Books, wars & Br-exit: Is "Cali-exit" next?
I just love going to book conventions -- and I bet you would too.
As many free books as you can carry home in your suitcase? Visiting a
city that you would never otherwise consider going to? Meeting
interesting authors and hearing what they have to say? What's not to
like!
Plus, as a war correspondent, I can easily visit many of the places
where all these "wars" are actually originating from. Why go all the
way to Syria or Yemen or Gaza and get shot at when it's much easier to
go to the very places where those bullets that the neo-colonialists shoot are
actually being made and the bombs they drop are actually being paid for
instead -- the United States of America. Plus it's a hecka lot cheaper
and you don't have to fly as far.
The American Library Association convention was in Orlando, Florida
this year -- and it was Big Fun. Almost every major publisher was
represented in its huge exhibit hall and there were librarians
everywhere, the salt of the earth. Surprisingly, a main publishing
theme this year seemed to be books about fleeing North Korea. And
fleeing Afghanistan. And fleeing K Street.
One especially interesting freebee was Julissa Acre's new book, My
(Underground) American Dream, a page-turning story about how Acre rose
from being an undocumented immigrant to becoming a Goldman Sachs
vice-president. She also talked about how undocumented immigrants pay
over 20 billion dollars yearly in various taxes and Social Security charges -- for services that they can never receive. https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/julissa-arce/my-underground-american-dream/9781455540242/
And my favorite publisher of all time was at the convention too -- Soho
Press. Always the best. Best books, best authors, best
after-parties! https://sohopress.com/
I also spent time flogging my latest book, the library edition of Mecca & the Hajj: Lessons from the Islamic School of Hard Knocks.
High point of my efforts? When some distinguished curator of a Middle
Eastern collection at a well-known university library actually showed
interest in it! "This book reads as if Mark Twain had gone on Hajj and
then written up his adventures. It's deep, meaningful -- and
hilarious," I said. He promised to read it. Yay! https://www.amazon.com/Mecca-Hajj-Lessons-Islamic-School/dp/1533396159/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=
And speaking of war, don't let anybody fool you about Br-exit. The
Brits didn't leave the European Union because they were racist. They
left because they were sick and tired of paying for Bush's wars, Obama's
wars and possibly Trump and Clinton's wars. "NATO? I've got better
things to do with my money than use it to support Nazis in Ukraine and
ISIS in the Middle East." It's the wars, stupid.
And speaking of Br-exit, a whole bunch of Californians are also starting
to feel the same way about the good old USA. "Why do our schools have
to deteriorate and our bridges crumble just because Obama or Clinton or
whoever wants to sell us yet another war?" Why indeed. http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/37536-the-pentagons-real-trategy-keeping-the-money-flowing
Perhaps it's time that we consider a "Cali-exit" election too.
But then I read Andre Vlechek's article on Br-exit and, as usual, he nailed
it. "Everybody in Europe now wants more, more and more. Screw
austerity! 'Give us more benefits! Provide us with better wages, job
security, and
shorter working hours!' What is shocking is that (oh so innocently!)
those demands are only
made for the chosen bunch – for the Europeans and North Americans – not
for the rest of the globe that is actually paying the bill…. And has
been
paying it for hundreds of damned years, suffering horribly from
everything, from slavery, colonialist plunder, genocides triggered by
Europe, terrorism against its liberation struggle, to the multi-national
corporate looting."
According to Vlechek, nobody mentions the cruel "austerity" programs
that Syrians, Libyans, Yemeni, Ukrainians, Africans, Indonesians and
Latin Americans are now suffering at the hands of Europe and America.
Nobody mentions that Europeans and Americans are complaining about
their "austere" standard of living, but that it is actually based on the
fact that the rest of the world is barely living at all so that
Europeans and Americans can have what they have now -- only by sucking
the rest of the world dry. http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/07/01/brexit-let-the-uk-screw-itself/
Perhaps we lucky ducks of European descent should just stop whining and
make sure that everybody in the entire world has the same standard of
living as us -- whatever that may turn out to be. Let's work to make
the entire world "great" again.
