Jim Power's Blog: Jim Power, page 4

Prisons will be the new civil rights vanguard

In a recent MSN poll, the large majority of respondents believed that released prisoners should never again be permitted to vote. In general, the hatred and viciousness toward prisoners in the United States borders on sadism. At some point in the distant future, prisoners will be the new vanguard of civil rights, in the tradition of minorities, women and gay people.

Prisoners in the United States are horrendously abused. They have been stripped of all privacy, all freedom, and all vestiges of human dignity.

The most vicious and sadistic will immediately state: "Well, they deserved it. No one forced them to break the law. They made their own bed and now they have to sleep in it."

Firstly, a percentage of prisoners are innocent. Every year we hear about people delivered from Death Row by new evidence which exonerates them. Imagine if that was you, or your family member, that was cursed at and despised.

Secondly, the justice system is undeniably unjust. Women, based merely on their gender, have been disproportionately spared the death sentence. This is blatant gender inequality. The male incarceration rate is 15 times greater than the female rate. Black people make up 12.6% of the American population, yet a whopping 41.58% of Death Row inmates. Death Row is full of poor people. There is nothing a billionaire in the United States could do to receive the death sentence. Nothing.

The United States has the highest incarceration rates in the world, surpassing China, North Korea, and Iran. The U.S. prison system is an industry that is little more than an insatiable vacuum cleaner. For instance, when people staying with Justin Bieber recently pulled the adolescent prank of egging a house - something any teenage boy might have done - that was a felony.

A black male born in 1991 has a 29% chance of spending time in prison at some point in his life.

Drug laws are designed to feed the voracious prison meat grinder. The worst part of prisons, though, is that they permanently destroy many, if not most, of the Americans who get caught up in them. The public is as cold to prisoners as villagers once were toward women who had been raped. They are a town without pity.

Prisoners will one day be given civil rights. I may not live to see it, but it will happen. Someday people will realize that prisoners were born of woman, cried as infants, took their first steps, laughed, loved, hoped. There are monsters among them, but not all of them. They are human beings, not garbage.

Democracy, by Jim Power

This is Top Secret, so do not share this information with anyone.

Two years ago, on a foggy night, a homeless man lifted a bottle of wine to his lips and was just about to drink when he saw a glowing orb. It was a space ship and it landed mere yards from him. Seconds after it touched down, a seven foot tall green alien with a huge head walked down the ramp. The first living creature the alien saw was the homeless alcoholic.

"Show me your boss," the alien said to him.

The homeless man nervously stood up and staggered to another homeless man around the corner, apparently the leader of the downtrodden group. The alien made the same request of him. The second homeless man led him to a low level official designated to assist the poor in the area. The alien made the same request to him and was led to a higher official in the municipal government.

After working through a series of progressively higher bureaucrats, the alien was taken to a state official, then to another, then another, and eventually was led to the governor. From there he met with an official in the federal government and eventually people in the Department of Justice and the Department of State. Finally, after climbing the ladder to the very top, the alien was taken to the White House and met the President of the United States.

"Show me your boss," the alien said to the the president.

The president looked around the room at dozens of high-ranking officials, shrugged with confusion, then looked out the window.

"There's my boss," he said, pointing at a homeless alcoholic staggering up Pennsylvania Avenue.

Should hate speech be protected?

The Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kansas, is renowned for demonstrating at the funerals of fallen American soldiers, usually with signs and chants denouncing gay people and the nation's tolerance and, indeed, acceptance of homosexuality.

A typical sign will read: "God hates fags."

Is this hate speech? To them it isn't. To the Westboro Baptist Church it is love speech because they honestly believe people who engage in homosexual behavior are going to hell. It is an expression of love, they feel, to wake people up, show them the errors of their ways, and point them in the right direction, which is heavenward.

I am an atheist who has a strong aversion to all religions, and if someone is straight or gay ranks on my scale of importance substantially below whether said person prefers butter or margarine on his or her toast. In other words, I couldn't care less what consenting adults do behind closed doors.

But I vehemently support the Westboro Baptist Church having the right to express their views, particularly in the proximity of military funerals. Why? Well, in my mind, every man and woman who died fighting for America was driven by one overriding motivation: to protect freedom. Freedom is the shining star, freedom is the foundation on which America was built, freedom is the religion that binds all Americans, regardless of gender, race, or age. Men and boys have sacrificed their lives on bloody beaches and in godforsaken hellholes fighting for freedom, and the military is the ultimate symbol of this fight.

In the old Soviet Union, there was nothing even resembling freedom of speech. Writers rotted in gulags, and Soviet citizens wallowed in a cesspool of government mandated conformity.

When an American wins a gold medal at the Olympics and speaks to the media, is anyone threatening his or her speech? Is anyone trying to shut him or her up? No. That speech needs no protection.

The speech that needs protection is hate speech, inappropriate speech, offensive speech. That is why the American Civil Liberties Union will have a black lawyer defend the Ku Klux Klan, and a Jewish lawyer defend the Nazi Party of the United States. The right supercedes emotion. Why?

Freedom.

Miracle drug discovered

By now you know all about it. You cannot turn on the radio, television or computer, or open any newspaper or magazine, without hearing about it. Yes, they have discovered a miracle drug that prevents your fingernails from chipping.

However, the drug company has noted a few side affects. Here is the official press release.

"Using Zana Zanadorium may cause an increased risk of heart attack and stroke, must be avoided by anyone with diabetes, high blood pressure and arthritis, has been known to make hands and feet fall off in extreme cases, produced insanity in about 20% of the people who used it, causes impotence and sterility in 90% of people who ingested more than one tablet, causes hair to fall out in a majority of cases, causes halitosis in all cases; blindness may result for users of Zana Zanadorium, as well as hearing loss, the loss of smell, taste and touch, and in extreme cases, total paralysis, followed by death with symptoms similar to the Black Plague. In a small number of cases, people explode, and in 75% of the cases, people with chipped fingernails actually experience a greater incidence of fingernail chipping.

"Free yourself from chipped fingernails and start Zana Zanadorium today!"

Hitch-hiking is dangerous, and fun

In my youth I hitch-hiked tens of thousands of miles, including a trip from coast to coast in Canada, and a trip from my fishing village in Nova Scotia, Canada, to the U.S., where I wormed myself into the Big Apple and played softball in Harlem on a beautiful Sunday morning in autumn. I always hitch-hiked alone and have had some hair-raising experiences, including being picked up by men who were too drunk to walk, a man tripping on LSD, and two different men with woman problems who threatened to kill us both in a high speed crash.

Hitch-hiking is the ultimate in green travel, an inexpensive means to see the world, and an enjoyable way to meet new people. But there is a Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde component to hitch-hiking, as you never know who is going to pick you up next.

My scariest drive came on a cross-Canada trip between Sudbury and Sault Ste. Marie. Near dusk I came to the stark realization that there were no rooms to be had in Sudbury, apparently because the changing of the autumn leaves attracted countless tourists. With a light rain starting to fall, I hit the road again and was almost immediately picked up by two men in a two-door Pinto. I got into the back and saw that the driver was about six feet tall, maybe 280 pounds, and he looked as rough as they come. Next to him was a small man, but this guy gave off an almost electrical current of creepy.

Ten minutes into the ride, just as it got dark, the small man turned around and said: "We're going to rape you, slit your throat, and throw you in a ditch. By the time they find you, we'll be long gone."

I have never felt so alone in my entire life. The man turned back around, glanced at the driver, who nodded insidiously, and they kept driving. It started to pour and the wiper blades slashed across the windshield. The highway was almost deserted and only occasionally did headlights approach.

For the next hour I waited for the knife to flash. Being in a two door car, with half the back seat filled with boxes and clothes, there was nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. I was determined, though, that if I died, I would go down fighting.

We pulled into a gas station and the driver rolled down his window a crack and told the attendant to fill it up. I immediately started screaming and punching the window. The small man turned around with a look of rage. "Shut up!" he ordered.

I grabbed the back of his seat and shook it, hollering that I wanted to get out. People in other cars started looking and pointing. "Let him out," the driver said to the smaller man, a look of intense anger on his face.

The small man leaned forward and opened the door. I was out of there like a shot, hurrying away into the darkness and the pouring rain. Little did I know that my adventure was just beginning....

Olympics, a gold medal in sad

Remember playing pick-up sports when you were a kid? There was always one clumsy, uncoordinated child with no sports skill who was invariably picked last. Do you know what happened to those kids when they grew up? They became the people who look down on Olympic athletes that don't win medals.

In my home country of Canada, some genius developed the so-called "Own the Podium" program, a scheme designed exclusively to win medals at the Olympic Games. That sounds fine in theory, but in practice it's just sad.

This program has placed crushing pressure on our athletes, now treating them like meat in the market of professional sports, where a human being's worth is determined solely on his or her ability to win. But that's contrary to the spirit of the Olympic Games.

The Olympic Games is a torch burning brightly on the hillside, a reminder that we are all human beings, and that for a time every four years, the peoples and nations of the world can assemble peacefully and play games. No one is shot, no one is threatened with execution, no one is forced to tow a party line. We just get together in a big family reunion and celebrate not only our own, but those from other nations whose skill and determination we so admire.

Athletes get up every day and practice their sports, sacrificing time, effort, money, work opportunities. They give it their all in exchange for the dream to participate in this, the finest example of the human spirit. Once there, they lay it all on the line for everyone to see. How dare anyone sitting in an office or lazing on a couch demean this spirit, regardless of how the athletes fare.

I saw a Canadian woman who had hoped for a medal, only to have years of deprivation and hard work disappear in an unexpected fall. She cried and apologized to the Canadian people for letting them down. That hurt. No, you did not let us down. You brought honor to yourself, to your nation, and to all of humanity simply by being an Olympian. - Jim Power

What are your 10 favorite movies? Here are mine.

People are so different. We like different foods, different music, and have different ideas of what constitutes beauty. Even brothers, or mothers and daughters, can have completely different tastes in almost every conceivable area. In some ways there are no qualitative differences, there are only preferences.

Here are my Top 10 favorite movies. What are yours?

10.)The Godfather;
9.)The Wizard of Oz;
8.)Logan's Run;
7.)Pulp Fiction;
6.)One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest;
5.)God on Trial;
4.)Shawshank Redemption;
3.)Beauty and the Beast (Disney);
2.)A Streetcar Named Desire;
1.)Pride and Prejudice, A&E version with Jennifer Ehle and Colin Firth.

Honorable mention:
11.) The Terminator;
12.) Planet of the Apes (Charlton Heston);
13.) Sin City;
14.) Predator;
15.) To Kill a Mockingbird

If a tree falls in the forest

If a tree falls in the forest and there is no one there to hear it, does it still make a sound?

If humans disappeared from the face of the Earth, would there still be any arrogance left? Of course it makes a sound.This pseudo clever remark illustrates the absolute depths of depravity from which human arrogance rises.

If the sun shines and there is no one to feel it, is it still sunny? If the rain falls and the wind blows, but there is no one there to get wet or have her hair tossed, does it still rain or does the wind still blow?

When a deaf Beethoven composed his music, did this music exist? Of course it did, just as the wind, rain, sun and falling trees exist. The world is not merely a reality so long as humans perceive it. Man is an animal, albeit a clever one, but the idea that outside stimuli have value and reality only if funneled through his perception, is so extraordinarily arrogant that it defies all bounds of decency.

Long after the last human heart stops beating, probably because of some virus created in a lab or through some unprecedented volcanic eruption, trees will still fall and they will still make a sound, even if there is not one set of ears from any species to hear it. Arguing the contrary position reveals a bloated, obnoxious and unjustified self-importance.

Are rappers male chauvinist pigs?

Have rappers gotten a bad rap regarding their demeaning treatment of women, both visually in their videos, and lyrically, where there seems to be no limit to what they'll say? Does this make the white establishment wax poetic for those good old days of rock and roll?

Firstly, let's not kid ourselves. Rock and roll is the most decadent, self-indulgent, egocentric form of music in human history. My all-time favorite band, The Doors, graced us with their signature song, The End, which detailed a man wanting to kill his father and rape his mother. I don't think any rapper has produced a cover of that little gem. Rock and rock is strewn with the corpses of young men and women who ended their miserable lives with needles in their arms, empty liquor bottles at their sides, or reached Nirvana by blowing their brains out with a shotgun blast to the head. Collectively, they have snorted a Mount Everest of cocaine up their noses. A few are still with us because modern medicine was able to kick start their hearts.

Rap music is the music of the younger generation, black and white. It is the most intellectual music since Bob Dylan, and artists such as Immortal Technique are modern day philosophers. Eminem is a poet extraordinaire, Jay-Z is an empire who could phone the White House and ask for the president, and the president would come to the phone. Grandmaster Flash produced the greatest rap song of all time, The Message, and this song can stand alongside any piece in any genre. Rap is today's Shakespeare. It is based solely on words with music little more than an afterthought; in fact, outside a few catchy hooks invented by geniuses such as Dr. Dre, rap relies on the written word exponentially more than other forms of music. Folk music is its only competitor, but folk is much less complex and narrower in scope.

But is there an element of sexism, even misogny, in some rap music? Absolutely. Some rap promotes not only the objectivization of women, but a disdain, almost a hatred, of women. It is so stark that it recalls the way vicious racists in the Old South treated black people.

Why would they do that? I'll tell you why. In the inimitable movie, God on Trial, Jews in Auschwitz put God on trial for breaking his covenant with the Jewish people. The Jews in that concentration camp are constantly threatened with murder, but one Jew in the barracks becomes a supervisor for the Nazis and this gives him heightened powers. In effect, it allows him to feel that at least someone is below him. This is the vein in rap music where low self-esteem allows itself to be heightened through demeaning another group of people, in this case women.

The irony is that in the black community there is a disproportionate number of single mother families. Women are the backbone of the black community, they are the strength of it, the heart of it, the soul of it, and yet also the brunt of its anger among predominantly young male rappers. Which proves what? That human beings are one messed up species.

Should it be banned? No. Free speech trumps all emotion, all democratic outrage, all heartfelt denunciations. In a free country, musicians have to be permitted to express hatred and to be offensive. It's called freedom. But it's still one nasty piece of goods. - Jim Power

The Jodi Arias Trial

On June 4th, 2008, Jodi Arias killed Travis Alexander.

According to the FBI, in 2008 there were 14,180 murders in the United States. In reality, 14,179 drew little media attention.

So why did the Jodi Arias trial hijack CNN for months, appear on other national networks with amazing frequency, dominate magazine covers, and take over our lives, whether we wanted it to or not?

Travis Alexander was not the President of the United States, Jodi Arias was not the reigning Miss Universe; in fact, both of them were amazingly average in almost every way. Yet the media storm, equivalent to a Class 5 tornado, tore through America, cutting a wide swath that can never be forgotten.

Why was America so obsessed with this woman and this trial? You know, I've pondered that as long as Einstein took to form his theory of relativity. And then it hit me! Entertainment equals mass control, squared.

The reality is that America was not obsessed with the Jodi Arias trial. It was all an illusion, smoke and mirrors, and it was thought up in a cynical board room somewhere behind closed doors. America was merely told that they were obsessed, while, in fact, America couldn't have cared less.

But why did the networks randomly chose this woman and the dead body of that poor victim to put through the meat grinder of tragic entertainment? Why? To prove that they could. Once they elevated this nondescript woman to the level of cult status, they then pummeled the American people with the story, pounding them into submission.

The reason is simple. Money. Not only did they hope to make money, they realized they could do it without spending money. It depletes one's gold to send reporters all over the world, paying informants, conducting journalism, but it's dirt cheap to tap into a court camera then have a gaggle of talking heads gossip about it ad nauseam.

Wait, we have to leave this blog report for a special news flash. As you know, Jodi Arias had a reported friend in Grade 3 named Mildred Turtle, and though she could not be reached for comment, we have an acquaintance of Mildred's third cousin twice removed on the line right now! You won't want to miss this! We'll be right back after the break.