-----Original Message-----
From: G2 .:. TMG Records [mailto:G2@tmgrecords.net] 
Sent: Tuesday, November 9, 2004 11:36 AM
To: Fishy
Subject: Anti-war quotes

Hey fishy, check it out.

"Never has there been a good war or a bad peace." 
—Benjamin Franklin 


Dear G2, 

Great sentiment and catchy too. But I do not agree with this idea now. Franklin penned this before the great world wars of the last century. World war two was a good war, as good as they can be I suppose. We saved a shit load of people, perhaps an entire race. If we wouldn’t have gotten involved, the Jews would have been nearly exterminated --- one could only imagine that if civilized man -- if there was such a thing at the time -- would have come up against us, the European settlers/our founding fathers, while we were slaughtering the native American people of this continent then maybe we would have been able to save them too. But we were not that fortunate. No one did a damn thing, so we basically wiped them all out. But yes we did manage to save the Jewish people in world war two, and maybe even saved democracy and freedom in the western world as we know it today against an insane and irrational tyranny of blind, mad men. Thanks for the quote though.
Love Fishy

Current spin: the song hot down from father Bloopy. This track is killer and we will cover it on our next CD!

Last screening: since I don't have TV and netflix sucks in nyc, the only thing I have is all the bbc versions of Oscar wilde plays which I have seen like a hundred times now, and series 2 and 3 of Father Ted from the BBC. This stuff is funny. Gross and stupid, but funny in a sick way.

Tonight I have a date with an Italian girl. There are two girls now that I have been hanging out with. I am trying hard to change this shyness thing I have. So I have been trying to talk to girls a lot more. I just figured it won't kill me so I will try. And now look. Cool. But the problem is that when I do date a girl who I don't immediately think is “the one” I start to feel uncomfortable. I don't know why exactly. But maybe this is limiting me because I don't go out with that many girls because I figure why bother if she isn't the one. maybe its just that my desire for finding a wife and having a children is stronger than anything else, stronger for instance than my desire to hang out with someone just for fun. And the worst part is that lately I started thinking that I wanted to kind of save myself for the woman that I will totally love and worship. Again, this is crazy thinking. there are still a few things sexually that I want to do before I settle down. I want to do it with like two three four girls at the same time. and more than once. I want to be in a few massive orgies with tons of hot girls. And also with some fat girls too. that would be tons of fun. I've never done that. and I think I should probably do this stuff before I get married I would think. Yes definitely. Maybe I should head to Amsterdam from here and go off a bit. Get it out of my system. 

I went out last night with these other two girls. Students from school. One is from England and one is from Ukraine. And it was so much fun. I really enjoy hanging with the Ukraine girl because we are just totally different. Different cultures. And I'm old enough to remember life during the cold war times so I feel so lucky that we can hang out now, whereas before we could not. She is very stylish. And she teaches me a lot about Russia and the Ukraine. She speaks no English. Our communication is in Italian. Things are not totally cool there yet. she cannot travel to America yet because she is young and she is a girl and they are very afraid to let people travel to America because they think they will stay there and never come back home. So they aren't as free as they want to be yet. But they are on their way. its really quite beautiful.  

I love learning other languages. I feel like it really helps tear down the separation that exists between us all as humans. We are all so similar. I feel more and more connected the more languages I learn. And the more I learn about the different countries and cultures of the world. When I get back to the states I will re-enter life as a gringo in Miami [the word gringo actually means “foreigner” --- usually refers to the white man—the invading white people who conquered the America’s---so this is funny that in Miami we are referred to as “gringos.” But it is the just the nature of what the city has turned into now. and really that is kind of a beautiful thing. I mean, that's America—the penultimate melting pot.] I will take some more classes in Spanish at a local school to really nail it when I return. its not fair of me to live there and still speak Spanish so poorly. Some people complain about Miami and how everyone speaks Spanish there now. they think that English should be the official language of the United States. I think this is truly a hilarious concept. Imagine the ignorance of this. America was “discovered” (conquered really) by an Italian (who spoke Italian not English) who was sponsored by the Spanish (who spoke Spanish of course), not the English. And the country is made up of people from all over the world---think Little Haiti, China Town, Little Italy, Little Havana. I don't like this idea of America having an official language... if we’re really going to try to force an official language on America then let it be the official language that was already here for thousands of years before we conquered it---the various native American languages. I will learn French next. I Next summer I will do the whole live in France thing just like I did here. Although I have heard from everyone here that they aren't so nice over there. especially not to Americans. They don't care if we are trying to speak their language or not. But we shall see. I do pretty well. after that, i will have french down enough hopefully to be able to travel through northern Africa and be able to communicate with them and get by. This will enable me to be able to study the music and culture of the north western countries of Mali and Ghana. This is a music I am very passionate about. After that I will have the Latin languages studied and then I would like to move into an Asian one.... I think that would be really awesome. Their culture is so different. I think we have a lot to learn from them. china is the next big thing. in our lifetime we will see it I believe. So Chinese it will probably be. 

[when I see old people all hunched over I wonder what the hell happened to them? did they see it coming? Did they notice it as it started? Could exercise have helped? Chiropractic? Massage? Martial arts? Stretching? How can we stop this? I don't want this to happen to me. I do not want to get old.]

O.k. so today in class the conversation for some reason led to talking about Bush and the Iraq thing and the power outages in America this weekend. I just listened. There are ten different countries represented in my class and they all had the same opinion. They were against the invasion of Iraq by America. They are against Bush, and they think we need to follow the UN like everyone else is supposed to. I listened and tried to understand as much as I could what everyone was saying. they all compared notes as to how many American military bases each of their countries had. Italy has the most. Which is funny because they are the most “America resistant” next to the French and then Germany. Here in Italy you see anti-America graffiti everywhere. In every city. things like “Bush is a pig” to “No more support the Americans” to “No war” etc.... this is really an amazing thing when you think about it. how quickly that technology has unified humanity all over the world.

The war is for oil 

No more service or support of the Americans

Make love, don't make war, we want peace, for the whole world

I wondered as I rode through the streets if people back home had any idea how bad the world sentiment had become against us in America. you think we had it bad before, when the rest of the world was just jealous of us and everything that we have over there. now they actually have a reason for their hostility. We’re giving them ammunition....

Bas says to me tonight, “I wish there was a way to show the rest of the world that we weren't all blood thirsty war mongers like Bush, that dumb-ass cock-knocker.” We talk about a website where people can post their picture and a simple message to the rest of the world, that we oppose any more wars or violence, but that we are prisoners of our government. One such site is www.votenowar.org but I think we may need more. This site does not show the pictures and signatures of the tens of thousands who have signed it. This site would be a simple message to the rest of the world that regardless of what our president says or does, that we aren't out to hurt you. and we trust that you aren't out to hurt us either. That we aren't half as interested in our rather twisted and brutish foreign policy as we are in just keeping the peace around our own borders and getting our economy back up to where we need it to be.

  

II

Tonight we watched an episode of The World at War called, The Final Solution, about the Nazi death and concentration camps during World War II. We listened as the survivors talked about the screams of the people being shoved into the gas chambers. About their constant prayers to their God. About the utter brutality and the insane game that went on for almost five years as over five million of them were murdered in mass numbers. We heard the stories of the women being stripped and shot with their screaming children still clinging to them. we watched as the bulldozers pushed hundreds of dead lifeless bodies into big pits in the ground. And as Jewish prisoners dragged their friend’s and relative’s skinny-little chicken-like bodies through the dirt into mass graves that they themselves had to dig, only to be shot and thrown into when they were finished.

As we watched, we talked about this concept of God that we carry so strongly within us. As many of the survivors talked of God and asked the question where was God when these people were screaming for him to help them, day after day and year after year. Many of them who were very devout Orthodox Jews before they got to the camps could not understand why God was ignoring them and so they killed themselves when he did not eventually offer any help or means of salvation for their plight. They realized for the first time that perhaps we really are alone here on earth. Where strength and the will to live, and not justice or God, rule the land.

Wow. What an exciting day! Went to the anti-war rally and march today held at the Vietnam veterans memorial. Over 200,000 were there. It was very inspirational because no one I knew was going. Like I said most people feel content with just watching stuff like that on TV, staying home and doing their own thing. So I had this lonely feeling flying up, like, “man what are you doing now…” But then I woke up this morning and started walking towards the rally spot and before I knew it I am surrounded by hundreds of thousands of people from all over the country who feel the same way that I do about things. I met up with the bus that came from Florida. There were about fifty of them. 


We all hung out together and listened to the speeches at the rally. Busses were arriving throughout the day from every state in the nation. Susan Sarandon spoke very passionately; patty smith sang the song ‘the people have the power.’ Al Sharpton and Jessie Jackson spoke. One of the best speeches was by Ramsey Clark, the ex-United States Attorney General. He blasted Bush and what he calls the real axis of evil that is made up of Bush, Colin Powel, Donald Rumsfeld, and Dick Cheney. All oil and big business war mongers ready to take down as many American lives and Iraqi lives as they want to in their little war for oil. And of course they won't fight. Plenty of young poor Americans will. Al Sharpton used the bogie-man analogy and said that George Bush was just trying to use this war as a means to get the public’s attention off of what was really important to us right now, like the falling economy, horrible education problems, the federal deficit, the recession, disastrous health care—this is something I can relate to because almost all of the musician friends I have all over the country do not have any health insurance—they are just  ‘winging it’, the Enron scandal, a company that he and Cheney were both very close to, and many other real problems. And of course the fact that we haven't made any progress in catching anyone responsible for the September 11^th attacks, including Osama Bin Laden.

  

Arrived in DC tonight for the anti-war march. Sick-tired-nauseas, from the plane ride and shuttle ride. Going to sleep now; I'm not even going eat. Energy in the air all over the city. Everyone is talking about it. The hotel is filled with people from many different organizations who are attending the march tomorrow. But this hotel is a rat trap. Pretty gross. We’re not in South Beach anymore.

Last Movie: Father Goose with Cary Grant. Thank God for Cary Grant.