations are violated badly enough, there might just be hell to pay. If you make a habit of being unethical, sooner or later, "might" becomes "will."

Most often, ethical consequences are not as easily visible as this. For instance, for every time a customer is treated rudely, there are probably ten people exposed to that scene, and clearly silence does not imply approval. Check out the reviews from before the alleged assault. You will find a lot of disgruntled folks supplying details that make this incident seem entirely plausible, and certainly not an "isolated incident."

Here's one ethical statement I use a lot: "My right to make a fist ends at the tip of your nose."

I've spent a great deal of time working on my ethics, because like many people on the autistic spectrum, I have no other recourse; I have found that going back to the very basics is the only way to figure out how to act for myself, and how to figure out where I stand when neurotypicals have what are to me inexplicable fits of drama while loudly proclaiming their right to not be held accountable for nose/fists interactions. As in, well, this case.

And being "counterculture" is no excuse. Indeed, it means there's far less excuse.

In many countercultures, and particularly alt-sexual countercultures, "Straight" morals are rejected and the violation of "straight" conventions is a given, but part of pulling that off with style and grace is realizing that those morals and conventions are being rejected for a good reason; because of their soul-destroying hypocrisy and ethical vacuity. It is not a license to be a dick, it's a statement that you aren't going to hide behind convention.

Here we have some little hipster wannabe Republicans, going by the very Down South "my house, my rules, if you don't like it, don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out" paradigm. It's' so very Blue Collar Comedy.

Oddly enough, I have no issue with that, so long as they don't have any problems with not whining about the potential problems of being petty authoritarian dicks, and post the policy clearly in the window. Go ahead, BE a "soup nazi." But it's a high wire act. If you fall off, no whining.

I can't think of anything more uncool, less punk, more totally ungoth than pissing in someones cornflakes for fun - and claiming the right to get away with it.

I mean, seriously. Even worse, I have the feeling that if I been there in my silks and my leathers, with my AS kid, it would not have happened. Why? Because I am counterculture, I look like an elegant punk, (when I go out) and I can clearly and wordlessly communicate that I have no trouble whatsoever turning some twink wanker into a whimpering pretzel, and would rather enjoy doing so. Therefore, I suspect I would get excellent food and excellent service at Pokez. Indeed, I wouldn't be entirely surprised if one of those little tramp-stamped packages of attitude called me "Sir." And that pisses me off, because it tells me that they don't actually respect anyone, and most of all they don't even respect themselves; they merely disrespect others to the extent they think they can get away with.

Those are the values of James Dobson and Pat Roberson. It's Focus on the Family values. It's Godhatesfags.com values. In other words - Red State values. Values any self-respecting counterculture member rebelled against starting in sixth grade when they shoved a safety pin through their My Little Pony's nose.

Counterculture is not about pulling crap and getting away with it. It's about questioning authority and poking it until it goes away or gives you a sensible answer. It's mocking it when it tries to make contemptibly stupid unenforceable rules - and proving that you can live outside those rules without bursting into flame or being struck down by Jehovah's lightning bolts. It's about rigging your OWN parachute, thank you very much.

You own your own shit; compost or wallow as you choose.

The lamest thing of all is to hide behind the slack-ass San Diego police, or cower behind stupid lies. That's contemptible.

Cynthia, go back to the 'burbs and live in mommies basement, because clearly, a couple of tats and an attitude does not bring that elusive quality known as "street smarts."

Watch that happens, exponentially, as those others chime in, people who are, or could be punk, or goth or otherwise counterculture because their wetware just is not designed to live in the suburbs and go to the Church of God with the other sheep. And a lot of them are incredibly protective of children who seem rather like themselves. We wetware-driven "freaks" are the core of many countercultures. Believe it or don't, I'm not about to hand pointers to voyeurs as proof. Collectively every day, in every way, we are reminded of the many small advantages and comforts we have abandoned as the price of our dignity and our liberty.

Is it worth it? Hell, yes. But there is a price to pay, and one of them is self-awareness, self-discipline (in a somewhat elastic but very real sense). People who live outside the lines better damn take care of their own and correct one another with "grandmotherly kindness" BEFORE shit like this happens, because when the straights come in, it's either to do nothing, or it's the Stonewall riots.

Meanwhile people like Lenny Schaefer will be raking in the bucks by using this as an example of what can happen when you don't torture your children into maintaining an acceptable facade of normalcy. Yep, for people like Lennie Schaefer, it is always the fault of the child for attracting the attention of bullies, always the fault of the parents for not teaching their child how to suck up and take it, to accept the truism that "shit rolls downhill" instead of wondering aloud what sort of damn fool would play "king of the hill" on a crap volcano.

Me, I much prefer telling bullies and social game-players how very painful it will be for them if they continue to expect me to play their games of status and dominance. Five gets you ten that's what this was; Cynthia was trying to impress someone kewl at David's expense. If you ever watched Tool Time, you KNOW how this ends. So if you know, don't go. Because really, saying no will hurt a lot less.

One of my very favorite moments in life was standing up to four bullies, each twice my size, who surrounded me at my locker in front of the Principal's office to tell me they were going to beat me up after school, and I was required to attend. I wrapped my hand around my big brass combo lock and informed the Four Stooges that it was right here, right now, if they wanted to go that route, I was gonna eff-bomb-kill one of them.

This was in the early seventies, when a good F-bomb was worth a fuck of a lot more than it is today! Hell, I kinda recall it freezing the entire first floor, but memory probably exaggerates. However, Authorities who were mysteriously absent before (despite having a clear line of sight through plate glass windows) appeared as if by magic!

Oddly enough, I was expelled as a "troublemaker." See above reference to "stooges." But what I didn't get was beat up. Not ever again.

Here's another ethic for you: "An it harm none, do as ye will." The part before the comma is not optional.

tag: Unintended Consequences, lenny schaefer, autism, autistic, assault, san diego,

Amanda Baggs: in My Language

Watch this all the way through - and then realize this is the sort of thing Lennie Schaefer fears so much he'd like to eliminate it entirely, through genetic screening, abortion and if need be, the torture that behaviorist approaches can be.

As for the social issues that autistics to all degrees suffer - I think what we really need to do is cure this:

IWasFelt (14 hours ago)

blah blah blah whatever, retard

(Reply) (Spam)

tag: anti-cure, curebie, autistics.org, common decency, AM Baggs

Greetings from Ayn Rand

I've often said I'd be an Objectivist if I could believe in a single, objective shared reality. This was untenable for me even before the '04 election.

What if Ayn Rand had gone into the greeting card industry? Imagine the artistic potential of applying Objectivism and the moral system of rational self-interest to a field notorious for being whimsical and/or maudlin…

...click here for hysteria...

Washington State to Washington DC: IMPEACH!

I'm proud to have grown up in Aberdeen, Washington,

Impeachment: Breaking the Dam in Olympia, Washington | BaltimoreChronicle.com: "If the state of Washington ends up passing a joint legislative resolution next month calling on the US House of Representatives to initiate impeachment proceedings against President Bush and Vice President Cheney, it will because 900 people who crammed into Olympia’s Center for the Performing Arts last Tuesday evening, and countless others across the state, pushed them into it."

tag: Washington State, Olympia, Ray McGovern, Elizabeth de la Vega, Dave Lindorff, Nancy Pelosi, Impeach the President, Impeachment, S6018

The Evil Monkey with the bloody burrito should have been a clue...

These are your Vegans
These are your Vegans on Crack.
Any questions?

Pokez in San Diego is notorious for bad service, mildly filthy conditions. a seriously cool vibe and food that ranges from average to exceptional, possibly depending on the medication level of the cooks. Love it or hate it, most people just put up with it, because it's A Cool Place To Be. This apparently makes it worth putting up with rude, possibly stoned wait staff and God knows what in the coffee.



But when a rude, possibly stoned waitress allegedly shook and yelled at an autistic child, his father thought the situation to be very uncool indeed.

UPDATE: Coming from Childfree_Hardcore? This is just for you.

Story found at Ballastexistenz.

Autistic child assaulted while ordering food

"Last night, we went with nolly to Pokez, a Mexican restaurant in downtown San Diego. We had to wait about 15 min. to order, and the waitress seemed stressed. It was David's turn to order... he was slow to make up his mind while ordering, and grumpy. Not yelling or anything himself, just cranky. The waitress took this as directed at her, she suddenly snapped. She grabbed his shoulder, shook him, and leaned over and started mocking him, yelling his words back directly in his ear. He asked her to stop, and she grabbed his shoulder and then started screaming in his ear. Screaming that she had had enough and didn't have to work with this. And then she let go, stood up, told the table that she would not serve anyone at the table, and stalked away. He hadn't touched her beforehand... he wasn't even making eye contact, he had been looking at the menu.

We all looked at each other, in shock. After a pause, I got up and went to the manager, behind the register. I politely explained that I had an autistic son, that sometimes he needed a bit of extra time or patience, and did not read body language well. And that his waitress had abused him and refused to serve our table, and that that was unacceptable. I wanted an apology and a different server. But the manager backed up the waitress. He said that she was right, and that if my son was "going to be too much trouble" then we should not let him order for himself in restaurants. That it was our fault for having a child that needed patience or hesitated while ordering, and so we should have ordered for him. And that our party should leave.

James (his teenaged brother) was sullen and blamed David.... we were silent, mostly not believing that this was happening. Eventually went to another place for dinner.

[updates have been posted subsequently... basically, as of Friday evening, I have talked to the local Autism Society, and their attorney several times, have tried twice to file a police report (only could get an "incident report" from the SDPD), and have sent a letter to the local paper (Union-Tribune)]"

I called Pokez myself and asked to speak to the manager. I found that I was, and I asked for their version. The manager (I'm afraid I aspied the name) replied that those present were "being rude" and were ejected for that. She also informed me that the child was "not really autistic" because "Most autistic kids can't speak."

Thank you for all your help, Lennie Schaefer.

However, the only honest way to describe the conversation was "rude and dismissive."

My only other contact was the webmaster for Pokez, who disclaimed any responsibility for pokez, other than hosting the website, but said he'd try to speak to the owner. He did repeat over and over - as if it were a mantra - that if there had been a problem, it should be reported to the police. That didn't make a lot of sense to me at the time, but after seeing multiple alligations that the place is staffed by "crackheads," it begins to make sense. I assured them that it had been He also informed me that Pokez has their own Myspace. I found myself in the strange land of cool kidz who don't give a fuck. (loud music autoplays)

A little too much "attitude," not enough punk ethic if you ask this old punk.

Meanwhile, it's rating on Yelp.com continues to plummet, lawyers keep offering the father of the alleged assault victim representation services and it's turning into the Giant Hairball of Doom. Things should be interesting come Monday.

Asshole vegans pick on suburban NASA employee's kid, because "they don't have to put up with shit." That might just be wishful thinking.

This review, if true, may Reveal All.

Pokez, what a strange place, but sort of a quintessential san diego thing.

First you should know that none of the servers get paid. They work for free. And for tips. Why? I think there are a few reasons. Because working at Pokez is a glamorous job in the mind of young san diego hipsters. And most of the Pokez crew are using drugs (meth, coke, heroin). So that would explain the service.

How the owners get away with this I don't know. Where they find these kids (the staff is continually changing) I don't know. But I would surmise, drugs has something to do with it. And there's always some new naive hipster moving to the environs of downtown san diego.

The food is your basic greasy mexican food. It can be good or bad depending on the cook. Pokez does have a lot of vegetarian options you won't find at other mexican restaurants though.

The atmosphere is kinda like the malt shop on happy days but with a hipster, druggie vibe. And with everyone thinking they are the fonz. I'm always struck by how young the crowd is, and how they seem so out of place in that part of town, like they teleported in from god knows where.

Check it out if you must, its kind of an interesting place.

Bottom line - from all the reviews that came up before this occurred it seems like the story is plausible, and if true could - and should - result in some unpleasant consequences for those involved and those responsible for those involved. And as it happens, people on the spectrum, such as myself, have both a passion for justice and the ability to perseverate until justice takes notice.

And all because a waitress couldn't - you know - actually wait for an autistic child to make a choice.

Karma is a bitch and I love her so.

UPDATE: More here, not so much about the incident per se, as about the ethics of the incident and why it's become such a massive hairball so quickly. I had to get an ethics post out of this somehow.

UPDATE: I got some off the record indications that people connected to this are deeply concerned with what they see as an unfair perception of the business. But I have so far not been contacted in any official, on-the-record way by Pokez management or owners.

UPDATE: The link to the Pokez myspace above has some kind of wierdness - let's try this: http://www.myspace.com/pokezsd

If that gives a 404 error, go to myspace and search for pokezsd and you will find the page; it's still there.

tag: karma, pokez, San Diego, mexican food, vegan, autism, autistic, assault, assholes

Evidence of Nonsense

The term Autism has become a vast catch-all for a wide variety of traits that range from those that are functionally incapacitating to those that mildly affect behavior and social interactions. Nobody knows quite what "autism" is, save that it is obvious that it's probably far more than one thing and that it causes a good deal of fear and confusion among parents who are moving heaven and earth to find treatments and cures.

Which is wonderful of course, but it's also terrible.

ScienceDaily: Ped Med: The autism treatment challenge: "'There are no standards for safety in autism treatments,' said Steven Gutstein, psychologist, autism specialist, researcher, child, marital and family therapist and co-director of The Connections Center for Family and Personal Development and of the Relationship Development Research Institute in Houston.

...

'There's not a single study to see if anyone is harmed by the treatment, be it biomedical or behavioral,' Gutstein said in an interview. 'The assumption is both are better than nothing, and the more the better, but there are no data to confirm that.'"

Hey, I have an idea; how about asking an actually autistic person?

"I am not a puzzle, I am a person."
This shirt design supports Autistics.org, autism awareness and neurodiversity in general.

Now notice the language I used. "Autistic Person," not "Person with Autism." Speaking as an Aspie - diagnosable with Asperger's Syndrome - and speaking from my experiences dealing with actual autistics, such as those at Autistics.org, It's pretty common for folk on the spectrum to think of autism/aspergers/whateverthehellitis as something they are, not something they "suffer from" that could be cured.

I'd rather be "cured" of opposable thumbs.

And that with full realization of all the downsides that I and those who love me cope with every single day - much to our blended amusement and frustration.

Interestingly - even astonishingly enough, many full autistics, who seem to suffer quite badly from clearly crippling "downsides" feel exactly the same way; our minds are beautiful places to live, and from our perspective, being able to live fully in a neurotypical world exactly as neurotypicals do seems like a "cure" that is far worse than the "disease."

Oh, don't get us wrong - we'd definitely like the hard parts to be easier - but we'd also like you to notice the things we do well without words like "idiot-savant" being thrown about. "Geek" is somehow better, frankly. Not a LOT better, but at least it's an honest word.

Personally, I prefer "eccentric."

UPDATE: Autism Diva has a great long article up that I'd like you to read. I particularly like these two 'graphs, which illustrate her point rather well - and the one I was trying to make. Autism - and so many other things in life - are much more issues of perception than substance.

Autism Diva is reminded of a caller to the Diane Rehm show when Dr. Grinker was on there promoting his book. The caller said something like: "I'm from a large extended family from Tenessee," (maybe he said, Kentucky) "the behaviors I see in my son, that the doctors call "autism" is just how my family is. No one in my family would have sought out a diagnosis in the past because so many in the family are just like this. It's normal for us."

So it sounds like if you come from a family where lots of the kids spin can lids and stop answering to their names at 12 months, everyone just says, "Yup he's a Johnson, awrighty. Wonder if he'll be able to do that calendar trick like cousin Ted." The caller certainly didn't indicate that the family had a habit of mourning the birth of another of these weird kids, and it's safe to assume that some of the members of the family were quite autistic and others were more like normal-ish, like it is in little Hayden's family.

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