Sunday, March 30, 2008

CSC




CCC
Yellow Rose
You undermine the horizon with your absence.
Eternally in flight like the wave.
CSC: Caputo's Subconscious/Subliminal/Symbolic Communication
My life grows tired, hungry to no purpose.
I love what I do not have. You are so far.

Thursday, April 10

5:30 pm

DL21C's Women's Issues Committee presents a forum on
Women's Issues and the 2008 New York State Legislative Agenda

with
State Senator Liz Krueger (D-NY-Manhattan's East Side)
State Assemblywoman Deborah Glick (D-NY-Greenwich Village)
Moderated by:
Ellen Chesler, Distinguished Lecturer, Director of the Eleanor Roosevelt Initiative on Women and Public Policy, Hunter College

5:30pm - 7:30pm
K Lounge at the Bombay Palace
30 W. 52nd Street (between 5th and 6th)

Please RSVP!

  1. Gender, one of my favorite topics.
  2. Bombay Palace. That is an Indian place. That is where I met a three time Prime Minister of Nepal. (Surya Bahadur Thapa) One of the sharpest political minds ever, even though two of his terms were during absolute monarchy. But Caputo's political mind is sharper and warmer. His granddaughter was at Mt. Holyoke. She, her white roommate and I ended up at a bar owned by a Nepali in midtown, Snafu. (Chiran Thapa: Snafu) I confused Mt. Holyoke for Bryn Mawr. When I lived in Philly in summer 1999, I took the train to Bryn Mawr, and from there I walked to U Penn. I told them I have walked from Mt. Holyoke to U Penn. They are like, no way. Then they thought I was trying to impress them. They acted impressed.
  3. I was there for another major event with a leading human rights activist from Nepal. (Sushil Pyakurel)
  4. I am half Indian. I had to come all the way to America to claim my Indian side. There is some major anti-India sentiment in Nepal.
  5. I am working to assemble my tech team in Mumbai, Bombay's new name, rather the original name.
  6. K Lounge, my middle name is Kumar.
  7. Near the UN. After all countries have been turned into democracies, a world government is inevitable, but until then the UN is only mildly interesting, but it is interesting in its symbolism.
  8. April 10 is when Nepal will hold its first elections in almost a decade. The civil war is formally over. It was in April 2006 that Nepal had its magical revolution.
You are like the night, with its stillness and constellations.
Your silence is that of a star, as remote and candid.

A new door opened between you and me
The Spy Event
laugh, because your laughter
will be for my hands
like a fresh sword.
Barackface: The Need For A Race Gender CoalitionThe first time Rudy, the state director for Obama 2008, met me, he asked me if I was a "spy!" Spy for who? Hillary? Rudy? My blog cured him, but that was an ...
  1. The first greeting by the mystery woman (Satyagraha, Day 1) that there is a mandatory coat check, and the second greeting by the white guard asking to see my ID might have been a way to say, you took two offenses at the Holiday party, and that is when you walked away and never really came back. ("Is This An Obama Party?", December 18: Crash The Party) You ended it, not me. True: Confronting My Own Demons.
  2. This was the first DL21C event of so many I have been to where people were made to wait out in the street. That might have been a response to my complaining I got "street level welcome" on March 4. (March 4 Returns Parties)


The Pollster Event

perhaps it was the voice of crying rain,
a broken bell, or a torn heart.
CCC, Pledge Of Allegiance
  1. I praised the race balance of there being one black guy, one white guy at the March 4 event, so Dan and Mike were balanced out this time by two women receptionists.
  2. At the March 4 event the black guy saying "Hold on, there is this woman" and its implication of how I might have been described, and the offense I took, these two women asked for my name instead. That was an attempt at sensitivity.


March 4
  1. "The event has not started yet." Meaning: You had a full half hour before the event started at the Texas debate watch party. Why did you leave? Why did you not look me in the eye and talk?
Texas Debate Watch
I have no other star. You are my replica
of the multiplying universe.
  1. The script for the evening is at your blog: Texas Debate Watch: Another Story In Indigntiy? I don't need to read your face.
  2. I am wearing my coat. You got offended by the mandatory coat check at the Holiday party.
  3. Four different moods.
  4. I got offended by the Al Pacino, Meryl Streep talk. So you admire my political acumen? Is that it?


The Zipper Factory

Planned Parenthood: First Impressions
Planned Parenthood: A Different Kind Of Event
  1. At the December Baby party why did you tell Dan Berger that he had "until February 5." Why did you not tell me directly that you are very busy until then? I will similarly talk through him to tell you stay away until February 5. Then I will speak to you in a major way after that. And you know how I express myself, through events.
  2. If you are uncomfy with white guys, how about women?
  3. If a DL21C event is not conducive, how about an event by another organization?
  4. You showed up for a Women's Issues Committee event. The following day was an Economic Policy Committee event. I get it: The 12 Year Itch.
  5. The suggestive location.
  6. How about an Asian and a Hispanic instead of a Jewish and an Italian? Is that better? You like that better?
  7. You want to talk? (An Open Letter To Elizabeth Caputo) Okay, I am sticking around for two and half plus hours after the event.
  8. I want two drinks but I have no money.

I don't love you as if you were a rose of salt, topaz,
or arrow of carnations that propagate fire:
I love you as one loves certain dark things,
secretly, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that doesn't bloom and carries
the light of those flowers, hidden, within itself,
and thanks to your love the tight aroma that rose
from the earth lives in my body in darkness.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where
I love you simply without problems or pride:
I love you like this because I don't know any other way to love

I could go on and on on the symbolism, digging further and further into the past. But I will stick to only the most recent events.

The subconscious, the subliminal, the symbolic are not supposed to go away. But it is high time we claimed face time, the verbal, and the conscious zone of our minds. It is time to make it official.

Enough.

I would like to rub your nose with my nose. That is how they greet in some cultures. Will you let me rub your nose?

Friday, March 28, 2008

New York City's Progressive Galaxy


New York City's Progressive Galaxy
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of "Spiritus Mundi"
Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

-- William Butler Yeats, "The Second Coming"
I forgave Dan Jacoby. He is a court clown. Lewis Cohen tries to be.

I am eager to give Heather Woodfield a fresh start to our political relationship as long as she agrees to sit on the Women's Revolution Committee. The only thing wrong about your trying to hook me up with an Asian is just like you can't imagine a dozen wise Indian men finding a man for you, my idea is two people hook up on their own or not, otherwise we Asians are all the rage. Heather knows a lot of nuts and bolts of politics, besides she is from Howard Dean's home state. Dean is all the rage.

Tracey Denton, social butterfly, tries to be extra respectful of people. I think because of her Republican family background she feels the need to be extra nice to the traditionally Democrats. I don't know if she lives in Europe these days or what, but if she does, she should never stop telecommuting into the NYC political scene. If I can telecommute from NYC to Nepal, she can telecommute from Brussels to NYC.

I am the other way round. I start with distrust for white guys. Some of them go on to earn my respect.

Abhishek Mistry is the smart Asian, it is not me. I disapprove of stereotypes.

Charles knows a ton about Indira Gandhi.

Leila Noor is like Barack, she is both. She has a great sense of empathy and a rather huge mailing list. She is more political than she makes out to be. She is friends with the next Mayor of the city, looks like. She is a focal point to many black politicians in the city, people like Hakeem and Karim.

Delilah Rothenberg is a white person absolutely, totally fascinated by Africa. How often does that happen?

Justin Krebs has extreme social intelligence: it is an extreme sport for him. He learns names like he were trying to acquire vocabulary for the SAT.

Negina Fersad is funny as hell, especially when she is talking about nuclear energy. She is Persian cute too. I told you, we Asians are all the rage. By the way, she also makes fun of her sex life.

Kristina Hoke is "one smart cookie." But I hear she retired. I hope she comes to sit on the Women's Revolution Committee, and brings Liz along. Ben needs a Jerry.

Lee Motayed is a cutie. I told you we Asians are all the rage.

Dan Berger has sharper emotional intelligence than Justin Krebs, but the dude is a Jihadi. He tries to invade your privacy with the passion of a Jihadi. Each attempt shrinks his space. And you don't get along with me by suggesting Rangel is a bigger deal than I am.

Mike Lupinachi has great killer instincts. He has good martial intelligence. He can shift through the terrain in a fight and come out intact.

David Pollak hovers over the entire scene like Santa, quietly understanding and appreciating everyone's impulses. People who fight each other all relate to him one on one. He takes in the unfolding scene like a Supreme Court Justice.

Me? I am ether. I am everywhere. It is called having a blog, it is called being a digital democrat. I am a Third World guy on a mission.

But ultimately it is the queen we all respond to. Things fall apart when the center can not hold. She is "clean. I frisked him." People are clay, she makes pots out of them.

Long live the progressive political religion. We are the New York Mafia, here to take over the world.


Trying To Become More Social

Naturally I am bubbley and excited socially. But the first two plus years into the city I did intense work for Nepal. It was urgent. The country was on fire. And the work ended up being amazing. Then I coasted along to do some good work for Obama.

All that 2.0 work cost me dearly socially. But now I am trying to become social. I am trying to meet and greet and get to know people. When you step out of the dark, you start with squinty eyes. Right now I got squinty eyes.

I don't ask for forgiveness. It is the other way round. I forgive you for not getting involved when I was doing urgent work for Nepal.