Posted 1:49 AM by Paul
American Enthusiasm

My friend Ray from Louisianna (see blog a few days ago) wrote a book about Pamplona aimed at explaining the fiesta of San Fermin to the American market. I see that a link his book is on the home page of Blogger, so I expect it go ballistic. Available on Amazon blah blah blah .

This is great for my already huge ego - as I am mentioned in it as some kind of incapsulation of fiesta spirit amongst the foriegn crew. This is very nice of Ray but I can't help feeling like a bit of a fraud - as the last two fiestas I have spent a great deal for time dancing to the Mexican pop goddess Paula Rubio in bars frequented by the Navarran bourgoisee. I have gone to fiesta every year since 1976 and have been unable to kick the habit since. Maybe I should ask Ray to set up a branch of Fiesta Anonomous.

Its a very good book with superb photographs, it covers a whole lot more than the bull running and is thankfullly accurate. OK I admit it, I wrote part of the glossary but before you ask, I am not on royalties. We got so amused by the inacurracies and fictions in American literature about the fiesta that we even started to invent our own and leak them to US college students. I think my wife Heather took the top prize for her claim that the fake plastic chorizos (Spanish sausage) hung outside a delicatessen on the bull run represtented every runner that had been killed or seriously injured. We even overheard a young British man repeating the myth in all seriousness to a friend in the bar opposite the said chorizos. Another story spread by Heather was that as part of their Equal Opportunities programme the town council ran an encierro in the opposite direction for wheel chair users to take advantage of the gradient.

One interesting thing about Ray's book is the way that various people (me included) are effectively nominated as honorary Americans - and I understand this is entirely meant as a compliment and with the best intentions. However, it highlights a trait in American society which is both charming and a bit grating to a European audience. Many Americans assume that anyone with a brain would really prefer to be an American. The film Green Card is based on the same assumption - that a young Frenchman would go to the extraordinary length of marring Andy McDowell simply to become a US citizen. Or perhaps we are meant to believe that the hapless Frenchman played by Gerard Depardieu was tired of fine wines, universal health care, superb architecture and a brilliant train service -and that is why he longed for an American passport.

On the plus side, Americans' boundless enthusiasm for their own culture is one reason for their success. It's not just about resources and intrinsic wealth otherwise Russia would rule the world and Nigeria would be right up there with Switzerland. Americans are like those hyper-active teenagers who run the best parties. " But you have got to come to our party! It will be blast" And finally you give in. Sometimes I think that being American is not so much a nationality as a state of mind.

Posted 4:47 AM by Paul
USA Get Medieval on Yo Ass

So it seems that Uday and Qusay Hussein died in a big shoot out with US forces. Very Tarantino. Were they all wearing dark suits and sunglasses. The jury is out on whether or not they committed suicide but it looks as though the 14 yeard old grand son of Saddam - little Mustafa - was killed whilst returning fire. Clearly, he is due to go down in the history of Arab nationalism as a hero. The iconography is perfect. Boy child showing all the manly virtues of Saladin as he battles the infidel invader to the last bullet.

Despite widespread condemnation by the West of Isael's polciy of selective assasination, the USA - with the unequivocal support of the Britsh Government has adopted the same policy. In an nutshell we have the politics of the 15th Century with rocket launchers.

Blair hailed the death of the two evil tyrants as "good news" but I can't help be sceptical on several points.

- The US did not want to take them alive because they may have revealed in open court that we funded them during their reign of terror on the Kurds. They may also have revealed that the main chemical weaponry was destoyed in the mid 90s as has been claimed by a number of experts. Part of the factory that created the early weaponry was funded by a grant from the UK. We are so generous
- With the "bad guys" [ and lets remember they were the baddest of the bad ] gone many Iraqis will see no justification for a continued occupation of their country. Any anti-US military operations will no longer be tainted by the old regime and young men may sign up rather than be deterred.
- If we have decided to junk the norms of war and opt for a more ancient policy of assination of the leaders we can hardly be surpised if the opposition do the same. In fact this is all more Viking than Medieval.
- The US showed pictures of the bodies to the world's media this making us look like total hypocrites when we complain about Al Jazira showing equally grotesque pictures of slain US and UK soldiers.

Today they are promising to show video clips of the bodies. Apparently very few Iraqis saw the pics yesterday due to power cuts. So much for reconstruction. Or maybe the plan is to deregulate Iraq's utilities and turn it into a Moslem California.

My guess is that with the end of the Hussein clan resistance will grow alongside international sympathy for those resisting occupation. A nightmare for British and US soldiers who just want to go home. We are also due to see the irony of Bush and Blair pleading for help in reconstructing Iraq because they are fast running out of cash. They need other countries to foot the bill which is rising daily at a time when both of them will shortly have to face their electorates with the prospect of raising taxes (Blair) or printing money (Bush).

New York next week. Thank fully I don't smoke. Really looking forward to it except the flight. As ever I will opt for an aisle seat and keep a close watch on my fellow passengers, particularly lone Hassidic Jews with platform soled boots - the perfect diguise.

Posted 2:10 PM by Paul
So I got back from Pamplona (gave up bull running in the mid 80s) in one piece and spent a good deal of time with American friends.

On the night of the 4th of July we were in Biarritz on a pre-fiesta rendevous to meet up with a friend of mine called Ray Mouton. Ray is a Louisanna radical democratic and writer (as in someone who gets his work published and is read by people ) who made a considerable pile of money in the law. Ray worked for the Catholic Church. He has now retired in his mid 50s. It is just as well Ray made some cash because the champagne he ordered in the Hotel Du Palais cost $200 a bottle. Ray picked up the tab which was especially kind of him because he is a recovering alcoholic who lives off coca-cola, french (not freedom) fries and cigarettes. He gave up the booze in the late 80s and has never touched a drop since. People still ask him the inevitable stupid question, " But can't you have just one glass of wine?"

So, sat in the ballroom of the Hotel du Palais admiring the view of the sun setting over the Atlantic we notice a stream of elderly French people in ball gowns and tuxedos streaming into the dining area. They are attending a 4th of July banquet in honour of the USA, and a huge Stars and Stripes is hung against one of the windows.

The house band strikes up "Star Spangled Banner" and the whole room rises - except Ray's 25 year old daughter who stays resolutely in her seat. His step son, a stong lad who looks like he plays American Football, is one his feet, stood to attention - right hand clasped against his left breast. We stood up to show our repsect for the USA even if we do thing that the present incumbent of the White House is a bully and a dimwit. The band then segways into La Marsellaise and after the applause we all sit down whilst my friend Chris reminds us that roughly translated one of the lines means " we will water the land with our enemies blood". And who said the French were effete?

So neatly the night's interlude had challenged the widespread misconception that the French hate the Americans, and also my assumption that an American woman sitting down during her national anthem would have been disowned by her compatriots. No one even mentioned it. We all went out for dinner at a great Spanish restaurant and drank and sang (badly) into the small hours. Long live Democracy.

So what did the Americans think about their Government and the war? Basically there were two reactions.

1. Don't talk about the war - I am here to enjoy myself
2. Acute unease and embarrasment amongst those people who remember that Vietnam began with a few deaths and the flying in of special advisers.

So a few weeks later Blair flew to Washington in a bid to boost Bush's chances of re-election, improve his own image as a world statesman and give the world a banal high school lecture about Liberty and why we must "Stand by America". But Blair is not standing by America at all. He is lying down in front of a section of American society who have Bush as their cheerleader who believe the Vietnam War was lost because of a biassed liberal media and lack of political will at home to use "decisive military force" [ code for tactical nuclar warheads). Blair has abandoned millions of progressive Americans who are quite simply horrified and ashamed of the actions of their Government, not just in Iraq but on the home front where taxes are cut for billionaires and schools fall apart.

The news has just come in that another two US soldiers have been killed in an ambush in Northern Iraq, a region bitterly opposed to Saddam Hussein and the Ba'ath Party. This is on top of the young man who was picked off yesterday by a sniper whilst he was guarding a bank. It just goes on. In his speeech the foolish Blair said that we lived in an era where History could not give us a guide on how to we should act now.

He was obviously not paying attention at school during History when they covered the Boer War, the Mao Mao insurrection, the Irish Troubles or the Boxer rebellion. How one man can be so clever and yet so very foolish is just beyond me. If pressure were not building up for him to "In the Name of God Go!" I would despair.

But I do not despair. The dustbin of history beckons.