Brief Year End Commentary December 28,2009

Dear Friends

Andrew Xenios is a photographer with Salem State connections.  But he's
been all over.  Last time we emailed he was south of the border.  In
2007 he was in Afghanistan.  This link  
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ycvtZlv7ryc   will take you to a slide
show of Xenios' photographs of Afghan orphans.

This slide show is designed, of course, to elicit our concern. However,
if I may editorialize, I should like to point out that no matter how
circumstances should be resolved in Afghanistan, no matter who is
actually responsible for the plight of these kids, you and your
descendants will inevitably be held reponsible for them because "our
country", decades before 9/ll, decided to place its armaments, for its
benefit, far from its own territory.

I just heard a radio report that in 2003 "we" held a drone attack on
suspected Alqaeda sites in Yemen. Yemen? How did "we" get there?  How
about being a half starved innocent civilian Yemeni or Afghani and
witnessing drone attacks? Speaking as one born and steeped in the
heritage of Eastern Massachusetts, that sort of thing, making
unConstitutional occupational war, radicalizes me.  I think that the
recently abandoned Massachusetts Evacution Day should be the first World
Holiday.  Get every foreign warship out of every foreign harbor. Of
course, the overwhelming majority of such warships are "ours".  The
radio report also informed that it looks like "we" are going to get more
involved in Yemen to prevent the possibility of what NOW (post drone
attack)  looks like failed state status.  I wonder how failed the United
States would be if we suffered drone attacks.  Personally, I'd rather
see failed states declared as Wilderness Areas and prevent any goverment
or institution from ever establishing there.  Governments, after all,
have an evil history of making wars.  Now that I think of it, though,
the biggest failed state is the United States of America . . . the obese
world redcoat where ball cap patriots throw away their search and
seizure rights for the opportunity to  fart  greenhouse gasses for the
sake of their tropical vacation flights . . . . that's why "we're"
"there" . . . everywhere . . . forever. 

Once again, here's the orphans: 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ycvtZlv7ryc

You're gonna have a New Year. 

Brian Joyce
bjoyceart@123mail.org

Brian Joyce

P.O. Box 8313

East Lynn, MA 01904

Phone:

339 970 4760

email:

AncientOrderOfLonghairs@hotmail.com

For More BJoyceArt links to Art, Opinion, Videos, and More go to BJoyceArt.blogspot.com

Brian Joyce's Belated History of Santa Fe:



{"Each day, as they have for three centuries, Indians gather at the long, porchlike portal of Santa Fe's Palace of the Governors to trade and gossip." So, erroneously, begins the 1978 article in Newsweek magazine. That this national news weekly (which had in 1978 virtual "last word" powers over those matters on which it reported) should have fallen for and encouraged this Santa Fe Myth is not too surprising. That the Museum of New Mexico who, after all, was among the reported subjects of the article and who, after all, is responsible for accurate delineation of New Mexican history, should let the error go uncorrected, at Newsweek, and everywhere else, and undoubtedly unto this very day, is just another example of institutional abuse in America.}

In primeval times there was, At the site of the Palace of the Governors, a pueblo, an adobe village. It was near the Santa Fe river, which probably, actually flowed with water at the time. The terrain was largely a flat grassland with hills nearby and mountains behind the hills. There were no virtually no trees. I mention the topographical details because the shade trees in modern day Santa Fe leave the surrounding landscape a mystery to the eye.

The Spanish ascended the plateau from the lower Rio Grande valley to the south. Through their eyes of European civilization the Santa Fe Pueblo site must have immediately struck them as the natural location for an impressive city. The lower valley that they had just traversed was rather barren and inhospitable. Now here was flatland backed by the hills, backed by the mountains; and with water nearby; and right at the economic crossroads of natural resources and transportion.

There was some serious wrangling between the Indians and the Spanish over the site: a Spanish conquest, an Indian revolt and finally a Spanish reconquest. Without attempting to diminish the impact, the actual number of combatants and consequent deaths in these hostilities were few. The Spanish then dominated the region with a medieval system of highly cultivated well provisioned lords in possession of huge landholdings maintained by an illiterate Spanish peasantry and the whole of this system supported by the Church. The other pueblos in the Rio Grande Valley, whose location did not stir the Spanish dream, were generally left alone. However, Spanish/Mexican Santa Fe functioned as the center of trade for (fur) resources of the Southern Rocky Mountains. Prior to the appearance of the Spanish, the Puebloans had never worked in silver. Had there been a lot of silver in the area the Indians would likely have been wiped out. Neither were there any sheep for colorful blankets prior to the Spaniards.

The seat of government was built at the Santa Fe Pueblo site in horizontal Spanish Hacienda style. This Palace of the Governors sat at the north side of a small city square, the Plaza, of no more than a couple hundred feet on each side. The Palace, and all the neighbors on the Plaza, had large porchlike overhangs on the front of their buildings. The overhangs were not paved as sidewalks because the primary purpose of the overhangs in this treeless landscape was as parking space for horses.

There is very little documentary history of what went on under the Plaza overhangs, or Portals, but while there was regular trade with the Indians during the Spanish era I think it's a fair assumption that it usually took place inside the several trading posts rather than habituating trade among the horses.

Wagon trains full of trade goods from Missouri via the Santa Fe trail showed up the 1820's. A Conestoga wagon could hold six tons. This boon to the local economy, for all races, was believed have been rather celebratory and boisterous at its appearance on the Plaza and if ever there was an antique heritage of outdoor trade on Santa Fe Plaza this was it.

U.S. armed forces entered Santa Fe Plaza in 1846 during the Mexican War and afterward New Mexico became a U.S. Territory. Local legend has it that in the 1870's U.S. Terrritorial Governor Lew Wallace strode the "porch" while composing his famous novel "Ben Hur." I suppose by this time the Portal of the Palace of the Governors was paved as were the streets (very likely at the same level). The legend does not include mention of Lew Wallace having to deal with an open Indian arts and crafts market while he did his composing. Give or take a decade from the Lew Wallace era, however, there is an obscure local history book that mentions the Portal of the Palace of the Governors as the location where farmers sell their fresh produce.

Now, putting aside my bigoted, prejudiced, racist writing slant, the previous paragraphs are generally accepted as factual. These facts, however, coincide in conflict with the myth that Aboriginal Americans have been selling jewelry for centuries at the Palace of the Governors. I believe that there was very likely no collective Indian ethnic assembly of any kind in Santa Fe from the time of conquest and through the 19th century excepting possibly during the annual city Fiesta.

Funny how time makes history vague . . . in reverse. Our notions of the ancient pueblo are so secure and archeology will even back us up in every detail. Likewise, the Spanish/Mexican era has its nostalgic aura of factualization in the mind. And then, the villainous American Empire, of whom anthems and allegiances are sung, shows up in uniform and our historic memory becomes dim . . . or erroneous.

Around the time of New Mexico's entry into U.S. statehood in 1912, as the local politicians created a state constitution ("All . . . are born free and equal") a cultural coterie decided to spruce up the city. (This is also the era when the dreams of an automotive future arrive; and behind that is that economic illusion and myth maker - Tourism.) My guess is that preparations for statehood conferred some political monetary benefits and these civic minded (white) (aristocrats) were assigned to spend it. They developed a unified vision of what the local cultural emphasis was to be. They instituted, made concrete, with concrete, and law, the City of Three (racial) Cultures. However enlightened this effort at cultural toleration may have seemed in 1912, or even in 1978, its very racial definitude was and is inorganic to culture. The Three (racial) Cultures could not have conceived or admitted of a fourth culture, or an incubating culture, or a sub-culture, or a counter culture, or an independent culture or a solar culture. Obviously, African Americans were not considered and who can say what were their ideas on subcontinental Asian Indians.

Along with the Three (racial) Cultures, Santa Fe got an architectural make over. The Palace of the Governors was redesigned and covered in stucco to look more Pueblo-like than Hacienda-style. The Plaza had become Americanized over the years and was now predominantly brick buildings and included a bank with marble columns. It was suggested, by law, that all buildings in downtown Santa Fe - which was all of tiny Santa Fe - be covered in stucco and/or painted brown to harmonize in Disnification.

END of Part One.

Brian Joyce

P.O. Box 8313

East Lynn, MA 01904

Phone:

339 970 4760

email:

AncientOrderOfLonghairs@hotmail.com

For More BJoyceArt links to Art, Opinion, Videos, and More go to BJoyceArt.blogspot.com

Dear On The Media:


Your recent story about a congressional bill to make newspapers into nonprofits caught me half asleep in bed as it was aired over WBUR in Boston on Sunday morning.


However, through the morning fog I noticed that no mention was made that the newspaper beneficiaries of such a bill are virtually all megaphonic cheerleaders for their local corporate monopoly ball teams which are composed of numerous multimillionaires almost all of whom are male.


I seem to recall that your story also got to the ideals of newspapering and journalism. I remember, and have been greatly affected by, the discussion of objectivity during the Watergate/Nixon era. Too bad virtually no one in journalism (OTM excepted) continues this discussion or supports such ideals. Journalism consistently, close to unanimously, willingly trades its ideals for the opportunity to freely, without question and without charge, promote the "ideals" of ball playing.


Here in Boston, WBUR takes my support and interest for the ball team so much for granted that this summer I got hourly inning by inning updates of the games, as well as the "pre-news" announcements of who would be pitching. This despite the fact that the "News" involved can be found in so many other sources. I thought the raison d'etre of public radio was to NOT do that.


OTM's next story was about some historic reporting on the KKK. How many members of that organization are/were sports fans? What is a "Good Old Boy" but a loyal lifetime dependable sports fan? What is the framework of the "glass ceiling" if not sports fandome? Is that sports paraphanalia we find in the home and vehicle of the latest outrageous violent criminals? These and other questions will apparently never be answered by the cheerleaders of the "news" media. ["Please, Comrade. Are we not all members of the same Party?" . . . Sports?]


Sorry if I got off on a tangent but I just don't see how any issue related to "The News Media" can be discussed without bringing it back to America's Own Iron Curtain Propaganda Machinery.


Tags: News Industry of Socio/Psychological Juveniles. Dumb Journalism, Jocksuckers.


Sincerely,

Brian Joyce

Brian Joyce

P.O. Box 8313

East Lynn, MA 01904

Phone:

339 970 4760

email:

AncientOrderOfLonghairs@hotmail.com

For More BJoyceArt links to Art, Opinion, Videos, and More go to BJoyceArt.blogspot.com

Where the (my) (blogging) problem begins

Do you believe in Free Enterprise? Ok. But I want you to consider the following: The thing that Corporations, Government, Religion, Museums, and Colleges all have in common is that they are all Institutions. And my experience is that they all are involved in creating myths. And speaking from my poverty experience money is made by those who have an institution. In fact, money is an artifice of institutions. Money has nothing to do with how hard or well one works. "Get a job" really means "Get an Institution". The singer asks "Where would you be without Love?" I want to ask "Where would you be without your institution?" "Where would your Love be?"

Personally, I have chosen to do without. An' I ain't givin' in. So when you want the point of view of human/planet/reality without insulation (natural man) this is the place.

Looking for a natural woman.

Brian Joyce

Brian Joyce

P.O. Box 8313

East Lynn, MA 01904

Phone:

339 970 4760

email:

AncientOrderOfLonghairs@hotmail.com

For More BJoyceArt links to Art, Opinion, Videos, and More go to BJoyceArt.blogspot.com