tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6167409842665539059.post7757115830951265487..comments2023-06-30T21:49:45.967+12:00Comments on Liberazzi: The Rotten Log IKivakhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02251347847577318969noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6167409842665539059.post-10309743630077159322007-09-14T07:22:00.000+12:002007-09-14T07:22:00.000+12:00Check it:Ismay Soldier Co-Authored Critique of War...Check it:<BR/><BR/>Ismay Soldier Co-Authored Critique of War<BR/>By MATT GOURAS - Associated Press Writer - 09/13/07<BR/><BR/>A soldier from eastern Montana killed in Iraq earlier this week was one of the authors of a high-profile New York Times editorial critical of the progress being made in the war.<BR/><BR/>Staff Sgt. Yance T. Gray of Ismay was remembered Wednesday as a strong and friendly leader who loved the Army and dreamed of being a soldier his entire life. A member of the 82nd Airborne Division, he died Monday when the cargo truck he was riding in overturned in Baghdad.<BR/><BR/>Another co-author, 28-year-old Sgt. Omar Mora, also was killed in the crash.<BR/><BR/>The Times piece, called “The War As We Saw It,” expressed doubts about American gains in Iraq. “To believe that Americans, with an occupying force that long ago outlived its reluctant welcome, can win over a recalcitrant local population and win this counterinsurgency is far-fetched,” the group wrote.<BR/><BR/>In the last line, the authors reaffirmed their own commitment: “We need not talk about our morale. As committed soldiers, we will see this mission through.”<BR/><BR/>U.S. Sen. Max Baucus, whose nephew was killed in Iraq last year, said Tuesday that he was asking the military for details of Gray’s death. <BR/><BR/>"I was deeply saddened to learn of another young and clearly gifted Montanan lost to the war in Iraq," said Baucus, D-Mont. "Our soldiers and their families sacrifice so much."<BR/><BR/>Gray graduated with a class of just 18 from Plevna High School. He was one of five students from the class that joined the military, and news of his death spread quickly through the 138-person town, said school secretary Lynette O’Connor.<BR/><BR/>Plevna is about 19 miles east of Ismay, a town of 25 residents in 2006.<BR/><BR/>Read the rest at:<BR/>http://www.helenair.com/articles/2007/09/13/montana_top/a010913_04.txt?rating=true<BR/><BR/>ROTTEN OUT.Rottenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02308756993877264706noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6167409842665539059.post-31896270829763381192007-09-07T23:03:00.000+12:002007-09-07T23:03:00.000+12:00Hey Rotten, I appreciate the contribution. I was r...Hey Rotten, I appreciate the contribution. I was really beginning to run out of steam there. Don't know whether I can keep up another six months of blogging on my Jack Jones before I start encountering some interesting experiences to relay back to the two of us via the blogosphere. I got an extremely rare email today from my 'adopted' mother in Jablonec who was laying down the usual law about not straying into countries that don't follow the Nine Cathecisms of Consumerism. Which is interesting given that my birth mother used to fret about me living in Third World countries like Czechoslovakia in the early 1990s.<BR/><BR/>But back to McCarthyism. I've been wracking my brains about how you came up with that interpretation of the ending. I reread the ending tonight and consulted the missus, who read it after me, but we're both puzzled. The bowman who took the flare is highly unlikely to be the boy's rescuer at the end because you're left with the distinct impression that he's left dying in the arms of his woman. The guy at the end is carrying a gun on a leather lanyard, so why would he bother with a bow and arrow in an earlier assassination attempt? It seems more likely that the final gunman is part of the crew that abandoned the bowman after he was shot and maybe went after the father and boy because they'd be useful to have in a larger human community. Fuck knows.<BR/><BR/>From a highly personal point of view, I read more secular ameliorism into the book than I did religion. I haven't read anything from McCarthy himself about his motivation for writing the book and the symbolism used, but it's hard to read the hand of God into the story as the driving theme unless you're an out-and-out Amargeddonite, or as a modern parable of Noah without any of the resources for rekindling life on Earth. That's why I was a bit confused by the ending, because I felt that the offer of any type of hope was a cop out. But then again, if a reader is of a religious bent, they can interpret the carrying of the 'fire' as somehow perpetuating a belief in God. I wonder what Richard Dawkins would make of the book.<BR/><BR/>I agree entirely though on the father-son theme and how brilliantly the love of the father for the son is portrayed despite the extinction of all hope (another potential religious motif I guess). The way the father brutally suppresses his own humanity in the face of the son's innocent and dogged belief in goodness is done quite superbly done. You're very optimist thinking that an actual father might offer an opinion on this issue...<BR/><BR/>Sort out that 18-year-old missionary position boy with a copy of Christopher Hitchen's God Is Not Great. See how he refutes it ;) <BR/><BR/>Can't be arsed checking this for grammatical errors. It's 11pm and I've had three large glasses of very cheap red wine.Kivakhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02251347847577318969noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6167409842665539059.post-73142965433876551262007-09-06T21:17:00.000+12:002007-09-06T21:17:00.000+12:00Hey Kivak, I suppose this is as good a place as an...Hey Kivak, I suppose this is as good a place as any to pick up The Road again. SPOILER ALERT!<BR/><BR/>Thanks for getting back to me on the book. I was thinking about reading it since it made such a big stir in the US (Oprah!) but didn’t finally get off my ass and pick it up until you mentioned it. <BR/><BR/>I was a little surprised at your endorsement of the book because of all the holy rolling in it. Must have been a yin dose to all that Dawkins yang you were reading. (I haven’t read any Dawkins but I just finished a nifty little screed by one of his adepts named Daniel Dennett called Breaking the Spell. Lot's of cool material on religion as a viral meme...)<BR/><BR/>First of all, I thought The Road contained some fantastic etchings on the cannibalism thing. Spooky stuff. I counted three that built up to that truly horrifying moment when they come upon the recently abandoned camp with the baby barbecue happening. <BR/><BR/>But I couldn’t stop myself from thinking, “Okay, they’re pushing for the coast, but what are they going to find there? Disneyland?” The cataclysm is global, after all. To his credit McCarthy didn’t do a Good Ship Lollipop ending, a cop out I thought “Children of Men” fell victim to. One abandoned yacht full of goodies to keep them going a little longer but other than that, more of the same desolation. Fair enough.<BR/><BR/>But what about that ending? I ruminate on this shit so much because it bears directly on the post-Apocalyptic "heavy metal novella" I’m trying to finish up. Hard to write an end for a story that takes place after The End. I don’t know how much to read into the end of The Road. The bow and arrow guy that took a flare in the face comes out to find the boy, but doesn’t kill/eat him when he does? Why not? There’s some implication that they’ve got religion out on the coast, an echo of the man’s statement that it’s his holy charge to look after the boy (the holy rolling I mentioned earlier). So if the bow and arrow man's so full of Jesus, why the fuck did he shoot the father in the first place? Because that happened before the loving father “enlightened” him (literally, by shooting a burning fucking flare in his eye) and now that he’s “seen the light,” (heh heh) he’s going to do the right thing by the boy?<BR/><BR/>Either that or he’s recognized that the boy is on the verge of an adolescent growth spurt and is of greater nutritional value on the hoof, rather than drawn and butchered on the spot.<BR/><BR/>I’m not particularly partial to the ‘just put your trust in Jesus to fix it’ method of ending stories (or of conducting your life in general. There’s a missionary boy who comes to our Prague Playhouse acting workouts. Eighteen years old and already born again and knows absolutely fucking everything. Couldn’t answer my questions about why Jesus has been such a slack ass viz the Human Suffering Problem but insisted “it’s going to be the first thing I ask God when I’m on the Other Side.” These people are a lethal fungus hellbent on rotting the species from the inside out...they must be stopped...but I digress...). So I give The Road a B-plus.<BR/><BR/>Where I thought the book excelled was as a meditation on parenthood, fatherhood in particular. The man knows the world is full of deadly killers who will literally eat your child alive. Sounds like a revelation a new dad would have. Plus the man’s need to be hard for survival’s sake, even though he risks earning the boy's hatred because the boy doesn’t understand just how bad the world really is. Any dads out there want to comment? <BR/><BR/>Also a very nice touch with the portrayal of the boy, who gets a little bit sassy later on in the book. Yeah, we’re walking through Armageddon, but that doesn’t mean pre-teens are going to be any less bratty. Nice work. <BR/><BR/>Okay, that should just about get it over the net.<BR/><BR/>ROTTEN OUT.Rottenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02308756993877264706noreply@blogger.com