Al Davis Quotes

Es un grito al vacío, una palabra imposible de pronunciar, una sacudida, un pensamiento fugaz. Algunos lo llaman amor. Otros, magia.

-Vamos donde los sueños se cumplen, donde moran las palabras no dichas, al corazón de la magia.

Don't treat people how you want to be treated, treat them how they want to be treated.

Tommy to Zack- "Aw, come on. Just a little slow torture, then? Can't I make him scream like a girl, just once?" "I can make the worm disappear for you," Joaquin offered with a dangerous smile. "Permanently." Zack rolled his eyes. "Ignore Al Capone. Murdering the competition is never a good plan.

Athens’s disastrous 415 B.C. expedition against Sicily, the largest democracy in the Greek world, may not prefigure our war in Iraq. (A hypothetical parallel to democratic Athens’s preemptive attack on the neutral, distant, far larger, and equally democratic Syracuse in the midst of an ongoing though dormant war with Sparta would be America’s dropping its struggle with al-Qaeda to invade India).

The wide receiver had a real taste for crime, and he indulged it with an erratic kind of vigor that made him an albatross for Madden and a natural soulmate for my old friend, Al Davis, who remains the ultimate Raider. They were serious people, and John Madden was definitely one of them, for good or ill. Living with the Oakland Raiders in those days was not much different than living with the Hell’s Angels. I

Jesus, you know I was walking back to the huddle and I looked over and, god damn, I almost flipped when I saw you and Davis standing together on the sideline. I thought, man, the world really is changing when you see a thing like that—Hunter Thompson and Al Davis—Christ, you know that’s the first time I ever saw anybody with Davis during practice; the bastard’s always alone out there, just pacing back and forth like a goddamn beast. …

O my Love sent me a lusty list, Did not compare me to a summer's day Wrote not the beauty of mine eyes But catalogued in a pretty detailed And comprehensive way the way(s) In which he was better than me. "More capable of extra- and inter- Polation. More well-traveled -rounded multi- Lingual! More practiced in so many matters More: physical, artistic, musical, Politic(al) academic (I dare say!) social (In many ways!) and (ditto!) sexual!" And yet these mores undid but his own plea(s)(e) And left, none-the-less, the Greater Moor of me.

Well-planned vegetarian diets are appropriate for individuals during all stages of the life cycle, including pregnancy, lactation, infancy, childhood, and adolescence, and for athletes”(Craig, Mangels, et al. 2009).

Ich hätte ihr gesagt, dass Davis und ich nie viel geredet oder uns angesehen hatten, aber das war egal, weil wir zusammen denselben Himmel sahen, was viel intimer ist, als einander in die Augen zu sehen. In die Augen kann man jedem sehen. Aber jemanden zu finden, der dieselbe Welt sieht, ist ziemlich selten.

G. Davies et al., “Genome-Wide Association Study of Cognitive Functions and Educational Attainment in UK Biobank (N=112 151),” Molecular Psychiatry 21 (2016): 758–67; M. T. Lo et al., “Genome-Wide Analyses for Personality Traits Identify Six Genomic Loci and Show Correlations with Psychiatric Disorders,” Nature Genetics 49 (2017): 152–56.

—[...] ¿Por qué tú no te casas, Marilla? Quiero saber. El hecho de ser soltera nunca había apenado a Marilla, de modo que después de un cambio de significativas miradas con Ana, respondió. —Pero quizá tú nunca le pediste a nadie que te quisiera —protestó Davy. —Oh, Davy —dijo Dora puntillosamente, metiéndose en la conversación—, es el hombre quien debe pedirlo. —No sé por qué debe hacerlo siempre —gruñó el niño—. Me parece que en este mundo todo se le carga al hombre.

A. Okbay et al., “Genome-Wide Association Study Identifies 74 Loci Associated with Educational Attainment,” Nature 533 (2016): 539–42; M. T. Lo et al., “Genome-Wide Analyses for Personality Traits Identify Six Genomic Loci and Show Correlations with Psychiatric Disorders,” Nature Genetics 49 (2017): 152–56; G. Davies et al., “Genome-Wide Association Study of Cognitive Functions and Educational Attainment in UK Biobank (N=112 151),” Molecular Psychiatry 21 (2016): 758–67.

Questo ti assomiglia veramente tanto — disse a Noah, appoggiandosi a lui con tutto il peso del corpo.— La mia ragazza ha molto talento — replicò Noah. Il mio cuore smise di battere.Il cuore di Anna smise di battere E venne da me. — Andiamo — mi ordinò dolcemente quando fu al mio fianco. Il suo corpo mi sfiorò la spalla e un braccio in modo protettivo. E poi mi tese la mano.Volevo prenderla, e volevo sputare in faccia ad Anna, e volevo baciarlo, e volevo dare un calcio nelle parti basse a Aiden Davis. Ma gli sforzi compiuti da mamma e papà per fare di me una persona civile dimostrarono di essere andati a buon fine, così mi limitai a sfidare Anna solo con il pensiero, e tutti gli altri a rispondere a questo gesto: intrecciai le mie dita a quelle di Noah. Sentii una scarica elettrica andare dalla punta delle dita alla cavità in cui in teoria, fino a un attimo prima, c’era il mio stomaco.E fu così che divenni completamente, totalmente, interamente Sua

Son culpables todos los que han contribuido a despertar la conciencia del sexo y son aquellos que me empujan, cuando quiero usar al máximo mis facultades en un libro, a buscar esta satisfacción en aquella época feliz, anterior a Miss Davis y Miss Clough, en que el escritor utilizaba ambos lados de su mente a la vez. (...) Es funesto para todo aquel que escribe el pensar en su sexo. Es funesto ser un hombre o una mujer a secas (...) Y por funesto entiendo mortal; porque cuanto se escribe con esta parcialidad consciente está condenado a morir.

I've spent a life-time attacking religious beliefs and have not wavered from a view of the universe that many would regard as bleak. Namely, that it is a meaningless place devoid of deity. However I'm unwilling simply to repeat the old arguments of the past when, in fact, God is a moving target and is taking all sorts of new shapes and forms. The arguments used against the long bow are not particularly useful when debating nuclear weapons, and the simple arguments against the old model gods are not sufficient when dealing with the likes of Davies et al. For example, the notion that God didn't exist, doesn't exist but may come into existence through the spread of consciousness throughout the universe is too clever to be pooh-poohed along Bertrand Russell lines. And if I had the time I could give you half a dozen other scientific theologies that will need snappier footwork from the atheist of the future.

La niña de mi cuento soñaba con encontrar su estrella. Pasaba mucho tiempo observando el cielo y estudiando las estrellas, hasta que, un buen día, supo que la había localizado. Su estrella era el sol. ¿Cómo podría haber estado tan ciega? El sol que siempre estaba ahí cuando le necesitaba, que le enseñaba el mundo en todo su esplendor. El sol era una parte de ella. Claro que la niña sabía que el sol nunca podría pertenecer a nadie. Tan cegada estaba que no vio venir a su estrella. Sí, sabía que era hermosa y que su luz brillaba con mucho más vehemencia que el resto, pero no era el sol y ella creía ciegamente en él. Su estrella no se rendía, intentaba atraer su atención bailando a su alrededor, brillando con la luz más hermosa que se haya visto nunca y cantándole sus mejores canciones. La niña estaba impresionada, tanto que poco a poco se fue enamorando de su estrella. Un amor limpio, eterno, uno de esos amores que se te meten dentro y sabes que te destrozarán cuando decidan partir. Las nubes del invierno habían ocultado a su precioso sol y la niña empezaba olvidarse de su magnificencia, de la creencia del que sabe cuál es su destino. El invierno llegó y, de repente, el sol ya no le parecía tan imprescindible como antes. O al menos eso pensó, hasta que se sucedieron las estaciones y volvió la primavera. Él sol volvió a brillar de nuevo con fuerza y, a pesar de que su luz no iba dirigida a la niña, ella, tan ingenua como era, estaba segura de que sí lo era. Y se equivocó. Sabía que su estrella sufriría, pero pensaba que su hermosa luz jamás se apagaría, que aceptaría sus sentimientos por el sol. No fue así. La estrella se marchó y dejó de cantar para ella y, cuando lo hizo, se dio cuenta de que el sol siempre era silencioso. Era ella quien daba vida al sol y no al revés. Pero ya era tarde, demasiado tarde. La niña se quedó sola, escuchando el eco de su estrella sollozando. Al final aceptó que había perdido una estrella única y viva, por el sol que era mudo e incapaz de amar a nadie, que solo podía recibir y nunca dar. Así que le dio todo lo que tenía; su tiempo, su vida y su alma. No podía arrebatarle nada que ella no hubiera arrojado ya al vacío. Perdió a su estrella y el lamento del sol fue su único refugio.

Se había aplicado una máscara que ya no le pertenecía pero no se atrevía a quitarse, se le formaba un nudo en el estómago y se le agarrotaban los músculos de solo en exponerse, en mostrar a la verdadera Wendy. Porque la que se ocultaba detrás de ese disfraz era una chica tímida, insegura, con miedo al dolor pero con unas ganas tremendas de vivir, de sentir, de probar, de equivocarse y volver a intentarlo. Quería volar pero no sabía cómo. Vivía con el miedo atroz de dar un paso el falso que hiciera caer tal velo de perfección que la recubría y que acabaran viéndola tal y como era: una chica más.

Se había aplicado una máscara que ya no le pertenecía pero no se atrevía a quitarse, se le formaba un nudo en el estómago y se le agarrotaban los músculos de solo en exponerse, en mostrar a la verdadera Wendy. Porque la que se ocultaba detrás de ese disfraz era una chica tímida, insegura, con miedo al dolor pero con unas ganas tremendas de vivir, de sentir, de probar, de equivocarse y volver a intentarlo. Quería volar pero no sabía cómo. Vivía con el miedo atroz de dar un paso el falso que hiciera caer tal velo de perfección que la recubría y que acabaran viéndola tal y como era: una chica más.

For me, the sources from the past, primary or secondary, are not a prison. They are a magic thread that links me to people long since dead and with situations that have crumbled to dust. The sources set off my reflection and imagination, I stay in dialogue with them, and I love this. This liaison with the past is the heart of my vocation as historian. The sources leave a space for speculation, and I will have to use it sometimes in my book on al-Wazzan. But I must always identify my speculations as such for my readers, and show them the bases for believing a certain thing is possible, probable, or contingent.

Soon thereafter, Al Davis, the late owner of the Raiders (who were in Los Angeles at the time) called me and said, “I’ll give you any seven players on our team for the rights to Jim Kelly. Name the players.” So I named Howie Long, an eventual Hall of Famer, and virtually every other star that they had. He said, “Well, I’ll call you back.” He never called back.

trigo —como escalar, lanzarse en trineo por una montaña o hacer puenting— es un deporte extremo. Es el único alimento común que implica su propia tasa de mortalidad a largo plazo.

Aparte de un poco de fibra adicional, comer dos rebanadas de pan de trigo integral no es distinto, y a menudo es peor, que beber una lata de refresco endulzada con azúcar o comer una barra de chocolate.

Yo también le odiaba, pero mi odio se parecía más al amor.

Feedback smile. Smiling itself produces a weak feeling of happiness. The facial feedback hypothesis proposes that ". . . involuntary facial movements provide sufficient peripheral information to drive emotional experience" (Bernstein et al. 2000). According to Davis and Palladino (2000), ". . . feedback from facial expression [e.g., smiling or frowning] affects emotional expression and behavior." In one study, e.g., participants were instructed to hold a pencil in their mouths, either between their lips or between their teeth. The latter, who were able to smile, rated cartoons funnier than did the former, who could not smile (Davis and Palladino 2000).

En contra de lo que opina la sabiduría popular, incluido tu amigo dietista del vecindario, no se desarrolla ninguna deficiencia por la eliminación del trigo, siempre que las calorías perdidas sean reemplazadas por los alimentos adecuados.

No te odias -dijo la mujer con un tono que no daba lugar a réplica-. Has olvidado quién eres. Estar aquí es fácil, no tienes que enfrentarte a nada, ni tomar decisiones. Solo necesitas hacerte pequeña e invisible, respirar el mismo aire viciado mientras te marchitas al mismo tiempo que las rosas que tanto mimas.

Groups that had focused most of their energies dreaming up bloody attacks against India had begun aligning themselves closer to al Qaeda and other organizations with a thirst for global jihad. Some of these groups had deep roots in Lahore, which was the very reason why Raymond Davis and a CIA team had set up operations from a safe house in the city.

Je zittriger und erschöpfter Davis von seinen Liegestützen wird, umso mehr vermischen sich die normalen Wörter, die wir alle jeden Tag benutzen, mit den Wörtern, die er zu einem früheren Zeitpunkt in seinem Leben benutzt haben muss [...] Und als mir Davis' alte Wörter erst einmal aufgefallen waren, fing ich an, sie überall zu hören, denn dieser Ort hier ist ein Wortgefängnis - Wörter bleiben hier stecken, sind gefangen von dem Moment an, an dem in unserem alten Leben die Uhr stehengeblieben ist [...] und ich schnappe mir diese Ausdrücke, ich fange sie in meinem Kopf und ich bewahre sie auf. Denn jedes davon hat die DNA eines ganzen Lebens in sich, eines Lebens, in das diese Worte gepasst und in dem sie einen Sinn ergeben haben, weil alle anderen sie ebenfalls benutzten. Ich sammle diese Wörter, und später, wenn ich das Notizbuch aufschlage, im dem ich dieses Tagebuch führe, [...] trage ich eins nach dem anderen ein. Und aus irgendeinem Grund versetzt mich das in gute Laune, wie Geld auf der Bank.

Unfortunately for the Inuit (and their Paleo imitators), the rest of the story isn’t so rosy. Turns out the Inuit are not healthy at all. They suffer from many chronic diseases and live, on average, ten years less than statistically matched Canadians (Choinière 1992; Iburg, Brønnum-Hansen, et al. 2001). In fact, they have the worst longevity of all populations in North America. There are many reasons for their short life expectancy: high rate of infections and TB, as well as a high suicide rate. While these may not be diet related (although more and more evidence suggests a strong connection between diet and the ability to fight of infection, and between diet and mood), Inuit also die of cancers of the GI tract and stroke, afflictions strongly correlated to diet (Paltoo and Chu 2004). Autopsy studies show they have less heart disease, likely due to their high omega-3 and low omega-6 and low-saturated-fat diet, but they are by no means free of heart disease (McLaughlin, Middaugh, et al. 2005). And there’s a possibility that autopsy statistics showing low heart disease are unreliable, based on really poor data collection (Bjerregaard, Young, et al. 2003; Bell, Mayer-Davis, et al. 1997). In fact, one of the likely reasons for their apparent low rates of heart disease and some cancers is their short life expectancy: Inuit eating their traditional diet simply don’t live long enough to demonstrate heart disease and cancer. In fact, the Westernization of their diet—adding the very foods the Paleo movement vilifies—may actually be prolonging their lives. A recent review of the literature suggests that a diet high in seafood does not lead to less heart disease and may lead to worse health (Fodor, Helis, et al. 2014)!

After learning about mindfulness, you might now wonder if there is any science behind it. Research studies find many benefits of mindfulness practice, such as stronger concentration (focused attention) and greater body awareness. Mindfulness practice also increases the ability to stay present with life experiences instead of avoiding them by time traveling in the mind or zoning out (Holzel et al. 2011).

According to a 2007 study published in the Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, protein provided only 7 percent of the calories in the Okinawan diet (Willcox, Willcox, et al. 2007, 2009; Sho 2001).

Analysis shows that most long-term successful “losers” have a few things in common. They get moderate exercise, they don’t skip breakfast, they don’t go on crash diets, and, importantly, they focus on low-fat diets (Shick, Wing, et al. 1998). Yes, many low-carb diets show better initial weight loss, but what we should be focusing on is the long term. After all, do you want to be lean for six months, or for the rest of your life?

Parcells: “Al, I am just not sure how we can win without so many of our best players. What should I do?” Davis: “Bill, nobody cares, just coach your team.” That might be the best CEO advice ever. Because, you see, nobody cares. When things go wrong in your company, nobody cares. The media don’t care, your investors don’t care, your board doesn’t care, your employees don’t care, and even your mama doesn’t care. Nobody cares. And they are right not to care. A great reason for failing won’t preserve one dollar for your investors, won’t save one employee’s job, or get you one new customer. It especially won’t make you feel one bit better when you shut down your company and declare bankruptcy. All the mental energy you use to elaborate your misery would be far better used trying to find the one seemingly impossible way out of your current mess. Spend zero time on what you could have done, and devote all of your time on what you might do. Because in the end, nobody cares; just run your company.

Just win Baby

In their zealous pursuit of weight loss, low-carb dieters risk “compromised vitamin and mineral intake, as well as potential cardiac, renal, bone, and liver abnormalities overall” (St Jeor, Howard, et al. 2001).

Like Miles Davis, Graham often used to turn his back on his audiences. This was primarily between songs, while he was retuning his guitars. For Graham, in the early 1960s, was privy to a secret alternative tuning system known as DADGAD, which he was reluctant to share with any rival guitarists in the crowd. He began using it around 1962–3, on a trip to the bohemian Beat capital Tangier, where he spent six months and earned his keep by working in a snack booth selling hash cakes to locals. The raw Gnaoua trance music preserved in Morocco’s town squares and remote Rif mountain villages stretched back thousands of years, and Graham was hypnotised by the oud, a large Arabic lute which resembles a bisected pear (the word ‘lute’ itself derives from the Arabic ‘al-ud’) and has been identified in Mesopotamian wall paintings 5,000 years old. The paradigm of Eastern music, defining its difference from the West, is the maqam, which uses a microtonal system that blasts open the Western eight-note octave into fifty-three separate intervals. DADGAD is not one of the tunings commonly used on the eleven-string oud, but Graham found that tuning a Western guitar that way made it easier to slip into jam sessions with Moroccan players. The configuration allows scales and chords to be created without too much complicated fingering; its doubled Ds and As and open strings often lead to more of a harp-like, droning sonority than the conventional EADGBE.

couple dozen men under Rich Davis’s command, the SEAL unit charged with capturing, not killing, Al-Wazu, were an exceptionally well-oiled $85 million machine.

In the vocabulary of neuroscience, we map brains to discover we have “mutable maps” (Merzenich, 2001, p. 418). For example, with the decision to play a violin well, and resolute practice, string musicians alter the structural configuration of their brains to facilitate fingering the strings with one arm and drawing the bow with the other (Elbert et al., 1995).

Instead, knowledge of past wars establishes only wide parameters of what we can legitimately expect from new ones. The scale of logistics and the nature of technology changes, but themes, emotions, and rhetoric remain constant over the centuries, and thus generally predictable. Athens’s disastrous 415 B.C. expedition against Sicily, the largest democracy in the Greek world, may not prefigure our war in Iraq. (A hypothetical parallel to democratic Athens’s preemptive attack on the neutral, distant, far larger, and equally democratic Syracuse in the midst of an ongoing though dormant war with Sparta would be America’s dropping its struggle with al-Qaeda to invade India). But the story of the Sicilian calamity and the changing Athenian public reaction to it, as reported and analyzed by the historian Thucydides, do instruct us on how consensual societies can clamor for war—yet soon become disheartened and predicate their support only on the perceived pulse of the battlefield.

Sulloway (1996, 2011) proposed that the adaptive problems imposed by parents on children will create different “niches” for children, depending on their birth order. Specifically, because parents often favor the oldest child, the firstborn tends to be relatively more conservative and more likely to support the status quo. Second-borns, however, have little to gain by supporting the existing structure and everything to gain by rebelling against it. Later-borns, especially middle-borns, according to Sulloway, develop a more rebellious personality because they have the least to gain by maintaining the existing order; studies of birth order and personality confirm this prediction (Healey & Ellis, 2007). The youngest, on the other hand, might receive more parental investment than middle children, as parents often let out all the stops to invest in their final direct reproductive vehicle. Salmon and Daly (1998) find support for these predictions. They discovered that middle-borns differ from first- and last-borns in scoring lower on measures of family solidarity and identity. Middle-borns, for example, are less likely to name a genetic relative as the person to whom they feel closest. They are also less likely to assume the role of family genealogist. Middle-borns, compared to firstborns and last-borns, are less positive in attitudes toward their families and less likely to help a family member who needs help (Salmon, 2003). These and other results (Salmon, 1999) lend some support to Sulloway’s theory that birth order affects the niches a person selects. Firstborns are more likely to feel solidarity with parents and perceive them as dependable, whereas middle-borns appear more likely to invest in bonds outside of the family. Interestingly, middle-born children might receive less total investment from parents even if parents treat all their children equally (Hertwig, Davis, & Sulloway, 2002). This result occurs because firstborns receive all of their parents’ investments early in life before other children are born and last-borns receive all of their parents’ investments after all other children leave the house. Middle-borns, in contrast, must share their parents’ investments, because there is rarely a time when other siblings are not around. Even when parents strive to invest equally in their children, middle-borns end up on the short end of the stick—perhaps accounting for why middle-borns are less identified with their families (Hertwig et al., 2002).

These include the Self-Compassion Scale (Neff, 2003); White Bear Suppression Inventory (Wegner & Zanakos, 1994); Cognitive-Behavioral Avoidance Scale (Ottenbreit & Dobson, 2004); Thought Control Questionnaire (Wells & Davies, 1994), Distress Tolerance Scale (Simons & Gaher, 2005), the Emotional Nonacceptance subscale of the Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale (Gratz & Roemer, 2004), or similar subscales on various mindfulness measures such as the Kentucky Inventory of Mindfulness Skills (Baer, Smith, & Allen, 2004) or the Five Facets of Mindfulness Questionnaire (Baer et al., 2008), among several others. The definitions of acceptance vary in all of these approaches.

Intrapersonal intelligence may indicate one’s ability to see inwardly and develop self-awareness (Goleman, 2005; Goleman, 2013; Ludvik et al., 2016a; Tan, 2013; Davis, 2014;

Although one might think that psychology would be the one field where unconscious biases might be acknowledged and considered, it rarely is. Inferential errors are common among clinicians, who tend to attribute client change for the better to intervention effectiveness (illusory causation; Lilienfeld et al., 2014) while change for the worse is attributed to client factors (attributional bias; Batson & Marz, 1979). Diagnoses are conceptual heuristics prone to the same errors inherent in all stereotypes,3 and their use is directly associated with prejudice and fear (Read, Haslam, Sayce, & Davies, 2006). Increased genetic determinism and “blaming the genes” can be considered as evidence of the ultimate attribution error (Pettigrew, 1979), wherein behaviors perceived as problematic by a person from a stereotyped group are considered to be genetically based; at the same time, any positive behaviors are suggested to be exceptions to the rule or due to situational context (i.e., “treatment”). Confirmation biases appear to be rampant, in that researchers and clinicians, unless actively seeking alternative explanations, are likely to observe and take note of behaviors and explanations that fit their preconceived ideas and beliefs (Croskerry, 2002; Garb, 1997; Nickerson, 1998). Another common bias that may arise is an overpathologizing bias that describes the tendency for women and minorities to be perceived as requiring more intense and intrusive interventions (Lopez, 2006; Ussher, 2010

Anglos dominated the prisoner population in 1977 and did not lose their plurality until 1988. Meanwhile, absolute numbers grew across the board—with the total number of those incarcerated approximately doubling during each interval. African American prisoners surpassed all other groups in 1988, but by 1995, they had been overtaken by Latinos; however, Black people have the highest rate of incarceration of any racial/ethnic grouping in California, or, for that matter, in the United States (see also Bonczar and Beck 1997). TABLE 4 CDC PRISONER POPULATION BY RACE/ETHNICITY The structure of new laws, intersecting with the structure of the burgeoning relative surplus population, and the state’s concentrated use of criminal laws in the Southland, produced a remarkable racial and ethnic shift in the prison population. Los Angeles is the primary county of commitment. Most prisoners are modestly educated men in the prime of life: 88 percent are between 19 and 44 years old. Less than 45 percent graduated from high school or read at the ninth-grade level; one in four is functionally illiterate. And, finally, the percentage of prisoners who worked six months or longer for the same employer immediately before being taken into custody has declined, from 54.5 percent in 1982 to 44 percent in 2000 (CDC, Characteristics of Population, various years). TABLE 5 CDC COMMITMENTS BY CONTROLLING OFFENSE (%) At the bottom of the first and subsequent waves of new criminal legislation lurked a key contradiction. On the one hand, the political rhetoric, produced and reproduced in the media, concentrated on the need for laws and prisons to control violence. “Crime” and “violence” seemed to be identical. However, as table 5 shows, there was a significant shift in the controlling (or most serious) offenses for those committed to the CDC, from a preponderance of violent offenses in 1980 to nonviolent crimes in 1995. More to the point, the controlling offenses for more than half of 1995’s commitments were nonviolent crimes of illness or of illegal income producing activity: drug use, drug sales, burglary, motor vehicle theft. The outcome of the first two years of California’s broadly written “three strikes” law presents a similar picture: in the period March 1994–January 1996, 15 percent of controlling offenses were violent crimes, 31 percent were drug offenses, and 41 percent were crimes against property (N = 15,839) (Christoper Davis et al. 1996). The relative surplus population comes into focus in these numbers. In 1996, 43 percent of third-strike prisoners were Black, 32.4 percent Latino, and 24.6 percent Anglo. The deliberate intensification of surveillance and arrest in certain areas, combined with novel crimes of status, drops the weight of these numbers into particular places. The chair of the State Task Force on Youth Gang Violence expressed the overlap between presumptions of violence and the exigencies of everyday reproduction when he wrote: “We are talking about well-organized, drug-dealing, dangerously armed and profit-motivated young hoodlums who are engaged in the vicious crimes of murder, rape, robbery, extortion and kidnapping as a means of making a living” (Philibosian 1986: ix; emphasis added).

Las personas que eliminan el trigo de su dieta suelen referir un mejor estado de ánimo, menos cambios de humor, una mejor capacidad para concentrarse y un sueño más profundo en cuanto pasan días o semanas desde el último mordisco a un bagel o a una lasaña al horno.

A fines de agosto nuestra delegación, junto con la portorriqueña, que era más numerosa, subió a bordo de un carguero cubano en el que habríamos de cubrir la primera etapa de nuestro regreso, hasta las Antillas francesas, adonde el barco llevaba una carga de cemento. Al atardecer zarpamos de la bahía de Santiago. Cuando nos alejamos de la isla era ya noche cerrada, y no se veía la tierra ni el mar, pues no había luna. Nos instalamos y empezamos a orientarnos en el barco y, al igual que los portorriqueños que venían con nosotros, trabamos conversación con la tripulación. El capitán era un antiguo estudiante de Filosofía de veintiséis años, con quien me apresuré a hablar de nuestro común tema de estudio. Era su primer viaje al mando de aquel barco y, como nosotros, debía familiarizarse con él y con la tripulación. De pronto, cuando estábamos en alta mar, en plena oscuridad, un avión sobrevoló el barco a muy baja altitud y a gran velocidad. Antes de enterarme de lo que ocurría, el avión cruzó otra vez por encima de nosotros. Cuando Kendra y yo corríamos al puente para preguntar al capitán qué pasaba, un miembro de la tripulación nos explicó tranquilamente que se trataba de un acto hostil por parte de un portaaviones norteamericano de los que controlaban el bloqueo económico. Con sus luces, el portaaviones empezó a hacer señales a nuestro barco pidiéndole que se identificara y explicase su misión. Naturalmente, podían ver la bandera cubana; todo aquello no era más que el rutinario hostigamiento que habían de soportar los barcos cubanos cada vez que salían de sus aguas territoriales. Mediante señales, el barco cubano comunicó que, antes de identificarse, quería saber el nombre y la misión de quienes deseaban aquella información. Durante aquellos momentos una cierta diversión había acompañado al nerviosismo. Pero después, de pronto, no lejos del barco, un extraño y silencioso estallido de luz rompió la oscuridad de la noche. Al principio semejaba una nubecilla en forma de hongo, pero un segundo después pareció desplazarse directamente hacia nosotros. Yo me asusté tanto que no pregunté lo que ocurría; pensé que, si aquello era gas letal, no podríamos escapar. La nube de luz inundó el barco e iluminó toda la zona circundante como un sol de mediodía. Un miembro de la tripulación dijo entonces que seguramente se trataba de un nuevo proyectil luminoso que estaba siendo experimentado por Estados Unidos aprovechando el bloqueo. Por fin nos libramos de los militares norteamericanos y pudimos disfrutar durante unos días de la legendaria belleza del Caribe. Pasamos junto a Haití y Santo Domingo, países no tan hermosos desde el punto de vista político, y después el barco recibió instrucciones de atracar en Guadalupe. Aunque no me gustaba la idea de encargarme de las relaciones con los nativos de la isla, yo era la única persona a bordo que sabía francés, de modo que no tuve alternativa. Nuestra delegación llevaba muy poco equipaje, pero los portorriqueños traían varias cajas de libros que les habían regalado los cubanos para su librería de San Juan. Tuve la precaución de preguntar a los funcionarios de la aduana si se proponían inspeccionar todos los equipajes

Al, I am just not sure how we can win without so many of our best players. What should I do?” Davis: “Bill, nobody cares, just coach your team.

La memoria nos relaciona con nuestro pasado, informa de nuestra relación con el presente y determina nuestra actitud hacia el futuro. Tal vez encontremos que existe un sano balance entre recordar y olvidar, y Alicia tiene claramente una buena ocurrencia al decir: «no vale la pena retroceder hasta ayer, porque entonces era yo una persona muy distinta».43 Vivimos en la memoria y por la memoria, pero Alicia nos dice que pensar que la persona que recordamos ser ayer pueda ser diferente de la persona que somos ahora, o de la que estamos por ser, no debe resultarnos tan preocupante.

- A što mi znamo, zašto smo taki, sinko! To je u nama, pa nikako da mu se otmeš. Niko ne može sam proti sebi. Mi se hranimo tuđim srcem i pojimo tuđom krvi više nego hljebom. A ako nam to ne dadu, onda grabimo i kidamo. - Al ti ne, mamo. - Ja ne, jer ja hranim svojim srcem i napajam svojom krvlju. Ja sam žrtva. To je najslađe: biti žrtva. Nju ne grize savjest, nju ne boli ništa, nju ne davi čemer. Ona je sretna.

Alsof ze met de lucht vecht - alsof de lucht zo dik is als een laken en zij zich er al scheurend doorheen moet zien te werken.

Millie kijkt naar Stella die op haar thee blaast - de damp stijgt op en maakt figuren, net als de koffie in het warenhuis. Stel je voor dat alles zo zou ademen. Dieren en mensen en gras en bomen. Iedereen en alles had dan altijd dampende kronkellijnen om zich heen die figuren maakten, en bij sommige mensen zou je een korte, snelle ademhaling zien, door het rennen of een hartaanval, en anderen zouden een lange, trage ademhaling hebben van het slapen of tvkijken. Het zou net zijn of je naar muziek keek, als je aan muziek iets kon zien, en de wereld zou altijd vol ademmuziek zijn. Misschien blaas je wel alles uit als je je laatste adem uitblaast: je herinneringen en gedachten en dingen die je had willen zeggen en dingen die je niet had willen zeggen en plaatjes in je hoofd van hete koffiedamp en de laatste blik op het gezicht van je vader en het gevoel van modder tussen je vingers en de wind als je van een heuvel af rent en de kleur van alles, ooit.

Misschien blaas je wel alles uit als je je laatste adem uitblaast: je herinneringen en gedachten en dingen die je had willen zeggen en dingen die je niet had willen zeggen en plaatjes in je hoofd van hete koffiedamp en de laatste blik op het gezicht van je vader en het gevoel van modder tussen je vingers en de wind als je van een heuvel af rent en de kleur van alles, ooit...

Progresivamente me aficioné a las películas, me convertí en espectador asiduo y ahora pienso que la sala de un cinematógrafo es el lugar que yo elegiría para esperar el fin del mundo. Me enamoré, simultánea o sucesivamente, de las actrices de cine Louise Brooks, Marie Prévost, Dorothy Mackay, Marion Davis, Evelyn Brent y Anna May Wong. De estos amores imposibles, el que tuve por Louise Brooks fue el más v ivo, el mas desdichado. ¡Me disgustaba tanto creer que nunca la conoscería! Peor aún, que nunca volvería a verla. Esto, precisamente, fue lo que sucedió. Despuesde tres o cuatros películas, en que la vi embeselado, Louise Brooks desapareció de las pantallas de Buenos Aires. Sentí esa desaparición, primero, como un desgarriamento; después, como una derrota personal. Debía admitir que si Louise Brooks hubiera gustado al público, no hubiera desaparecido. La verdad (o lo que yo sentía) es que no sólo pasó inadvertida por el gran público, sino también por las personas que yo conocía. Si concedían que era linda – más bien ‘bonitilla’ – , lamentaban que fuera mala actriz; si encontraban que era una actriz inteligente, lamentaban que no fuera más bella. Como ante la derrota de Firpo, comprobé que la realidad y yo no estábamos de acuerdo. Muchos años despés, en París, vi una película (creo que de Jessua) en que el héroe, como yo (cuando estaba por escribir Corazón de payaso, uno de mis primeros intentos literarios), inconteniblemente echaba todo a la broma y, de ese modo, se hacía odiar por la mujer querida. El personaje tenía otro parecido conmigo: admiraba a Louise Brooks. Desde entonces, en mi país y en otros, encuentro continuas pruebas de esa admiración, y también pruebas que la actriz la merecía. En el New Yorker y en los Cahiers du cinéma leí articulos sobre ella, admirativos e inteligentes. Leí, asimismo, Lulú en Hollywood, un divertido libro de recuerdos, escrito por Louise Brooks. En el 73 o en el 75, mi amigo Edgardo Cozarinsky me cito una tarde en un cafe de la Place de L’Alma, en Paris, para que conociera a una muchacha que haria el papel de Louise Brooks en un filme en preparacion. Yo era el experto que debia decirle si la muchacha era aceptable o no para el papel. Le dije que si, no solamente para ayudar a la posible actriz. Es claro que si me huberian hecho la pregunta en tiempos de mi angustiosa pasion, quiza la respuesta hubiera sido distinta. Para me, entonces, nadie se parecia a Louise Brooks.

Parcells: “Al, I am just not sure how we can win without so many of our best players. What should I do?” Davis: “Bill, nobody cares, just coach your team.” That might be the best CEO advice ever. Because, you see, nobody cares. When things go wrong in your company, nobody cares. The media don’t care, your investors don’t care, your board doesn’t care, your employees don’t care, and even your mama doesn’t care. Nobody cares.