Friday, July 24, 2009

About Face and Why I Booked

My father never taught me much. Oh,sure, he said the obvious things about being good and working hard and about not letting people get you down. But he never really gave me much in the way of practical advice. How to step to the side to avoid taking the full force of a punch or how to fix a sink.

These things I learned on my own, through pain and repetition. And maybe these are our best teachers after all.

Still, he left m with one bit of advice that made sense to me--advice that I gladly shared with my own children and a few others over the years. He told me to never put my name on something that did not make me proud. Your name, he told me, is something you’re given a little after you’re born, and is the only thing you really own, throughout your life--and even after you die-- should you care to leave a marker.

I’ve done that with my writing. I’ve done that with my work as a teacher. Even when my bottom line was the dollar, I never let that be my measuring stick. Basic sentence, essay, story. It was all the same to me. To do things in a way that, at the end of the day, I could step back from, appraise, and proclaim, “Yup, I did the job on that, and I don’t care who knows it.”

This is why I quit my Facebook page the other day.

Quite a leap,huh? Let me explain.

I originally joined Facebook several months ago to follow the work of several writer friends. They have pages and, as part of the content, they list recent publications--not to mention discoveries and new projects. It was a good way to keep up with a couple of pals, to eavesdrop on their preoccupations and, maybe, use them as a guide for some of my own.

I was content--and even more so when a couple of friends from grad school and,then,from college discovered my page. We caught up on old times, traded information. The ex-wife of an old friend even found me there and sent along a cache of photos that he’d left when he passed away last year.

Photos of my youth with a grim reminder of its going away. I thumbed through and relived the memories, experienced the loss.

Facebook giveth and it taketh away.

Wearily, I backed off until my email bore messages of more friend requests. Some were from people who really were/are my friends. Some were from folks that I barely knew at all. Thus, I became aware of a phenomenon well known to Facebook frequenters-- the use of the site to network for commercial purposes or merely to gather friends like the early Plains indians used to gather honor in war--counting friends as a kind of counting coup. Thus, I was comrade and commodity all at once. I didn’t like the feeling. I began to pull further away.

Next, I began to notice the postings of people who must record their every living movement or sometimes lack of same. I’ve read of past eccentrics who have filled rooms with journals of their daily lives, recording every minute down to the “I know an old lady who swallowed a fly” event of recording the very act of recording the very act of.... (It’s a pity there was no Facebook in their day. Think of the living space they’d have saved.)

Then, there were folks who took the endless quizzes provided by whom? (Is Barbara Walters behind this site somehow?) If you were a tree; what kind of tree would you be? If you were a painting, a sandwich, a song....?

To be called a gelatinous, tree-hugging, bug-eyed Lilliputian might have been the cause for a bloody nose in bygone years. These days it’s a quiz result on Facebook.

Oh, brave new world!

Still, I was not completely blameless in this world of infinite show and tell.

A few months ago my daughter gave birth to a beautiful baby girl, Alcina Mae. My son-in-law, a photographer, fully and beautifully documented this arrival. And I, a typical doting grandfather, posted a select few on my page--perhaps doing my own part in driving others from the surety of their screens.

But one must pay for his mistakes, after all. And I did. With congratulations and cutouts of teddy bears, floral displays and rainbows and cuddly creatures rendered in pastels guaranteed to grow fangs on even Mary Engelbreit. And, worse yet, I was sent hugs. Daily hugs. Hourly hugs. Hugs by the minute, by the second...hugs enough to make me claustrophobic....

But finally it was not just “ beauty killed the beast.” It was a politically conservative friend who drove me screaming from the net. He was the last friend I’d been asked to admit, and he brought with him, predictably, a backload of screeds and rants and jeremiads the like of which you might find any day on the Limbaugh show or any minute on Fox News. Some of the language, not to mention the logic (which most conservatives in the post-Buckley era seem to have little use for anyway) was appalling-- but nothing I’m not used to--and certainly not enough to justify barring him from the page.

He was and is a friend. He was freely admitted as same, and I would not have thought twice about inviting him to a gathering at my home to trot out, at his own peril, some of his ideas for my generally ”progressive” pals. I might have encouraged it, in fact--then gone out to give everyone a round of drinks before returning to enjoy and, if need be, join in the festivities.

But, seen on the page as part of this pastiche of other less than satisfying things, his jibes were finally too much.

There was no longer anything of myself about this concoction save for the name at the top of the page--the only thing I used to own.

All of a sudden I felt like my site was a sandwich board and I had become the local stewbum who’d been trapped between its wooden pages. Doomed to carry it aimlessly and without even the promise of a jug at the end of the day.

I know there are things I could’ve done to block people totally or to sanitize the pages so that they’d be palatable once again.

But these actions didn’t seem fair.

And my name would still be there to remind me of my complicity in creating something as undemocratic as it was uninspiring. No, this was not for me.

So, I quit Facebook. And I don’t need to stay up to date on what car you’d like to be driving let alone on which one you’ll likely become. And, bereft of the online tools, I can only make myself into a cartoon the same way I’ve always done, with my writing and my words.

And I don’t need any evanescent hugs.

I’m much happier now, sitting here with the blank screen before me, awaiting words that I might, at the end of the day, gladly add my name to.

But, damn it all, I’d still like to be your friend.

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Friday, October 17, 2008

Plumb Loco!

In the interest of being cutting edge and competitive, I've decided to reach beyond the confines of this personal blog to give my readers access to other points of view and expertise greater than my own.  Not well known enough to line up an interview with John McCain, Barack Obama or Joe Biden and too well known to speak to Sarah Palin ( who talks less than Garbo, anyway, and is about as difficult to understand), I decided to try my luck with a lesser known but lately notorious member of the political elite who might be a bit more forthcoming.  Yes, gentle reader, I put in a call to Toledo, Ohio and the infamous (and apparently non-appositional) Joe the Plumber.  Little did I realize that I was already too late.

Man's Voice:  Hello.

Me:  Hello, Joe?  Joe the Plumber?

Man:  No.  This is Mr. Wetzelberger's personal representative, Swifty Moskowitz.

Me:  Personal rep....

Man:  Yes, Mr. Wetzelberger....

Me:  I believe the name is Wurzelbacher.

Man:  Wetzelberger, Wurzelbacher, what's the difference?  Senator McCain called him Wetzelberger....

Me:  Wurtzelberger.

Man:  What's a burger?

Me:  McCain called him Wurtzelberger.  But his real name is Wurzelbacher.

Man:  Look, let's not make a baseball routine out of this.  Wertzel, Wetzel...what's it matter? We call him Joe the Plumber anyways.

Me:  True.  So can I talk to Joe?

Man:  Joe, is it?  You fixin to do some 'say it ain't so' bit here.  Or maybe you're a friend or something?

Me:  No.  Sorry.  Can I talk to Mr. the Plumber?

Man:  Actually, Mr. Wer...ah, Joe is booked through mid-November.

Me:  Booked?

Man:  Ah, yeah.  Six morning talk shows, a MOREY, a THE VIEW,  a MEET THE PRESS....Let's see....

Me:  There's more?

Man:  Three water softeners, a bidet, and a public toilet.

Me:  Public toilet?

Man:  At Senator Craig's house, I believe.  So, I'm afraid we can't spare him.

Me:  How disappointing.  Well,  I'm sorry to have....

Man:  I can get you a deal on a kosher butcher, though.

Me:  Kosher butcher?

Man:  Yeah, my brother-in-law, Shmuel.  McCain would've used him in Miami. but he couldn't pronounce the name.

Me:  Shmuel.

Man:  Yeah, and when Palin tried to say it, oy.  It was a cross, you should excuse the expression, between a brecher and a briss.   So, you want, Shmuel?

Me:  No.

Man:  My sister neither.  How about a nice chicken sexer?

Me:  No, look....

Man:  A towel boy, a roofer, maybe a rodeo clown?

Me:  No, look.  I wanted an interview.  You know.  About politics.

Man:  Politics, he says.  You want to talk politics so you're calling a what?  A plumber?  How dumb is that?  Now, I got this mail room guy, Billy....

Me:  Yeah, but he's a mail room guy!

Man:  Aha.  But he works for a bunch of shyster lawyers.  Ain't that closer to  politics than some gentleman what's got his head down some crapper?

Me: Ah....

Man:  On second thought, don't answer that.  Let's see, I got Billy, the mail guy; Hazel, the receptionist; Phil, the department store cop....

Me:  But don't these people have last names?

Man:  Say, I thought you was in politics.  Last names,pah.... Whose got time for last names? You see what happened to Senator Smartypants when he got into last names?  Wurtzel, wetzel, pretzel.  All that went out with the Edsel.  You think he calls them guys who mow his 7, 8, 9 lawns by last names?  No, it's Juan, the hedge guy; Juan, the flower cutter; Juan, the bug guy....

Me:  I....

Man:  This Juan here.  That Juan there.....

Me:  But....

Man:  Jobs is how you name the people who do for you or, praise God, who bring you a vote every few years.  Last names are for contributors.  The guys who pay the freight, not the guys what carry it.---Or maybe they give last names to the crooks they want to accuse you of palling with or....Hey, that reminds me.  I got this bookie named Fred.

Me:  Nah.  I guess I'll just....

Man:  What about a nice stage dancer.  You know table dance, lap dance?  How's about a Ginger, Bambi, Fawn, Rachel, Cinnamon?

Me:  Hmm.  Exotic dancer?  That could dress the site up?  Say, are they pretty?  You got pictures?  You....

Man:  Pictures, he says.  Boobalah, I don't know who it is raised you?  Or where you been?  But I'm talking about the same girl here.  You know, on Mondays she's Rachel; Tuesdays, Ginger; Wednesdays....

Me:  O.K.  I get the picture.  Let me get back to you on that.

Man:  Sure.  And, by the way, should you need somebody after the election, I got a governor and a snowmobile  guy I can let you have real cheap.




Monday, October 6, 2008

Career, March!

A couple of people have written asking why I haven't posted an entry lately.  Truth is, I've been doing some thinking.  I won't try to guess what triggered the direction of my thoughts, but I am certain about the decision that they have led me to reach.  Namely, that I have decided to abandon my previous dedication to writing to pursue full time my goal of becoming a practicing doctor of surgery.

I know that some of you may register surprise at my decision; however, I am hoping that you will be kind enough to allow me this opportunity to explain.

For one thing, those who know me are aware that I come from a lower middle-class background. Thus, I have not had the advantages of some whose parents had already cracked "the glass ceiling" of privilege and class that, in my neighborhood, wasn't even visible to the offspring of the working poor.  (There the ceilings, like most glass-bearing structures in hard-scrabble places, were covered over with plywood.  So, we didn't even know they were there, let alone that we should try and crack them.)

In any case, I didn't have the luxury of choice that many of you enjoyed as youngsters.  Had I been so fortunate, I might have exhibited an interest in surgery in my formative years.  After all, my father and paternal grandfather were both barbers and, as anyone knowing the history of that long-standing occupation  could certify, in earlier and perhaps more enlightened times, the town tonsorialist did much of the surgery on members of the local gentry--leeching blood, repairing broken limbs and performing other necessary medical tasks.  Thus, my very lineage puts me in good stead to be a practitioner of the healing arts.

Secondly, I have a natural familiarity with the human body due to my proximity to said vehicle.  I am, so far, in possession of nearly all bodily parts with which I had previously entered the world--having suffered only the removal of a couple of tonsils and a little less than a quarter-inch of skin, both at a very early age and before I had even begun to notice these apportionments.  True, I have only those organs typical to the male members of our species but a long life,  several marriages and having lived through the era of the 1960's has given me a more than ample expertise in the handling of all aspects of the female corpus as well.  (Pay no attention to what any of the members of that tribe might say by way of contradiction.)

So, yes, I am very familiar with the human form.  The very first thing I see when I awake in the morning is the end of my own nose--then, my feet as I struggle to find my slippers.  Next, having stumbled to the bathroom with an overly full bladder....  Well, you get the idea.  The human body is no stranger to me.  Indeed, I have had one for as far back as I can remember.

You may scoff and ask me :"Yes, but what about knowledge?  What about the years of education and training that we currently require of our medical personnel?  The study and the testing?"

Well, all I can say by way of answer is, "There you go again!"

As to testing, I have no objection.  Have any expert you choose ask me any question he or she chooses, but rest assured that I will, in turn, present only answers that feel right to me and that will be gratifying to members of my audience--not those that are learned by rote out of outmoded textbooks concocted by self-declared experts who seek only to obfuscate and confuse.  However, should any of you have need of such verbal pyrotechnics, let me assure you that I can parry with the best of them.  As a frequent viewer of such excellent medical fare as HOUSE, M.D.  (yet another proof of my worthiness for the job), I am familiar with such terms as "neurocystercercosis,"  "syphitis," and the ever-popular "McCune-Albright polystostic fibrous dysplasia."  So, just stick that in your windpipes (tracheae) and smoke it!

You've been brainwashed, of course, by years of exposure to the warped, "gotcha," liberal media into believing that only possessors of esoteric degrees from elitist colleges can be members of the healing fraternity.  Thus,  only "insiders" have been allowed to examine...well...the insides of members of our populace for generations.  The result of this has been long waits at hospitals and soaring prices for procedures which could be eliminated if people like myself were allowed to compete with members of the current medical establishment for potential clients.  And our lack of exposure to medical texts and predetermined procedures might actually serve as a benefit to would-be medicos since we would be freer, with no expectations about an operation, to see things as they are actually occurring rather than to view them through the debilitating lens of experience.  Oh, sure,  we would lose a few patients along the way.  But, gosh darn it, don't the professionals?  Why do you think they call their businesses "practices"?

You're still skeptical, I can tell--as I've grown used to such smirking condescension over the years.  The wrinkled brows, the raised noses, the lips turned down over the edges of martini glasses (resulting in a good deal of spillage and some hefty dry cleaning charges, I might add).  Yes, these are all trademarks of the intellectual Georgetown crowd that has controlled this great land of ours for far too long.

Therefore, it is with this wisdom and with the knowledge that each of us has in us the deep-down ability to aspire to greatness that I hereby announce my self-certification as a doctor of surgery, primoris expertis.  And, to allay some of the reservations harbored by many of my unenlightened peers, I will confine myself, for the present, to merely assisting a doctor five years my senior (I'm 67) while I'm learning the rudiments of the trade.  Of course, I have agreed to mentor him on such occasions when prior knowledge might interfere with intuition and when there is a need for kitchen-table logic and good, gut-given, down-home common sense.  Further and in deference to the plain-spoken aphorisms of our forebears, I agree to limit my earliest efforts solely to the performance of brain surgery and that solely to the followers of Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska.

For, in the words of that great American, Henry Ford:  "Nothing is particularly hard if you divide it into small jobs."






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Thursday, September 25, 2008

Palin, Pail Out/ Bailout

It's been awhile since I've posted. Fact is I've been almost as silent as Sarah Palin who, since reading her ghost-written speech off the teleprompter in Denver, has been the least loquacious v.p. candidate since Calvin Coolidge--and with a whole lot less experience than Silent Cal,too.

Like most thinking Americans, I'm not surprised. Even in the prefab speech she delivered for the party faithful, the good governor's vocal tones were only a little less grating than were, oh, I don't know, maybe Marjorie Main's, when she was playing Ma Kettle. ( "Hey, Pawww, git in here and put some shimmer on them sows!")

So, anyway, I figure that they had Ms. Palin stashed away and were doing the Eliza Doolittle bit on her. ("Soft, less nasal,breathe. Now, not 'nu-que-lor' but 'nu-clee-er,' your honor. Try again.")

(And--note to Al Franken-- can't you just hear Senator John as Henry Higgins doing "Who reigns in Spain, I can't recall his name.... I wish I'd got it. I wish I'd got it...?)

Still, since they can't sequester everyone, McSame was out responding to the latest fiscal crisis in his best, instinctive whirling dervish ways. "The fundamentals of our economy are strong...."

Huh?

"Oh, when I said that I was referring to the workers. And I believe in the American workers...."

Would those be the same American workers whose minimum wage bump you voted against a total of 17 times?

"Umm...."

Ah, well...you are a 'maverick' so I guess that, unlike other politicians (including your running mate, by the way), you wouldn't be "for it before you were against it" but "against it before you were for it." You did vote for the wage hike in 2008 but only because it was attached to a war-funding bill that you embraced. (You're consistent there. Pro-war spending but anti all spending on the veterans, including providing adequate body armor for the troops in Iraq.)

And,hey, weren't you the guy who used to say "I think deregulation was good for our economy" before you morphed into your new reformist role?

Yeah, I can see now, Senator, why you've recently come to believe that you are the CHANGE candidate. Hell, you can change faster than the weather in a snow globe--and with a whole lot less shaking, too.

But, buck up, McSame. There are only a few more weeks to go. Then, you can go back to being the same old 90% voting conservative you've always been or maybe even start a new party with your bellicose buddy, Joe Lieberman. I hear he may be looking for one too.

Tuesday, September 9, 2008

Faked Alaska

Well, somebody finally found that cone of silence that John McCain couldn’t locate when he was at Saddleback. And Sarah Palin is in it.

As right-wing as Dick Cheney and hopefully a better shot, the good gov promises to out-do veep C. in the “now you see me, now you don’t” department. Rumor has it, in fact, that the make-believe maverick McCain may put her in charge of the stealth bomber program, while ensuring first that she doesn’t sell them all on eBay.

O.K., I kid. But I kid because there’s little else to do when we’ve got a nominee about whom less is known than we initially know about most serial killers.

One thing we can understand for sure is that McCain’s acceptance speech in which he promised that his “administration will set a new standard for transparency and accountability” may be undeniably true–but not in the way we thought he meant it.

However, what do we expect from a lock-stepping maverick who votes with the people he now pretends to run against more than 90% of the time and who tells us, after choosing a running mate who is so far right of center, that he intends to reach across the aisle to the opposition? (He might– but what about Sarah? She’d need the arms of an orangutan to even reach the aisle on McCain’s side, let alone get across it.)

That’s a reach the equivalent of which Senator McSame is asking the voters of this country to make if they’re going to buy into the current image of himself and Palin that he’s trying to sell. Hopefully, there will be no takers.

Senator Small Change

September 5, 2008 by themortalcynic

I feel sorry for Bill and Sue Nebe of Farmington Hills, Michigan and Jake and Terry Wimmer of Franklin County, Pennsylvania. Why do I feel sorry for them–even though I’m not running for political office and,therefore, don’t have to list a litany of names to put a face on my heightened sensibilities ? Well, I feel sorry for them because John McCain has listed them as the faces of people who he’s fighting for.

The former couple, after all, lost all of their money in real estate. And John McCain knows something about real estate– what with having more houses than most Monopoly gamers and all. Still, he’s spoken out against government involvement in helping people who’ve lost their houses and constantly sided against homeowners in favor of lenders in the past.

Now, the Nebes must work a total of FOUR jobs to make ends meet. Still, don’t despair, Nebes! John McCain says that his party believes in “hard work and risk takers,” so you folks should be o.k. Of course, he was talking, here, about the top one-percent and why he believes they need their tax cuts. Hopefully, those FOUR jobs are pretty high end and will allow you to qualify. If not, I’m afraid there’s bad news. John McCain has continually voted against the minimum wage and equal pay for women, and since Sue Nebe has three of the FOUR jobs, well….That’s why you made my “sorry for” list.

As to Jake and Tony Wimmer, well…Jake works on a loading dock, coaches Little League, and raises money for the mentally and physically disabled. And Tony teaches. The good news is that John McCain is not on record as having any problem with Little League or with helping the disabled–though Governor Palin might find these predilections a little too close to community organizing to meet her comfort level. And the loading dock thing…well, I hope it has to do with imports since McCain once again last night declared his support of free trade–no matter how unfairly it’s weighted. As to you Tony, McCain is really behind you. Of course, you’d be better off if you taught in private schools such as the ones his kids attended or the ones he wants to offer vouchers for. If not, not a problem. He has said that he’ll look into providing funding for the “No Child Left Behind” program that he had a hand in creating and has voted against properly funding in the intervening years. But,hey, it could be worse. How? Well, you could be working FOUR jobs like the Nebes!

I won’t even go into the other case he mentioned. The young man who was killed in Iraq. Some of the worst minutes of my life in the last few years have been spent watching the silent roll call at the end of the Lehrer Report. Yet I watch because I feel it is my duty to watch. I’ve been asked to sacrifice nothing else for this war–the least I can do is to pay attention to the faces of some our country’s best kids as they flash before me and I’m left to wonder, as their families must, what might have been.

Yet, change is coming, he says. ” Change is coming!”

And if he’s referring to change of position, then there’s no disputing that McCain is,indeed, the change candidate. He wrote an immigration bill that he says he now couldn’t even vote for. He was against the tax cuts for the rich BEFORE he was for them. He denounced the Karl Rove school of dirty politics BEFORE he embraced it. He said last night that he would help create millions of new jobs in the field of alternative energy, and yet his record BEFORE last night was a perfect one when it came to energy legislation last session. He missed all eight votes dealing with the issue, even though his vote might have been the deciding one in several instances.

In fact (with a special nod to our new watchdog, Sarah Palin), John McCain was NOT PRESENT for 60 percent of the votes taken last session. So, when he talks about a “do-nothing Congress,” listen well–for he knows whereof he speaks.

And one final word, since we’re talking of voting records– and I can feel the word “maverick” in the offing. When I grew up, a maverick was a person who used his own head, blazed his own trail, sailed his own course. (Since you’re such a ‘feminist,’ Governor, you can insert feminine pronouns there, and it would be more than fine with me. Just leave out the references to lipstick.)

But CONGRESSIONAL QUARTERLY, tells us that McCain voted with the evil President Bush fully 95% of the time in 2007 and 100% of the time (every time he showed up) in 2008.

Not to mention, my good Governor, that he chose you as his running mate, I suspect, to please the “conservatives” (and I’m sorry, I can’t even use that word because of my respect for men like the late Senator Goldwater)…let’s say (in kindness) “social-conservatives” of his party. Not exactly a maverick move where I come from, young lady.

Deny that if you will. But, if so, in the words of the immortal Ricky Ricardo ” ’splain me this.” Why would his acceptance speech be so much about reaching across the aisle, ending “partisan rancor”– why– if you were,indeed, his ideal choice? Do you really think that he’d have named someone from so far right a position if he’d all the while planned to offer himself as a peacemaker? If you answer yes, then you must certainly believe him to be a few spokes short of a wheel or a little less than “with it,” I fear. And maybe you’re right.

But right or wrong, this is not the John McCain who really was a hero and who really did used to be a kind of “maverick.”

And right or wrong this is not the change we have been looking for.

Lore And Odor

September 3, 2008 by themortalcynic

“Lore and Odor!” How ’bout that as a title for Fred Thompson’s new, ready-for-prime-time show. Or just a description of his “keynote” speech, perhaps.

A former candidate in this year’s Republican presidential primaries and a guy who might well have been featured in some one’s anti-celebrity ads ( a little too second-rate to be seen with Angelina but right on the mark for a Paris Hilton spot), Thompson donned the greasepaint once again in praise of former rival, John McCain.

His acting was, as usual, sub par.

A man with a J.D. degree from Vanderbilt and currently a Washington lobbyist, you wouldn’t think old Fred would be so apt to welcome the election of a “maverick” (McCain) and a potential “reformist” (Palin) who are coming to Washington to “irritate the alligators” and “drain the swamp.” You’d think that, being a lawyer and a lobbyist Mr. Thompson would be a little more protective of his natural habitat.

You’d also think that a guy with a law degree from Vandy and a high-powered, multi-digit income might be too embarrassed to assume some “aw-shucks” Uncle Fred persona at a time when he’s not supposed to be playacting and when he’s asking the American people to trust what he has to say. But take a look at the speech. It’s full of water and buckets and swamps–an exotic dancer named “Marie, the Flame of Florida,” field-dressing a moose –and it even gives a tip of the cap to good old Teddy Roosevelt who, after all, ran a few percentage points ahead of Fred in this year’s primaries. But, hey, didn’t everybody?

Don’t be too hard on old Fred, though. He did give a pretty accurate accounting of the serious problems now facing our country. “Terrorists, rogue nations developing nuclear weapons, an increasingly belligerent Russia, intensifying competition from China, spending at home [not to mention in Iraq] that threatens to bankrupt future generations, [and] for decades an expanding government, increasingly wasteful and too often incompetent.”

What he failed to say is that most of these problems are as a result of the “leadership” of George Bush and Republican control of both houses of Congress and that one of the “alligators” who worked their little “swamp,” and an old bellowing bull one at that, was none other than Senator John Sidney McCain.

Aw, shucks! Lore and odor, anyone?

Rainy Day Woemen

September 1, 2008 by themortalcynic

Now, let me get this straight. The Republican Convention has been held up by a hurricane less than a week after its own prima donnas of prayer, led by Stuart Shepard of Focus on the Family, urged the deity to send “torrential rain” to douse the acceptance speech of Barack Obama at Invesco Field…and nobody else is laughing? Well, all I can think is that it’s too early.

After all, it’s not everyone who can gloat over a natural disaster by proclaiming that it’s been sent to an area in punishment for a gay pride parade the week before. (Never mind that thousands of innocent bystanders also had to suffer–neither God nor President W. seems to have the hang of making “surgical strikes”quite yet.)

So, I’ll withhold my own ironic laughter until my fellow citizens, no matter what their sexual preferences, are hopefully spared any devastation this time and let the G.O.Pevangelicals, who have His ear, speak for the Absolute Being.

And I’ll let John Hagee, James Dobson et al do the play by play on what the divinity is up to here. (I doubt they’ll mark it up to political affiliation since even a Being with an infinite sense of humor would have trouble throwing in with the Democrats.)

An honest response could be that if He/She (the Godhead) is behind this at all, it might be to alert people that with all the misery and pain they find around them they oughtn’t be praying to bring harm, even of a “prankish” kind, to anyone. But,then, I guess we all know better than to seek an “honest response” from the priests or the politicos.

So, I’ll just sit up here on my perch and hope for the best for now. Nearly two-thirds of the population of Orleans parish didn’t go back after the last devastation, and so there are fewer people in harm’s way and fewer to evacuate. The Washington Establishment is already in place this time and looking dour and chastened and “Brownie” is back running with the horses, so it’s hoped that our brothers and sisters to the South are the better for all that.

But just in case, let’s all say a prayer.

The Palin Pick

August 31, 2008 by themortalcynic

It’s official. John McCain has gone to the well and lowered the bucket and Sarah Palin emerged as number 1 on his bucket list. The pundits are having a field day–those on the right trying to defend the “experience” of Palin as better than Obama’s since hers is as an executive (a governor) which,thus, makes her, automatically, a sounder manager than he. Because we all know that those with gubernatorial experience have superior managerial skills to those of mere Senators, don’t we? After all, look at George Bush! (Oops, better not…better,um, let’s move on.)

The pundits on the left are charging McCain with making a cynical political move. (With nary a nod to the redundancy of all that,either.)

Frankly, I find it a very honest choice. After all, what is the main requirement of a V.P. anyway? Why it’s to replace the guy at the top should he (God forbid–the usual interjection used here) fall ill or become even more mentally incapacitated than recent office holders have been or (God…oh, the hell with it) dies. So, the veep need not be a superstar but merely good enough to fill the hole left by the departure of the sucker she supplants.

So, by choosing a backup with virtually no known accomplishments and even less grounding in international affairs than he has (see previous blog for that), he’s admitting that it won’t take very much to replace him should he go down. ( Reminds you of the Ravens’ quarterbacking situation, don’t it?)

And I say, hooray for Senator McCain for such an honest assessment –no matter how backhanded he might have been in making it.

I have often said that you’d have had to look long and hard to find a worse “leader” than the current occupant of our highest office, so someone who raises 5 children…or any of the children, for that matter, might do a better job than what we’re currently having done. That’s why I say: “Why not have a fresh hockey mom to replace one of our previously elected hockey pucks ?”

Congratulations to John McCain and to the Republican leadership for nominating a woman for veep a little fewer than 25 years after the Dems did the same. And thanks for the honesty of your choice.

How Many Houses Does It Take To Make A Loser

August 26, 2008 by themortalcynic

O.K. I know that this whole thing has been blown up out of proportion, but,then, it was the Rove Regiment who got that started, so it’s not seemly that they be squealing now. (How does the word “elitist” sound when it’s coming in your direction, hmm?) McCain is answering by playing the P.O.W. card (”I spent five and a half years in a prison cell, I didn’t have a house, I didn’t have a kitchen table….”). In other words, we should honor his past before we diss his present–just so long as we don’t start honoring the other guy’s struggles or that we don’t go too far back in time to when he was an undistinguished student at the Naval Academy–more or less a “legacy” case in the way that his recent “strange bedfellow,” George Bush, was at Princeton. (”Undistinguished” only refers to his grades. Having come from a well-to-do family and rating visits by high-ranking brass, pals of his father and grandfather, put him otherwise out in the spotlight, thank you very much.)

So,we are to begin our critique of Senator McCain only after the Vietnam experience and to cut him slack as a result of that experience. Sure. His marital infidelities can be forgiven. After all, a guy who has spent so much time in the weeds deserves some clover when he can get it. (Sounds exactly what he was saying in his “houses” defense,now, doesn’t it?) Or he has the right to slip ups on matters of national borders (Iraq and Pakistan,for instance), enmities (Sunni, Shiite–who cares?), houses (”My staff will get back to you on that.)

O.K. Fine. And I’m down with all of that. You bet, I’ll make him some room. He’s done his share, and he’s more than paid his dues.

Still, the question that I’m left with after I give him all of these passes and agree that he’s entitled given his trials is this: Does a guy who, through no fault of his own, undergoes life-altering experiences to the point of mental and psychological impairment deserve to be taken seriously as a candidate for the highest office in our land?

Sure McCain is the “experienced” candidate, but not all experience leads to positive outcomes. Heck, any visit to a local correctional facility should be enough to tell you that.

I’m just asking. And I’m asking because I’m the Mortal Cynic. Experience has made me that.

My Censored Posting

August 23, 2008 by themortalcynic

In yesterday’s entry, I mentioned a response to a poster on the HUFFINGTON site that got edited out of sight. The original comment came from a person who was gleeful at how his candidate, Senator McCain, had clearly won the Saddleback “debate.” I pointed out that what went on at Saddleback could hardly be called a debate and that his candidate looked good mainly because he was often not responding to the questions but simply plugging in stories (the cross in the dirt) and statements (”gates of hell”) that had been field-tested previously. I compared Reverend Warren’s tolerance of this behavior to what we might all undertake for an old but lovable uncle who meanders sometimes when he’s telling stories at the dinner table. I further pointed out that a real moderator might have sought clarification when the question”What’s been your greatest moral failure?” was answered with the very generalized response of “my first marriage.” Here, although the question was to the person, the answer omits any mention of the person. Was the undertaking of the first marriage a problem? Was the condition of the spouse after her accident the problem? (Doubtful since neither of these was a moral failing.) Basically, the Senator was allowed to skate while receiving kudos for his directness in answering questions. And no mention of his adulterous behavior was made or sought after. Don’t get me wrong, I could care less about his marital misadventure. I leave all the judgmental moralizing to such chosen ones as Hannity, O’Reilly and Limbaugh. But when a man is misdirecting like a magician, I don’t want to be told that he won a “debate” by being a straight shooter. McCain may want to treat me like a “chum” but I ain’t no “chum-p”!

Off In A Huff

August 22, 2008 by themortalcynic

A bit of a greenhorn when it comes to computers but pretty passionate when it comes to politics, I have tried to answer a couple of what I would consider underhanded posts on various sites. I submitted a couple on Youtube only to discover that my comment could be removed at the whim of the original poster and, worse, that I could be barred from ever entering that poster’s comment zone again. Then, yesterday, moved to action by what I considered an unfair attack on my candidate, housed on the Huffington Post site, I composed a lengthy screed which I had to edit several times to make fit–only to have it put on a thread that would never open. (That’s where this first post gets its title.) So, now, I am trying this blog. The first entry will be brief, but I hope to get wordier later on, and I hope someone out there reads and reacts to this. I can’t promise you that you’ll never lose something that you send in response to one of my posts, but I will promise that it will never be of my doing. Disagree with me if you wish. I will never censor anyone or bar anyone who takes the time to respond. And should this Administration leave any of them open, you can take that to the bank.

Friday, September 5, 2008

Senator Small Change

I feel sorry for Bill and Sue Nebe of Farmington Hills, Michigan and Jake and Terry Wimmer of Franklin County, Pennsylvania. Why do I feel sorry for them--even though I'm not running for political office and,therefore, don't have to list a litany of names to put a face on my heightened sensibilities ? Well, I feel sorry for them because John McCain has listed them as the faces of people who he's fighting for.

The former couple, after all, lost all of their money in real estate. And John McCain knows something about real estate-- what with having more houses than most Monopoly gamers and all. Still, he's spoken out against government involvement in helping people who've lost their houses and constantly sided against homeowners in favor of lenders in the past.

Now, the Nebes must work a total of FOUR jobs to make ends meet. Still, don't despair, Nebes! John McCain says that his party believes in "hard work and risk takers," so you folks should be o.k. Of course, he was talking, here, about the top one-percent and why he believes they need their tax cuts. Hopefully, those FOUR jobs are pretty high end and will allow you to qualify. If not, I'm afraid there's bad news. John McCain has continually voted against the minimum wage and equal pay for women, and since Sue Nebe has three of the FOUR jobs, well....That's why you made my "sorry for" list.

As to Jake and Tony Wimmer, well...Jake works on a loading dock, coaches Little League, and raises money for the mentally and physically disabled. And Tony teaches. The good news is that John McCain is not on record as having any problem with Little League or with helping the disabled--though Governor Palin might find these predilections a little too close to community organizing to meet her comfort level. And the loading dock thing...well, I hope it has to do with imports since McCain once again last night declared his support of free trade--no matter how unfairly it's weighted. As to you Tony, McCain is really behind you. Of course, you'd be better off if you taught in private schools such as the ones his kids attended or the ones he wants to offer vouchers for. If not, not a problem. He has said that he'll look into providing funding for the "No Child Left Behind" program that he had a hand in creating and has voted against properly funding in the intervening years. But,hey, it could be worse. How? Well, you could be working FOUR jobs like the Nebes!

I won't even go into the other case he mentioned. The young man who was killed in Iraq. Some of the worst minutes of my life in the last few years have been spent watching the silent roll call at the end of the Lehrer Report. Yet I watch because I feel it is my duty to watch. I've been asked to sacrifice nothing else for this war--the least I can do is to pay attention to the faces of some our country's best kids as they flash before me and I'm left to wonder, as their families must, what might have been.

Yet, change is coming, he says. " Change is coming!"

And if he's referring to change of position, then there's no disputing that McCain is,indeed, the change candidate. He wrote an immigration bill that he says he now couldn't even vote for. He was against the tax cuts for the rich BEFORE he was for them. He denounced the Karl Rove school of dirty politics BEFORE he embraced it. He said last night that he would help create millions of new jobs in the field of alternative energy, and yet his record BEFORE last night was a perfect one when it came to energy legislation last session. He missed all eight votes dealing with the issue, even though his vote might have been the deciding one in several instances.

In fact (with a special nod to our new watchdog, Sarah Palin), John McCain was NOT PRESENT for 60 percent of the votes taken last session. So, when he talks about a "do-nothing Congress," listen well--for he knows whereof he speaks.

And one final word, since we're talking of voting records-- and I can feel the word "maverick" in the offing. When I grew up, a maverick was a person who used his own head, blazed his own trail, sailed his own course. (Since you're such a 'feminist,' Governor, you can insert feminine pronouns there, and it would be more than fine with me. Just leave out the references to lipstick.)

But CONGRESSIONAL QUARTERLY, tells us that McCain voted with the evil President Bush fully 95% of the time in 2007 and 100% of the time (every time he showed up) in 2008.

Not to mention, my good Governor, that he chose you as his running mate, I suspect, to please the "conservatives" (and I'm sorry, I can't even use that word because of my respect for men like the late Senator Goldwater)...let's say (in kindness) "social-conservatives" of his party. Not exactly a maverick move where I come from, young lady.

Deny that if you will. But, if so, in the words of the immortal Ricky Ricardo " 'splain me this." Why would his acceptance speech be so much about reaching across the aisle, ending "partisan rancor"-- why-- if you were,indeed, his ideal choice? Do you really think that he'd have named someone from so far right a position if he'd all the while planned to offer himself as a peacemaker? If you answer yes, then you must certainly believe him to be a few spokes short of a wheel or a little less than "with it," I fear. And maybe you're right.

But right or wrong, this is not the John McCain who really was a hero and who really did used to be a kind of "maverick."

And right or wrong this is not the change we have been looking for.

Wednesday, September 3, 2008

Lore And Odor

"Lore and Odor!" How 'bout that as a title for Fred Thompson's new, ready-for-prime-time show. Or just a description of his "keynote" speech, perhaps.

A former candidate in this year's Republican presidential primaries and a guy who might well have been featured in some one's anti-celebrity ads ( a little too second-rate to be seen with Angelina but right on the mark for a Paris Hilton spot), Thompson donned the greasepaint once again in praise of former rival, John McCain.

His acting was, as usual, sub par.

A man with a J.D. degree from Vanderbilt and currently a Washington lobbyist, you wouldn't think old Fred would be so apt to welcome the election of a "maverick" (McCain) and a potential "reformist" (Palin) who are coming to Washington to "irritate the alligators" and "drain the swamp." You'd think that, being a lawyer and a lobbyist Mr. Thompson would be a little more protective of his natural habitat.

You'd also think that a guy with a law degree from Vandy and a high-powered, multi-digit income might be too embarrassed to assume some "aw-shucks" Uncle Fred persona at a time when he's not supposed to be playacting and when he's asking the American people to trust what he has to say. But take a look at the speech. It's full of water and buckets and swamps--an exotic dancer named "Marie, the Flame of Florida," field-dressing a moose --and it even gives a tip of the cap to good old Teddy Roosevelt who, after all, ran a few percentage points ahead of Fred in this year's primaries. But, hey, didn't everybody?

Don't be too hard on old Fred, though. He did give a pretty accurate accounting of the serious problems now facing our country. "Terrorists, rogue nations developing nuclear weapons, an increasingly belligerent Russia, intensifying competition from China, spending at home [not to mention in Iraq] that threatens to bankrupt future generations, [and] for decades an expanding government, increasingly wasteful and too often incompetent."

What he failed to say is that most of these problems are as a result of the "leadership" of George Bush and Republican control of both houses of Congress and that one of the "alligators" who worked their little "swamp," and an old bellowing bull one at that, was none other than Senator John Sidney McCain.

Aw, shucks! Lore and odor, anyone?