klondike sal

My, what a tangle of latched-onto opportunities this Republican platform has turned out to be. What I saw [at the convention] was; an exclamation of surprise from the (P)resident that his lawless rein of misrepresented initiatives has angered the left (forgetting, momentarily I suppose, that about half of his own Party are echoing their sentiments); a photo-op with the ghost of the twin towers; snide dismissals of community service, conservation, and diplomacy; selectively fluffed biographies; and the introduction of a self-described pit bull in lipstick (which I am ready to believe). I saw a self-emaciated trophy heiress in a $300,000. dress use her adopted daughter to nominate herself as the great white hope of brown little girls the world over (Mother Teresa owes her bigtime), a promise as smug as it was hollow that "Special Needs children" would have friends in high places, and perhaps the most scurrilous charge of misogynistic muck-raking Us magazine has ever known. I was taking it all in stride until... the woman who looks like she stepped out of a Lens Crafters ad took a swipe at set designers with her belittling comment about Styro-Foam columns. Just where does she think that is going to get her? It is not with a great amount of pride that I report that one of the few reliable sources of income I've had in the past eight years has been filling Republican convention halls, inaugurals and after-parties with...what? Scenery- the staging of every conceivable fantasy from a simple evening in "Margaritaville" to the full-out ensconcement of George II on a neo-Roman dais at the foot of the Lincoln Memorial. The day I spent gluing red glitter to a nine foot cut-out of the State of Texas to read; "Bush Country", was surely a concession to putting Froot Loops on my table that has stained my very soul. If that woman hasn't paused to imagine the life-sized foam moose that is undoubtedly waiting for her at some $1000. a plate "McCain raisin' " event, then her expectations just aren't high enough, yet. There are bound not to be many surprises from her in the coming weeks- until the scrappy little maverick has had time to integrate more of the Party planks into her comedy routine. In place of a candid reaction to pressing issues we can expect only the replay button to be pressed on the "Palin-drone" we saw at the Convention. I may have to agree with her surrogates- she and her family are undeserving of space in the tabloids...for red-necks, they are quite unremarkable. But what DO you buy your sister for Mother's Day?

5-7-5

Who has time to sit around filling ashtrays and channeling thoughts into typewritten words when there is so much else to be done? Actual things that need actual doing! Tomatoes to transplant, stamps to buy, ...blood to wash off the vinyl siding. There's a quick story about that last one. Lulu, our great Dane, had the bad luck to be wagging her tail in too close proximity to a slamming car door. She lost about three inches in all- I know this because about a month later I found her laying in the driveway, licking the amputated bit of tail which had escaped us. She's healed up nicely though, and doesn't seem to have been put off tail wagging. Thoughts about my three and a half months working in Massachussetts were recorded (in haiku form) in an illustrated journal and I've been keeping up with friends (in haiku form) with text messages. The once all important blog has been pushed aside to make time for [mouthing syllables as I count on my fingers]. Once constructed they are dashed onto a tiny keypad with the corner of my right thumb and sent, sometimes for annoying or harrassing purposes, to select contacts. I am proud to report that a good percentage of the replys are also haiku. This is not to suggest that I have abandoned the blog (or the illustrated journal) as creative outlets. Surely moments still come when I can't be brief. But if I am slow to post as I have been, please understand:
I've run on some time, in sentences that dizzy. Let's all get some sun.

delegation

I pin my every last hope for this nation on Senator Obama.

he Is Risen

I'm enjoying an extended working stay in Boston, removed from the assault of screaming children and political analysis that would otherwise consume me, and hoping to add my name to the whirling list of nobodys (amidst those who are somebodys to the nobodys) at the end of an Oscar winning motion picture. My hopes are usually pinned to shakier prospects than this, so it's a big deal. My holiday has lasted only long enough to lay flooring for my parents and mediate a battle over who's spitting on who's chocolate bunny. I'll have to miss the heavily salted ham and gray bean casserole for an overpriced chicken sandwich at the Vince Lombardi rest stop on the New Jersey turnpike en route to my lonely hotel room [decorated by someone who deserves to be smacked around {that from a Quaker}]. I'm working on affording the technology [and discipline] that would allow me to more regularly post. Upcoming for sure is a diatribe on the MA driver (Masshole; since when is the shoulder a lane?). I'm having a taste of power as a 'gang boss' over a crew of furniture restorers though the job title suggests we're picking up litter on the highway. My travel day commences in about fifteen minutes so here's my loftiest introspection. Even an atheist would have to revisit the idea of an afterlife if one has managed to survive a 6:30 am merge onto I-95 at exit 15B. Peace.

today in washington

It's not always all about politics. But this month, between loading laundry, I'm getting more than my fill and just can't seem to shut up. One of the very few differences between last night's State of the Union speech and any other is that his usual "The state of the Union is strong!" [delusional] assertion came not up front but rather, snuck in the back door at the end of the speech with 'blah blah blah"...to keep the state of our Union strong". This President, with more than his share of unintended laugh lines has finally developed , if nothing else in the past seven years, a sense of comedic timing- although he did seem to be taken off guard by a bit of spirited mid-sentence applause for an [otherwise hollow] invocation of the Constitution. Timing aside, he may never 'get' irony. The Democratic spokesperson's rebuttal was so stumpy that it came as no surprise to me in the following forty minute news cycle whom she was expected to endorse today. The "join us, Mr. President" chorus left me with the impression that 1. A Democratic Governor of a formerly red state might as well be a Sudanese warlord before getting the attention of this President; and 2. Competent political speech writers must be honoring the strike. It was an interesting news day. Twixt this coverage and the 'Liberal Lion's endorsement of Barrack was the story of a man apparently standing outside of the north fence around the White House shouting 'threats'. I imagine these might have included "If you don't get us out of this damn war, no one will be safe anywhere" and "If you manage to finish out your term I'm gonna be a pauper!". This development was important enough to secure the area against the unknown contents of his duffel bag but apparently not important enough for a follow-up report- even by end of the next day. I'm confused. In the main-stream media the absence of bombs, or bombs thwarted by the administration's vigilance is usually big news. I'm guessing the bag contained instead pictures of Laura, since they have to be somewhere. Remember, they fell in love when he was still a party animal. I have to say, I was most impressed by how Senator Ted was able to balance himself on a spindly Ikea bar stool for fifteen minutes of accolades without toppling off into the young A.U. student's laps. Noting the invariable fate of inflatable front lawn snowmen, it was something of an inevitability. Later at the SOTU, he displayed a palpable relief at having no reason under the sun to stand up again for the rest of the day. He delivered a rather withered expression to something Senator Obama whispered in his ear- which I lip-read to have been, "There's Hillary, pretend we're making out." Sour-faced Hillary, sitting between Senators Carper and Biden must have hoped she was invisible- (no one would ever think of looking for a primary candidate in Delaware). I won't even comment on the Florida Republican primary other than to marvel at the alacrity with which they've gone from too much paper trail to none at all. And did I hear Mitt Romney use the phrase "...in countries like Asia and India."?? But I'll shut up now.

mlk

Couldn't we have at least one day out of the year not spent evoking the legacy of Dr. King? I kind of knew where we were headed when clues to the long answers in this mornings crossword puzzle were; King of Hollywood, King of the Wild Frontier, King of Swing, and King of the links (kind of an extension of Saturday's puzzle where the answers were; Dr. Kildare, Dr. Feelgood, Dr. Zhivago, and Dr. Who[ever]- and VBIRHZ CSRWOI FHZM, KI. made the cryptogram no challenge at all). But the capper was listening to Wolf Blitzer hypothetically dragging him from the grave for one of the Democratic candidates to claim his endorsement (and I thought that the Frederick Douglass quote used earlier by Ms. Clinton to define her battle to fulfill Dr. King's legacy was going to be the gallsiest moment of my day). But why not dig up Thurgood Marshall, and for that matter Malcolm X, to beg their endorsement? Perhaps American history searches only among the pacifistic bids for black empowerment to define the civil rights movement; hoping that the memory of black militancy will just go away and skipping over Justice Marshall's legacy, who as Chief Council for the NAACP won 29 of the 32 cases which he argued in front of his predecessors on the Supreme Court. (Look up "Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka", then tell me your best lawyer joke.) I'll save my most savory question to the long-dead to ask Justice Marshall for his musings on Clarence Thomas. Not to take anything away from the dreamers; the Republicans have had a free hand at making theirs come true for some time now. Lest my wandering commentary not point clearly enough to the idiotic Blitzer as the cynosure of my sarcasm, be assured that even were he not an on-air personality with an abundance of facial hair AND despite his unfortunate given name, AND the combination of the two, I could not let such a question enter the public dialog uncommented on. (Luckily, only Edwards took the bait). If Dr. King were to come back to weigh in on anything at all, I would expect he would have surfaced years ago to protest the right-wing takeover of Southern Baptist theological seminaries, an issue perhaps closer to home than even the secular brand of hypocrisy- though I'm not convinced that the one isn't inextricably tied to the other. As long as 'folks' are trying on the idea of a [non-white male] President, couldn't we adopt an idea promoted this past month in the funny papers? Let's install a "Shut Up Zone" around the poor Doctor, and let our candidates march the last couple of miles on their own.

change

There we have it. Republicans, Democrats, and Close-mouthed-On-The-Cut-Of-Their-Political-Jibs alike- Iowans went with 'change'. For the Democrats- job well done; not only for pulling record numbers away from Ugly Betty and out into the cold, but for distilling the mind-boogling array of substantive issues into a cogent snipe-fest worthy of year-long MSM coverage. How many news cycles did we spend hashing through the "Hussein" quandary (would he be able to shake the nefarious implication in a general)? Will our next Commander-In-Chief be sporting pearls or diamonds? Myrtle Gooch, the retired key punch operator from Fleasburg, South Dakota-with an un-insured bi-polar boyfriend sharing her 'double-wide' trailer and an arsonist son carrying out the remainder of his house arrest in Iraq, has QVC on the line: she needs to know NOW. And wasn't that $400. invoice for a 'haircut' just bookkeeper code for 'Botox'? Some could argue that our greatest hope for the future is that there will be one (asking for anything greater would be audacious), but in the end Mo got Eeny and Meeny good! Miney never stood a chance. For the Republicans- likewise; running a low budget campaign in the Bible Basket against the seductive influence of a handsome corporate millionaire from New England who is rumoured to believe that Jesus was Satan's brother couldn't have been easy. Spelling Huckabee is in itself a feat (it's 'hucka...' without the '...alzabub'). I'll bet there was a whole lot of "kneeling before God" going on it those living rooms. This message of change has lifted us all. As a Democrat I am happy that we are all spared the many decades of experience my own state's candidate might have muddled the debate with (droning on the way he does about this warring faction and that belligerent government agency- save it for Larry King), and relieved that my vote for substance over buzz words has been pre-empted by a process that to this outsider sounds for all the world like a politically charged quilting bee. Thank you, Iowa. Now, if I'm lucky, I won't have to wait for the convention to find out which sparkling speechifyer we go into battle with. Which vision will America embrace?; change with experience, change with hope, change with not a whole lot of change, change of wives, or change without evolutionary change.