Blog Posts for Alex Fraser

The Course of Civilization: Peace! Peace! But There Has Never Been Peace in the World!

Alex Fraser — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 17:17:54 -0800

"The average age of the world's civilizations has been 200 years. These nations have progressed through this sequence: from bondage to spiritual faith; from spiritual faith to great courage; from great courage to liberty; from liberty to abundance; from abundance to selfishness; from selfishness to complacency; from complacency to apathy; from apathy to dependence; from dependency back again ...

MAZATLAN: My Favorite City Away from Home:

Alex Fraser — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 16:50:36 -0700

Whenever it is Mid Winter (or at least not Summer) in my soul, I long to leave the now crowded, expensive, deteriorating Bay Area to head south into Mexico. I have been to a number of haunts there, including Guadalajara, Puerta Vallarte, Durango, Chihuahua, and Los Mochis. Each has its charms, but the place I most often dream about is Mazatlan, on Mexico's Pacific Coast. One of the reasons I like ...

If Only Water Does Not Become More Expensive than Bunnahabhain in the Next Four Years.

Alex Fraser — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 22:21:55 -0800

President-Elect Obama still has seventeen days, by my West Coast time, before he has to assume responsibility for the shambles the Bush Gang, triumphantly greedy Wall Street "supply-siders," profoundly ignorant (mostly Southern, I'm afraid) Republican Congressmen, and timid go-along Democrats have left us in. It is they who have sent many troops, brave men and women (from America and a ...

11/22/08: Approaching Midnight, Forty-five Years Later:

Alex Fraser — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 23:17:27 -0800

The month of November, occasionally a disastrous time for the Nation, for my City, and for my loved ones, has been rather good to us this year. Barack Obama is to be our New President, and already his decisions appear (cautiously) promising. George W. Bush, the undoubted worst President in our History, is preparing in his habitually sly way to leave another failed job and move on ...

11/10/08 -- The Long Good-Bye to George W. Bush

Alex Fraser — Sun, 09 Nov 2008 23:28:09 -0800

As President George W. Bush prepares to leave office, Laura Bush will take Michelle on a tour of the White House this afternoon, while he sits down for a face-to-face with President Barack Obama in the Oval Office. The occasion is an opportunity for me to look back at Alexandra Pelosi's JOURNEYS WITH GEORGE, one of the first documentaries on George Bush, as he was running for the Republican ...

10/31/2008: Macresarf1 Thinks Back to Halloween 1938, and Forward to Our Invasion of Mars.

Alex Fraser — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 20:59:54 -0700

On this damp evening in San Francisco, I have just put up on my Author's Page a memoir and meditation on the first time I heard Orson Welles' Mercury Theater on the Air adaptation of H.G. Wells' "The War of the Worlds." That would have been on Sunday, October 30, 1938 -- seventy years ago, last night. Back then, America was regarded with a mixture of admiration and indulgence. ...

10/17/08: "W." -- Neither Red Sox nor Diamondback Fan, a Man Without a Country

Alex Fraser — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 02:42:21 -0700

In honor of Alex or is it Adam: I had not meant to post this whole review over here, but here it is. My health has not been good, but I could not resist an invitation from Larry French, the distinguished San Francisco film scholar, moderator of Wellesnet.org, to attend a press screening of Oliver Stone's new film about the life of George W. Bush: "W." The film was ...

7/31/08: Two Different Kinds of Progress in Bringing Bush/Cheney to Justice.

Alex Fraser — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 12:37:23 -0700

This morning, the following news came over the AP wire about forcing Bush Administration Officials to testify under oath before the House Judiciary Committee, like any Ordinary American: ". . . U.S. District Judge John Bates said there's no legal basis for Bush's argument and that his former legal counsel, Harriet Miers, must appear before Congress. If she wants to refuse to testify, ...

7/30/08: End of Bush/Cheney Begins to Rock:

Alex Fraser — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 19:50:30 -0700

Yesterday and today, two highly significant developments occurred in bringing President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney to justice. Yesterday morning, Alaska's Senator Ted Stevens, 84, longest serving and most senior of Republicans in the Senate, was indicted on seven charges of lying to the FBI, by a Federal Grand Jury. Stevens, a man of immense power and clout, was ...

7/29/08: Rambling in the Miles and Irma Archer Memorial Information Center.

Alex Fraser — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 11:43:30 -0700

On this morning, I am drinking cold coffee, listening to the pigeons coo and make love on my window sill. Down Geary Street, a man is ranting passionately, but I cannot make out what he is saying. A car growls in my ear, and there is the odd whistle or siren. Soon it will be Noon, and an insistent recorded voice, over-miked and over amplified, will shout: "THIS is a Test! This is A ...