obama

Dear TM

My friends thought I was being reactionary, difficult  when I didn't join in the in the euphoria at his election Now I would gloat - I told you so -  if it weren't so serious, so depressing.  I was surprised at everyone's naivety.  A reason for the attraction was that he was black.  I know that sounds banal, but it is so.  And understandably so.  In the way that one supported women leaders.  surely they can only do better?

Of course he is attractive. I laughed when I read the most attractive since Kennedy.  [!]  Of course he is intelligent.

Suaveness has become the criterion for choosing a leader.  Celebritising, mediatising spin.  Like Blair, Cameron, Clegg  [let us leave Brown out of this], the Millibands.  What work did any of these people do before standing for election?  

Maybe if I had a child like you I would want to believe in a saviour, someone who would save her and her generation from the dismal ugliness that stares one in the face.  But I also am amazed at the naivety of you all.

But did you really  not know that Amerika is ruled by obscene capitalists, and by the military?  Manipulated by the right wing media.   When you visited I kept on asking you -  tiresomely at times - how you could live there?  18 % of Americans believe he is a Muslim!  [and as such a condemnation.  Does it matter if he were?  A few years ago, my physiotherapist, an intelligent guy, told me a previous patient had told him that Mandela had secretly converted to Islam.  What nonsense I said:  why would he -of all people -  secretly do so?  You convert because you are convinced it is the truth.  He would have changed his name, accordingly. ]

When I asked you [+ others]  at the time why you saw it about a choice between Obama and McCain, when there is Nader:  you [all] said he doesn't stand a hope in winning.  But wasn’t he the only sane choice?

Both you + Q are right.  What I said at the time of his election was that he would be devoured by the machinery of America.

Yes, Afghanistan.  Yes, they will wage war on Iran.  He said that he would close the iniquitous Guantanamo camp within one year.  There is no sign of this happening.    The ghastly thing is that we, who thought we were intelligent and sensitive,  have become immune to what has happened, and is still happening there.  Do you hear me:  it is a fucking outrage.  

The most terrifying thing is that the next card will be Palin.  No not suave.  Ignorant, yes.  Dangerous, yes.  And you thought Bush was bad....

I was after the sinus operation at a small bay. Isak was there to help me.  It is interesting to learn the Coloured folklore.  To see his relationship to the sea, because he is rooted where it is not.    He told me – I thought Conrad [+ you] would approve -  that you should never take a pack of cards near the sea.  That night it will come crashing down through the walls.  I suspect to bring in a game of chance in the presence of the unpredictable Poseidon.   Wasn’t Ulysses instructed to pour wax in the ears of his men, +  he bound to the mast to prevent them being bewitched by the sirens?  Paradoxically,  for one who is obsessed with knowing, this all appeals.

Mais, mon ami, dedans tous la laideur je cherche encore pour  la beauté.


Je t-embrasse