JC interviewed by Don
My MySpace friend Don sent me these interview questions in April - and I'm just now getting around to answering them.
Better tardy than trash-canned, I suppose....
And I'm going to try my best to tame my tendency toward verbosity and keep it brief (heck - even that sentence was redundant... lol).
Don: What is the single most important thing that has happened in America in the past 25 years?
JC: George W. Bush winning the Presidency in 2000.
Don: Using only three words for each, describe the three presidential candidates.
JC: Clinton = Smart, strong, stubborn
Obama = Smart, surprising, swiftboatable
McCain = Bore, war, whore
Don: Who has been the most influential person in your life?
JC: Short answer: Mom, for a number of reasons. I know I wrote a blog about this on my old MySpace profile (that was deleted a year ago by Murdoch's minions) long before I knew Don - wish I'd saved it in Word so I could cut and paste it here.... Here are a just a few reasons for my choice: I might not have gone to college, might not have survived prison, and might not have been as sensitive as I am without Mom. I think I might have discussed this more in one of my "Ask Jesus Anything" blogs (here are links: Part One, Part Two, Part Three).
Don: You are very passionate in your beliefs. How often does someone have a convincing enough argument to sway you?
Not often.... I tend to be very indecisive. I deliberate forever over even the most trivial things. I always try to look at all the evidence, put myself in the shoes of folks on all sides of an issue, and really be objective and thoughtful before drawing a conclusion. So once I've made up my mind, I usually find that the arguments people use to try to sway me are ones I've already seriously weighed before I made the decision. Sometimes new information will surface, however - or I simply mature/grow/evolve - and I will change my mind. After all, I voted for George Bush in 1988, before I knew better. It does happen - so I try to keep an open mind. Like anyone perhaps, I hate to have to admit I was wrong. So I try to be thorough in my thinking before I decide - and thereby keep my mea culpas to a minimum.
Don: Should we boycott the Olympics? Would that help Tibet in any measurable way?
I am boycotting the Olympics. I feel I need to do something to show solidarity with the Tibetan people, and I'm not sure what else I can do. I wrote a blog about the subject, and then elaborated on my views in response to comments on it (here's the link: Chin Check China's Olympics). Since then, I've read about the Dalai Lama not supporting a boycott, et cetera, and I'm not so sure about my stance. Will it help the Tibetan people? I think the publicity helps them - and maybe the Olympics have been a boon in that they have brought publicity, though they also seem to have brought increased oppresssion in the short term. I don't know. Maybe this is one of those cases where I've been swayed. I've at least been swayed from my certainty (though I wasn't totally certain in the first place). Let's be honest, though. It's easy for me to boycott the Olympics. I doubt I'd watch them if they were held in Ohio. I do wish I could do something. Maybe getting people dialoguing about it is something. But is it enough? The decision I made to boycott was largely an emotional one, made quickly and before I'd completed my usual deliberations. Perhaps it's still the right decision - I just don't know. Still deliberating....
Let the games continue. These are the "rules" I've inherited from Don, who inherited them from the soul who first interviewed him.
1. Leave me a comment saying "interview me," if you wish.
2. I will respond by e-mailing you five questions. I get to pick the questions.
3. You will update your blog (so you have to have a blog) with a post containing your answers to the questions.
4. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the same post.
5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.
You don't have to do anything - just if you want to....
Better tardy than trash-canned, I suppose....
And I'm going to try my best to tame my tendency toward verbosity and keep it brief (heck - even that sentence was redundant... lol).
This is Don!
Don: What is the single most important thing that has happened in America in the past 25 years?
JC: George W. Bush winning the Presidency in 2000.
Don: Using only three words for each, describe the three presidential candidates.
JC: Clinton = Smart, strong, stubborn
Obama = Smart, surprising, swiftboatable
McCain = Bore, war, whore
Don: Who has been the most influential person in your life?
JC: Short answer: Mom, for a number of reasons. I know I wrote a blog about this on my old MySpace profile (that was deleted a year ago by Murdoch's minions) long before I knew Don - wish I'd saved it in Word so I could cut and paste it here.... Here are a just a few reasons for my choice: I might not have gone to college, might not have survived prison, and might not have been as sensitive as I am without Mom. I think I might have discussed this more in one of my "Ask Jesus Anything" blogs (here are links: Part One, Part Two, Part Three).
Don: You are very passionate in your beliefs. How often does someone have a convincing enough argument to sway you?
Not often.... I tend to be very indecisive. I deliberate forever over even the most trivial things. I always try to look at all the evidence, put myself in the shoes of folks on all sides of an issue, and really be objective and thoughtful before drawing a conclusion. So once I've made up my mind, I usually find that the arguments people use to try to sway me are ones I've already seriously weighed before I made the decision. Sometimes new information will surface, however - or I simply mature/grow/evolve - and I will change my mind. After all, I voted for George Bush in 1988, before I knew better. It does happen - so I try to keep an open mind. Like anyone perhaps, I hate to have to admit I was wrong. So I try to be thorough in my thinking before I decide - and thereby keep my mea culpas to a minimum.
Don: Should we boycott the Olympics? Would that help Tibet in any measurable way?
I am boycotting the Olympics. I feel I need to do something to show solidarity with the Tibetan people, and I'm not sure what else I can do. I wrote a blog about the subject, and then elaborated on my views in response to comments on it (here's the link: Chin Check China's Olympics). Since then, I've read about the Dalai Lama not supporting a boycott, et cetera, and I'm not so sure about my stance. Will it help the Tibetan people? I think the publicity helps them - and maybe the Olympics have been a boon in that they have brought publicity, though they also seem to have brought increased oppresssion in the short term. I don't know. Maybe this is one of those cases where I've been swayed. I've at least been swayed from my certainty (though I wasn't totally certain in the first place). Let's be honest, though. It's easy for me to boycott the Olympics. I doubt I'd watch them if they were held in Ohio. I do wish I could do something. Maybe getting people dialoguing about it is something. But is it enough? The decision I made to boycott was largely an emotional one, made quickly and before I'd completed my usual deliberations. Perhaps it's still the right decision - I just don't know. Still deliberating....
Let the games continue. These are the "rules" I've inherited from Don, who inherited them from the soul who first interviewed him.
1. Leave me a comment saying "interview me," if you wish.
2. I will respond by e-mailing you five questions. I get to pick the questions.
3. You will update your blog (so you have to have a blog) with a post containing your answers to the questions.
4. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the same post.
5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.
You don't have to do anything - just if you want to....
I'll gladly boycott the Olympics.
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Thanks, Terese!
I read that - China's government oppresses more than just the Tibetans. Falun Gong and the demonstrators for democracy at Tiananmen Square come to mind.
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Interesting. Veddy veddy interesting.
Obama-swifboatable? How so?
So scared we're going to screw this one up and end up with McBush II!
Hugs,
S.
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Look how the McBush Republicans unfairly and deceptively butchered John Kerry's character in 2004.
If we think Obama's image has been tarnished by Clinton's attacks, wait till the Republicans get hold of him. He's less known than Kerry was, in a lot of ways. And people fear what they don't know. You can bet the Republicunts will take advantage of that. And nevermind if the shit they throw has little foundation in fact - unfortunately, something will stick, as it did to Kerry, at least until after the election. They'd try that with Clinton, too, if she were the nominee. But I think she's a little less susceptible to that because her life has been, to a large degree, much more public and sifted through.... She also strikes me as more of a fighter, even if it means throwing dirt back. But who knows? I could be wrong. That's why they have campaigns and elections. I thought Bill Clinton was swiftboatable (before there was such a word) and likely to lose the presidency for the Democrats in 1992. Turns out I was wrong... though one could argue that he eventually lost the Congress for a season.
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I'm with Suzette on "swiftboatable"...except I'll go one step further, and question the use of that word entirely... sounds like a word from one of your poems, to me...LOL! Indesisive but unable to be swayed, eh? Just another complexity to ponder, my lord Crisis. And I'm feeling brave today...
The Minister is willing... go ahead, interview me...
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It's the only S word that came to mind and I couldn't argue with myself over... or so I thought until I responded to Suzette's comment above. Savvy also seems to fit. He even has potential to be sweet... but the jury's out on that one. If anything, Clinton's seasoning of Obama has only strengthened him and perhaps made him less swiftboatable.
Maybe I should make that into a poem. But right now I'm feeling a bit burned out on politics, which I suppose is another reason I took so long to respond to Don.
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oops "indecisive"... not "indesisive"...
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"I am boycotting the Olympics."
"I just don't know. Still deliberating...."
hee hee...
what were saying about being indecisive?
go ahead and ask away. i should tell you though i did this once before when st@cey interviewed me, and i still haven't asked questions of the people who wanted to do it...
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Cool....
Too many (if not ALL) problems in our world are caused by folks seeing things in black and white or saying "always" or "never." In my forty-one years, if I've learned anything it's that everything is some shade of gray and there are exceptions to every rule.
Maybe in another 41 years I'll see things differently - but this is where I'm at right now.
And that's my excuse for being indecisive....
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ain't the gray part the truth?
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Seems that way to me....
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hillary is swiftboating herself - i can't believe the slimy things i hear her and her promiscuous husband say.
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You may be right... but as I said, she's pretty darned smart. She's positioning herself as either the vice-presidential pick ("Choose me or lose in November") or the 2012 frontrunner (if Obama loses in 2008, he won't be as viable next time). If she campaigns heartily for Obama when all's said and done, she'll have a better chance in the future and people will largely forget her attacks. So that is the best path available to her, and I'll think she'll take it if she can't wrestle the 2008 nomination from Obama (and it seems very unlikely she will do so at this point).
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I see what you mean John, a very close girlfriend of mine...whom I THOUGHT I knew fairly well, spouts off with this gem,
"THINK Suzette....do you really wanna vote for a man with HUSSIEN for a middle name?" WTF?
I also know family members, sadly who would vote for Satan himself before they would a black man OR any color woman.
Another friend, male also, told me not to underestimate Hill's toughness. He said he'd rather go up against Obama AND McCain in a dark alley than Hill by herself! lol
I read her autobiography years ago and I really like the kind of girl she is/was.
Now she is a force...wish Kucinich & Co. would just storm the White House like the Bolsheviks did the Winter Palace sometimes....
But then I'm Libra too (dorky I know) but supposedly we are constantly questioning ourselves, the Universe, life and weighing every side to death! I know I do! lol
Hugs,
S.
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Better a man with Hussein as his middle name than a man with Bush or McCain as his last name... lol.
If "Hussein" makes Barack anything like Saddam, then John makes me like Lennon, Adams, McCain, Kennedy, Depp, Holmes, Rotten, Wayne Gacy and Cash.
If we stop questioning ourselves we become Bush (or Hitler). And if we think we have all the answers about everything in the world for all of eternity, we're full of Bushitler.
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"wish Kucinich & Co. would just storm the White House like the Bolsheviks did the Winter Palace sometimes...."
think we could talk him into it?
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He doesn't live too far from us... perhaps I can pay him a visit.
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OK, I'm having writer's block and my kid won't wake up...lol.
I'll answer ANY five you ask!
Hugs,
Suze
(Go easy on me...don't make me thing too hard...I know you could!)
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Awesome!
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You don't know me all that well yet...so here goes. Interview me...
Then I may take a little time to respond if work gets crazy but I will do it.
I have a MySpace blog but I seldom post.
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Cool... I will send questions sometime this week. Thanks!
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Great job, JC! Excellent answers to every question.
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Thanks, Don! I appreciate you making me think - you came up with some very good questions!
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As for boycotting the Olympics I guess China has more concerns than that right now with the disastrous earthquake. And the Buddhists in Myanmar after the cyclone and their horrible military regime that has dragged its feet in accepting humanitarian aid...it seems that there is little we can do to or for either country except pray for the relief of the thousands of people who have lost everything including their lives.
The Democratic Party has to get it together soon or United we Stand, Divided we Fall, but right now it is Divided we Stand. With both Hillary and Barack running so close in votes it is my hope that they are both on the ticket. Any other choice will give the McCain Republicans too much advantage.
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Interesting.... Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Elena!
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Ok.. I'm a sucker ..I'll take the bait. INTERVIEW ME...
LOL..
As far as indecisive,,, you answer on Tibet was the most indecisive answer I've ever heard...LOL.. just kidding.
The only thing I know about November is I know I'm voting Democrat... who ever gets the nomination.
I got suckered into voting for Nader last time..
never again.
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Cool... thanks, Chris!
I didn't vote for Nader last time, but I voted for Ross Perot in 1992.
This time... give me a Democrat or give me death!
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Ron Paul was the only option for me really. The others are all under the same control...big business, corporations, bankers, the super Old Money wealthy, like, The Rockefeller's, The Rothschild's, etc. The whole system just does not work anymore. We are being brainwashed, distracted, and pacified with "things" so that we won't really ask questions or think anymore. I am just thankful that there are still a few people left who actually do think and ask questions. But we aren't going to do anything until our lifestyles are actually threatened, which, I fear will be coming soon. We need to wake up and see what's happening to our freedom, our rights, we as humans. I thought about Hillary for a while, but changed my mind...there's just something wrong about her that I have yet to figure out.
While they distracted us with the so called "terrorists" they slipped in that Patriot Act, which pretty much takes our freedom away. Of course they want war, it distracts us from what "they" are really doing. I know I'm going off on a tangent here, but this..all this political lying rhetoric makes me sick and I want to do something about it!
BTW, I don't vote party, I vote for whomever I feel is the best for the country. I hate to say it, but I don't think any of these are.
Boycot the olympics? Yes.
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Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Susan.
At present, I'm feeling a bit disillusioned with the whole political scene. I agree that we should go with the best person for the country regardless of party. And I feel McCain is the worst of the bunch in dozens of ways.
I wonder if someone like Ron Paul (or even Dennis Kucinich) can win in America today. This is, after all, the country who's recently voted for a Bush three times. When will we learn?
I kinda wanted to avoid politics for a while on here - but I also didn't want to reneg on my promise to answer Don's questions. Maybe I'll get back into it again as November approaches. Right now I don't know.
Would you like to be interviewed?
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I'll have to think about the interview thing.
I'm with you. I get very passionate about the political arena, but this year I am disillusioned as well. It mostly serves to make me angry and upset.
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Sorry to put you on the spot as far as the interview
But it seems you have something interesting and insightful to say about every subject under the sun.
And I won't ask any political questions... lol.
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OK, then. Thanks JC. I don't know how interesting or insightful, but I do have strong opinions on most things. I do worry about offending others though. I guess you could say I'm unconventional. One thing I despise more than anything are injustices. Which, (aside from your obvious talent,etc) has drawn me to you.
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I could use the stimulus in my blogging so Interview me.
I feel the same way on politics recently. I'm just sorta burned out on them.
I'm not a big conspiracy theory nut but I am worried about the accuracy of our current voting systems and what seems to me a trend of the government being by the corporation, for the corporation.
Since you are avoiding politics what subjects are occupying those frontal lobes?
Miss you on myspace but I understand why you left. It makes it a little harder to remember to get over here and participate.
MM
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You're right, my friend. Although it's gotten to a point where I receive as many blog views here as I did at my peak on MySpace, I receive only a fraction of the number of comments I used to receive and (unlike on MySpace) rarely from anyone new. I miss that somewhat, though I love and very much appreciate the folks who do comment. I know it's a pain to enter one's information everytime someone wants to leave a comment. And I miss having everyone's pictures next to their comments, which allowed me to easily shoot to their MySpace pages.
I feel where you're coming from on "the government being by the corporation, for the corporation." I think the only way we're going to save our planet before it's too late is my making "going green" affordable for the consumer and (sadly, but realistically) more profitable than not going green for the corporations.
Lately my lobes have been mostly into poetry, writing my book, and seeing new places locally. But I go in phases. Next month it could be religion again... or something else altogether. "Variety is the spice of life."
Thanks for your comment!
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JC,
It would be an honor to be interviewed by you, sir.
That would make for a choice blog.
~Brandon
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Fantastic! I will send out the questions sometime this week.
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You are braver than I. I don't think that my life could withstand the scrutiny of a myspace interview, which is precisely why I will never be a candidate for elected office or a game show contestant. I was shocked that you voted for Bush in 98, but I will give you this. I don't think that anyone could have predicted the disasterous results of his Presidency would have such far reaching implications. I agree that the Bush Jr. Presidency is the most important thing to happen to the US in recent years. Besides the obvious tragic consequences, he may have inadvertently swayed America to end it's dependence on oil. We simply cannot afford it's financial, political and humanitarian consts.
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Thanks, Tara! But I think you're pretty darned brave as well.
Actually I voted for Reagan in 84, Bush senior in 88, Perot in 92, and Kerry in 04. Those were my only presidential elections (not counting primaries), since I didn't turn 18 till 1984 and I spend from October 1993 to June 2004 in "another country"...
Funny how age, experience, and injustice have turned me so liberal.... I led a fairly sheltered childhood in many ways.
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