The Origin of LITTLE PEOPLE, BIG GUNS, Or "A Lie Can Travel Around the World and Back Again While The Truth Is Putting On Its Shoes”

There's a supposed quote from American author Mark Twain about how, "A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes." Many times the first media report about something, regardless of its accuracy or whether the complete story is told, will travel far and people will ignore the follow-up. 

This article from NPR discusses the early coverage of the Sandy Hook school shooting, including how somebody else was mistakenly identified as the shooter and how some early reports claimed school officials actually let the shooter into the school. Sunil Tripathi was initially identified as one of the Boston Marathon bombers, only for it to come out later he'd committed suicide long before the bombing. More recently and speaking from my personal experience, I initially thought the episode with the students from Covington Catholic High School and Native American activist Nathan Phillips just involved a confrontation between them--the involvement of a third party (a group of street preachers affiliated with the Black Hebrew Israelites) didn't appear in any of the news I'd read until some time later. This article from The Atlantic breaks down how the major media failed to point out that the BHI preachers had initially confronted the Native Americans and then attempted to redirect the whole situation toward the Catholic students, instead focusing on student Nick Sandmann, who appeared to be smirking at Phillips while he plays the drums. Several media outlets ended up settling lawsuits with Sandmann, whom I remember being vilified online at the time (to the point the school closed due to threats) and even now.

And this is something that applies to my own writing, in particularly my horror-comedy novella Little People, Big Guns from Deadite Press. I got the initial idea for LPBG from a news story that claimed TV chef Gordon Ramsay had a gay dwarf porn star lookalike named Percy Foster, who was found dead in a badger den. However, the Huffington Post did some digging and found that not only had local police no idea what was going on, but nobody in the porn industry had heard of Mr. Foster, who should be more well-known given his stature and appearance. Furthermore, the initial reporting on the incident came from The Sunday Sport, a British tabloid that, among other things, has claimed a WWII bomber had been found on the Moon. However, before this had happened the initial reporting went viral. The story circulated online--here's a Facebook post from 2014 about it and here is a 2018 article from The Daily Mail. 2018--that's seven years after the incident was debunked. Lies can live forever on the Internet it seems.

However, even though it turns out the whole incident with Mr. Foster didn't actually happen, that got my creative juices flowing. The initial story idea (which just focused on the little people and the killer badgers), after some suggestions from then-editor of Deadite Jeff Burk, soon grew into a bizarre almost true-crime saga involving terrorists, car chases, and even an unnaturally large and dangerous animal. If you like your horror spiced with comedy or if your sense of humor trends very dark, I would recommend checking out Little People, Big Guns.

Ministry of Land and Resources Offers Free Farms For Retired Guardsmen

Ministry of Land and Resources Offers Free Farms For Retired Guardsmen

Stenhus Posten
By Nils Berglund

The Obsidian Guard, in partnership with Sejera's own Ministry of Land and Resources (MLR), has formally put out another call for retired guardsmen or guardsmen considering retirement to apply for lands in the Basin.

"Since the defeat of the Camrose Confederation eight years ago, hundreds of millions of acres in the eastern and southern Basin have been vacated due to the vagaries of warfare -- the death or flight of the original occupants, failure of irrigation systems, or other causes," said Erica Wivell, a spokeswoman for the Obsidian Guard. "Hundreds of millions of acres of land that, if put to good use, can support a family or many families, but at present are lying fallow, serving as haunts for bandits, or simply not being put to efficient use."

Wivell went on to say that Grendel, Lord of Sejera and First Lord of the Northlands, believes very firmly that those who have helped win this land should be the ones to benefit from it. Consequently, members of the Obsidian Guard eligible for retirement or who have already retired may apply for a land grant. Experts from the MLR will interview them and any families they intend to bring with them to determine their eligibility for a land grant and, if so, what type of grant they might receive.

"Generally speaking, a veteran colony dedicated to farming should be self-sufficient in terms of labor, both in quantity and in skill," she continued. "A veteran with a wife and children skilled in agricultural pursuits would be able to put a large amount of prime farmland to good use, while a single man without agricultural skills might be better-suited for a personal home and a different occupation."

She added that local labor, though often available, is best not relied upon, especially in sensitive matters.

 
And this boon isn't solely for those who've faithfully served their twenty years. If a guardsman has received a medical discharge due to injury or illness, doctors and agronomy experts will judge their fitness for particular jobs and if their kindred can take up any slack. Wivell cited the examples of Sergeant Chao Wang, given a medical discharge for epilepsy after ten years' service, who now owns a prosperous farm in a veteran's colony near the interior entrance of the Pass, or Private Abbas Naifeh, who lost a leg at the Battle of the Iron Horse and ironically now shoes horses at the veteran settlement of Klókskapr near the borders of the new Firebird Host in the northeast.

But any interested veteran would be advised to act quickly. Wivell emphasized that available lands between Sejera and the Pass are filling up quickly and requirements for skills and capital to claim the remaining land are rather strict. Further east, in the regions of the Basin across the mountains from the lands formerly ruled by House Merrill and now under the control of our loyal allies from the Flesh-Eating Legion, the requirements are less strict. The Obsidian Guard and the MLR will even provide capital and tools for deserving applicants. Although the risks are greater, the rewards will be greater still.

So how did this policy implemented by Grendel, Lord of Sejera and First Lord of the Northlands, work out? The answers can be found in Battle for the Wastelands and "Son of Grendel."

LITTLE PEOPLE, BIG GUNS Two Weeks Out

Once upon a time I was probably spending time reading articles on the Internet when I should have been writing or doing something else useful and came across an article originating in the British tabloid The Sunday Sport and spread throughout the world claiming that a gay dwarf porn star who looks a lot like TV chef Gordon Ramsey was found dead in a badger den. Although most people laughed and moved on, that got my creative wheels turning...

Now the fruit of my spending way too much time on social media is here--my second published novel (novella really), Little People, Big Guns from cult horror Deadite Press. On 11/23, after the print and Kindle editions were synchronized, I sent out my MailChimp newsletter and spent most of the day tweeting to people who'd expressed interest in or supported my Twitter pitches (on things like #pitmad and #pitdark) and got a lot of retweets and likes. We're talking thousands of impressions (views) on lots of different tweets here. This ran the US Amazon e-book sales rank from #122,342 in the Kindle store on 11/22 (the first day with an actual sales rank) to a high point of #30,861 on 11/23. It rose as as high as #73 in Amazon's horror-comedy category, beneath a bunch of "harem" books and even World War Z that don't look like they belong in the category.

In addition to enough sales to spike the rank, I got one review on Goodreads, one review on Amazon Canada, and one blog review from Canadian writer Matthew Stienberg, whom I know from an online alternate history forum and who offered to read and review as soon as possible. In Amazon Canada it was #68 in "Horror Parodies and Satires" Thanksgiving morning and is #128 in the category today. Although sales dipped severely over the next few days, I got another nice spike December 2 when an interview with me on the the Bizzong podcast dropped. Although on Amazon US I don't have any also-boughts (I suspect due to US buyers being Matt Quinn fans with disparate tastes), Amazon Canada's also-boughts feature books from Deadite Press like Lakehouse Infernal and Killer Lake as well as the new White Trash Gothic Part 2 from Section 31 Productions, a new publishing house headed by former Deadite Press editor Jeff Burk. I've got an interview scheduled for sometime in January with Arm Cast, the podcast of author Armand Rosamilia (who, like Burk, I met at the World Horror Con in Atlanta in 2015) that will hopefully increase sales as well.

So if you hadn't seen any of my binges on Facebook or Twitter or aren't a regular listener to Bizzong, check out Little People, Big Guns! Let's keep the momentum going. And if you know any podcast hosts in need of an interview or bloggers who might be interested in hosting a guest post connecting a topic their readers would like with LPBG, let me know.

Democratic Presidential Candidate Andrew Yang Visits Piedmont Park

Andrew Yang, businessman, philanthropist, and Democratic presidential candidate, stood on a podium at the Promenade at Piedmont Park in Atlanta and said something that one doesn't expect in these days of political polarization.

"Donald Trump got a lot of the essential problems right," he said. He said that Trump pointed out many problems facing modern America, to which the Democrats simply claimed everything was fine. This, much more than Russia, Facebook, or the FBI, was the reason that Trump won the election and Hillary Clinton didn't. However, although Trump diagnosed the problems, his solutions were all wrong. "It's not immigrants," he said about the losses of jobs. "It is technology."

Millions of manufacturing jobs in the Midwest had been automated in recent decades. Once prosperous blue-collar communities had been hollowed out as workers were replaced by machines and it's not going to stop with industrial work. He cited the case of malls and other retail outlets closing due to competition with Amazon, something that's a real problem given how retail workers represent the majority of American jobs. He also pointed out that advances in artificial intelligence would put call-center workers and truckers out of work as well. Although convoys of self-driving automated trucks would be more efficient and save lives (no drivers to fall asleep at the wheel after long drives, for example), millions of truckers would be out of work and towns that provided lodgings, food, maintenance, etc. for truckers would wither. This is what he called "The Fourth Industrial Revolution."

The solution, Yang advocated, is a universal basic income (UBI) like Alaska's. However, instead of oil funding what Thomas Paine called a citizen's dividend and what Martin Luther King Jr. advocated in Where Do We Go From Here? Chaos or Community, it would be funded by technology. This "trickle up economy" as he called it would set the economic wheels spinning as people spent their money and would encourage entrepreneurship. This dividend, which Yang said would be $1,000 per month, would solve many of the problems Democrats talk about. Many women, for example, remain in abusive or exploitative jobs or relationships because they lack the financial means to get out. Democrats talk about empowering poor people of color and this dividend would accomplish that.

In addition to UBI, Yang advocated "Medicare for All" and thanked Bernie Sanders for making the idea mainstream. He rhetorically asked how "Medicare for All" would be paid for and said that the existing private insurance system is a network of middlemen who don't add value. He also advocated legalizing marijuana and what (to me) sounded a lot like forgiving $1.5 trillion in student-loan debt. This way young people can get out of their parents' basements and buy houses, start families, etc. He also criticized the idea of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) as the best measure of American progress. Although robotic trucks would increase the GDP they'd be bad for humans. He also cited how his wife's care for their two sons, one of whom is autistic, isn't measured in GDP either. He advocated for what he called "human-centered capitalism" and suggested an "American Scorecard" would be better to measure the well-being of the country.

Yang joked that as an Asian who liked math he was the opposite of Trump and ended his speech by citing his support from different factions in American politics. He said he had Trump supporters (a few made their voices heard) as well as Libertarians (these were louder). Louder still were those who identified themselves as "progressives."

"It's not left, it's not right, it's forward," Yang said, capping off his speech.

Protesters Come From Across Metro Atlanta 6/30

Protesters gathered from across the metropolitan area gathered in Atlanta June 30 to protest against U.S. President Donald Trump's aggressive immigration enforcement that has separated 2,000 children from their parents.

According to the Atlanta-Journal Constitution, over 4,000 protesters marched through Atlanta from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)'s Atlanta Detention Center to the Richard B. Russell Federal Building in protest of recent "zero tolerance" immigration enforcement. U.S. Rep. John Lewis, a veteran civil-rights campaigner, spoke to marchers outside the Richard B. Russell Federal Building. The protest was one of many such protests the AJC reported taking place nationwide.

These protesters came from different regions of the metropolitan area. Anna Crumbliss came from Doraville, while Eli Banks came from near Grant Park. Coming a little farther afield was Kara Sweeney from Johns Creek, GA.

"This is a time in the US when we have to resist any and all policies and actions that lead us away from our humanity and compassion," Sweeney said when asked why she was participating in the protest. "The family separation practices at the border, implemented by the Trump Administration, are cruel and unnecessary."

Banks echoed her words, saying that previous U.S. immigration policies were questionable already and that detaining children separately from their parents was cruel and unnecessary. Crumbliss said she participated in the rally because she wanted to show compassion for immigrants mistreated by the government and advocate for compassion and change.

Banks described the protest as "passionate, but friendly." There were no counter-protests he could see, or other incidents of friction. Sweeney said there was a good turn-out when the protesters gathered at the detention center. Protesters cheered and waved to ICE detainees within the building, who waved back. She described the march as not being particularly long, less than a mile.

"The rally was the most beautiful environment I could have imagined," Crumbliss said. "Everyone there was advocating for others, beaming with hospitality, and fighting for the America that we know and love."

She said the love that echoed through Atlanta when the protesters started chanting, "Love, not hate, makes America great!" gave her the chills because of its power. She said she was proud to be part of a movement of people from all walks of live, ages, and religions coming together to fight for justice.

Although representatives from ICE could not be reached for comment, Banks, Crumbliss, and Sweeney did not report seeing any of them there. Banks said that he only saw a few police and members of the Atlanta Fire Department. Crumbliss said the police mainly directed traffic and kept protest participants safe.

"It was a very peaceful and upbeat event where all we felt from the police present was support and respect. We appreciated them being there," she said.

When asked about what they thought the government should do, all three said ICE should immediately reunite separated children with their parents, a process that is still going on despite a court-ordered deadline. Banks went on to advocate for more humane centers for those still detained, citing how illegal entry into the U.S. is only a misdemeanor. He advocated a path to citizenship for those who entry the country without documentation rather than immediately deporting them. Crumbliss stated that although open borders is impractical, the U.S. should spend monies earmarked for a border wall she described as "pointless" by revising existing rules to not count families of skilled workers who get green cards against the 140,000 yearly cap, something she said would eliminate the backlog of Indian, Chinese, and Filipinos in the U.S. on work visas. This would allow these immigrants to start businesses or change jobs without bureaucratic hurdles.

Crumbliss also advocated allowing the states to run their own visa programs alongside the federal one to allow for workers to be brought in for state-specific industries, specifically suggesting that dairy-producing states could create agricultural visas for farm workers as an example. Crumbliss cited regional visa programs like Canada's Provincial Nominee Program or Australia's different regional schemes.

"These programs have created greater population and employment growth," she said.

Sweeney advocated Donald Trump be impeached for his role in the crisis and stated that her ideal immigration system would be based on compassion and human dignity and be free from racial discrimination.

Although Banks said he would be making sure to write his elected representatives and Crumbliss said she believed that the current administration's policies would likely prompt her to protest again, Sweeney had the most elaborate plans.

"We are an activist family," she said. "We believe in being allies to those who are oppressed or harmed."

She attended a meeting a local mosque to learn how Trump's blocking of immigrants from several Muslim nations impacted Muslim communities. Her church Unitarian Universalist Metro Atlanta North is deeply involved in political activism and Sweeney described how she contacted senators and congressmen daily to protest the Trump administration's policies. She also campaigns for local political candidates and will be looking for volunteer opportunities with the communities most impacted by the administration.

Q&A With ROSETTA Author Stephen Patterson

Today author Stephen Patterson, who in the interest of full disclosure is a former member of my writing group and came to my first The Thing in the Woods book signing and bought a copy, will be holding a book signing of his own at Posman Books in Atlanta. Here's a Q&A about him and his new novel Rosetta.

What inspired you to start writing Rosetta? 

I have always loved science fiction since I was ten and my older cousin gave me a copy of Stranger in a Strange Land. I’m the type of fellow that makes his own knives, even though I can buy really good ones at the store, I still make my own anyway. It was only a matter of time before I made my own science fiction. Rosetta is my first completed novel-sized work.

How long did it take you to write the book? 

Well, I’m something of a perfectionist. I had to teach myself to write novels in the process of writing a novel. It took me more than five years.

Once it was done, how did you go about getting it published? 

I own a publishing company.

What kind of reception has Rosetta received since publication? 

So far the reviews have been favorable. It’s a bit of a cyberpunk, so people who like that genre seem to like it. It’s complex in some ways and I find people like that in a story. I do. A novel should be about more than just the events it describes.

What are some major literary influences on Rosetta? 

Ursula LeGuin, Robert Heinlein, Ben Bova, and Arthur C. Clark have all been a big influence on me. Plus, I’m a huge fan of Richard Morgan and Lois McMaster Bujold.

What does the future hold for you writing-wise? 

I’m hooked! I have a very atypical vampire epic swirling around in my cerebrum. Not a magical sparkling vampire, but a gritty noir thriller. Ex-roman legionnaire, still alive after 2000 years . . . and can lift a truck, if the need arises . . .

What was your favorite part of Rosetta to write? 

The fight scenes were fun for sure, but I think the verbal ‘fencing’ scenes are my favorite. Think about the verbal sparing that happens in The Godfather, always with the undercurrent of violence in the immediate background.

What was your least favorite part? 

I had to learn about the nuts and bolts of linguistics, a lot more than I ended up putting in the book. It’s enjoyable to learn new things, but fight scenes are much more fun!

Do you anticipate writing any sequels or works set in the same world? 

Yes. I am working on a prequel to Rosetta, and I have a sequel planned as well. So much writing!

So there it is, folks. I'm already reading it on my Kindle, but if I can, I'll swing by Posman Books today and see if I can snag a signed copy of Rosetta. You should too. :)

News Article Roundup 6/6

It's been a long time since I've done a "News Article Round-Up" post featuring interesting news articles and commentary. Here goes...

Michael Bay is Giving "Britain's Loneliest Dog" 15 Minutes of Fame-Not only has Michael Bay included this no doubt incredibly sad and bored shelter dog in Transformers: The Last Knight, he's also going to try to get her adopted. I've got friends who criticized Michael Bay for his various excesses, I wrote "The Revenge of the Fallen Reboot" because I was so disappointed with Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, and I never even bothered with Transformers: Age of Extinction, but I think this is a really cool thing to do.

The Zoo That Wants To Release Wild Elephants In Denmark-This article is about "rewilding," or restoring places to their pre-human state. Some of the more radical variants involve bringing lions, tigers, elephants, etc. to North America and Europe. There's this article I found on The Atlantic that describes the emptying of rural parts of the U.S. So long as people aren't forcibly displaced or endangered by more dangerous types of wildlife, that doesn't seem like a bad idea to me. The reintroduction of wolves in various places doesn't seem to have caused problems.

This is Africa's Most Overlooked Achievement And It's Changing the Lives of Millions-Africa is one of many places that's skipped a generation of technology--for example, areas that never had landline phones now have lots and lots of mobile phones. This article describes another area where Africa has "skipped a generation"--a lot of rural villages now have small-scale solar power and wind power as opposed to feeding off gigantic industrial power-plants. This is pretty cool, as it provides Africans with modern technologies while at the same time avoiding the environmental problems gigantic power plants, huge power-line infrastructures, etc. Decentralized power generation would be the way to go for the whole world and it looks like Africa's leading the way.

Engineered bacterium inhales carbon dioxide and hydrogen and excretes fuel alcohols-Get enough of this going and goodbye greenhouse effect. I have heard some concerns about the bacteria potentially getting out of control and causing problems, but perhaps there's the possibility of engineering them so they can't reproduce beyond a certain point? Think the "terminator gene" to avoid GMO plants spreading their genes to wild plants.

Ten Slavic Spirits and Monsters You've Probably Never Heard Of-For those of you who are into writing science fiction, fantasy, and horror, here are some new critters for you to use.

Enter Hiero Desteen, Pursued By Mutant Wolverines-This isn't really a news article per se, but it's still pretty cool. It's a linked series of blog posts in which the blogger, who's a college professor somewhere, re-reads and comments on the novel Hiero's Journey. I first read that novel in high school and it was a big influence on my Wastelands series. I re-read both the first book and the sequel The Unforsaken Hiero recently and they're still fun. The blogger's comments are also pretty darn funny, including the following commentary on the first chapter:

Things are looking dark for Hiero, and it appears that our novel is about to become a short story, when of a sudden Gorm the Bear comes out of hiding and bites S'nerg in the balls.This was probably the point at which, while I was first reading Hiero's Journey, I realized I was going to finish the novel. You just don't get mutant-bear groin-biting in conventional stories.

I hope all of the above content interested you...

Blast from the Past Movie Review: An American Tail (1986)

My friend Jamie, a noted animation buff and a major fan of Don Bluth, was back in Atlanta for Christmas and so Nick decided to host a very special episode of Myopia: Defend Your Childhood just for him. Jamie decided to defend An American Tail, which I first saw on a rented video (yes, an actual VHS tape) probably in the late 1980s. I later reported on the Atlanta Jewish Film Festival in which the movie was screened and interviewed Don Bluth and Gary Goldman, two of the masterminds behind the film.

So how did it hold up? Here's the podcast. And now for the review...

The Plot

It's December of 1885 and the Mousekowitz family, the mouse neighbors of the Jewish Moskowitz family in Russia, are celebrating Hanukkah. The festivities are rudely interrupted by human Cossacks who rampage through the village throwing torches onto the roofs and even shooting a fleeing man dead while cats in fur hats rampage alongside them. The Mousekowitz family, who are aware of a happy, safe place called "America," travel to Hamburg, Germany and set out across the Atlantic for this new Promised Land. Along the way, young Fievel is washed off the ship during a storm and must reunite with his family on Manhattan Island, which is not nearly as friendly as the naive immigrant mice think...

The Good

*Except for a bit in the third act, the movie moves along pretty briskly and isn't boring.

*There's a lot of historical humor that kids won't understand, but adults will. The mouse politician Honest John from Tammany Hall, for example, and we see that corrupt political machine in action. There's also a wealthy female mouse who seems to be a stand-in for the Progressive reformers who sought to aid immigrants as well.

*The movie teaches kids a valuable history lesson about what brought immigrants to America and their experiences when they got here, which weren't always positive. The French pigeon Henri seems to be doing pretty well, but many of the immigrant mice end up exploited in a sweatshop alongside human immigrant workers.

*There are a couple songs that are massive, as TVTropes puts it, Ear Worms. In "There Are No Cats in America," the immigrant mice of different nationalities (Sicilian, Russian, Irish) sing about the horrible conditions back in their home countries (where their oppressors are depicted as cats) and how things are better in the United States. And when Fievel meets Henri, they have a musical number about positive thinking, "Never Say Never."

*The Giant Mouse of Minsk, foreshadowed by Fievel's father early on, is really cool when it's unleashed.

*There's a scene where a despairing Fievel thinks he'll never find his family again that's genuinely sad. When I interviewed Goldman years later, he said that was his favorite part of the film.

*A cat who claims to be a vegetarian admits that he does eat fish. Given how cats are obligate carnivores, that's kind of important.

The Bad

*The third act, in which Fievel is held captive by a group of cat gangsters and has a duet with the friendly cat Tiger, kind of drags. I really didn't like the song "A Duo," even though there is a funny bit about how Tiger has three fathers that those who are aware of cats' promiscuity will find funny.

*There's at least one big anachronism--the young Fievel sees a group of American school-age mice saying the Pledge of Allegiance, which didn't exist at the time. Furthermore, they're saying the version with "under God," which wasn't introduced until the 1950s. I think Steven Spielberg's grandfather remembers looking into a school he wasn't able to attend because he was Jewish, but they could have had Fievel seeing something else.

*The radio version of "Somewhere Out There" (sung by James Ingram and Linda Ronstadt) is a beautiful song, but when Fievel and his sister Tanya sing the song themselves, I didn't find it very impressive.

The Verdict

It's an entertaining and educational children's movie, but for an adult I'd say just see it once. 7.5 out of 10.

On The Ethics and Practicality of Hanging ISIS Prisoners...

Posted a news article I found earlier on Facebook and got quite a discussion. The gist of it is the Jordanians have threatened to kill ISIS prisoners if any harm should come to a Jordanian pilot captured alive by ISIS during the air campaign.

I posted that I supported this policy. After all, one of the reasons armies are (supposed to be) kind to enemy prisoners of war is reciprocity--they don't want any bad things happening to their own people who fall into enemy hands. ISIS, given its propensity for killing prisoners en masse (you see this mostly with Syrian Army soldiers), taking and beheading hostages, etc. clearly needs to be taught this lesson.

Some people took issue with my supporting this policy on the grounds of both morality and practicality...

The first to object was Zaid Jilani, who pointed out that the guilt or innocence of anybody tried and convicted by Jordan is questionable given the practice of judicial torture, especially in regards to terror suspects. In case you need a source other than Wikipedia, here's al-Jazeera and here's Human Rights Watch. He also said "civilized people" don't execute prisoners, which is not something I agree with but that's not relevant to the issue at hand. My friend Evan, a college professor, said if anything merited killing ISIS prisoners, it would be that they had committed capital crimes, not that ISIS had killed prisoners/hostages first.

These are some very good arguments. If the Jordanians captured a bunch of teenage conscripts forced to fight by family members held hostage (I don't know if ISIS actually does this, but knowing them I wouldn't be surprised) or people like this teen "volunteer" suicide bomber, that would be victimizing them twice. The same if the captured female suicide bomber is telling the truth about being an unwilling participant in the scheme. During WWII the Allied powers didn't retaliate for Nazi crimes by making indiscriminate massacres among POW camps, although organizations that routinely violated the rules of war could expect little mercy. All too often the argument "don't sink to their level" is basically an exercise in putting the scrupulous at a disadvantage vis-a-vis the unscrupulous (think honorable Ned Stark vs. the crafty Cersei or Littlefinger in Game of Thrones--if Ned had been more willing to be more ruthless or dishonest about his ultimate intentions he could have won even as late as the attempt to arrest Cersei in the throne room), but this is not one of those situations.

On the matter of practicality, Zaid pointed out that ISIS glorifies the deaths of its soldiers in battle, so they wouldn't be unduly upset if some of their prisoners were hanged. Furthermore, martyrs can make useful propaganda tools, so giving them more is not a good idea. And if those hanged were not guilty of major crimes, the PR problem is multiplied on top of the morality problem. To use a WWII analogy, this isn't like bombing Germany--there are many Germanies and some of them are U.S. allies (i.e. Jordan, Saudi Arabia), so PR, propaganda, etc. is much more important.

(I didn't come up with that analogy, but it's a good one.)

Furthermore, this article depicts an ISIS emir captured by the Kurds praising them for their mercy and claiming to have been deceived by ISIS "caliph" al-Baghdadi, so even a high-ranking (and presumably guilty of capital crimes given ISIS's propensity for killing prisoners, making Yezidi women into sex slaves, etc.) enemy commander could be worth more alive than dead. The captive emir, for example, could be used to make particularly effective anti-ISIS propaganda videos and encourage ISIS soldiers facing the Kurds to surrender rather than fight to the death. Showing mercy to a defeated enemy is not just an ethical issue, but can be a practical one as well.

That said, avoiding making martyrs is not the be-all, end-all. The Allied powers made millions of martyrs for fascism during WWII and yet the occupied Axis countries are not ungovernable hellholes. Furthermore, there are martyrs and there are martyrs. If the Jordanians hanged some teenage conscripts, ISIS and opponents of Jordan's government more generally could give them such hell over it that it might not be worth it. But if the Jordanians have got an ISIS technical specialist (like the chemical weapons guy just killed in an air strike) or commander, the threat of hanging them might deter ISIS from killing its remaining hostages (since these people, unlike foot soldiers, aren't a dime a dozen) and their deaths would damage ISIS's cause so much that the "martyr factor" wouldn't compensate.

Think the bombing of the Axis countries during WWII--whatever hay Goebbels (or his Italian or Japanese equivalent) might make it of, their physical ability to make war was damaged. Severing the spinal cord of a mad ax murderer might make him more angry or psychotic than usual, but if he's paralyzed he can't do anything. And as far as the "repentant ISIS fighters make good propaganda" angle is concerned, someone who is remorseful and willing to denounce his former comrades is useful--an unrepentant fanatical twit is not.

So however much hanging ISIS prisoners might appeal to one's instinct, this course of action should be trod very carefully. It would have been better if the Daily Mail article had included more detail about who these "ISIS commanders" the Jordanians have got are, so whether hanging them is moral and/or worth the trouble can be examined. However, it is not a course of action that should be closed off completely either. However vile and racist the Confederates could be in the Civil War (see the Fort Pillow Massacre or Confederate slave-raiding during the Gettysburg campaign), the threat to kill or enslave Confederate prisoners was enough to deter (most) Confederates from treating black prisoners as slave rebels.

Some Thoughts on MARTA, Infrastructure, and Keynesian Economics

I was perusing some articles from magazines published by a company I've been working for since midsummer and that got me thinking about transportation, Atlanta's mass-transit system MARTA, and related topics. Here goes...

MARTA has historically not functioned very well for a number of reasons, including a lack of support from the state, state meddling in how it spends its money, opposition to expanding it from its core territories (for various reasons--although a lot of opposition is driven by excessive fear of crime and even outright racism, there're better reasons like not wanting to pay extra taxes and the fact the train doesn't go to places like Turner Field), etc. However, under new management, it has undergone a major turnaround. The possibility of extending MARTA buses and even rail (although they really should stop being so vague about doing this "in the future") to Clayton County is on the table, while 2012's failed TSPLOST (which would have passed if it had been limited to a more truncated area instead of including counties like Cherokee) included proposals to extend MARTA rail to Emory and even up Ga. 400 into North Fulton or up I-75 into Cobb. As the Governing article notes, there's a lot more support for expanding MARTA due to people moving in-town, high gas prices, etc.

And now for the Keynesianism. This article here describes how in many places, growth and employment are low but so are borrowing costs. That would be a good time for infrastructure investment, since it would employ people and get them spending money ("priming the pump" if you will) and low interest rates mean that it's safer for a government to borrow money to fund the project. And given the dilapidated state of much of U.S. infrastructure (here's a specific example of where things can go very wrong), we wouldn't be talking about stupid make-work projects like paying people to dig holes and paying others to fill them, but stuff that is in legitimate government purview. Here's some evidence that this can kick in the "money multiplier" effect.

As far as Atlanta is concerned, Georgia recently had the highest unemployment rate in the nation, although things have gotten better now. MARTA has a bunch of projects under consideration already. I'm not a transit expert, but I can see some areas where expanding MARTA rail in-town and out-of-town would merit further investigation and, if built, would provide lots of construction/infrastructure-type jobs.

*Although the stereotype of MARTA opponents is white people from the northern suburbs, there was opposition to the TSPLOST based on how it wouldn't have extended heavy rail to Stonecrest Mall. Residents don't want to wait decades to get rail out the I-20 East corridor. This would be pretty pricey based on that article--according to these specifics here, it'd be 12 miles of heavy rail, some transit centers (presumably for buses), and a bunch of other stuff, at a cost of $2 billion. That's billion with a B. Still, if it would clear out the traffic in the area, it would reduce air pollution and improve quality of life for area residents on top of the obvious "reduce traffic" parts.

*The Clifton Corridor project would extend MARTA to Emory University and the Centers for Disease Control facility in Atlanta. This is the main reason I advocated in favor of the TSPLOST, since I've visited friends out there and the place is a traffic black hole at certain periods of the day. Someone I knew online opposed TSPLOST funding for the project by saying that Emory and the CDC should contribute and that's not a bad argument. I'm not sure about using light rail vs. heavy rail--a lot of the times light rail isn't separated from car traffic and if the trains get snarled among cars like a streetcar would, people won't use them.

*A direct rail connection to Atlantic Station would help remedy the "doesn't go anywhere" problem inside the Perimeter. I've seen movies like Ender's Game with friends from Alpharetta and it was easier to drive than take the train because then we'd have to use a shuttle bus to actually get to Atlantic Station. This would be even more convenient for people already in-town, since they wouldn't need to make the long trip down from North Springs into Atlanta proper. Thing is, with all the development already there, it would be more expensive to build a rail connection (even a cheaper light rail one) and according to the MARTA site, it's not that far of a walk.

*Assuming Clayton votes for MARTA this November, go to page 2-11 to see where rail stops can go. I used to live in the Lovejoy/Jonesboro area (back when I was a reporter for The Griffin Daily News) and I would have loved this for DragonCon and even for church (I go to a church in-town near a MARTA stop). Although rail wouldn't go as far south as Lovejoy (at first), it would have been much better to get on the train at the Jonesboro Justice Center than drive all the way up to Lakewood/Ft. McPherson.

*Extending MARTA rail to Turner Field (which would allow the buses used for the Braves shuttle to be deployed elsewhere) was on the initial TSPLOST project list, but was ultimately removed. The lack of transit options was one reason the Braves gave for leaving Atlanta, although the fact they're moving to Cobb (where the transit situation is even worse) makes them look dumb at best and dishonest at worst. Still, given the possible uses Turner Field could be put to--Mayor Kasim Reed wants a middle-class housing development and Georgia State University wants to transform it into a combination of sports, retail, and student housing--extending MARTA rail to the site anyway would be a good idea.

*As far as extending MARTA outside the Perimeter is concerned, back when I was a reporter in North Fulton I heard all about various proposals to extend MARTA into Alpharetta. That particular line would begin in the Perimeter area and extend all the way to Windward Parkway, with stops in Roswell along the way. That has faced some opposition from people who think it would "urbanize" Alpharetta (in context they're talking about dense development, not using "urban" as a synonym for "black"), but others have pointed out that there's a whole lot of office space in the area. If you work in the same office all day, you won't need a car like more mobile workers (such as journalists like me), so if a lot of office workers commute to Alpharetta from elsewhere, rail service might be a boon for them.

*If we go through with bringing the Braves Stadium to the Cumberland area (gag me with a spoon), it's going to create a traffic nightmare in the area. Extending MARTA up I-75 will connect the system to in-town fans and fans from the south who could take MARTA through Atlanta to Cobb, but one reason the Braves moved is because, based on ticket sales, they figured most of the fan base lived in the northern suburbs. However nice building a MARTA line connecting Cumberland to the rest of Atlanta would be in and of itself, it won't help "northern arc" people get there any faster and, as the following article points out, the politically-easiest route would also be quite expensive. Here's a transportation proposal that should make things easier and would create jobs to boot.

*This is an odd proposal that I'm not aware anybody has even studied, but some kind cross-Perimeter line connecting Doraville (Gold Line) to Dunwoody (Red Line) would be interesting. The distance is relatively short and it would allow much easier transit between the Red and Gold lines if somebody wants to go from the Northside to Lenox or Brookhaven rather than having to go all the way to Lindbergh Center and then change trains. If someone is heading up from downtown to the Northside and wants to detour to Lenox for whatever reason, they could keep going on the Gold Line and get back on the Red at Doraville.

Why You Might Need a Gun at Kroger (and Some Thoughts on Open-Carry In General)

Lately, the anti-gun advocacy group Moms Demand Action has been putting pressure on the Kroger supermarket chain to ban private citizens from carrying guns (or at least carrying them openly) in their stores. As a private business, Kroger has the right to determine what happens on its property and Moms Demand Action, however annoying they are, has the right to advocate for the policies they think best.

However, some recent news articles have come to my attention indicating that being armed at Kroger can be a very good idea...

Brutal Kroger parking lot attack caught on camera

And here's another one, involving a defensive shooting at an ATM outside a Kroger.

Man shoots, kills suspect after attempted robbery

Note that the police were nearby but failed to intervene until the private citizen shot and killed the perpetrator. I've seen gun-control advocates claim that people shouldn't carry guns and should instead rely on the police, but the police can't always respond in time, especially in more rural areas or areas where there are lots of demands on them. And under U.S. law, the police have no obligation to protect any individual citizen. This is not to cast aspersions on the police's good intentions, but on their capability.

Fortunately, Kroger has not yet bowed to the pressure from these people. Hopefully they won't, even if the individuals in the following link who are either brave enough or stupid enough to post under their own names start deliberately spoiling food or even making armed-robbery calls against open-carriers, both of which are crimes and the latter of which could lead to someone getting killed. Here's a National Review article on just how many anti-open-carry people are advocating "Swatting."

That said, the open-carry movement comes off as rather trollish. They may have the legal right in states to open carry, but are they openly carrying for any purpose other than to thumb their noses at people they don't agree with? The NRA itself said that this wasn't "neighborly" before the open-carry people pitched a fit and forced the organization to back down.

To paraphrase Scripture, everything may be permissible, but not everything may be beneficial. I'm a supporter of gun rights, I don't have a high opinion of the gun control movement, and I think the "don't sink to their level" argument often serves to put good people at a disadvantage compared to the wicked (think honorable Ned Stark getting screwed by the treacherous Cersei and Littlefinger), but I fail to see any advantage to be gained from this open-carry business. It risks alienating moderate people and gives the gun-rights movement in general a bad name. Furthermore, were I a criminal, I might shy away from a bunch of open-carriers but if I wanted to commit a crime and saw there was only one or so present, I'd shoot them first. It might not even be that effective against crime.

My Thoughts on Ferguson and a Poll For You

The situation in Ferguson, Missouri seems to be winding down right now, but it was a pretty wild few days. We had such wonderful things as:

*The police using what looks a lot like military equipment to intimidate protesters.

*Rioting and destruction of property.

*Armed store owners keeping the hooligans away.

*Journalists roughed up in a McDonald's.

*Journalists getting gassed.

*Foreign propaganda outlets use this to make Americans look like a bunch of hypocrites.

*Someone writing in a respectable outlet called it a "police coup."

*I'd heard something about a state representative getting arrested too, but I haven't been able to find any corroborating evidence. I think it was referring to this state senator getting tear-gassed.

*Real soldiers sounding off on how inept the police were even with their military hardware and how if this was the "militarization" of the police force, it was the most inept militarization they'd ever seen.

*Cops telling people not to film them, even though that's perfectly legal.

*The hacker militia Anonymous shutting down much of Ferguson's government.

*A no-fly zone being declared. Very convenient for keeping away news choppers, I think, although it's the FAA and not the local cops declaring it.

Here're my thoughts. I identify as a conservative politically and/or as a Libertarian and I think this is bugnuts insane. Even IF the police shooting that set this all off was justified--and based on witness reports it almost certainly was not--the police massively overreacted to citizens exercising their rights to speak freely, assemble, petition the government for redress of grievances, etc. That the local thug element used this as an opportunity to make trouble doesn't justify the sheer overkill involved.

Some online left-wingers have been claiming Tea Party types, libertarians, militia types, people waving the Gadsden Flag, etc. have been awfully quiet about the situation, with the implication they're entirely cool with brutal police-state stuff if it's directed at black people.

Well, as a big fan of the Gadsden Flag (I plan on having the protagonist in my Wastelands series use it as his personal insignia), here's my response:

The police here have been behaving in a ridiculous manner, to the point their authority in the area has been revoked and the State Highway Patrol (led by a black officer who grew up in the area) has been brought in. Things seem to have gotten a lot better.

(And by the way, libertarians have been complaining for awhile.)

Now for some political thoughts:

*The militarization of the police has gotten absurd in this country. I could understand the need to have some kind of heavy iron for an emergency, but a lot of departments have stocked up on gear they're not likely to ever need short of an alien invasion. I'm an Eagle Scout and I'm all for being prepared, but there's not unlimited money out there. Although the problem in this situation is more of attitude than equipment, I'll steal a page from Rahm Emmanuel and suggest that a good crisis never go to waste. A relevant bill has been put forward. At the very least it might help control government spending.

*From eyewitness reports, the officer straight-up murdered the man. The robbery-suspect thing seems like an ex post facto justification for what happened, given how it didn't come out for days. If the eyewitness claim is true (it may not be--there hasn't been much of an investigation so far), he needs to be charged with the appropriate degree of murder and subject to the appropriate punishment (up to and including execution). Police have a reputation for closing ranks in the event of an accusation of wrongdoing and that needs to stop for the sack of justice.

*I've seen the suggestion floating around the Internet about having police carry small cameras on their persons to record the events of their shift. This seems like a good idea, in order to reduce police brutality and provide evidence to protect the cops themselves if a suspect attacks them and then claims to have been brutalized. It might also give them another source of information for their reports and all. Here's a poll from one of my major clients on cop cameras. If you could vote in it, that would be spiffy.

And because I'm a nerd, here's a selection from Battlestar Galactica about why the police and military are two different things.

THING IN THE WOODS First-Ish Draft is Done

This announcement is a week or so late, but here it comes. The first draft of my "teen Lovecraftian horror novel" The Thing In The Woods is finished.

The story began when I was hanging around the Borders in East Cobb when I was in high school or college. I was reading a Call of Cthulhu role-playing game manual and came across the concept of one of those isolated small towns where Lovecraft depicted evil things afoot being suburbanized. The phrase they used was "supernatural Love Canal." What began as a short story turned into a novel (in terms of concept, as I actually hadn't written very much), a novel I neglected to focus on other projects like Battle for the Wastelands.

However, I eventually realized this was another project I could write fairly quickly, since I wouldn't need to do as much research as I would for other projects. As of last March, only 1,517 words had been written. By the time the summer writing challenge with my friends Nick and Lauren began, only 6,000 words had been written. Now it's 46,000 words long. I call it a "first-ish" draft because I typically write one or two chapters at a time, print and revise them, submit to writing group(s), and then revise based on their comment. The last two chapters, which one of my groups will consider on 12/29, would technically be at the "second draft" (or a "Cherie Priest first draft" because she considers an unrevised-but-just-finished project to be "draft zero"), but earlier parts will have been revised twice or more.

Then things will get a bit tricky. Many agents will not represent and many publishers will not publish a work that's this short. There are some presses that will, but oftentimes they will only put them out as eBooks, not as print books. Although the eBook market is rapidly growing and threatens to obliterate mass-market paperbacks, no print editions mean no book signings. That's a very good way to generate publicity and thus further book sales (I've covered a bunch in my years as a journalist--see here, here, here, and most recently on page 10 here). If book signings are not an option, I'm not sure how I'd do my bit to promote the book.

Fortunately, I've got ideas for at least three more scenes I can add that flesh out the book's female lead (she's a relative newcomer to the story and I fear it shows) and provide one last POV for the novel's (human) villain that's thematically fitting. Hopefully I can get it to 50,000 words. Then I can bring the completed novel before my other writing group (and some interested friends) and once I revise based on their opinion, it'll be ready to be shopped around. I'm thinking this will be done by the end of first quarter 2014, although graduate school could be a problem.

Fingers crossed. Wish me luck.

EDIT 8/20/17: The Thing in the Woods has since been sold to a small press and is now available on Amazon. Enjoy!

Notes from DragonCon 2013 Part One

Sorry for the big gap in blog posts. I have recently started graduate school and between that, freelance work, and my own writing projects, that's bit into my blogging time considerably.

So here are some notes I took from DragonCon 2013:

*At a branding panel with artist John Picacio, he said art directors are the ones who generally hire artists. To become a successful freelance artist, he recommends building relationships with publishers but also be a member of the fan community via things like attending conventions.

*Many independent authors want book covers but offer too little money. He's turned them down for this reason, but suggested that second rights to an artistic work can be sold for much cheaper.

*Those interested in finding good fantasy art should check out Spectrum or visit DeviantArt. One DA artist has done the covers for several of my Kindle stories, so I've already taken that advice into account.

*At a pulp panel featuring my writer friends James R. Tuck and Delilah S. Dawson, I learned the ideal word count for pulp publisher Airship 27 is 60,000 words. That's what I'm shooting for with The Thing In The Woods, although I fear it might come up short. James has advised me to send Battle for the Wastelands to pulp publishers and once I hear back from some biggies I've already sent it to, I'll take his advice.

*With pulp, there's less need for a back-story.

*Later books in a series can feature a Dramatis Personae that's a recap without being a recap.

*Audible.com is a good place to have your books recorded for audio purposes. I might give that a try with my e-books.

*Nazi rocket planes were fueled by red foaming nitric acid and 100% hydrogen peroxide, both of which will dissolve anything. When mishaps occurred and the chemicals spilled into cockpits, pilots would literally melt. This happened at least once.

*John Ringo is apparently popular in Europe. His father-in-law, a minister in Lithuania, name-dropped Ringo and doubled the number of people at his church services. Meanwhile, either Ringo himself or a friend of his (I can't remember clearly) encountered some German women who were big fans.

*Romantic fiction in Germany is apparently very BDSM/dominance-heavy. Dawson and Ringo discussed the reaction to their books in more-puritanical America and according to Ringo, his Paladin of Shadows novels fit right in but Dawson's steampunk vampire romance is very tame. Ringo's account of the reaction of his mother (and her book club) to Ghost, the first Paladin novel, was hilarious. If you've ever heard of the Internet meme "Oh John Ringo No," it's about the series. Here you go.

*Pyr Books' "Toxic City" novels taking place in a London quarantined due to the use of chemical/biological weapons are being adapted for a television series. However, it's being set in Los Angeles. Given how the first book is London Eye, I'm wondering what they're going to call the series. "Toxic City," according to one of the Pyr panelists, seems like a good bet.

Kellie's Custom Costuming Business

My friend Kellie Jureka is at it again. She has just opened an Etsy shop selling clothes she has made herself as well as "upcycled" goods.

Here's the link: KAIJ Custom Costuming and Design on Etsy, where you can buy stuff. Here's her Facebook page.

I have more familiarity with Kellie's costuming than with her jewelry parties, since I've seen it firsthand. Kellie made her 2011 DragonCon costume, which is Pepper Potts' dress from the first Iron Man movie, herself. A picture of it can be found in a story I wrote about North Fulton residents who attended DragonCon that year.

I would recommend her highly for any kind of costuming or custom-clothing need you might have. You can see a good example of her work in that article and there's more on her respective websites.

Like Jewelry Parties? Help A Friend...

My friend Kellie Jureka has recently gone into business for herself hosting "jewelry parties" for Premier Designs Jewelry. Here is her personal page.

If you're looking to buy jewelry for yourself or for someone else in your life, I would recommend her. Although she hasn't posted much on her Facebook page lately, interested parties should feel free to message her about hosting or attending parties, ordering jewelry, or joining her as a jeweler.

Character Interview: Patrido Guzman

Today we're sitting down with Patrido Guzman, a former farmer from Zacatecas, Mexico.

(Guzman is a shorter man, but taller than a stereotypical Mexican. He has thinning dark hair.)

Me: Buenas dias, señor Guzman.

Guzman: Buenas dias to you as well.

Me: So let's get started. When were you born?

Guzman: I was born in 1989 in Zacatecas. My father was a farmer, like his forebears before him. We were better off than many campesinos, since we owned our own land and could occasionally hire help. We grew corn, mostly, but we also had chickens and even some cattle.

Me: Do you have any brothers or sisters?

Guzman: Oh yes. I have an older brother Juan and sister Carolina, my younger brothers Eduardo and Quinto, and a younger sister Pilar.

Me: How was the land going to be divided?

Guzman: Well, there wasn't enough to sustain every member of the family, so we couldn't all get a piece. My father thought it best that all of us get work and education so that whoever didn't inherit the land could still make a decent life. My older brother and sister went to Zacatecas City, where my brother found work in the silver mines and my sister as a teacher. I was in secondary school and studying for university when NAFTA came.

Me: What happened then?

Guzman: Free trade is great in principle, but Mexican farmers cannot compete with American corn, especially when it's subsidized to the point it can be sold below cost. We worked harder than ever before and managed to sustain ourselves in the face of American imports for years, but in the end, we couldn't compete.

Me: Your family lost its land?

(Guzman sadly nods.)

Guzman: Losing the land that had been in our family since before the Mexican Revolution was too much for my father. He died of heart trouble a year after we were forced to sell our land and move in with my older siblings in the city. My mother followed him soon afterward.

Me: I'm sorry to hear that.

Guzman: I couldn't attend university and had to go to work right away to help support the family. My younger siblings had to finish school themselves. I went to work in a maquiladora, one of the new factories NAFTA made possible. The Lord takes and He gives, you know?

Me: Job 1:21?

Guzman: The very one. The money was better than many of the other jobs I could have taken, but I hated working there. The supervisor was a real mula who mistreated some of the women in the factory. I didn't want to lose my job and didn't do anything for the longest time and then when I saw him hassling a widow working to feed a child, I told him to go to hell. I got fired the next day.

Me: Yikes.

Guzman: He got his. When the government started fighting the drug cartels, he was found dead. Whether he caught a bullet meant for someone else or someone decided to take revenge for a sister or daughter he put his hands on, I don't know. Good riddance either way.

Me: So what are you going to do now?

Guzman: Well, I've had friends who've gone to work in El Norte.

Me: El Norte?

Guzman: The United States. They made good money doing even the most menial work, enough to send home and build big houses for their families, put siblings and children through school. I once heard of a man who took over a concrete business when the gringo owner retired and he's a millionaire now.

Me: How are you going to get in? I've heard it's hard to get in legally unless you've got special skills and you said you never got to go to university...

Guzman: Well, I knew a man from the factory whose brother knows someone on the other side of the border. A coyote, a smuggler. Juan and Carolina, they loaned me the money to pay him up-front. No need to work for him for years. We're going to meet up in...well, I don't know you. Maybe you work the limones verdes.

Me: Limones verdes? Green lemons?

Guzman: Sorry. Your Border Patrol. They drive around in green trucks.

Me: Got it.

Will Guzman make it to the United States? If you want to find out, check out the short story "Illegal Alien," which appears in the short story collection Flashing Steel, Flashing Fire. Non-Amazon e-books here.