Obama

My deepest apologies for the wait. Life, as often happens to those who are young and busy and facebook obsessed often doesn't grant us time in our blogs as we might wish. Not to say there is nothing to talk about, because, in seasons such as this, there is much to talk about, more than there has been for awhile.

So what shall I say? Shall I tell you that my last post was written in despair, as I feared Barack Obama would fail my generation in its deepest hopes and demands and needs? I shall, and it shall be the truth. I do fear that Barack Obama will not be the president we imagine him to be. I fear that he will be the dreamer in whom we trust, but that the age of the 21st century will not be kind to dreams, as it was unkind to the dreams of Jimmy Carter, and for the next thirty years he will be a fortgettable president, doomed to helping the weak and unfortunate as only we normal Americans can.

For thousands upon thousands of Americans, that is as much, or more, than we can ever accomplish, to help other country men and fellows of the Earth. Or will ever accomplish, let me say, because we do not try. I do what I can, but I am just one person, and despite the power of one person, I do not think I could ever do enough. And I certainly cannot do as much as Barack Obama can.

He has the power to hypnotize a lost and worried generation who were raised to politics with the shadow of a draft, the horror of war, and the anger at a Republican Party that has forgetten the small in favor of the rich. He has the power to harness new life and energy of this generation and drive it into his campaign. As a young college student, I have the honor of seeing that drive in the eyes of liberal friends speaking of Barack Obama, and their hopes for him.

If he is to be a great president, or any president all it, it will not be enough to harness the power for a win for himself in this election. he must simultaneously harness that power into a win for America, for the world as it might one day be. He is the only politican today with the words capable of harnessing the wildness and frustration the young people, raised with recession and terror and George Bush, and transforming it into a powerful force of America, the same power that has made this country great and threatens to destroy America when it gets wasted.

I think Barack Obama knows that. He was a community organizer. He saw in Chicago many young people who needed to channel their talent, and he wants to expand that to the entire country. If the black community in general had any sense, they would see that the true potential of America, including themselves, lies with Barack's Obama's being heard, not literally castrated by Al Sharpton.

So that is my message. I do not side with politicians lightly, as all of you Lobolians have no doubt seen. But Barack Obama is the first and only to show himself worthy of such a grant, coming even from an online weakling such as myself.

Have a nice day Lobolians

Roman Wolf

the Audacity of Hope, in the Shadow of truth

where is our hope in America today? Is it with the people we face, the array of handy politicians racing for our votes in a race jockeyed by money and circling the people like vultures?

or is it hidden in those we have not yet seen, ducked inside hearts yet young and unable to express with direct power, acting through the people above them, in hopes of becoming more like them?

i thought i had found it, but i was, i fear, wrong. How often are americans going to be wrong about their politicians, or is it how long are politicians going to be wrong about Americans?

For that matter, who is right about Americans? Is it the shock jocks who tell them what to think, the bloggers dodging the news streams of the past century, tapping the old lineage of the 19th century journal? All i can say is, i hope that the spin doctors and vote tabulators and experts of the candidates are wrong. because at the rate they are advising, we have no more hope.

But this is not yet Rome

Roman Wolf

Return of the Politico I

Hello Lobolians

It is now a new year, and high time to return to the grand old theorectical days of yore. Now, at this point, the average blogger would simply declare, I am for ___________! yell at all of you, and insist that you are for ___________! too. I consider such politicoing rather rude, and consider it rather high minded of me to insist that you share my polical views. I don't want you to share my political views. Blindly following the political view of any blogger, especially one that resides online with a psuedonym called "roman wolf". We all know what the romans made of politcs.

Caesar walks up to the senate, (stab stab stab stab stab stab)x(stab stab stab stab stab stab)
et tu brute?

yep, i'm a brute

stab

end of Ceasar

So yeah, don't trust your political views to a Roman.

But I always liked the Greeks better, except for the fact that Lobopolis didn't sound nearly as good as Lobolius when I needed a fake name, so I became the Roman Wolf, rather than the Greek Wolf. Plus the Romans had their Lupercale, so they liked Wolves. I am not sure if the greeks liked wolves or not, Homer certainly was fond of lions. But I am no lion. Lions are for people named Richard. or at least their hearts are.

cour'de'lion and all

or however you spell the french word for heart. If you know, leave a little comment for me, so that I know. Something close to that, but i have a feeling there is an e in it somewhere. haha

Now, about Politics.

Hilary appeared on the Tyra Banks show today, and was talking about Chelsey Clinton. Amazing how wonderful a fierce and strong minded mother is when she protects here child, but oh how dreadful the fierce and strong minded female politician is. One is admirable, the other divisive.

Obama is still scavenging for his post as the Kennedy of the Generation that grew up under the reign of Clintons and Bushses. Some say he is too young, but so was the guy who fended off the darkest, most nearly human extincting, phase of the cold war. Rather amusing, isn't it, how short memories of history can be. everyone who was old enough to fall in love with Kennedy is old enough to blast Obama for being too young.

Among the Republicans, it is a mad scramble for whoever can be the most Reaganesque, or have the most charming smile, or be the most right about iraq, or who can charm the most neo-neo-conservatives.

Thomson is handidly playing the Reagan Card, drawing off the 1980's memories of the old guard conservatives and cashing in on his status as an actor, hoping that the shadow of the guy who killed farmers in nicaragua then lassoed and ripped down the berlin wall will waft him into the oval office.

Mitt Romney obviously read somewhere in the mass media that Americans vote in the man who looks the prettiest for president and while lovingly eyeing himself in the mirror decided that he was the fairest of them all and after a bit of flip flopping, made up his mind, and then changed it again and ran for president anyway. If the presidential looking card contiues to pan out for him, then he is in luck. He has the biggest smile and the whitest teeth and the correct hair.

McCain saw Iraq and decided that he was going to hedge all his bets on Iraq being a good idea for America, because since it was a new Vietnam, and Vietnam was a good fight, Iraq was one too. He knew Vietnam was a good fight because he was a POW. And in NH, it actually worked for him a bit. He won there.

Huckabee loves the Neo-Neo-Conservatives. These are the neo conservatives who are trying to reform the neoconservatives, by having a strong focus on youth issues like the enviroment, while keeping up the old guard;s defence of the sanctitiy of marriage with at most a modern separate but equal doctrine. At least, well, the status quo is nice too, and since they are Conservatives, the olden days when gay meant no more than happy would proabably be pleasant too. he's their hero. Plus the evangelicals like him too, he's from the south and he's a governor. Both are strong creds for anybody not named Will Clinton.

Course, there are plenty of others i could critique, but my fingers are tired and your eyes probably are too. When i have made my next post, this will be the earlier one. But till then, more will be on the way.

Gentle Rambling

Greetings my Lobolians

Whoever you are, whereever you are, since it is hard for me to know of those things. I have only gotten one comment in two years from a viewer, so the vast majority of you need to say more or I can never tailor my posts to your liking.

I am rather tired tonight, so I don't think I will write more. But you should. It's easier to comment than it is to post, you just have to read stuff that I write down for you and hit the comment button. Then you say something like, You rock Lobolius! or Lobolius-I think you are an idiot. I won't mind either, really. I am a true believer in freedom of speech.

Roman Wolf

Is there some point to the world or do we simply like to delude ourselves? Come on, face it, the world is a large spinning ball containing mostly water, salt water, with a bit of dirt here and there, and some ice on top and bottom. That's all there is. Why should such a ball have a purpose for each and every one of us?

But being human, and homo sapiens, wise humans, at that, we all have concluded that there is a point to our wisdom. We need a point for our wisdom, an outlet for those superfluous conclusions we draw every day. That is why the internet is so popular. We have all been raised in America to believe that we are all unique and special, but with so many unique and special voices, we need to be heard above the clamor.

The postmodern world is said to be filled with such ruckus, a mindless miasma of thoughts disconnected from the world around them, beings trapped without a sense of location, when, like me, they wander onto a computer and tap the powers of the net.

But is it that bad? Does not the internet, with its super strength of individualism surmount that babble? Of course it doesn't. The Rant is a single voice yapping in a loud brook, surrounded by thousands of other yappers, and a handful of screamers whose voices are known, heard, and occasionally recognized by many people who skim the net for those who can be heard.

There is more sound than ears to listen, more to be heard than can ever be heard. That is the nature of the world I and so many of the people my age have grown up in, yet we have all been told from infancy that our voices matter, that what we say counts. We have been raised knowing both realities as inherently true, and some people look at us and wonder, why are the young people today so disenchanted, so cynical, so refusing to vote? We have been decieved. That is why.

We have grown up with soundless voices, talked with our fingers, looked with a two dimensional screen and made friends with images alone. What else could we be but image centric, snappy thinkers who cannot look in depth at an issue? A generalization of course, but truer than many of us would like to admit to. We are fought by our own world as we grow up, yet coddled and told we are safe and loved.

Our own inherited passions have destroyed us, the technology we have been raised to love has replaced any other world in beauty, in rightness. There is no swifter way to learn, to talk, to experiance the world than the internet, but one day there will be. And that is the ultimate hope for any generation, that they outlive what they were born with and eventually become capable of remembering antiquated things, like vcrs.

Roman Wolf

Hello Lobolians!

I fear this blog has lost it's political teeth, especially compared to last year. Well, I want to change that.

To do so, I will start with a topic that many consider frivilous in the world of politics, but not so frivolous as to make me shy away from it while biting hard on political matters.

So, now, in keeping with my theory of enforced neutrality by bombing everyone, I guess i will go after the democrats. Consider that lineup they give us. The standard fare of old white men, an old black man, a young black man (too young for many to like)and a white woman.

And now, we see that come down to this-those two at each other's throats. Where else can a politician's teeth go? How about to being critical of our national debt, in the trillions and largely held by China. Money brought down many nations before this, the Romans among them. But where are those words?

I have no idea where the words against that are. We seem too eager to attack the "other" and too uninterested in doing anything about the issues that need to be attacked.

How to defeat Obesity, a Sarcastic Approach

People who wish to remain anomymous have touted a brilliant new way to combat the obesity epidemic in today's youth. While admitting that some find it a little extreme, they insist that it will succeed where M rated video games, freeze dried apples at McDonalds and banning tag on playgrounds has not:
Starve Them.
The plan is simple, really. Child comes back from the M rated Video, asks mom, can i have some cookies? The mom turns gently but firmly to her child and says, no I am sorry honey. You are fat. I read about a way to save you from diabetes.
The kid frowns, aware so far only that he is being denied cookies.
"What's that?" The kid wails, in an age old technique.
"I need to starve you." The mom replies, padlocking the safe loaded with cookies, bread, milk, apples, and cheerios.

Has anyone else ever found situations like this pathetic in some way? I mean, we are a nation largely consisting over the overweight, the underexercising, where the idea of starving yourself is encouraged on websites as a way to become beautiful. In other parts of the world, starving is something everyone dreams of avoiding. Who knows where I am going with this, I just thought it was an interesting foil this morning.

Roman Wolf

The First Covenant War, A Two Part Documentary by Karla Vixen Rove of Lobolia

A long time ago, but not that long ago considering the history of the universe, there was a war fought by my old friend Karla Rove and the allied regions of Pygmyraptor and Snowcapped. There was a despot in Pygmyraptor, a cruel and power-hungry tyrant who dreamt of false holiness and eventually tried to take over the world. . . This is the story of his downfall, Part One. . .

Pumpkin Time

Greetings Lobolians.

It is nearing Halloween. Don't know why I would mention that, except that there is a pumpkin now sitting on my desk, that I was looking at just now. Rather interesting thought, wouldn't you say? Or maybe not, making I make no sense, sitting here talking about pumpkins. Anyone can talk about pumpkins. Who doesn't know about pumpkins?

But why not talk about pumpkins? They are a fascinating plant, one we grow over 10% if each year for no other purpose than to cut funny/scary/sarcastic faces into them, plop them onto our porches, and light candles in them. Rather ridiculous. No other species has ever thought of growing food for the sake of playing with it. Not only that, but mothers around the world ENCOURAGE the practice. Wonder how many see it that way?, . . . .

Just me, Lobolius of the Rant, probably. Yawn. Not a real yawn, just one of those yeah the patheticness of this rant, talking about pumpkins yawn. Sorry folks, tonight your precious Wolf has fallen into the abyss of soft news. I will have harder, more analytical stuff one of these days. But honestly, I don't have any grittiness in the world grating at me. Just quiet thoughts of pumpkins sitting on porches across America, facing the streets for ages past and ages to come, eternally sculpted, constantly rotting and being replaced, year after year. How often do you think about such things? Never?

You should. If there's one message I seek to send out, it's look. Look. Just look, but don't bother memorizing or touching, or seeking, or feeling, or knowing all the time. Look at a pumpkin, look at a leaf falling from a tree, or a bunch of leaves swirling in a tornado. Is that difficult? Or is it too easy to do?

Roman Wolf

Multiple Topics: One Poor Burdened Blog

Perhaps some of you, while scrolling down futher, will see a picture. They are a couple friends of mine, Karla Rove and Pygmaeus.

that's not what I'm here to talk about, I just wanted to introduce them to you, and have a nice time of it. So now they will be introduced and I will just ignore them.

What is the point of a shoe? Obviously we need shoes, or so we are told, or else we would step on sharp things and feel pain. But our ancestors stepped on sharp things and felt pain, and we are here. But we have evolved past that rock stepping age and moved into the stubbing toe on bedpost stage. Shoes work for both purposes.

And then we can talk about other things now. Shall I talk about water? Dihydrate oxide? Good stuff, not as poisonous as some nerds will have you think. Just water. H20. Very refreshing when you have a dry mouth.

And cell phones. We live for cell phones at times, because without cell phones we would never be able to reach people when we are away from home. That keeps people we know, including ourselves, from ever getting away. Another very useful thing in an age when privacy has become antiquated.

Moving along my list some more, I reach the word starving. Starving children in (insert poor nation/continent here) or simply the hungryish human being in a well off nation who hasn't gone to the kitchen for an hour to eat. Both are described with the same word, but the word has different connotations for different places. Almost all Americans will say they are starving at one point in their life, very few Americans die each day of starvation. We are more likely to kill ourselves, be killed by another human being accidentally or intentionally, or succomb to a fatal disease. Not many of us starve to death.

Okay, that should do me up for the random words and topics of the day. don't die folks, life is pretty sweet once you get used to the sour.
Roman Wolf

Questions of the Campfire

Greetings to the World, and all my Lobolians!!!=)

Is there something I want to talk about today, or not? I really can't say. How about we go back to the boy and his mom by the campfire, they're old pals of this blog and always useful in an emergency.

"Mommy? Why is the sky blue? Why do stars look like they twinkle down at us? How was I born?"

The little boy asked his mother, snuggling closer to her because he was young and very tired. It had been a long day for such a young boy, being out camping in the woods and asking these profound questions about life. His mother sighed, but was glad that her son was finally asking normal question for somebody his age. However, she did not know why the sky was blue, or why the stars twinkled. She did, however, know the answer to the third, but thought that the full description would scare him into nightmares.

"It hurt. I screamed, and then you started screaming too. At that moment, I loved you son."

Remarks on Democracy Part ??

किन्दा करे
No, not Hindi. Want English. Looks cool though, quite different from Roman characters, but being the roman wolf that I am, I hardly could change myself to the Hindi Wolf on a dime.

I was reading down some earlier posts that I had written. One in May caught my eye. I was talking about the Libertarian Republican Candidate who had claimed that taxes only pay for cradle to grave care. I had countered his argument by talking about roads and "crumbling bridges", which nobody wants to drive on. I am from Minnesota. I know the bridge that had fallen, I went out to see where it went down, and I have driven over Minnesotan bridges since then. Sometimes you just gotta pay, or you pay more than just taxes. That is the essence of living in an interactive world. There is no escape from duties that must be done, and there shouldn't be. I don't mean that from any end of the political spectrum, I'll blast anyone who messes with what matters in life, and part of what matters is survival. We all want us, our ideas, our families to survive. Representative Democracy has given us common people our best chance ever. Not the best chance possible. One day a better chance will come. But at least we have the undisputable right to assemble peacably, at least we have the right to make our voices heard in this bright and talkative new age. At least we can decide a very little portion of who makes the decisions from above, so we can control a little more of our destinies. It took two thousand years to come from god-kings, monarchs, rich white man democracy, more monarchs, and finally the 18+ non felon voting rights of today. Two thousand years for women, for African Americans, for eighteen year olds to vote for who send them to war. In 4007, who knows. Maybe sufferage will truly be universal, stretching from planet to planet, all the worlds where mankind can find enough room to live peacefully side by side with one another. One day that may come. I cannot say that it will not, any more than Plato could have wondered about shadows in Mammoth Cave.

Roman Wolf

Greetings Lobolians!

I have returned from a long hiatus, but now you shall hear from me again. In the broad world, that has only recently been united in Internetwork, we consider many to be heroes. We even have a tv show called heroes and I think that show is totally awesome. But again, are we overdefining a term? Shouldn't the word hero, or heroine, be something truly reserved, truly special? What makes a person a hero? Is it doing something we wished we had the guts to do? According to Webster, a hero is a person of myth and legend, a person whose outstanding and amazing feats of strength set them apart from mere mortals. Also according to Webster, some synonyms are martyr, prize athlete, conquerer, victorious general? Who are the enemies todays heroic generals defeat? They defeat their weight, the collapse of a bridge, enemies we led into a country by invading it. We speak also of unsung heroes and seek to honor them, forgetting that to do is a paradox, and the truly unsung hero is known only to those that they save. Known only to the family that holds them to their hearts, even forgets sacrafices that they make ever day. Known only to the person that they save. I dedicate this blog to all those heroes, and heroines I cannot and shall not name. I respect the paradox, and so I will not speak much further of this matter. Know, Lobolians, that life demands heroes, but there isn't enough time in our days, in our years, to name them all. Name one for yourself everday, and maybe together we could name them all.

Roman Wolf

Peoples

Why, hello all of you Lobolians



Perhaps you have missed me, perhaps you haven't noticed, but I am back again. People always have things to do, places to go, in both this world and the virtual world. That is the defining feature of our time, that with a single bit of will and a small dose of creation we can become anything else and nobody knows the difference. Just yesterday I met in person somebody I've only known over a website. He wasn't the way I imagined him looking, if i even imagined him looking like anything. He was always his country and his country's flag, nothing else. No doubt he closely associated me with Lobolia's wolf flag, and the name Lobolia. That is the height of amusement, and also rather poignant. If I hadn't gone to my friend's party yesterday, that wouldn't have happened, ever. Rather amusing, wouldn't you say?





So as you read this, (There is a point to my actually speaking to you as myself, not the Roman Wolf) remember something for me. Remember that there is a person behind every person you ever meet. There is a person behind the face at the check-out counter, the local hamburger pigoout joint, the annoying car that just won't drive ten miles over the speed limit.



Thank you

America 2008? Poem

Skipping and Skipping
The puppets dance and skip
We all dance, we all watch
We all look at their hair
Watch the sound bytes
Why wait a year?
Eighteen months is good!
To scramble and spend spend spend!
After all, the elections almost here!
Hurry and hurry, get to the polls
We cannot wait, US Americans and all
We must vote vote vote. . .
But why come to the booth?
Voting's a waste of time,
I have celebrities to watch

Couldn't resist the quick spoof

Ta

Roman Wolf

Quick Chat of Congrats

Well well well

It seems I have the power to rant in Hindi. That would scare you all, wouldn't it? Maybe I should write this blog in Lobolian. That's Karla's language, she jokingly suggested it to me last night.

The good citizens of America have caught a new terrorist cell. Congratulations to the great DVD maker who realized that men shooting machine guns and calling for jihad could be a grave threat to our nation. Cudos also to the FBI for finally paying attention to bizzarre behavior. If only they realized a few years back that if a man wants to fly a plane but not land it he probably belongs to some very dangerous group of killers. Or else needs to find his way into a psycho ward until he picks up on the idea of gravity.

That'll settle my chat for today. I'll come back some other time, eh?

Lobolius

Reaction to the 'Right'

After watching the Republican presidential debates, held, obviously in the shadow of Ronald, I can't say I was terribly impressed. Mitt Romney, whom everyone says was the most presidental, was too presidential, too polished, too eager to be a politican moving up into the spotlight. I like scrappy ones, they are the ones who can be counted on for loyalty to the public, at least for a little while. Then they too become polished and presidential, to the detriment of all. Nobody fit that image. They were all old white men playing the cards of old white men and eager to keep playing the cards of old white men from here to eternity. I have nothing specific against old white men. Socrates and Hippocrates have done a lot for us mere mortals. But still, at least among the Dems there's variety. We have boyish men, black men, women married to old white men, in addition to the standard fare of old white men.
So in that context, I cannot image how image gets a Republican politician anywhere. They all look basically the same. Among Democrats, well, I certainly see how they play up the woman vote.
Back to political matters. The libertarian Republican, I can't think up his name but he was an old white man, was a typical libertarian. Excellent theorectical hypothoses, trapped by practical fallacies. It is beliefs such as, "Yes I would get rid of the IRS. Taxes are only good for paying off cradle to grave care and policing the world." that keep me strictly a personal libertarian ranting on the web and not a political libertarian. Let's do a historical analysis of Mr. John Q Libertarian's tax theory.
No taxes. Excellent idea-just like during the Articles of Confederation Days. Look where that got us. Rebellion, drunk bachelors trying to take over the country, and no money to bind the union into anything but a bunch of cheery independant states celebrating glorious freedom by printing their own currency. No No NO NO NO!
Sure, who likes taxes.? Nobody! Who likes to drive? Everybody. Who likes to drive on overcrowded, potholed, rundown roads lined with crumbling bridges? Nobody. But who wants to buy smooth sleek roads through taxes? Nobody. When Libertarian politicians can propose a decent alternative that doesn't involve private ownership of roads (That could get out of hand, fast) I'll consider giving them by vote.

Not Much

Hello Lobolians

Not much to discuss today, but it seemed worthwhile to swing by and say hello. Now that I've done that, I'll just say good bye.

Ta

Roman Wolf

Voltaire and the 1st

'I do not agree with a word you say, but will defend to the death your right to say it' Or something like that. Voltaire said it, but you can't ask him how it went, he died quite a while ago. Anyway, that's the gist of his quote, I think you all can get the picture. You people are smart, I hope.

Now to bring us to Don Imus. Should we defend to the death his right to say that the losers of a basketball game are "Nappy headed hoes?"

According to Voltaire, we don't need to agree that losing a basketball game makes you a glorified garden tool with nappy hair. I most definitely do not. Nor should you. If you agree with that assumption get off this blog and never return. You should know what I think of bigots like you. Now scram. You shouldn't even be able to reach this sentence. Are you gone yet?

It is jerks like Imus who make people like me, (blog writing Libertarians) absolutely pissed off because they only encourage those other third derivatives of position (jerks) to abridge the first amendment. It is that sin, more than anything else, for which he MUST be kicked off every blasted airway in this country. And the planet. And the universe while we are at it.

Those who speak openly, to many people, are required by sheer love of gods (God) and country and liberal democracy to watch their words and make sure nothing NOTHING that they say makes the ever aggravating communitarian's (Order and Equality above freedom) increasingly anxious to knock the first to the ground.

Everyone entrusted to speak to the masses must bear those things in mind. There are always going to be fools who don't think before they endanger the voices of all, but try not to join them. I hope I never do.

Roman Wolf