arabaliozian

OBSERVATIONS ************************* Loyalty or subservience to the leadership is not a definition of patriotism but of fascism. * The only good thing about life is that it is above ground. * Sometimes we forget that Assad sits on a “throne of blood,” like Macbeth, and reality is catching up with him as it tends todo sooner or later with all of us. * If someone whose judgment I don't trust were to agree with me, I would disagree with myself. * Andrea De Carlo: "He tells me to follow my instinct. But what if I have two of them?" # PROVERBS *************************** If you like proverbs you will love THE DICTIONARY OF MODERN PROVERBS Compiled by C, Doyle, W. Mieder & F.R. Shapiro (London: Yale University Press, 2012). Some samples follow: * “The best man for the job may be a woman.” * “If you aren’t the lead dog, the scenery never changes.” * “Life is a shit sandwich: the more bread you have, the less shit you eat.” # SPEAKING OF OBAMA ********************************** Next time you speak of Obama, ask yourself: Would Romney have been a better choice? * To brainwash children means to train them to say “Yes, sir!” instead of “Hell, no!” * Cherish your enemies, you may learn more from them than from your friends. * Our most dangerous enemy is not the Turk but the Turk within us. * I find it very difficult to love my fellow men after reading my morning paper. # NOBODY’S PERFECT ******************************** Whenever I am told “Nobody’s perfect” (meaning “Shut the f*ck up!”) I say: “Dzour nesdink, shidag khossink.” In other words: our own imperfections should not prevent us from discussing our own motherf*ckers. * My contempt for loud-mouth Armenians from the Levant is not mine but that of a Levantine elder statesmen who once told me: “They walk past an elementary school and brag about their university degrees.” * Neither is my antipathy for Islam mine but that of Sunnis and Shias for one another. * You cannot deceive God, not even a non-existent God because God is another word for Reality. * The right word at the right time can be as effective as a hammer-blow to the head. #

VIGNETTES ************************** As a child I had the IQ of a parrot and the understanding of an ape. * More often than not lies make more sense than the truth. * Fiction is more predictable than reality. * We will never know all the consequences of our actions and words. * A child will believe everything he is told by an adult. * Superstitions acquired in childhood are never abandoned. * Children educated by rabbis, imams, and bishops will grow up to be Jewish, Muslim, and Christian respectively. * Human conflicts begin in the cradle and end in the grave. * There is no law that says it is criminal to deceive children. * Wars and massacres are planned and executed by ruthless operators who speak in the name of God that is merciful and compassionate. * Whoever said Planet Earth is the insane asylum of a distant galaxy knew what he was saying. * Am I right or wrong? I don’t know and I don’t care to know. My past is an encyclopedia of blunders: one more will make no difference. # CONSIDER SYRIA ********************************* We are perennial dupes because we are satisfied with easy explanations. Turks massacred us because they are evil. We are a progressive nation because we were first to convert to Christianity. We are smart because “it takes seven Jews to fool an Armenian.” Russians are our Big Brothers. * All these explanations that have acquired the status of slogans can be easily torn to shreds by anyone with a single-digit IQ and a superficial knowledge of history. * Case in point: what’s the use of being smart in the market place if we are idiots in politics? And if we are idiots in politics what’s the use of being smart anywhere else? * Turks are evil? Can you name a nation that has not committed massacres? And if you can’t name one, consider Syria and the fact that most Armenians support the massacres. * As for Russians being our brothers: Russians are nobody’s brothers, not even their own. # COMMON SENSE & HISTORY ******************************************** In their initial phase my greatest blunders appeared to me as triumphs of logic and common sense. * When the distribution of wealth is uneven there will be benefactors; and where there are benefactors brown-nosers will prosper. * In a dishonest environment honesty will be perceived as a capital offense. Common sense may be against me but history is with me. * To say we need solutions is to conspire with habitual and compulsive liars. * One of our most cherished ideas: If you can blame it on others, why assume responsibility? * In political and religious propaganda lies make more sense than the truth. What is the truth? I don’t know and I may never know it. I am neither a prophet nor a messiah. I am only a scribbler whose sole function is exposing lies and liars. # QUESTION I ****************************** Which is worse or more damaging to the economy of a nation : street crime or dishonest chief executive officers? * QUESTION II ********************** Which is worse or more damaging to our survival as a nation: what the Turks did to us at the turn of the last century or what our own political leadership has been doing to us for the last two thousand years? * ON STYLE ************************ Charlatans are long-winded. Be brief. If what you say makes sense you don’t need a defense attorney. * SLOGANS ****************** We preach “freedom or death” but practice life at all cost, no matter how degraded and dehumanized. * CONFESSION ********************** Like everyone else I was born stupid and I was educated to say “yes, sir!” to idiots until I realized that stupidity is neither an asset nor a terminal condition. #

IMMORTALITY ******************************** On the radio this morning when asked if he believes in immortality, a self-described “Christian agnostic” replied: “Only in the sense that my DNA will survive in my children and grandchildren.” * WISDOM OF OLD AGE ******************************* Once upon a time I sought the company of fellow Armenians. Now I avoid them. Ignorance is a luxury only the young can afford. * TWO BIBLES ********************* There are two Bibles: God’s (written) and the Devil’s (unwritten). The first is used for sermons. * BEAUTY AND THE BEAST ******************************** Leonard Bernstein to Glenn Gould after he played Beethoven’s Second Piano Concerto: “You played so beautifully in the cadenza that I almost came in my pants.” * IMMORTALITY (II) ********************************** I have already lived twice as long as the average Armenian writer. That’s long enough for me. # TRIBALTHINKING ********************************** If Assad is on our side, he can no wrong. If the rebels are against us they can do nothing right. The mindset of tribal people without a moral compass. * UNGRATEFUL BASTARD! ************************************* Because I diagnosed him as a sado-masochistic fascist and an advanced case of narcissism, he refuses to talk to me. Instead of gratitude for saving him from many trips to the shrink, I am treated as a hostile witness. But then, no one has ever said gratitude is our strong suit. * SHARING WISDOM ************************** Some readers refuse to share their wisdom with me. They only say “You know nothing and understand even less,” or words to that effect. Throughout our millennial history our writers have been misunderstood, ignored, rejected, abused, starved, even betrayed and murdered by the people and their representatives. So they can dish it out but they can’t take it? * PREVENTING MEASURE ********************************** There is a park, a lake, and a river a block from my house. To prevent anyone from crapping on my grave I have decided to have my ashes scattered in one of them. # ON THE RISE & FALL OF EMPIRES ************************************************* Two thousand years ago -- give and take a decade or two – England was part of the Roman Empire. Who could have predicted then that from the ashes of one empire another would rise? * What will the world look like two thousand years from now? If the Turks acquired an empire of their own, why not the Zulus? * What if after long centuries of degradation, darkness, and filth a new generation of Armenians says enough is enough! We want our own place in the sun. We want to choose our own allies and, with their cooperation and help, our own empire? * As I write, we are witnessing the gradual collapse of the American and Russian empires. Who will replace them? Can anyone guess? When it comes to the rise and fall of empires, your guess or anyone else’s is as good as mine. * To say we will never have an empire of our own is as absurd as to say we will. I choose to say neither. What I say is, in the realm of possibilities nothing is impossible. Or, in the words of Jean-Paul Sartre: “As far as men go, it is not what they are that interests me, but what they can become.” #

WE ARE A NATION ********************************* We are a nation that has suffered genocide. Delete the Genocide from our history and our collective profile would disintegrate into fragments or tribes that have been loyal and obedient servants to first-class swine. * It addition to a profile the Genocide has also given us a rallying point, not to say full-time jobs to scholars, teachers, Turcocentric ghazetajis, fund-raisers, Genocide-Recognition tax collectors, activists, lobbyists, and memoirists. * Don’t misunderstand me. I am not implying we should be grateful to the perps. I am only saying let’s give the Devil his due. * All professions, we are told, are “conspiracies against the laity.” We have all heard of cynics who use someone else’s crucifixion to make a comfortable living. The blame-gave is the favorite sport of our leadership. Zohrab tells us it is a mistake to confront our problems with lamentation. * I am not casting aspersions. All I am saying is as human beings we share the frailties of our species. We are not a morally superior nation. But we are a nation. We… # TURKS QUOTE ME? ****************************** That may be because my critics keep calling me a “denialist.” * You expect me to believe you are a dedicated and selfless patriot? But my belief system tells me “the better they classify themselves, the worse they are.” * You want to know what I think of Arabs and Muslims in general? All I know about them is that they want to be loved by the world even as they hate one another unto death. Could something similar be said of us? * You say everything I say about Armenians proves that I don’t know them, I don’t understand them, I can’t stand them. So what’s wrong with that? The people have consistently rejected, even betrayed and starved our writers. If you don’t like the word justice, how about retaliation? Unless of course you are one of those who can dish it out but can’t take it. # POLITICIANS **************************** An American mayor on TV when told she doesn’t behave like a politician: “That’s because I am not a politician. I am a public servant.” * WISDOM ****************** To read the unwritten and to hear the unsaid are the beginning of all wisdom. * DISAGREEMENTS ************************** When an honest man disagrees with me I begin by questioning the validity of my own convictions. But when a crook disagrees with me I feel vindicated. * THEY ARE AHEAD OF US ********************************** Turks have produced their share of dissidents because they know what compulsive and habitual liars their politicians and academics are. * I REPEAT MYSELF? ***************************** So does our reality! * Q/A ***************** Did he use poison gas against his own people, including women and children? An irrelevant question. He is guilty as hell because his father is his role model. He thinks he can save the nation by reducing its cities to rubble. He enjoys the support of imams and Putin. Like all dictators, including their Muslim variants, he is a natural-born killer. * VOLTAIRE SPEAKS ************************** “…and because it was a religious war, there were no survivors.” # POLITICS ABC ************************* There are divisions everywhere, even within the family unit. A healthy family is one in which divisions are reconciled by means of mutual tolerance, understanding, compromise and consensus. * Divisions are symptoms of failure in leadership. Reconciling differences is one of the most important functions of the state. * To assume that you can stifle discontent and impose harmony by force or massacre is an Ottoman misconception. * Compromise and consensus don’t happen on their own. They are man-made. In politics they are results of competent statesmanship. * The Syrian leadership had several decades during which to reconcile its internal conflicts and differences. It failed to do so. What’s happening today is a consequence of that failure. * The blame-game explains nothing. Its sole aim is to deny failure and reject responsibility. * Honesty is a universal and invisible empire. We are either its citizens or cowardly liars who refuse to face facts and deal with reality. #

INSANITY *********************** Because the plea of insanity is not an option, they speak of political, economic, social and cultural conditions beyond their control. Ask them why they keep dividing and subdividing the nation, they will say it’s the opposition that does that. Ask them why they hate to assume responsibility, and they will call you “a piece of sh*t who doesn’t have Mt. Ararat in his heart.” * DEMOCRACY ****************************** In a democracy there is always a remote possibility that the right thing will be said and done. * ON WRITING ************************* Gide is right: writing gets progressively more difficult. Mann is also right when he says writing is difficult especially for a writer. * MY AMBITION ************************ To write prose and verse that is as accessible as “to be or not to be,” “Our Father who art in heaven,” and “There is nothing new under the sun.” * NOTHING NEW ************************** Everything that needs to be said has been said. All we can do now is quote, paraphrase, abridge, repeat, and when necessary, expand. # ENEMIES ************************** If my enemy’s enemy is my friend, what about his friends? Who would have thought Turks would have more friends in Washington than us, even after millions of dollars wasted on politicians? * AT HOME IN THE WORLD ************************************** Some people are born equipped for life. I wasn't. Never learned how. Never felt at home in the world. Who represents Armenians more: our fat-bellied bosses, bishops, and benefuctors or our starving poets? * TIME ****************** It will take time, they say, assuming time to be on their side. It wasn't in the Ottoman Empire. Neither was it in the USSR and the Middle East, nor even in our own beloved homeland. * MONEY ********************** Making money: I can’t imagine anything more degrading. The only reason I made money was to quit making money. * JUSTICE *************** A headline in this morning’s paper reads: “Access to justice in Canada ‘abysmal’ law group report says.” So is everywhere else, alas! # THE WORD & THE SWORD ************************************* The OLD TESTAMENT and DAS KAPITAL are, without any doubt, two books that changed the world and almost everyone in it. * Who reads Hegel today? Only a handful of academics who do not always agree on what he said or meant to say. And yet Hegel fully qualifies as one of the most influential philosophers of all time if only because Marx is unthinkable without him. * What did Dante and Shakespeare change? Only the lives of a few translators. There are twenty-two published English translations of Dante and a new one (by Clive James) has just come out. * Hitler’s MEIN KAMPF and Thomas Mann’s THE MAGIC MOUNTAIN: which has been more influential? The only thing I can say with any degree of certainty is that, like the Good Lord, the “word” moves in mysterious ways and literary merit is not one of them. # UNFORGETTABLE LINES ********************************************** “In a forest it rains twice” (German saying). * There are some lines that once heard or read are never forgotten. Lines from movies: “I am going to make him an offer he can’t refuse.” “The cat is in the bag and the bag is in the river.” “Gee, I wish we had one of those Doomsday machines.” * Closer to home: “Treason and betrayal are in our blood” (Raffi). * “The end is another beginning” (Baruir Sevag). * “To the poor everyone is generous with advice.” * “Pigs never see the stars.” * “Truth is a language that if not spoken is forgotten” (Hagop Baronian). * “Every Armenian has another Armenian whom he considers his mortal enemy” (Derenik Demirjian). * “You write a hit play the same way that you write a flop” (Saroyan). * “Let us learn to be human by observing animals” (Aramais Sahakian). * “He was a very passionate man. He was an Armenian” (Chekhov). * “You must burn in order to enlighten” (Toumanian). # Q/A ************** If we were introduced to our self as seen by others, would we recognize him? * ONLY IN ARMENIA ******************************* Can you win a political election if you have the personality of a non-person and the charisma of a robot? That question has been answered in Armenia. * THE SOPRANOS *************************** How can a non-Italian like David Chase, creator/writer/producer of THE SOPRANOS, know so much about Italians? The answer: very much like Mario Puzo he is Italian and his real name is DiCesare. For more on the subject see DIFFICULT MEN by Brett Martin (New York. 2013). * THE CASE OF THE DISAPPEARING NOSE *********************************************** In her biography of SAUL STEINBERG (New York, 2012) Deirdre Bair speaks of “Armenian noses, one bigger than the other” (page 355). I once heard one of our political activists say: “Our political parties have played a key role in the preservation of our identity in the Diaspora.” If the case of our disappearing proboscis is an index, they have been doing a lousy job. # ON FAITH ************************* Faith is not what it pretends to be. Faith is an imaginary antidote to imaginary fears. * ANSWERS ********************** To readers who say they don’t always understand my kind of writing, I say what I was told by adults whenever I asked an inconvenient question: “You will find out when you grow up.” * ON BEING TRANSPARENT *********************************** If we are an open book to others, it may be because we brag too much. Only idiots brag about what they don’t have. Smart, progressive, Christian? Don’t make me laugh! * HATRED UNTO DEATH ********************************** In his last book MORTALITY (New York, 2012) the late Christopher Hitchens regrets his early death from cancer because, he writes, he will not have the pleasure of reading “the obituaries of elderly villains like Henry Kissinger and Joseph Ratzinger.” I like that. I prefer honest hatred to dishonest sermons on forgiveness and love. * BAD ADVICE ********************** When told to be more tolerant and positive, I say, I refuse to entertain sentiments I don’t have. In the name of what, may I ask? To flatter the swollen egos of morally bankrupt nonentities? * EMPTY BOAST ******************** “No one understands Turks as well as we do!” Oshagan once bragged. My question is: What did we do with our superior brand of knowledge and understanding except wait until it was too late? # PEZEVENGS (corrected version) ******************************* There is a type of self-assessed “authentic” Armenian, born and raised in the shadow of Mt. Ararat, who views diasporan Armenians with Turkish surnames as second-class citizens or “white niggers” in need of his political and cultural guidance. * Thoroughly stupefied, brainwashed and moronizedby Kremlin propaganda this so-called first-class pure-blooded specimen whose preferred medium is Russian operates on the assumption that the USSR was a more civilized place than the Ottoman Empire and Stalin a morally superior butcher than the Sultan and Talaat. * Therefore, in solidarity with my Dajgahayer (Turkish-Armenian) brothers and sisters I plan to change my surname from Baliozian to Baliozoghlu. #

Sat, Aug 17, 2013 at 7:41 AM 7:41 AM Message starred latest Hide Details From [email protected] To ara baliozian TAVLU **************** As far as I know, none of my critics is an investigative reporter; and I have every reason to suspect most of them are no better than brainwashed ignoramuses like myself whose mantra was: Who the hell do you think you are to question the honesty and wisdom of bishops and benefactors – men of God and capital (make it, Capital and god)? * By the time I could afford to say “There is some shit / I will not eat,” I was no better than a middle-aged wholesale dealer in chauvinist crapola. * I know now that writing for Armenians is a waste of time and our writers – all 599 (or is it 722) of them – have made no difference. I envy Armenian writers who write for an odar audience. Consider Raffi Khachadourian who contributes regularly fascinating essays to the NEW YORKER. His last essay about tavlu was published about a month ago. I did not read it but I suspect millions around the world did. * If only I could convince myself writing about subjects in which Armenians are not even mentioned. But then, in what way writing about tavlu is different from writing about the eternal snows of Ararat or nightingales serenading the moon? * In our environment to survive as a writer is to write not about what you see in broad daylight at high noon but to behave like a blind man in a dark room looking for a black hat that does not exist. I repeat myself? Maybe, but only to those who read everything I write religiously. # PORTRAIT OF AN ARMENIAN ********************************************* Not only is he easily corruptible, he enjoys being corrupted. He considers it a privilege and an honor. He is flattered to be thought of as worthy of corruption. But perhaps I speak of myself as a young man. * I am fully aware of the fact that my status is that of a perennial loser and failure – very much like my people. That may well be why I understand them better than those who make all kinds of absurd claims on their behalf – smart, compassionate, progressive, civilized, generous, law-abiding, lovers of freedom, and so on and so forth. These claims have been made so frequently that they are now taken for granted and anyone who dares to question them is dismissed as “a piece of sh*t who doesn’t have Ararat in his heart.” * When death enters in the final act, it’s a tragedy. In that sense we are all actors in a tragedy even when we think of ourselves as comedians. * If I can write a readable line a day, a good sentence once a month or a quotable line once a year, I am satisfied. # ON TYRANNY ************************ A nation can be victimized by its own corrupt leaders as surely as by an alien tyrant. * ROLE MODELS ************************ My first reaction on reading a line written by an Armenian is to detect its hidden dishonesty. That maybe because respect for truth is not exactly our strong suit. Neither was it to our most recent role models, environments, and masters: Turks, Soviets, the Levant, and America. * FOUR ****************************************** Four Armenian taboo subjects: Dialogue, compromise, consensus, solidarity. Four popular subjects as defined by our political parties and Turcocentric ghazetajis: Turks, Turks, Turks and Turks. * A DEFINITION OF POETRY ************************************ The encounter of two words or ideas that have never met before – this according to an old Indian definition. An example that comes readily to mind: “An Armenian who does not have Ararat in his heart Is a piece of sh*t.” There you have it: the encounter of the purest (eternal snows) and the filthiest (a bad Armenian). #

ON BISHOPS ****************************** To the reader who has compiled a list of bishops who served the nation faithfully and selflessly, I say: There are good men everywhere but they are invariably outnumbered by the bad; and good bishops owe their goodness not to their religion but to their humanity, which is present in all men, including imams, rabbis, gurus, Zen masters, and witch doctors. * ON BEING HONEST *************************** If you decide to be honest in an Armenian environment be prepared to be called pro-Turkish or even the “son of a Turkish wh*re.” I speak from experience. * ON BEING NEGATIVE ***************************** If I emphasize the negative it may be because the negative should be emphasized especially when it’s covered up. * ON WOMEN *********************** Women may be real to other women but to men they are works of fiction. * ON DISAGREEMENT *************************** To those who disagree with me today I say, in such matters what counts is tomorrow and to live without learning is to be brain dead. * THE WORD OF GOD ******************************** The word of God is the word of megalomaniacs and their archetype is Moses. #

ASSERTIONS (MOSTLY AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL) ******************************************** No one can be as stupid as a self-ASSessed smart man in love. * To excel in one thing also means to fail in a thousand others. * Gandhi is right: there are not atheists; only people with different belief systems one of which is based on the non-existence of God. * In the kind of world we live in, corruption and incompetence are not seen as crimes against humanity. If they were, who would escape hanging? * Our leaders have committed so many blunders that their capacity for them must be ascribed to a gift rather than bad judgment. * No need to be afraid of what I say. I could be wrong; and if I am I will be the first to rejoice. * I have behaved like a pig and I have behaved like a human being: I can tell the difference. # IF KARL MARX… ******************************* If Karl Marx had lived in the USSR under Stalin and said he disagreed with Kremlin’s version of Communism he would have been arrested by the KGB and spent the rest of his life in the Gulag. * When fanatics fight it is the moderates who die. * When it comes to self-interest there are no sheep, only wolves. * We gain nothing when we replace the Turkish master with an Armenian master. * I write as I do because I am no longer dependent on the charity of swine. # A LINE FROM MOLIERE *************************************** “Are we among Turks who lock up their women?” * To be too careful may also be a mistake. * Marriage is the best cure for love as suicide is the best antidote for fear of death. * If reason is on our side reality may be against us. That may well be the most important lesson history can teach us. * What doesn’t kill us may make us so sick that we wish we were dead. * We live in a world where good men are persecuted by bad men and where the ignorant behave as if they had a license to kill those who may know better. #

Wednesday, August 07, 2013 ****************************** CHOICES ******************************* To live in the Homeland or in Turkey? Thousands of Armenians today choose Turkey. “Yes im anoush Hayastani!” * The God of Christians is an idol. I didn’t say that. Martin Luther did. * Two of the shortest sayings in the world: “Adam had’em” (microbes) and “Kirk krik” = forty broken (in Turkish). Freely translated “at the age of forty consider yourself half-dead.” * The secret of rewriting consists in deleting. If you can say the same thing in two words, why use three? * I see contradictions everywhere: moral failure in financial success and scratching the bottom in reaching the top. * Was the beginning of our cosmos the end of another? Does God recycle? * Two kinds of readers: the few who insult me anonymously and the many who ignore me. * Very often in life our choices are not between the good and the bad but between the bad and the worse, or between the worse and the worst. # FORGIVE MY FRENCH ********************************* My favorite political joke consists of a brief exchange between a speechifying Republican presidential candidate and a heckler. HECKLER: My grandfather was a Democrat; my father was a Democrat; I am a Democrat. CANDIDATE: If your grandfather were a jackass and your father were a jackass, what would you be? HECKLER: A Republican! * In the eyes of some we, all of us, are no better than jackasses. I speak from experience. Recently I was myself called “a piece of sh*t” by a committed patriot who spoke in the name of the eternal snows of Mt. Ararat. * Like all ideologies and belief systems, patriotism too is an instrument of deception whose aim is to divide, exploit, and deceive dupes. * The key to life is cooperation. If we are alive now it’s because of countless atoms in our body cooperating with one another. Let one of them deviate from its path and the result would be catastrophic illness and death. * As a nation we continue to be led by individuals who have consistently deviated from the right path by dividing us in the name of this or that ideology or belief system. In their eyes we may well be no better than jackasses who will believe everything they are told. * Some day in the near or distant future a historian may be justified in describing us as a nation of jackasses led by sh*ts – if you will forgive my French. # CONTRADICTIONS (IV) *********************************** Kipling: “When you know what you can do, do something else.” * What if what you do or say does not even register on anyone’s consciousness? What if nothing changes and when on those rare occasions something does change, the change is more likely to be for the worse. * I see contradictions everywhere. * The most important decisions in our lives are made behind closed doors. * The aristocracy does not work. Work is for the working classes. What the aristocracy does is create an educational system that promotes the importance of work. * If exploitation and thievery are both legal and profitable and if the 99% are more than willing to work for minimum wage, why deprive them of the privilege? * What if we have created an environment in which only liars and bloodsuckers prosper? * I see contradictions everywhere. Readers who demand a positive approach to our affairs blabber endless about massacres and genocide recognition. And consider our Turcocentric ghazetajis: the offspring of revolutionaries who promised heaven and delivered hall; and now they promise justice provided of course the 99% support their efforts financially. Mi kich pogh oughargetsek. * Samuel Johnson: “I can give you reasons; I can’t give you understanding.” I should like to see an Armenian writer producing such a line. # “C” POWER ************************* Louis B. Mayer on Ava Gardner: “She has cunt power.” (Mayer of Metro Goldwyn Mayer fame: no doubt an expert on the subject – he probably had more women in his stable than the last sultan had concubines in his harem). * Edmund Wilson on Saroyan: “…an agreeable mixture of San Francisco bonhomie and Armenian Christianity.” In what way is Armenian Christianity different from Gringo or Negro Christianity? I don’t know. I suspect neither does Wilson. * Armenians are smart but easily moronized. But then so is the rest of mankind. It is not that I have a low opinion of my fellow men; rather, I am beginning to see them through women’s eyes and think “Men are so stupid!” – especially when it comes to women’s “C” power. * Leonard Bernstein: “Love brings on tears.” Now I know why Bach’s Cello Suites make me cry. #

Saturday, August 03, 2013 ***************************************** OLD WOUNDS *************************** Smart Armenians give up on their fellow Armenians at an early age, but, in Saroyan’s words, “mothers hang in forever.” * I don’t take myself seriously except when I quote or paraphrase better men than myself, if you know what I am saying… * Since I never made more than minimum wage I cannot be accused of exploiting anyone; and yet, I have been called a capitalist by some of my detractors probably because I don’t allow my income bracket to determine my writing style. * The overwhelming majority of regimes today, including the most advanced, civilized democracies are either corrupt or incompetent or both; and the overwhelming majority of people are either dupes or greedy for either money or power and probably both. I am reminded of Southern rednecks who used to deliver speeches in praise of “Anglo-Saxon democracy” and against “Jews, Catholics and niggers.” Old wounds or new cancer? # GRANDMASTERS OF THE BLAME GAME ************************************************* In the Decalogue of our leadership there is only one commandment repeated ten times: “Thou shalt not assume responsibility.” * If you can blame it on bloodthirsty Asiatic barbarians or the degenerate West or even our mountains and rivers and Almighty God Himself, why plead guilty as charged? * Who in his right mind would be against one nation under God? The answer must be obvious: the opposition! * Because I write against dividers I am myself accused of dividing the nation. How? Why? Elementary my dear Watson. I am a divider because I divide the nation between deceivers and dupes. * To be a good writer, I am told, means to see the good in everyone, including irresponsible idiots who recycle propaganda and see moral victory in military defeat. * A member of the Party, very much like a theologian, is brainwashed to believe his God is the only true God and all others are in cahoots with the Devil. If you believe that, consider yourself a certified moron, and if saying so is a crime against humanity, I plead guilty as charged. # WHERE I STAND **************************** The only way to survive as a writer in our environment is by writing what someone else wants you to write. The only way to become a best-seller in America is by writing what everyone wants to read. I want to achieve popularity by writing what no one wants to read. Figure that one out if you can. * In his youth Thomas Mann was a nationalist; so was Dostoevsky in his old age. Nabokov was different: he didn’t give a damn about czars, commissars, Mother Russia and the Orthodox Church. But then he went to the other extreme: he supported McCarthy in America and the war in Vietnam. * Sartre loathed the French bourgeoisie to such a degree that he supported Stalin, Mao and Castro. It takes all kinds. * As children we are shaped by propaganda – that is to say, lies. As adults some of us become aware of this fact. Many others never do. * Political parties win elections not because they know better but because they are superior liars and organizers. That’s the only way to explain the victory of Stalinists in Russia and fascists in Germany, Italy, Spain and many other countries. * I don’t write as a writer. I write as a layman who is on the side of victims even when they happen to be writers with bad ideas. * When not systematically slaughtered by our enemies, our writers were ignored, insults, starved, and betrayed by our own ruling classes and the indifference of the people. * As you can see, I don’t happen to be one who is easily infatuated by my fellow men even when they happen to be my “brothers.” #

Sunday, July 28, 2013 ************************************ DIARY ******************** Because our youth in the Homeland was galvanized by petty cash, some thought that cause for celebration. As a skeptic with a touch of pessimism in all things Armenian, all I am prepared to say is, “Inshallah!” * I have no reason to trust Turkish or Azeri patriotism. Neither do I trust American, German, or Russian patriotism. Now then, tell me please, why should I trust Armenian patriotism? * One good thing about old age: the end can’t be too far and the end of a bad thing is bound to be good. * Muslims don’t respect one another but they are unanimous in demanding the respect of the world, including and above all the respect of infidels. Are we different? # NEXT DAY ************************ On Armenian TV today an interview with a community leader from Greece named Kurdoghlian – probably Kurdoghlanian (literally son of a Kurd). * Question: Will we ever know how many of our community leaders are odars or even Turks (according to one of our elder statesmen) who speak Armenian fluently? Please note that I have nothing against odars. As an Armenian I am even flattered that some of them choose to work for us. Unless of course the only reason they do so is that the pay is good; or as a community we are too ignorant, backward, and naïve to tell the difference between a good leader and one that is both corrupt and incompetent in addition to being a habitual and compulsive liar. * 11th COMMANDMENT ********************************** “Thou shalt not look up to dividers for moral and political guidance.” * ON EXPLANATIONS ****************************** We say an explanation makes sense only when it runs parallel to our limitations and prejudices. # REFLECTIONS ********************************** Blunders are not planned. They are more like unintended consequences of our ignorance, inaudible echoes of our limitations, and invisible reflections of our stupidity and arrogance. * The biggest mistake we make is to assume that man is a reasonable being. In reality Homo sapiens is less sapiens and more ignoramus. * The rotten apple false. Time is the true revolutionary. But unlike Chopin’s Etude, its tempo is Adagio molto. * I criticize myself in others. * The function of literature is to say what everyone suspects to be true. # FROM MY NOTEBOOKS ******************************************* To stand on your own feet does not mean to step on someone else’s throat. * Old age: not a confrontation but a siege. * If luck is on your side even your liabilities become assets. * My first job at the age of seven or eight was that of an apprentice to a blacksmith in the neighborhood. I didn’t think of it as work. I even looked forward to it. * To be a Romanian, according to Saul Steinberg, means to “carry a curse, the place from which you come, we carry it inside us. It doesn’t heal easily. Maybe never.” * The astonishing ease with which we make false assumptions about ideas, people, oneself. Every devout believer is convinced anyone who does not share his belief is wrong, maybe even in cahoots with the devil. * An academic once tried to explain to me why a poem by Hardy was a masterpiece. I felt as though I was being taught a new language. * In the last pages of Richard Burrton’s diary many entries consist of a single word: “Booze…” At one point he writes: “Both Elizabeth’s and my manners are appalling…” * When asked what he reads, Glenn Gould is said to have replied: “Everything by Thomas Mann, Kafka, and the Russians…” #

Thursday, July 25, 2013 ********************************** NOTES & COMMENTS ********************************** “You are not an Armenian writer!” I consider that a compliment. I don’t write as an Armenian. I write as a human being. There is no merit in being a member of an exclusive club at the expense of your humanity. * As a child I was exposed to many lectures on obedience and respect, but I don’t remember a single occasion in which subservience was mentioned. * If only I could count the number of times I should have said nothing instead of saying the wrong thing. * I am suspicious of men say “I know” more often than “I don’t know.” * The only time I feel sure about my moral stance is when I act against my own interests. * Nobody can be as free as a nobody. The higher you rise, the heavier the chains. * We have no choice but to admit that we have played a central role in our history – in our defeats (countless) as well as victories (very few), in our tragedies (without number) as well we comedies (one or at most two). # HAVE I SAID THIS BEFORE? ***************************************** “You repeat yourself.” “And you are an idiot.” “Why am I an idiot?” “Because you waste your time reading someone who says the same thing over and over again.” “I thought I was being helpful.” “You want to be helpful? Say that to our speechifiers and sermonizers.” “Say what?” “You repeat yourself.” * HE REPEATED HIMSELF ********************************** A headline in a French magazine: “The Zen Master was a serial killer.” Further down: “What’s the number of his victims? Hard to say. There are new revelations every day.” * EITHER/OR ********************* Solidarity is not our forte. Either that or we have a highly developed sense of mutual disapproval. * ON BAD MARRIAGES ******************************* Blame neither the man nor the woman. Blame instead the games nature (or the irresistible urge to procreate) plays on both. * THE CONSOLATIONS OF MEDIOCRITY *********************************************** “Like Shakespeare, Bach, and Vermeer, he was not much prized by his contemporaries.” # ON A REVOLTING DEVELOPMENT ************************************ My worst enemies are former best friends. You will surprise me if you say you are surprised. * ON MORAL SUPERIORITY ******************************* Have you ever heard a morally superior man brag about his moral superiority? No, of course not! It never happens. Only pimps and shits brag about their moral superiority. Something similar could be said of patriotism. Whenever an Armenian brags about the superior brand of his patriotism I know his next move will be to crap on me – in the name of patriotism, of course! * THEM & US ************************************** If you can’t brainwash them, silence them. If you can silence them, why reason with them? If they are silenced, who will listen to them? #

Thursday, July 18, 2013 *************************************** ON WRITERS AND WRITING ********************************** It has been observed that one of the most frequently used words in the Armenian language is “kidem” (I know). There is very little that an Armenian doesn’t know and that little cannot be worth knowing. * The average Armenian (assuming such a creature exists) has nothing but contempt for writers except when he decided to be one himself. * The ambition of every Armenian writer is to become famous in the odar world; as for being famous among Armenians: Who in his right mind would want to be a target of verbal abuse, betrayal, starvation, and an early death? * Style is being yourself provided of course you know who you are and where you are going. * If you read me because you want to feel proud as an Armenian, you’ve got the wrong man. You want pride? Read Charents and ignore his killers. * To write means to introduce meaning into countless fragments of reality. No one can do justice to all the fragments if only because only God knows all of them. * I know where I am going; I also know most of my readers don’t want to go there because it is against their religion, and their religion is a watered down cocktail of phony patriotism and verbal piety with very little alcoholic content. # NOTES & COMMENTS ************************************ Our environment, the very environment we have created, can church out only unprincipled mediocrities. If you want to achieve excellence you have no choice but to work in an alien environment. * When I was young and happy, I wanted to be happier because I thought I deserved better or so I liked to believe. But gradually I learned that happiness, true happiness, means coming to terms with one’s misery. * Our genocide in the Ottoman Empire had a beginning and an end. The moral collapse of our leadership has neither. What it has instead is a millennial history of gradual decline and degeneration with no end in sight. # FF ****************************** When two dissimilar intellects separated by time and space agree on an idea, it is safe to assume that there must be some truth in it. * Case in point: Tolstoy: “The higher I rise in the opinion of others, the lower I sink in my own.” * Saint-Simon: “My self-esteem has always increased in direct proportion to the damage I was doing to my reputation.” * In today’s parlance: “F*ck fame!” #

Wednesday, July 17, 2013 ******************************* Q/A *************************** Q: What do Christians, Muslims, Nazis and Stalinists have in common? A: Their most cherished ideas – ideas for which they have killed and died – are propaganda. What they think to be more real than reality itself is pure fiction. Their greatest truths are big lies. This is not an opinion on my part. This is what they themselves believe about one another. * The greatest offenses against God and men are inflicted with total lack of awareness. * Warning: Be aware of what you believe in: it may kill you. # DIARY ************************ Two new books of conversations – my favorite genre – with Orson Welles and Ava Gardner. The only book by Goethe that I enjoyed reading is his CONVERSATIONS WITH ECKERMANN. * In life when the predictable happens it does so in an unpredictable manner. * Turcocentrism is our present opium. * Silenced by rabbis, Jesus brought forth the papacy and the Dark Ages. All actions have unintended consequences. * I have never killed anyone. That doesn’t mean I don’t harbor a cold-blooded killer within me. * Am I right or wrong? Or rather: What if I am right? * If I lied it’s because I was a dupe of lies. * If I can write a single readable line a day, I am satisfied. * We don’t have critics. What we have are hirelings writing in defense of their source of income. # OBSERVATIONS ***************************** Like Pollyanna I like to see the best in the worst. Revolutions? When the men at the top start killing one another it can’t be all bad. * When a million people believe in the same lie they build a cathedral to prove its truth. * The best argument against nationalism is not even an argument but a simple statement of fact: “I only know the skin of the earth, And that it has no name” (Pablo Neruda). * There is nothing new under the sun. Neither is there anything new in what I have been saying. And yet, some of my readers like to pretend otherwise. * Our leaders have been wrong so consistently and for such a long time that it must be ascribed to some kind of special gift rather than a failing or a vice. # FROM MY NOTEBOOKS ********************************* God and religion are here to stay? So are understanding, tolerance, and men who place doubt above the certainty of dogmas. * Role models? I didn’t have any. All my role models were negative – I didn’t want to be like them. * “Some day I will write a book on the subject and prove you wrong.” An Armenian will say anything to win an argument. * A faithful member of the Party: ” What you say is wrong. We believe in free speech. None of my articles has ever been rejected or altered.” * A self-assessed smart Armenian is an idiot. * About the 1%: creating or killing jobs is not their central concern. Money is. * When I was a fascist I didn’t know I was one. * Persian saying: “It is better to be in chains with friends than in a garden with strangers.” #

Saturday, July 13, 2013 **************************************** GOOD NEWS ******************** The good news is: silencing dissent is no longer as easy as it used to be. * THE RIGHT QUESTION ********************************* When something goes wrong, I no longer ask “Who is to blame?” but what was my contribution. * FREEDOM ********************* Freedom is overrated by slaves. Consider what we have been doing with ours. * LINES ******************** There is a line that divides knowledge from ignorance, and the line is invisible. Whenever a line is invisible men will imagine they can see it because they have 20/20 vision. * MEN AND WOMEN ******************************** Some men are more like women and some women are more like men. Or, as the Turkish saying has it: “Among ten men nine are sure to be women.” Beware of men who stress their masculinity and women who rely too much on their femininity: they are up to no good. # FORGIVE MY FRENCH *********************************** “Morsi was democratically elected.” He was, yes, to be a servant of the people, all the people and not a fraction of it that tends to view all others as heretics and infidels, that is to say, the lowest scum on earth. * And speaking of scum: to be democratically elected does not mean to have a license to amass a fortune by means of thievery. * During World War II the French called Petain, their head of state, “putin,” or is it “putain” (forgive my French) because he collaborated with Hitler. * As long as our bishops enjoy the support of a benefucktor why should they give a damn about the collection plate? And as long as our “Putains”enjoy Putin’s support, why should they give a damn about serving the people? # EXPLANATIONS ******************************** If you decide that the men at the top can be trusted because they know better, you have no choice but to believe that even when they lie, cheat, and steal they do so for your own good. * Speaking of misplaced trust and the men at the top: Not only did they slaughter indiscriminately they also wanted to collect the insurance money. They thought they could fool odars as easily as they had fooled Armenians for centuries. * To a politician, ideas can be useful only in so far as they can be exploited as effective tools of deception. * It is myself that I criticize in others. What I really say is: I was there once and I was dead wrong. If I have lived long enough to tell the tale It may be because I am just about the luckiest man on earth. I have no other explanation. #

Wednesday, July 10, 2013 *************************************** CONFESSIONS ************************** Whenever I am told I am a disgrace to the nation, I think: what if it’s the other way around? * Only a patriot with the IQ of a jackass identifies the Homeland with the regime. * Writing has nothing to do with patriotism and everything to do with objectivity; in the same way that what a politician says has nothing to do with the truth and everything to do with propaganda. * Before making an assertion consider its contradiction, yoou may see more truth there. * Do not repeat what you were taught as a child: remember your schoolteacher had a family to support. * “A dog knows his master but not his master’s master.” * If you think I write as I do because I am some kind of daydreaming eccentric with illusions of grandeur, I say: ever since I came to terms with my own mediocrity, I write with greater freedom. That’s the only difference between me and other writers and me. # REALITY VERSUS FANTASY ***************************************** Sooner or later all belief systems and ideologies fall into the hands of cynical manipulators, opportunists, power-hungry mediocrities and their assorted dupes who at all times and everywhere outnumber decent human beings who can think for themselves. * The history of Christianity was written not by Christ and his Apostles but by Popes and Martin Luther (“a wild boar” in the words of a contemporary pope). * The history of nationalism was written not by Mazzini but by the likes of Mussolini, Franco, and Hitler. * The history of the British Empire was written not by “gentlemen” but by “shopkeepers” (Napoleon). * Had Marx foreseen the Gulag, my guess is he would have burned DAS KAPITAL. * To speak of religion and ideologies and to emphasize the role of their founders at the expense of their successors is to engage in high-altitude thinking, that is to say, to inhabit a world of abstractions, fantasy, and propaganda. # WINNERS AND LOSERS ************************************* In a jungle documentary on TV I saw nine lions attacking a buffalo and devouring it even as it was defending itself. It made me think of the medieval Armenian heresy – the Paulicians I think – who believed the world was created not by God but the Devil. If I am not mistaken, the foremost authority on this heresy is an Armenian who is quoted frequently in Toynbee big book, CONSTANTINE PORPHYROGENITUS. * If you speak the truth, liars will conspire against you. To remain silent when liars conspire against you amounts to joining their conspiracy. * Pirandello: “If you confront a man with his own image, there will arise a crisis.” It follows; understanding oneself cannot be a pleasant experience. Which is why most people are dupes who prefer to live in a world of lies; and if the lie is delivered by a king or pope, or for that matter, boss, bishop or benefactor, and contradicted by a scribbler who can’t make ends meet, guess who will be the winner or loser. # PROBLEMS (XXXII) *********************************** Our main problem is not “brainless leaders” (Avedik Issahakian) but brainless leaders who have been brainwashed to believe they are the brains of the people. * Happy is the man who believes he cannot be contradicted – also a damn fool. * Charles Peguy: “Fame potentially is the dictatorship of reputation and therefore always potentially impure.” Which is why I prefer to be just an honest witness with a name that has the double demerit of being difficult to remember and pronounce, and identified me as someone who (to quote a good friend) bears a Turkish “damgha” (seal). Or even better – as a reader from the Homeland once put it: “Baliozoghlu, you are no better than a piece of shit.” * You may gather by now that our Sovietized brothers and sisters don’t like to stand on ceremony. In their eyes we of the Diaspora might as well be white trash (“aghber”). * But then, nobody ever said to be an honest Armenian comes without a price. To console myself I remember an often repeated Hollywood phrase: “It may be shit but it has integrity.” #

Thursday, July 04, 2013 *************************************** AS I SEE IT ************************* Can there be such a thing as an honest capitalist in the eyes of a Marxist? Or a good infidel in the eyes of a Muslim? Or a good Armenian in the eyes of another Armenian? * Kemal was smart: he knew he could count on the ignorance and stupidity of the average Turk. Our bosses, bishops, and benefactors are smart too… * Atheists are not born but made and what makes them is the arrogance, intolerance, and cruelty of men who speak in the name of God. * The enemy within is invincible. * “Homo homini lupus” (man is wolf to men). What is an Armenian to another Armenian? A lamb? * The Turks were smart: they knew they could get away with murder. We were dumb: we thought they wouldn’t dare! # ON POETS ******************************* In a recent issue of the NEW YORKER, that until recently consistently refused to print profanities, I read the following exchange: “You asshole,” she snarled. “You’re the asshole,” I said. “I hate you.” “Ditto,” I said. “Ditto and square it.” Because I favor short lines some readers think I am a poet. I am not! I don’t remember to have ever written a single line about nightingales serenading the moon or the eternal snows of Mount Ararat. Not my style. * As a failure I write about failures. It tales one to know one. And I don’t write. I snarl! * And speaking of poets: In Armenian-American parlance poets are referred to as vodanavorjis. # SPEAKING FOR MYSELF ********************************** The 1% may know better but when they are wrong they are catastrophically wrong – universal bankruptcy, wars, massacres, genocides… * I have more critics than a dog has fleas. I like to reply to all of them including the contemptible ones. But I draw a line to those who are beneath contempt. * In the first one-third of my life I was mostly busy committing blunders. In the second, I tried very hard not to repeat them. And in the final third my main concern is coming to terms with my mortality. As for saving the nation: I leave that to our dime-a-dozen pundits with Napoleonic ambitions. * If I can make a nuisance of myself to a handful of readers, I ask for nothing more. Now then, go ahead and call me a megalomaniacal daydreamer. #

Sunday, June 30, 2013 ************************************** STATUS QUO *************************** All dupes are brainwashed to trust the judgment of their superiors even when their superiors happen to be the worst scum on earth. * The world is at the mercy of bloodthirsty cannibals who like to parade as peace-loving vegetarians. * Genocides come in all sizes, shapes and colors, including red, blue and orange. * The fist thing tyrants do is confiscate the idea of patriotism and call everyone who opposes them unpatriotic. * Once oppressed always an oppressor. Once a dupe always a brainwasher. You take it when you have no choice. You dish it out the first chance you get. # FROM MY NOTEBOOKS ********************************** When asked which side you support, always say (to quote a good friend of mine) “I am with the good guys.” * Nobody ever warned me that the right path may also lead to a dead end. * I write therefore I learn. * Every belief or ideological system produces its share of academics. Grub is better than no grub. * I write to share my anger. * Bishops, imams, and rabbis: you either believe in all of them or none. To choose one and reject the others amounts to say “I refuse to think for myself; I prefer to be a dupe of propaganda.” # YOU WANT A FRIEND? ****************************************** It has been said that it takes five generations to produce an English gentleman. It took more than two thousand years to produce the average Armenian wheeler-dealer and his dupes… You may now draw your own conclusions. * Armenian identity is like a layer cake whose bottom layer is shrouded in mystery and whose top layer is more Ottoman and Soviet than Armenian. * For 1500 years our writers – from Khorenatsi and Yeghishe (5th century AD) to our own days (Zarian and Massikian) have exposed the corruption and incompetence of our political and religious wheeler-dealers with the result that they are more corrupt, incompetent and divided than at any other time in our history. What does that tell you about Armenian contempt for selfless intellectual labor? * As they say in Washington: “You want a friend? Get a dog!” # NOTES AND COMMENTS ************************************** A dupe is a dupe regardless of nationality, ideology and religion. Kemal’s dupe and Stalin’s dupe might as well be twins. Now then, go ahead and say Armenians are smarter than Turks. * Our history in a nutshell: We owe our misfortunes to enemy action – beginning with the enemy within. * Worth remembering: All orthodoxies, heresies and divisions in general are conceived by the 1%. * I have lost many friends but I have never lost a single enemy. * All belief systems have a ready answer for every possible question, a plausible explanation for every objection, and a counter-argument for every argument – just like Jehovah’s Witnesses. #

Thursday, June 27, 2013 ********************************* FROM THE DIARY OF A NOBODY ***************************************** My ambition, my real ambition in life is to introduce humor in hell. * Armenians have a legal mind: they never ask a question whose answer they don’t already know. An Armenian in search of wisdom is like a Greek bearing gifts. * Confronted by total annihilation men may learn to co-exist. As for Armenians: I am not sure about them. After all, every rule must have its exceptions. * I was asked once to translate the diary of an unknown and unpublished writer on the grounds that “he could be another Shakespeare.” * On another occasion I was asked to translate a poem on the grounds that after reading it a friend of the family had said: “This should be translated!” # IF ********* If you say Turks are the scum of the earth, I ask: What’s the difference between them and the rest of the world? * If you say there is nothing wrong in hating a bad writer who spreads lies, I ask: What about incompetent leaders who lead the nation to genocide? * Why does the average smart Armenian allow himself to be brainwashed by charlatans? The obvious answer must be: Because it allows him to live in a fantasy world wherein (a) Armenians are the good guys, (b) They are God’s chosen, and © their military defeats are moral victories. * Am I saying anything you don’t already know? * Armenians in the Ottoman Empire and the USSR: they remind me of myself as a child when I respected no one and feared everyone. # IT BEARS REPEATING ********************************** They call me negative because my favorite subject is not massacres. * Everything I say to my fellow Armenians, American, French, English, German, and Russian writers have said about their fellow countrymen. * Mankind has been and continues to be at the mercy of hoodlums – Goebbels not Goethe, Hitler not Hesse, Richard III not Shakespeare, Stalin not Solzhenitsyn. * In the eyes of their contemporaries neither Socrates nor Jesus were successes. I wonder how many Greek mothers were overheard saying to their sons, “Behave! Do you want to end up like Socrates?” And Jewish mothers… * Never speak kindly of yourself: no one will believe you. * Why do I write as I do? The answer must be: Because I am no longer dependent on the charity of swine. #

Wednesday, June 26, 2013 ********************************** ON EDUCATION ************************ Those who control our educational system do so not because they support learning but because they want to cover up the nefarious role they have played in our decline as a nation. They are as hungry for knowledge and understanding as sultans and commissars. * I share my understanding; they share their propaganda. They identify themselves as patriots and me as a traitor. * Q: Can someone with the moral compass of an ape and the charisma of a robot win a democratic election? A: Yes, of course! Q: Where? A: Armenia. * If you don’t know where to begin, the end is as good a place as any. # SNAFULAND *************************** What does the Homeland share with the Diaspora? In both dissidents are rejected and brown-nosers prosper. * Consider what happened to Greeks and Jews after they rejected Socrates and Jesus respectively. A nation that rejects its critics digs its own grave. Nothing new in that. Americans have a word for it: Snafu, meaning “Situation Normal All F***ed up.” * Far from being the best and the brightest, ruling classes are more representative of the lowest common denominator. * Individuals may learn but mankind as a whole – judging by the number of present conflicts, wars, and related atrocities – seems to be immune to instruction. We are all citizens of Snafuland. # PLUTOCRACY ******************************** Success, real success, means total and uncompromising contempt for success as defined by failures. * Overheard on the radio early this morning: “From a market economy we have become a market society. In California today if you don’t like your prison cell you can get hotel-style accommodations for $90 a day.” * Which one of our political bosses today is not a millionaire or the hireling of one? What happened to the generation of Nikol Aghbalian, Rouben Der Minassian, Ohandjanian, Vratsian, Aharonian? How could they vanish without leaving a trace? # AM I RIGHT OR WRONG? ************************************** Or rather: Am I moving in the right or wrong direction? I suspect I am moving in the right direction when I think the opposite of what I was taught as a child. Allow me to explain. When the educational system of a nation (also known as its brainwashing apparatus) agrees with its political system (that claims to have a single aim in life, namely, the welfare of the people) I have no choice but to agree with Hamlet’s verdict – there must be “something rotten in the State of Denmark.” * MEN AND WOMEN ************************* The Fall of Man and to fall in love: in both instances the main characters are a man and a woman; or, in the words of Anonymous, an old wise man who is never or very seldom wrong: “Men and women, women and men: it will never work.” #

Thursday, June 20, 2013 ************************************** DEMOCRACY ***************************** In my formative years I don’t remember anyone remotely interested in explaining to me the difference between democracy and fascism; and I am no longer surprised when a reader demands to know what’s so great about democracy. * When those in power forget they are servants of the people, abuse of power and fascism become inevitable. * Knowledge is power, we are told. What we are not told is that individual knowledge is powerless against collective ignorance. * I don’t hate my enemies as much as I hate myself for allowing them to intimidate me. * Not to be able to read between the lines is also a symptom of illiteracy. # EASIER SAID THAN DONE *************************************** We are a nation of dreamers – make it daydreamers. We brag about being survivors even as we are experiencing two “white” genocides (exodus and assimilation). * “The Jews survived,” an elder statesman once informed me, “because of their Book. We need such a book and I am writing it.” He sent me a few fragments which I could not finish reading. * To explain their financial bankruptcy a Mekhitarist monk once said to me: “We were deceived.” They were deceiver because they were promised great wealth. All they had to do, they were told, was liquidate their assets and invest the cash in the stock market. Blinded by greed it never even occurred to them to suspect their financial advisers were a criminal gang. * I once wrote a short story that began with the words: “When I first read a Sherlock Holmes story, I wanted to be a detective. When I first heard a Rossini overture I decided to be a composer. When I saw Marlon Brando in ON THE WATERFRONT I wanted to be an actor. When I read Casanova’s MEMOIRS….” * What happened to my daydreams? Who and what am I today? The answer: Not just a scribbler but an Armenian scribbler, that is to say, the lowest form of animal life. # THINGS TO REMEMBER *********************************** Mankind: a collection of nobodies at the mercy of misguided fools. * Learn to read between the lines – that’s where the money is. * Success is a trap. Failure a challenge. Treat a success story as you would treat a warning. * Decisions are based on what is known and predictable; but it is the unknown, the unknowable and the unpredictable that conspire to bite your ass. * To be lucky means to knock on the wrong door and to have the right man answer it. To be unlucky means to rely on luck. * A Turkish scholar once informed me that as an Armenian I was in no position to be objective about a great man like Talaat. * The central function of politics is to brainwash fools to believe they are smart. #

Wednesday, June 19, 2013 ************************************* QUESTIONS WE NEVER ASK *************************************** Baronian and Odian: were they patriotic Armenians? What about Baruir Massikian when he saw more merit in a Cairo bordello than in our own institutions? What about Zarian when he said our political parties have been of no political use to us? Why is it that politicians, even when they are pathological liars and mass murderers like Hitler and Stalin identify themselves as great patriots? Why is it that we equate patriotism with blindness? A final question: What is the most frequently misunderstood and abused word in the world? * Moral: Next time you hear one of our speechifiers use that word, start counting your spoons. # POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE ************************************* “To emphasize the positive is better,” I am reminded once in a while by concerned readers. To identify those who poison the well: if there is a positive way of doing that I am all ears. * ACADEMICS ********************* Where there are academics there will be two schools of thought. Case in point: “Under capitalism man exploits man. Under communism it’s the other way around.” * Trust an academic’s judgment as much as you would trust the judgment of a religion or political leader who speaks in defense of his belief system or ideology – that is to say, his power, prestige, and source of income, not necessarily in that order. * SPEAKING FOR MYSELF ********************************* To paraphrase Socrates again: No one will ever accuse me of speaking in defense of my source of income for the simple reason that it has never exceeded minimum wage. None of our national benefactors has ever said to me what one of them is quoted as having said to one of our distinguished educators and poets: “I hire and fire people like you every day.” # THEN AND NOW **************************** As a child I thought words meant what they said. I now suspect they mean the opposite. * What is justice? It depends on who is in charge of dispensing it. * I write as I do not because I know better but because I got tired of saying “Yes, sir!” to idiots. * To make a comfortable living by exploiting someone else’s crucifixion or massacre: What a racket! * There are two kinds of people: Armenians and odars and I feel alien in the company of both. # GUILTY ************************** Unlike Turks we are not guilty of committing and covering up genocide. We are, however, guilty of placing our trust in a leadership so incompetent that, in the words of a friend, “cannot even lead a dog to the nearest fire hydrant or catch a flu bug in an epidemic.” * If incompetence were a crime against humanity how many of our leaders would escape hanging? #

Thursday, June 13, 2013 ************************************** DIALOGUE *********************** Dialogue: I am all for it; but not with a closed mind, or a self-righteous fanatic, or a member of the party (it makes no difference which party), or a bully who believes the word compromise is for the weak and the unprincipled: in short, an Armenian. * There is a type of reader – and I have had several of them myself – who begins by saying “I read everything you write,” and ends by saying “You are a disgrace to the nation.” * There are two schools of thought: the first says “We need critics,” and the second: “The only good critic is a dead critic.” Did I say two schools? Make it one. * I am a slow-learner. It took me many years to realize that you cannot argue against a propaganda line. # A NOTE ON OUR PARTISANS AND PANCHOONIES ********************************* “We have played a key role in the preservation of our identity and culture in the Diaspora,” I heard one of our speechifiers saying. They brag a lot -- our partisans and panchoonies; they lie a lot too. I should like to hear at least one of them saying they have also alienated a few. * I once received a letter from one of our political parties that said in effect they will support me provided I first write a series of profiles of their leaders. In my reply I said that I was not qualified to do that job because I didn’t even know who their leaders were. I should have added, neither did I care to make their acquaintance. # AS I SEE IT ************************* If you say “God is on my side,” God is sure to withdraw His support. * What is our unspoken policy towards writers? Treat them like shit until they come to terms with reality. * Nothing in life happens the way things happen in books and movies. * Being an Armenian is a rare privilege, or so I was brought up to believe, until I realized it is closer to being a nightmare. * All wars need Big Lies, so do all divisions. * We are a failed nation at the mercy of a failed regime run by former KGB agents. Enjoy! #

Sunday, June 09, 2013 ************************************ MONKEY BUSINESS ****************************** One does not have to be a prophet to engage in prophecy. All one has to do is adopt the past as one’s guide – that is to say, reality, facts, history as opposed to wishful thinking, illusions, and daydreams. * Raffi Hovannisian lost not because he did not enjoy majority support but because the oligarchs controlled the bureaucracy. We will rise against the oligarchs only after the Russians themselves do so. In the meantime all attempts at reform and revolution are doomed to failure. They are doomed to failure because we are essentially a nation of slaves. Raffi (not Hovannisian but Hagop Meliq-Hagopian) was absolutely right when he said “Treason and betrayal are in our blood.” So is subservience. In the Homeland we are subservient to the Kremlin; in the Diaspora to our bosses, bishops, and benefactors. * Our revolutionaries are not revolutionaries. They never were. They rose against the Sultan only when the Turks themselves did so and only when they relied on the verbal support of the West. There is an academic word for this kind of conduct, it’s called mimesis – in common parlance, monkey business. * We may have a better chance to understand ourselves if we study apes. The alternative approach is to place our trust and our destiny into the hands of bloodsuckers, speechifiers, and sermonizers, that is to say compulsive and habitual liars. * Speaking for myself, I would have more trust in an ape; at least an ape is less prone to engage in double-talk, deception, and betrayal. # IN PRAISE OF BEING FALLIBLE ******************************* “You are not always right,” a reader informs me. To be always right has never been one of my ambitions. As a matter of fact, if I had a choice between being always right and being always wrong I would choose being wrong if only because being always right would place me in the same category as some of the worst charlatans, bullies, and mass killers in the history of mankind. * Even when dead wrong, however, I like to believe I never deliberately mislead my readers or exploit their limitations by recycling a propaganda line or speaking in defense of a power structure or regime. How many of our bosses, bishops, and benefactors can say as much? * A good friend of mine once said to me: “I agree with you but I don’t say so in public because they may think you have brainwashed me.” But I am not in a position to brainwash anyone if only because I don’t write for children who cannot yet think for themselves. I write for adults who are free to reject what I say whenever they disagree with me. Neither do I subscribe to a specific ideology or belief system that happens to be my main source of income, prestige, or power. I operate more like a solitary voice in the wilderness and, in the words of Socrates, “My poverty is proof of my honesty.” # SITUATION / SHITUATION **************************************** The higher a man rises the bigger the size of his blunders. How many dared to say to Stalin “You are wrong” and lived to tell the tale? Closer to home: How many have dared to say to our bosses, bishops, and benefactors, “By dividing the community you dig its grave”? * Infallible men are not born but made and what makes them are dupes, cowards, and “yes men” afraid to say the emperor has no clothes, no brain, and no balls. * In the USSR they said Stalin was wrong only after he dropped dead and was buried. “Bishops are men of God,” I was informed by a reader once. “You should speak of them with greater respect.” If bishops are men of God, bosses source of power and prestige, and benefactors sources of income, that only means our own mini-sultans and neo-commissars continue to live, rule, and scare the shit out of anyone who dares to question their wisdom, integrity, honesty, dedication, patriotism, infallibility, and statesmanship. “Mart bidi ch’ellank!” # THE HUMAN CONDITION *********************************** Honest men: do they exist? I am not sure. I would define an honest man as one who has not yet been exposed as a crook. * From Roman emperors to Ottoman sultans – mankind has been at the mercy of ruthless crooks and pathological liars. Has anything changed? * If Zohrab was taken in by Talaat and Stalin by Hitler, can anyone claim to be immune to propaganda? * If we are smart, why do we consent to be subservient to a political leader with the moral compass of an ape and the charisma of a robot? Are North Koreans, Syrians, Turks, Russians, and Latinos better off? What about Greeks and Italians? * What about the Swiss? Where would they be without the money of blood-sucking tax cheats? What about Canadians? Listen, I live in Canada and I read the papers. Don’t talk to me about honest men. I could go on… #

Saturday, June 08, 2013 ************************************* AS I SEE IT ********************************* Some divide and conquer, others are divided, conquered, butchered and never learn. * One does not speak of ropes in the house of a hangman, neither does one speak of vegetarianism in the house of a butcher – which is what we do when we speak of genocide recognition to Turks and Yanks. * You want peace? Criminalize brainwashing. * We overestimate the value of what we know even when what we know is a big lie. * The aim of literature? To call an idiot an idiot. * We need solutions? A big lie! What we need is implementation. # POLITICS AND RELIGION *************************************** When I say I don’t believe in god I mean the god of rabbis, imams, and bishops (including the one in Rome). * Anyone who has had the patience and perseverance to read the final pages of EXODU and the first pages of LEVITICUS will be justified in suspecting that god is a control freak badly in need of a shrink. * The faith of rabbis, imams, and bishops has deep ties with power, prestige, and income. Take away one of these ties and you may end up holding an empty bag. * The difference between fascists and the ideology of our own political parties is that fascists criminalize free speech and our political parties silence dissent. The result is the same. * And now consider what they share in common: nationalism, anti-intellectualism, and anti-Semitism, namely “the three pillars of fascism.” * The secret ambition of all sermonizers and speechifiers is to brainwash you to believe you belong with the 1% even when you are the scum of the earth. I speak from experience. During World War II in Greece I was both stateless and homeless but I was “educated” to believe my god was the only true god. * I am not an atheist. I believe in the Unknown, the Unknowable, and the Incomprehensible because I believe Nothing cannot create Something. # MY MESSAGE **************************** If you are a reasonable man use your brain. If you are a patriotic Armenian stop saying ‘Yes, sir!” to our dividers and grave-diggers. If you are a good Christian stop hating your brother. If you are smart stop being a dupe. Remember, Jesus did not say the Kingdom of God is in the words of speechifiers and sermonizers but "within you." Remember also in a democratic environment leaders are not your masters but your servants. They don’t tell you what to think; you tell them what to do. # ARMENIANS IN BOOKS ******************************** In her brilliant and erudite study of Nabokov – THE SECRET HISTORY OF VLADIMIR NABOKOV (New York, 2013) – Andrea Pitzer mentions and discusses Armenian refugees, massacres and genocide on a number of occasions. Among individual Armenians she quotes and discusses are Nina Berberova, an early admirer of Nabokov, herself a brilliant novelist and the author of a remarkable autobiography titled THE ITALICS ARE MINE; and Azat Oganesian, about whom she has this to say in her Acknowledgments: “Translators played a key role on my research. King among them is Azat Oganesian, my research assistant, who poured through and translated interminable numbers of articles I sent him from RUL, the Russian-language newspaper in Berlin, as well as making trips to various libraries on his own to help with this project.” #