Finally, a day to rejoice.

After a racist piece of trash walked into an historic African-American church in Charleston, SC last week and shot nine people point blank with a perfectly engineered murdering machine, it was tough to resist a feeling of hopelessness for my homeland. The clown clusterfuck running Australia at the moment gives the brilliant John Oliver plenty of material but we don't have mass shootings here since gun control legislation was passed by a conservative government in 1996. Gun fetishists have little pull. Common sense does.

I don't like it when Australia makes the States look like Crazyland.

Brando's Kurtz. Possibly me someday.

Things picked up when South Carolina's continued flying of the confederate flag (yeah, lower case 'c') came under fire, though that talk was neutralised by NRA nutjobs claiming Emanuel AME Church victims could have prevented the cold-blooded slayings if only they'd been PACKING HEAT. In 2015 this sort of inhuman shit shouldn't surprise, much less outrage, but the day it becomes commonplace is the day I move to the highlands of Vitu Levu and pull a Colonel Kurtz.

On Thursday the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) rejected an argument that would have gutted the Affordable Care Act of its mission to provide poor people with basic health insurance. Again, with universal healthcare the norm in Australia it was hard to get overly excited, as the US has much ground to cover before matching what's routine in most Western nations. It was an unvarnished victory for Obamacare, however, and therefore good news for everyday Americans and a stick in the eye to the rampant right-wing 'Obama is a socialist!' mob.

A telling George Takei FB post today.

So, this morning. I couldn't sleep. Got up long before sunrise, made a pot of coffee, turned on the fantastic 5 Feet High and Rising radio show on PBS FM, checked Twitter and found a deluge of posts with the following hashtag: #lovewins

Love wins. Not often enough. But sometimes.

In a remarkable 5-4 decision, SCOTUS ruled gay couples across the US have a right to marry. As sunshine began creeping up Melbourne's eastern horizon I read Facebook posts from friends in the States who'd waited lifetimes for such recognition. The 14th amendment of the US Constitution guarantees citizens equal protection under the law, and as marriage is a lawfully binding agreement, governments cannot decide who marries who. Friday's Court decision in Obergefell v. Hodges was dominated by Justice Anthony Kennedy, who wrote: "The right to marry is a fundamental right inherent in the liberty of the person, and under the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment couples of the same sex may not be deprived of that right and that liberty."

The final paragraph of Justice Kennedy's majority opinion became a social media meme in its own right:

The New Yorker's legal writer Jeffrey Toobin summarised the decision:

The government confers a bundle of rights on individuals who choose to marry. The constitution’s guarantee of equal protection forbids any state from withholding those rights from the class of people who happen to be gay. End of story.

Australia's federal government is currently helmed by troglodytes who've self-dosed on the cognitive dissonance and anti-intellectualism of Karl Rove, US neo-conservatives and the Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld triumvirate, so in the case of marriage equality I can, today, June 27 2015, hold my head high knowing my homeland has done the right thing.

And Australia hasn't.

The ruling made me think back to my Asbury Park days, specifically March of 2004, when a city clerk named Dawn Tomek issued marriage licenses to a handful of gay couples. Same-sex marriage was illegal in NJ at the time, making it a national story for a few days and calling attention to the town's influential gay population. I first mentioned it on my Asbury Park Libbruhl blog on March 9:

Good to see Asbury Park make the Times for something other than another failed redevelopment scheme or race riot. A gay marriage at City Hall is hardly shocking, though. Kate and John Loffredo will no doubt handle the media spotlight with ease and AP's significance as a gay homeowner's haven will be solidified in the national media. Will there be a reaction from the not-always-gay-friendly AP African-American community? Especially as much of the gay marriage debate centers around a comparision to the black civil rights struggle?

Kate Mellina and John Loffredo are two giant figures of AP history who wrestled with AP's deeply entrenched veins of corruption long before any sensible person could claim optimism about AP's future. I posted this the following day:

Not much on the gay marriage situation in Asbury Park. Mayor Sanders -- who the day before said he wouldn't perform any such ceremonies -- put a halt to the issuance of any more licences for fear of putting the city in "jeopardy" and potential "financial liability." Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight. Way to cover your ass, Mayor.

Of course, the shameful local rag saw fit to put a picture of the lone nut job at Municipal Hall yesterday in the article. Man says he wants to marry Bart Simpson. Why Bart Simpson? Because he's "known him for 6 years." Such is the intellect of the hateful, holier-than-everyone-else minority in this country. Go back to Jackson, you freak.

The story came and went quickly as local officials capitulated to state law and satellite TV trucks headed back up the Parkway and the next Top Story. Some locals did more than treat it as a ripple in the news cycle. I posted this on March 27:

Want to help Asbury Park validate the gay nuptials that took place a few weeks ago? Here's some news about fund-raising events in town, including info about how friend and Deal Lake Tower neighbor Kris Sanchez is contributing profits from sales at Etc., his Cookman Avenue store, to the cause. If you can't make it to AP, here's how you can pitch in:

Checks should be made payable to "City of Asbury Park Marriage Litigation Fund," and mailed to: City of Asbury Park, One Municipal Plaza, Asbury Park, NJ 07712, Attn: Rick Diaz. For more information, call (732) 775-2100.

Kris was an early business owner on Cookman Avenue when foot traffic was sparse and local politicians were controlled by nefarious puppeteers. (His was also one of the first celebratory posts I saw on FB this morning.) He was born in New Mexico but made Asbury Park more than his home -- he made it his cause. He and many others in the gay community invested in a town white suburbanites had abandoned generations ago. Their relationship to the Asbury Park renaissance of recent years is akin to Abraham Lincoln and the abolition of slavery in the US: It would have happened eventually without them, but not for a much longer time and not without much greater struggle. NJ legalised gay marriage in 2012, but seeds of its eventual normalcy to a majority of Americans were planted in Asbury Park in 2004.

Sadly, the furor that's accompanied SCOTUS's decision was foreshadowed in 2004 Asbury Park, too. Here's a post from March 29:

I've been anticipating a reaction from AP's African-American community to the recent gay nuptials. It came yesterday. Since I was in North Jersey I must rely on the Asbury Park Press's reporting, which has been notoriously tabloidish in its coverage of Monmouth County's bastard step-child. That said, here's the story's lead:

A crowd organizers estimated at 1,200 lined Main Street yesterday morning to participate in a prayer vigil prompted by the problems facing -- and in at least one case, dividing -- the city.

The marriage of two gay men at city hall earlier this month was cited as one of the reasons for the vigil, although the organizing ministers said the need to deal with drug use, poverty, inadequate housing, gangs, violence and problems with city schools was why so many people showed up.

The granting of a marriage license to a gay couple was the final issue that made local area churches decide to unite in prayer for the good of the community, said the Rev. Porter S. Brown of Faith Baptist Tabernacle, Bangs Avenue. And same-sex marriage was the topic that dominated conversation during a news conference held after the vigil.

Brown accused city council members of paying attention to just one segment of the city's population and said the Bible defines marriage as being between a man and a woman.

"We believe the word of God is to be taken as is," Brown said, "and we are not going to compromise."

All the problems facing the African-American community and a city-sanctioned union of two committed individuals is what gets people to line the streets in protest --oops, I mean a "prayer vigil."

Proving once again that nothing stirs the faithful like bible-fueled hatred.

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose. Social change always brings out the worst in otherwise decent people. In the States right-wingers are already talking of sedition and social disobedience, using religion as a baton, predicting armageddon ... the same panicky litany belched by generations of bigots, fear-mongers and hypocrites.

Today, courtesy of SCOTUS, we can also call these people what they legally are: Losers.

Beloved Balaclava blasphemy.

Aradhna and I will soon be moving out of Balaclava and nostalgia for its bohemian spirit (and Jewish bakeries) is already sinking in. This poster went up before the US election and has remained, relatively unscathed, on a wall just off Carlisle Street. To juxtaposition Obama's image with the words 'Second Coming' is enough to detonate the brain stems of holy rollers back in the States. Woo-hoo!

I've yet to meet anyone in Australia who isn't optimistic about soon-to-be-President Obama. Especially as The Miserable Failure goes out in a final blaze of ignominy:

• A bipartisan Senate report confirms what the world has long known: Rumsfeld was responsible for detainee abuse at Gitmo. The Miserable Failure has never spoken an ill word about his former Defense Secretary, and I'm sure Rummy will be a welcome guest and confidant at George & Laura's new home in a segregated Dallas suburb.
  
• His administration has rushed through a new gun law that legalizes loaded, concealed weapons in nearly all US national parks. Gives camping at Yellowstone a sorely missing element of mayhem, don't it?
  
• Bush administration stooges at the EPA have decided against ridding drinking water of a toxic rocket fuel ingredient that's fouled public water supplies around the US.
  
• The Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld/Wolfowitz invasion-on-the-cheap of Iraq sent countless soldiers to their graves and left many more limbless by not taking steps that would have protected them from roadside bombs, according to the Pentagon's Inspector General.
  
• Then there's that 'aimless war' in Afghanistan ...
  

UPDATE: The Bush administration has just revised endangered species regulations so that the developers & federal agencies responsible for dams, power plants, timber sales and other projects do not need to consult federal scientists about their possible harm to vulnerable plants and animals.

It's weird. Bush never hesitates to profess his sanctimonious Christianity, yet also never hesitates to eliminate one of his god's creations when it suits business interests. So which is his one, true almighty?

A perfect day.

Many Americans will remember every detail of where they were when they first learned Barack Obama had defeated John McCain to become president-elect of the United States.

As I'm writing from a cubicle in an Internet cafe in Suva, I thought I'd share details of the day my pride was restored as a U.S. citizen living overseas.

Day began at 5 am watching the sun rise from my bure's hollow window on Caqalai Island. A pending early departure enticed me to snorkel a reef marked on a hand-drawn map in the tiny resort's dining hall as 'TOP'. Swam 30 or 40 metres from the island's strip of white sand and was enveloped by sublime schools of vividly painted fish, gardens of spiky coral and clumps of soft, swaying coral. Imagine if Rembrandt, Cezanne or Monet had been able to don headgear and fins and experience firsthand water bluer than the bluest sky; fish more brilliant and varied than any paintbox; coral more magnificent than anything sculpted by human hand? Their palettes would have exploded infinitely.

But I digress. After breakfast me and a pair of globe-hopping Americans named Dave & Cathy boarded a boat with Dive Master George (looking very Lenny Kravitz-like with dark shades and coral shells in his dreadlocks) for a 40-minute trip back to Viti Levu, Fiji's largest island. Our boat skimmed over flawless Koro Sea aquamarine and past miles of mangroves along the Waidalice River. We disembarked at a nub of concrete and waited for transport in the shade of a battered shack along Princes Road. I was determined to catch a bus direct to Suva so said goodbye to my Caqalai companions as they grabbed the first rides to Naisori. Five minutes later a smiling Sikh named Mr Singh stopped and said he'd take me to Naisori for only $3 -- most taxi drivers ask for $10 and up. I tossed my backpack in the rear of his lorry (which held 100 or so freshly picked pineapples from his farm that he was delivering to Naisori's market) and we chatted during a 20-minute ride past overgrown bush and farmland. His hard work has produced three grown children who are all educated and working overseas. He dropped me at a bus depot along Naisori's bustling commercial strip and said to ask for him the next time I was in town. I'm not one to pass up an invitation to a feast of Indian food. I'll see Mr Singh again.

That wasn't the end of my good fortune. It's common for buses to idle for long stretches before pulling out of depots in Fiji, so locals often drop their things on a seat and run off to grab a cold drink or snack. I learned yesterday that I'm not nearly as clever as the locals. Returning to the depot from a quick run to an ANZ ATM and an Indian shop for a Sprite, I found my bus had gone. And with it, my backpack. The Suva depot is a maelstrom of buses belching black smoke and Fijian men & boys pushing red wheelbarrows up to each new arrival, all vying to be first and earn 50 cents for transporting travelers' possessions. It was impossible to imagine getting to Suva in time to locate and/or claim my bag.

The resultant one-two of sadness and humiliation for being so foolish didn't last long. An elderly Fijian woman in a bright blue-&-white dress who'd been on the departed bus suddenly appeared. She was pointing to a battered mango tree, beneath which lay my backpack.

"God told me to take your bag off the bus when the driver wouldn't wait," she said. She asked me to hold her water bottle while she attended to something in the depot. I gladly paid for her $1.80 bus fare and thanked her throughout the 30-minute ride to Suva. "Don't thank me, thank God," was her reply.

I thanked her anyway as monsoon rain splattered the massive windshield of our wiper-less bus.

Next up was locating the office of Suilven Shipping in Suva. Aradhna told me long ago that addresses are of little concern in Fiji. Need to find a place? Get within its vicinity and ask a local. I assumed this practice was more common in rural areas, but yesterday learned it's also standard in Fiji's capital. After a few false starts and doused in a combination of sweat and rain I located Bligh Water Shipping's office beside Suva Harbour. Tricky, no? Booked a 10-hour overnight boat trip to Savusavu for Friday, followed by a 4-hour trip to Taveuni next Tuesday and back to Suva on Thursday on a 16-hour overnight trip. All for under $200. Could fly but this trip is about doing what Fijians do. Also gives me time to write.

Spoke Hindi to a taxi driver named Aar (he spelled it for me) who gave me a lift to South Pacific Private Hotel in South Suva. I checked in and walked around Suva a bit, replenishing supplies for the next & final leg of island-hopping. I'd befriended a University of South Pacific student named Zulfikar on Caqilai and he'd recommended Singh's Curry House in Suva for authentic Indian food. Just as the skies reopened I ducked into Singh's and encountered a dozen curries steaming behind glass. Hunger took a backseat to a more pressing concern, however, as the sonorous voice of Ted Koppel drifted from a TV set perched near the ceiling in the rear of Singh's.

I froze. The Election. Checked my watch: 3:30 pm Fiji time. Polls would have closed in the States. Nervous, fearful, hopeful, I walked around a booth and approached the TV. A huge Fijian security guard stood before it. On his broad face shone a smile as wide as his shoulders.

That's my moment. That's when I knew Obama had won.

Shook hands with the guard and watched the BBC broadcast from a booth below the set. Twenty minutes went by before I remembered to order food. Tucked into a victory feast of jackfruit, okra, spicy aloo, pumpkin and chicken curries with 5 exquisite rotis as McCain gave a dignified concession speech and Sarah Palin hopefully disappeared from national politics. BBC anchor said Obama's speech would be at midnight in Chicago, which gave me a few minutes to walk to a place I knew I'd find traveling Americans and ex-pats, Suva's Holiday Inn. I wasn't disappointed. Hotel bar was chock-a-block with Caucasian men and women staring at a flat screen near the ceiling. Bought a cold Fiji Bitter and took a seat for the most important acceptance speech of my lifetime.

Ironic aside: The network broadcasting the speech at the Holiday Inn was Al Jazeera, the Arabic news network.

When Obama appeared applause erupted but everyone -- Americans, Europeans, Fijians, Asians -- went silent as he strode to the podium. Like all sentient beings who haven't given into craven cynicism I was moved and inspired by the first African-American president-elect in U.S. history. More applause followed the speech and normal hotel activity resumed. Me and a group of U.S. Peace Corps volunteers remained transfixed as the TV showed the Obamas and Bidens hugging and waving and we all agreed that we FINALLY, FINALLY felt proud of our homeland. I spoke with a woman from D.C. named Carla who'd spent a year as a Corps volunteer in Levuka -- I spent 3 days there and wanted to move on; unfortunately for her, she wished she could have done the same -- and we both luxuriated in the reality of being from a nation with the BALLS to elect the more qualified presidential candidate in this election, regardless of race or Republican fear-mongering. She invited me to celebrate with friends at another bar but I knew my day would soon end on a soft pillow.

Walked out of the Holiday Inn to a refreshed, clearing sky. Half a rainbow painted a stripe over Suva's gloomy government buildings. Back at my hostel I sat on my bed, looked up, and discovered my room had a ceiling fan. Walked down a high-ceilinged hallway to the hostel's showers, turned a faucet, and felt hot -- HOT! -- water splashing on my tired face.

A perfect end to a perfect day.

Obama goes 3 for 3

Watched live coverage of the final debate. Made plain the genius of McCain's handlers: The only reason anyone would choose their cranky, Reaganomics-spewing conservative candidate over a vibrant, down-to-earth visionary is to portray that visionary as scary, dark, different -- a threat.

Because no one who's watched Obama and McCain go head-to-head can argue McCain's a better candidate. You'd simply have to be uncomfortable voting for a person of color for president. End of story.

Double dose of Bruce juice.

Extremely hard to imagine Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band performing at the Super Bowl XLII halftime clusterf*ck. Too scripted, unnatural ... phony. If anyone can maintain their integrity in front of over a billion TV viewers, however, it's Bruce and the heart-stoppin', pants-droppin', earth-shakin', love-makin', legendary E STREET BAND!

And though they've never shared a billing, it's easier to imagine Springsteen and Long Island's favorite son Billy Joel performing at a Barack Obama fundraiser in Manhattan on Oct. 16. Bruce announced his support of Obama's campaign many months ago, and apparently the feeling is mutual:

"Not only do I love Bruce's music, but I just love him as a person," Obama said last June. "He is a guy who has never lost track of his roots, who knows who he is, who has never put on a front."

Another reason to support Obama/Biden '08.

Indonesian motivation.

From a report on Barack Obama's childhood neighborhood in Jakarta -- is it any wonder the Illinois senator is beanpole thin?

Along the street, few old-timers recall the boy who moved in with his American mother and Indonesia stepfather in 1970. They find it difficult to believe that a one-time neighbour could lead the Western world.

One woman, 66-year-old grandmother Djoemaiti, remembers "fat little Barry" (as he was called then). "When he ran he looked like a duck."

Sign o' the times.

Other - izing works.

A time for heroes.

When Obama gave his once-in-a-generation More Perfect Union speech back in March, a speech that captured the reality of U.S. race relations with a clarity and forthrightness that opened a door for true discussion about a historically difficult subject, the media reported on it for about as long as a dog walker lets his/her pooch linger at the foot of a birch tree. Transcendent it may have been, but when the RNC yanks the media's leash, they don't resist. It was back to "Jeremiah Wright! blah blah why is Michelle Obama so angry? blah blah ...."

So it is with McCain's announcing his VP choice the day after what many are calling the most important political speech in modern U.S. history. I can only imagine the breathless analysis by pampered pundits shrewdly 'crediting' McCain for stealing Obama's 'thunder'. Institutional cynicism long ago replaced integrity as the lifeblood of North American media organizations. Pundit poodles sniff each other's butts and snap at upstarts who don't. Nothing's real. Nothing matters. An easy attitude when you're in the upper 1% of income earners and living, as Bob Somerby often writes, deep within the gilded recesses of modern-day Versailles.

I loathe McCain as a candidate and so have little interest in his running mate. Not so a celebrity-driven media fueled by trivia that will hunt exclusive photos and interviews with Alaskans cashing Gov. Sarah Palin anecdotes for a few seconds of notoriety.

So it's a perfect time to revisit what Obama said Thursday night about his opponent's cheap attempt to equate his 20 years of public service and inspiring rise with celebrity worship:

The fundamentals we use to measure economic strength are whether we are living up to that fundamental promise that has made this country great, a promise that is the only reason I am standing here tonight.

Because, in the faces of those young veterans who come back from Iraq and Afghanistan, I see my grandfather, who signed up after Pearl Harbor, marched in Patton's army, and was rewarded by a grateful nation with the chance to go to college on the G.I. Bill.

In the face of that young student, who sleeps just three hours before working the night shift, I think about my mom, who raised my sister and me on her own while she worked and earned her degree, who once turned to food stamps, but was still able to send us to the best schools in the country with the help of student loans and scholarships.

When I -- when I listen to another worker tell me that his factory has shut down, I remember all those men and women on the South Side of Chicago who I stood by and fought for two decades ago after the local steel plant closed.

And when I hear a woman talk about the difficulties of starting her own business or making her way in the world, I think about my grandmother, who worked her way up from the secretarial pool to middle management, despite years of being passed over for promotions because she was a woman.

She's the one who taught me about hard work. She's the one who put off buying a new car or a new dress for herself so that I could have a better life. She poured everything she had into me. And although she can no longer travel, I know that she's watching tonight and that tonight is her night, as well.

Now, I don't know what kind of lives John McCain thinks that celebrities lead, but this has been mine.

These are my heroes; theirs are the stories that shaped my life. And it is on behalf of them that I intend to win this election and keep our promise alive as president of the United States.

'This is our time.'

Not since the aftermath of 9/11 has it been wise for a U.S. politician to use possessive pronouns when addressing Europeans. Barack Obama isn't an ordinary politician, however, and the enormous crowd of over 200,000 Berliners that wildly cheered him yesterday demonstrated that international goodwill towards the U.S. hasn't been entirely snuffed by the war criminals of the disgraceful Bush epoch.

I'd like to think this amazing spectacle is one all U.S. citizens could savor. But the U.S. has been hacked in two by School of Karl Rove sociopaths who paint every occasion in black-&-white, my-side-versus-yours terms. Plus, a significant chunk of U.S. citizens don't give a fiddler's fart about the rest of the planet. Partisan hacks are undoubtedly waxing their moustaches in orgasmic anticipation of using Obama's European reception as proof of his elitism, his scary 'otherness', his being a left-wing 'rock star'. Naturally, a rubber-spined, shareholder-driven media will acquiesce.

And a wonderful moment for U.S. citizens of every stripe will get pureed by politics into just another bowl of bitter mush.

Step 1: Admit problem.

Barack Obama's presumptive victory over Hillary Clinton is big, big, big news in Australia.

It's no surprise. The world has watched the U.S. stumble and lurch and lie and cheat and make a giant jackass out of itself since the Bush administration began its brutal assault on the qualities envied by friend and foe alike in 2001. That a young, bright, African-American of mixed parentage can challenge for the most powerful position on the planet is a reminder that the U.S. is capable of greatness. Or, plainly, of living up to its promises.

Self-help books always stress that the first step to personal salvation is admitting there's a problem. Right now, a healthy chunk of U.S. citizens have faced the ugly truth -- their nation is unwell and in need of drastic change. Question is, will the rest come clean by November?

'Not this time.'

The speech Barack Obama gave on race in Philadelphia yesterday is astounding. Whatever you may think of his politics, the guy kicks historical, ideological and rhetorical ass.

Cheney Lite

Credit Australian PM John 'Cheney Lite' Howard for one thing: Momentarily altering Australia's off-stage position of utter international irrelevance. Howard, who channels Cheney's Grim Reaper persona better than any standup comic, says Barack Obama's call to end the war in Iraq would be welcomed by al-Queda. Obama replied:

I would also note that we have close to 140,000 troops in Iraq, and my understanding is Mr Howard has deployed 1400, so if he is ... to fight the good fight in Iraq, I would suggest that he calls up another 20,000 Australians and sends them to Iraq.

In other words ... put up or shut up, old man.

That Howard is a Bush stooge is no news here. I received a comment from an Aussie asking why there's no stopping Howard and Blair, especially in light of the intelligence fixing of the Bushies. But my question to her is: Where's the Aussie outrage to Howard's ignorance? Howard proves he doesn't realize last November's elections changed the course of American foreign policy -- that is how a representative democracy works -- with moronic statements "If America pulls out of Iraq in March 2008 it can only be in circumstances of defeat" and "If I were running al-Qaeda in Iraq, I would put a circle around March 2008 and be praying as many times as possible for a victory not only for Obama but also for the Democrats." It's up to the citizens of Australia to prove they've also woken up, and rid the man of the little international stature his title provides.

In this sports-obsessed country, it seems the citizenry watch the daily parrying of their political leaders like they would brutes kicking a ball around. Except those games, like those politicians, aren't given a moment's notice by the rest of the world.