Jill Rants and Raves

Dog Laws And Your Civil Liberties

Got a phone call the other day from a woman who has a model citizen canine pitbull. An older dog with no history of aggression whatever. Here's the thing - her job has been re-located to Denver. For all of you who have forgotten or who never thought this had anything to do with you - pitbulls (whatever that means, it's sort of an ambiguous term like 'herding breeds'; it can mean what you want it to mean) are banned in Denver. Not regulated or restricted. Banned. This woman, who in today's employment market, can't tell her employer to stuff the job, needs to re-locate her dog here in California unless she wants to violate Denver city laws, or have her dog impounded and killed. This IS a civil liberties issue - whether you like dogs at all. I'm not a pitbull (or similar breed) fan - no secret there, but this is downright screwed up.

In fact it is making me pissed off. As I often am when it comes to punitive lifestyle legislation. This has nothing to do with dogs - it has to do with whether America is becoming -  fast - the home of the shackled and land of the leashed - that's you, not the dogs. So, that's just my morning rumble and to go with it - a picture of a couple of nasty, vicious pitbulls......yeah, right.....

For Dog's sake

There's been a complaint that I haven't written enough about animals lately. No chasing after pitbulls loose on the freeway in the Oakland Hills, no grabbing the remains of a crushed cattle dog out of the way of a truck on a highway - yeah the dog was already dead, but there's something cruel about leaving an animal to become a shadow, as cars and semis roll over it, making it vanish into the tarmac. No cruising the streets of Richmond to find the little Pomeranian sighted over and over again with matted fur and grease stains all over it, and definitely no major animal rescue activity. An interesting and unexpected side-effect of my being more my old self - I have, strangely, become less engaged with the sub culture of animal rescue as my depression has lifted. Hmmmm. Very odd.

More than that, I have begun to chafe at the responsibilities I took on in my own life. I look at Roxy, heading towards 15 - adopted from San Francisco Animal Control 14 years ago, when she was almost a year old. She represented for me, the fulfilment of a dream.  To have a dog by my side as I drove around San Francisco in a pick up truck (inherited from a close friend after she moved up in the vee-hickle department  - why do Americans enunciate that word the way they do?).

But Roxy's back legs are beginning to tremble as she walks, she is totally deaf now, and it annoys me when she goes awol on walks. At least she keeps Oscar company at the back of the pack - Oscar, my dachshund prince, who spent the first 16 years of life with his original princess and then came to me 18 months ago when the cattle dog he lived with chewed part of his ear off. Funny thing, he adores that dog more than anything. It's just like people - she licks and kisses him, he snuggles close, she seems to whisper sweet nothings in his ear, then at some point it's all sturm and drang, all blood and tears.

 

I look at Frank the border collie. 'Cranky Frankie' to all who have been on the receiving end of his unceasing snarls, growls and moaning about how tough his life has been for the last 11 years, and there are days, I admit it - I sort of wish he'd get a sudden fatal disease and be dead in 24 hours without suffering. My ex, Susie, says I have threatened to dispatch Frank every time I get really flustered, but I think it's only when he nails a pup on the trail, or barks till he's hoarse, or raises his lip at me when I tell him to 'shut the fuck up' (my favorite phrase).

Then of course there's Calvin, who has destroyed most of the furniture in my home, escaped a few times, turning up in the Oakland Shelter one time (after someone had reported seeing a pitbull near a children's day care centre in an out of the way place in the hills, where animal control only ventured if a pitbull was on the loose - see photo to understand why this description of Cal is a bit ironic to say the least. But Calvin is here for the duration, feverishly scared out of his wits at the sound of just about anything.

And Roo. What to say about Roo except she is getting a little fat.

There are cats too, including the delinquent, Slim. Mr Erect. His fluffy gray tail seems to lay flat on his back. It means he has to make less effort when spraying.

Unlike Joe, the weird black cat who loves dogs, whose tail I used to have to shave
because he never took it out of the way, even when he was taking a poop. That is probably way too much information, but for those of you who want the animal stuff - you asked for it. And of course Ophelia, whose obituary I have written many times. I've even scheduled her euthanasia a few times. Somehow, as she heads towards 17, she always seems to know what I have in mind. Maybe she hacks into my computer and reads the obit. 'Ohmigod, that sounds just like me', she must think, and pops a few uppers to give me the impression she is way better than she really is. She's still here.

But then, I contemplate the alternative. A life of peace and quiet, a life with no dirty paw prints, a day with no laundry, days without the scent of wet dog in your car, days when you can do what you like, when you like, and with whomever you like, a house with leather furniture unscratched, a home without that peculiar and unique sense of sharing with souls who give unconditionally of their affection, attention and bad breath. Truth is, I won't be sad when the old ones make their move - wherever it is they move to. But this is the life I've made. The life they inhabit with me.

On Apples, Hatchets and Aging

Now that the creative mind behind the '1984' neo-apple attack ad on Hillary Clinton now running at a computer near you has been 'outed' and he has lost his job, it's time to say I thought the re-facing of the famous Apple ad is a beautiful thing to behold - a modern form of graffiti. But what's not so pretty is that the guy, who only admitted when confronted, worked for an agency working for the Obama campaign.

It makes you long for the days of  Lee Atwater - an unrelenting and avowed Republican - a hatchet man who was proud to be identified with his craft. Until, that is, he was diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumour and repented, apologising to various policitcal figures who still had puncture wounds in their skulls and psyches from Atwater's work.  Let's not forget that it was in the 1984 political campaign that Atwater honed his gifts against VP candidate Geraldine Ferraro, and fully realised his skills in 1988 when in his sterling work for Bushie Senior, he created the infamous Willie Horton ad, effectively scuttling Michael Dukakis' bid for Prez. Termed 'smashmouth politics' this kind of campaigning appeals to those who do not care who serves in the White House, and those who already feel disenfranchised, cynical and those who think that Al Gore is a filmmaker and George Clooney is a Congressman.

One more frightening little factoid about Mr Lee Atwater. He was close friends with a certain Mr Karl Rove and became buddies with Bushie Junior who had an office across the hall from him in Daddy's White House. Just think of the damage that little trio could have done, had Atwater not died in 1991. Gives ya chills, right?

But what really bugs me about the 1984 ad (regardless of who created it) is that by the time these two leading Democrats have shredded each other in the primaries, who, among a new generation of voters, is going to give a toss about a damn thing they say. As they tearily put their differences aside and pretend that none of it mattered, proclaiming it's now time to slay the real dragon - probably Guiliani - who is gonna care?

Who gives a damn about these two cardboard cutouts anyway? Obama doesn't seem to have the backbone to run a clean campaign, Hillary is a cold, aloof operative and neither can be trusted to run an executive branch which is not riddled with grace and  favor appointments and corruption. It's sad to say, but it's the truth - the Democrats do not have a leader. One can only be grateful that the Republicans are at a loss also. Philandering, ethically challenged adulterer, Gingrich, is an even bigger loser and Mitt Romney has a 'minor' religious problem. That leaves the man his own children don't speak to - Rude Boy Rudy, and the man who might have been Prez, John McCain if he didn't spend his time promising rights to the disenfranchised, and the disenfranchisement of those same people to the Right. Poor John. I wonder if he and Al Gore drink at the same bar in Georgetown.

And if you're wondering about ethics - it is true, I do not run a current photo of myself. I am not 8, nor 21, nor even 45. I have passed the 50 mark - a while ago - and in celebration, I'm running an even younger pic.

Scrotum, labia and needle phobias

I've been listening to all the uproar on talk radio about the word 'scrotum' which appears in the book “The Higher Power of Lucky,” by Susan Patron, this year’s winner of the Newbery Medal, the most prestigious award in children’s literature. 10-year-old orphan Lucky Trimble, hears the word through a hole in a wall as she listens in as someone describes how a rattlesnake bit his dog, Roy, on the scrotum.

Aside from the fact that no-one who owns a dog uses that word - we're all more likely to say 'look at that huge great Rottweiler, jeez why does he still have his balls? Hey mister, get your dog fixed.' At which point, the owner - a small man, wearing baggy pants, puts his hands uncomfortably into his pockets and tells you to mind your own damn business, and feels around for that reassurance that yes, indeed, he, like his whopping dog is still a man, still intacta non grata. Scrotum? I don't think so.

So, you kind of wonder - why did the author feel the need to introduce a word not in common use at all, to describe a situation that would more likely have been described thus - 'man, the worst thing happened, totally spooky, my dog Roy, you know, the one that jumped that spaniel last week, he was trolling around in a dirtpile and some rattler just up and bites him on the balls, right in the crotch, no shit.'

No ifs, ands, butts or scrotums. I'm just a bit mystified. But school librarians across the nation have gone on a rampage, banning the book, refusing to order it, expressing fear and terror, not to mention loathing of this 'dirty' word.

Me? I'm just totally bummed that a good author doesn't use her bully pulpit in a children's book to promote spay and neuter. It would have been just as painful had she written that Roy had been bitten on his haunches, on his penile shaft, on his shrunken testicles, no?  You all know I'm kidding right? I have been accused of too much dry wit, and irony and as Americans don't do irony, I feel as if I have to explain myself more.

But let's talk body parts for a moment. This is reminding me of a story by Lisa Palac in her autobiographical 'The Edge Of The Bed: How Dirty Pictures Changed My Life' in which she which refers to me as 'a butch dyke in a black leather jacket and an english accent' getting all worked up because Susie Bright (my friend and former housemate) and Lisa  had let my cats out of our apartment in San Francisco while they romped naked in Susie's bedroom with Nina Hartley's G string. This is, of course, a completely true story and one which you should check out in the book. The day after, as Lisa and Susie prepared to get their labia(s) pierced, I, who have the worst phobia of needles in anyone over 5 years of age, loaded my camera, checked that my flash unit was working (because after all, a needle sliding through a labia is not something that you can do a second take on), and readied myself to throw up - if the blood, the screams or the sight of it just made me lose it. I didn't eat breakfast that day.

I have to say, it hurt me more than it hurt either of them. I have been scarred for life by that experience, and can't even be in a room when a vaccine is given to a dog these days, scrotum-less or not.

But, back to the story. Lisa writes that the next day, I casually asked 'So, how's your cunt?'. And she notes that this was the first time she had ever heard the word 'cunt' used without embarrasment, or as an attack.

And that is the point of this - when we continue to allow words that describe sex, our genitalia, or our identities (be they the clinical text book words or common slang) to conjure up disdain, hate, fear and mystery in chldren's minds, we continue to perpetuate the worst forms of self oppression and self condemnation.

So, I'm a bit contrary here - Susan Patron, you shoulda just have written 'Roy, whose balls were nipped by a rattler, was damn sore for weeks afterwards. He was lucky to be alive, and his owner decided that it was way past time to get him castrated. Roy, for his part, looked over at his owner/guardian and said 'It's ok dude, they're my balls, not yours.'

Now there's a kids story that everyone can believe in.

 

dontcha just love springtime?

Wow, that was a beautiful day in the state of lightheadedness known as California. The morning started with that cosy warm breeze, like you can drink it, and the walk I took with my crowded house of dogs just made me feel like you do when you've plunged into a lake and now you're air drying on the dock leading to the water, and the sun dried wood smells like milk and cookies. Freckles have crept on to my face, and long shadows form as Oscar, Roo, Roxy, Frank, Calvin and their temporary friend Imo, careen around the former landfill, delighting in the brash green grasses, and the spring heat. The odd mix of roses, palms, fennel, irises and broom makes me smile, the red winged blackbirds sound like thin wine glasses clinking in a toast, ground nesting birds swoop and flutter and a cacophany of dog voices swells as more morning walkers arrive. Life is good!
The warm day has passed and now, it is the first evening after the coming of daylight savings, and I'm watching the exhausted dogs sacked out on the couch behind me in my little office, and I just read a moving short ditty on a blogsite I like, so check this one out.  And this is just what it is -

Don't bite when a simple snarl will do

As part of my pop culture diet I like to cruise the far reaches of the opposing political spectrums. So you'll find me rooting around on the left hand side of the airwaves as much as on the right. It's dirty both ends of the dial, let me tell you. And none dirtier yesterday than Mike Malloy - left wing talk show host, CNN commentator and sometime rock producer - on the inaptly named Quake 960, which is part of a network of 'progressive' stations called Air America.

I listen to the Quake occasionally, especially if I'm trying to skim the stations to listen to the San Francisco Giants (baseball team, for you heathens who think the sports calendar ends after the SuperBowl) and my finger slips the buttons as I'm avoiding yet another Berkeley car with a personalized licence plate. And as I'm careening past Michael Savage - whose real name is Wiener - my ears prick up at the name Newt Gingrich.

Look, Newt is one unethical guy. Politically and more poignantly, personally. This is a man who delivered the terms of his divorce to his critically ill first wife, as she lay in the hospital after cancer surgery. Word is he decided numero uno wasn't attractive enough for a Congressional stud like himself. But wife number 2 didn't cut the mustard either, so Newt, the mastermind of the Clinton impeachment, moved fairly swiftly on to number 3, a congressional aide. But aside from the women he had affairs with who he actually married, rumours of other extramarital affairs have followed this doink around from the beginning. Including, though not proven, that he got 'serviced' in the parking lot near his place of work - the US Congress. Class act.

As the groundswell in conservative circles starts agitating for a Newt Presidential bid, who does this hypocritical rat turn to for his mea culpa moment. None better than James Dobson from Focus On The Family. Dropping his gargantuan haircut to his chest, Newt admits with a plaintive sigh that yes - he cheated.  Why is it that the British handle sex affairs in their politicians so much better than you Americans do? I think it's because we don't have any pretense to being a country rooted in Christianity. You don't have to evoke God to get elected in Britain. Actually better if you evoke your dog. We're all pagans, and we know it.

But, dear reader you may be wondering why this makes me so mad at Mike Malloy. Newt's a stinker right? No question. But is he a child molester? And is it Ok for Malloy to broadcast that phrase along with other choice sexual and criminal innuendo to the world? I don't think so - and it's making me angry. There is a real difference between being an average male scumbag who cheats and lies, and a man who commits statutory rape, lewd acts with a minor or fondles underage girls. Mike, if you don't have the evidence - just zipper it. Why is it that male talk show hosts simply can't get their dicks out of their mouths?

This is all reminding me that perhaps the criticism made by a regular reader of mine, that I wasn't writing about enough animal stuff anymore, might have some validity. So, watch out for blogs about how to comb out the matted fur of a scratching cat, or what to do when faced with a feral dog in the mall. More immediately, if you know anyone who is looking for a cool 12 pound long haired female chihuahua mix, let me know. I just happen to have one needing a home....

 

Chicks Rule

I'm a popular culture junkie. It's one of the many characteristics that put me at odds with some of my lesbian separatist chums back in the grungy wimmins squats I lived in once upon a time. An irate lezzie in a pair of purple overalls once knocked my turntable over at the local disco as I played my favorite Bob Marley track for the assembled dykes in a smoky bar, with me wishing that women I went out with, looked more like Charlotte Rampling and less like, well - less like the androgynous wombyn who inhabited my particular ghetto.

My subscription Vanity Fair - the magazine not the novel, lies splayed open by my bed, I will see most Hollywood crap at the theatre, and I just devour new music whichever way it comes at me. Doesn't mean I like all of it, but I'm totally stoked that the woman who I think is cooler than ayone else, got me excited about Mos Def, Clarence Cope and the mighty Hole, not to mention AFI, The Slackers, and Flogging Molly. But what really got me remembering how potent popular culture can be and what the forces ranged against it will do to shut down an unpopular message, was watching the DVD about the Dixie Chicks 'Shut Up And Sing'.  In the aftermath of Natalie Maines impromptu comment about the Prez while onstage in London, the sheer unadulterated power of right wing control of county music radio stations in America became clear, as these darlin's of CW music found themselves systematically shut out, shut down and told to shut up.

Even if you hate movies about the music industry, even if you hate documentaries, even if you don't much like country rock - make a damn exception. Rent, buy, download this movie - made by the amazing Barbara Kopple who made one of the greatest movies about working class struggle in the US, 'Harlan County USA'

I am getting reminded a lot lately just how astonishingly beautiful it is to be alive, and watching the Chicks going onstage on the very day when there has been a death threat made against Natalie Maines reminds me that courage comes in surprising packages.

And as an aside, the theatre in London where Natalie made her famous comment about being ashamed that President Bush was from Texas was in Shepherds BUSH - one part of London where I never found a squat to live in, though I did date a cute Irish gal who lived there.

 

Ann Coulter Your Roots Are Showing

Who uses the word faggot as a slur anymore, anyway? Faggot? That is so done, so passé, so over. A faggot, as we all know is a good old fashioned pork meatball. And once was a term to describe an unpleasant old woman, or if you want to get really dramatic, a bundle of wood used to light the pyre on which witches were being conflagrated - burnt at the stake, in other words. But to use faggot in the smirky, precious, silly blonde, streaked, root showing way that Ann Coulter just did - that just shows no class whatever.

But then who said rightwingers have class? Just one glance at Ann Coulter's official site and you get the picture - here are the obligatory photos with fans at book signings, and the photo with her black friend Al Sharpton. Wish you didn't cozy up to just anyone, Al. There are shots of Ann aiming a rifle, Ann on a ski vacation, Ann showing leg in front of a Grateful Dead poster in Berlin, Ann in a pink dress, Ann in a short black dress in front of an imposing Washington landmark, Ann in expensive sunglasses and so on. A sort of 'look I'm not a kook, I'm just the girl next door with a high powered semi automatic, and bumper stickers that promote me and Condoleeza as Prez and Vice in 08.'

The scariest thing about Ann Coulter's so called slur of John Edwards (see my blog about Barack Obama to understand why the NeoCon's are worried about Edwards, the current 3rd place Demo) in front  of the well heeled Conservative Political Action Conference  on Friday, is that after the sharp intake of breath as they all asked one another 'did she just SAY that', is the ripple of giggles that turns into a sustained guffaw as the right armpit of America shows that you can take a conservative out of the toilet, but you can't take the toilet humour out of their mouths. Periodically, you just have to flush the toilet with the blue rinse, there's no way around it.

The quote from Ms. C is  "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 it's kind of an impasse, can't really talk about Edwards."

Now that is so funny. I just about lost my oatmeal I was laughing so hard. And having seen the video footage of Ms C as she delivers this fabulous 'joke', she has the appearance of  a six year old with that smirk you get when you've just shocked your parents with a cuss word. Grow up Ann.

But you get the big picture right?  Obama is already being described by con-umnists (spelling intended) as the closet Muslim, Hillary as the closet Bill Clinton, and now ladies and gentlemen we present J. Edwards, the famously closet gay. And who better to be the hatchet bearer than the blonde bombshell of the neocon calendar girls.

Ms. C has been roundly criticised by those Republicans who know they need to kiss a bit of gay cheek to get elected, and have tsked tsked their way onto the front pages being ashamed of Ann. And Coulter herself - she just has another funny line at the ready. She says "C'mon, it was a joke. I would never insult gays by suggesting that they are like John Edwards. That would be mean."

Ann, you just crack me up, girl.

Former Governer of Massachusetts, Mitt Romney, who is the proud beneficiary of Coulter's endorsement for President should watch out though. Being in Ann's sights, good or bad, can be a double egded sword. Talking about Romney, Ann says "He tricked liberals into voting for him. I like a guy who hoodwinks the voters so easily." Well, at least being in the Republican party she's used to those kinda guys.

Who cares about voting? Who cares about voting irregularities? Certainly not our trusty Republicans, and for sure not Ann Coulter who was investigated for deliberately voting in the wrong precinct. And that, at the end of the day, is that. Conservatives. No class.

Vote Democrat - With No Illusions.