Nowtopian

I’m back in San Francisco where the gray rain has followed me from the east coast. Doing my usual perambulations around the internet and blogosphere, I’m amazed by the frenzied thrashing in the shallow end of the pool going on. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised since we are now officially in election season. That’s the pathetic ritual that passes for “politics” in the U.S. every so often.

Nationally all news has been buried under the avalanche of the latest scandal, embraced with enthusiasm by liberals happy to see the Repugnicans turning on themselves, but scarily reinforcing the worst homophobia and exaggerated fears of child abuse. The power relations of exploitation are clear, but the unmentionable story of teenage sexuality in the overheated atmosphere of power and money is ignored. Who at age 15 or 16 hasn’t wanted to have sex with attractive adults? But who cares anyway? How can this culture still be so crazily obsessed with the private sexual behavior of politicians and celebrities? I know people aren’t getting enough for themselves, in any way you care to measure it, but this frothing irrelevance is absurd to an extreme. (For an intelligent, 5-part analysis of how Russia, China and others in the Great Game are reshaping the playing field of world politics while all this stupidity dominates our anti-news services here, check out this Asia Times series… in general Asia Times is one of the best news sources these days.)

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