Willie and the Hand Jive

"North side, east side
Little Willy, Willy wears the crown/
He's the king around town...
'Cos little Willy, Willy won't go home/
But you can't push Willy round/
Willy won't go."
(Chinn/Chapman)
"Little Willy" The Sweet, 1973

There are occasions in the life of Memphis city politics when you just have to stand back and stare in awe. In 1968, Mayor Henry Loeb's patronizing, pigheaded position concerning city employees virtually forced a confrontation with sanitation workers. Then there was the memorable evening back in the mid-seventies when a disgruntled bar patron grew tired of hard-drinking Mayor Wyeth Chandler attempting to grope his date and kicked his ass in the parking lot behind Overton Square. Now, we have the on-again, off-again resignation of Mayor Willie Herenton, supposedly set for July 30, depending on how spiteful he's feeling at the time. But the bellicose rhetoric and the contempt the Mayor has shown for those citizens outside of his loyal voter base has made it open season for Herenton's critics, and they are legion.

If Chicago is "The City of Big Shoulders," then Memphis must surely be "The City With a Chip On Its' Shoulder." It's true enough that African-American citizens have been disenfranchised, underrepresented, and used as pawns in city politics in the not-so-distant past, but most Memphians long for the time when those days can be considered ancient history. It's just that some politicians who shoulder the largest chips won't allow us to move beyond it. Race is just too good of a political wedge issue to leave alone. City Council votes fall routinely along racial lines with many agenda-driven Councilpersons seemingly in it for self-aggrandizement or personal advancement. There is the rare, well-meaning, public servant, but John Vergos retired in frustration over trying to deal with the half-wits, even if he denies it. Perhaps it would be helpful to begin each City Council meeting with a brief group therapy session, or a 12-step program to see how everyone's doing with their respective dependencies. Meanwhile, the mayor's utter contempt for the Council does not make for good government, nor do his take-it-or-leave-it pronouncements from on high.

The most common term describing the mayor that I have seen lately, from professional editorialists to letters to the editor, is "egomaniac." He has become George Bush-like in his opinion of his subjects; you're either with him, or you're against him. And if you're not beholden to the mayor for your job or other "city services," you're considered by Herenton as just another "hater." The Mayor has been playing defense so long now, he has forgotten how to inspire. But it wasn't that way always. I voted for Herenton three times, and three out of five ain't bad. But he lost me around the "Don't bring no mess" phase, when his speeches became increasingly angry, paranoid, and racially tinged. Recalling Herenton's election as Memphis' first black mayor and the tremendous elation that came with the hope that this city might finally transcend its' racially divisive past seems like a very long time ago. Eighteen years of waiting for a renaissance that never arrived has made me Willy weary in the extreme. Especially since he ran for his fifth term just to prove he could be re-elected.

Mayor Herenton's admirable place in the revitalization of downtown during his first two terms has decayed along with the city. The combined efforts of government and business have overseen the opening and closing of Peabody Place, the pending destruction of the Coliseum, the Mid-South Fair moving to Mississippi, and questionable construction issues concerning the FedEx Forum. And as far as our big, empty Pyramid, it is way past time for Bass Pro Shops to fish or cut bait. Remember when a consortium of businessmen wanted to put a first-rate aquarium in the Pyramid? The mayor blew that one off before he even examined how similar facilities in Chattanooga and New Orleans have become major attractions. The thought of coming over the Memphis-Arkansas bridge and envisioning the architecturally beautiful Pyramid with a giant, hooked fish on its facade would be enough to make the project's founder, John Tigrett, spin in his grave, had he not purchased the "Fair and Square" casket he descibed in his autobiography that leaves him no wiggle room.

So now Herenton wants to run for Congress against Steve Cohen to restore the majority black 9th District to African-American representation. As reported in the Flyer, the Mayor thinks Cohen is "an asshole," but he's wrong. Maybe Cohen used to be an asshole as a young, ambitious County Commissioner, but thirty years in the state legislature taught him the humility needed to compromise with others for the common good. The difference between Cohen and Herenton is that Cohen is running for re-election to serve his constituents; Herenton just wants to win. It was heartening to see Rep. Cohen get a position on the prestigious House Judiciary Committee, where as a freshman, he was taken under the wing of legendary Michigan legislator John Conyers. Cohen was wise enough to know that he had a lot to learn and humble enough to allow himself to be mentored by the elder Conyers. Herenton has no such humility. I'm certain that if Herenton knows John Conyers, he considers himself every bit his equal. After all, what has John Conyers ever run? In Congress, you must wait your turn; not the best job for a 70-year-old man used to getting what he wants when he wants it. Herenton has already said he plans to win election with black votes alone, so we can expect a particularly ugly and racial contest.

I think Herenton feels under appreciated. After 18 years, the Mayor is crying out for recognition as the historical politician that he is, only he has stayed at the dance too long and the guests have all gone home. This late-life, vanity run for Congress is an attempt to prove that nobody stops Willie Herenton. Except, the Mayor may first want to check the last election returns to see that Cohen captured 60% of the African-American vote, and in the age of Obama, racial politics takes a back seat to the competence of the candidate. My unsolicited advice is for Dr. Herenton to make good on his retirement of July 30, go out a winner, and forsake further political ambition. Either that, or learn how it feels to lose, badly. Mayor Herenton has become an angry man who no longer receives praise or thanks for his work and feels persecuted by those around him. I think what he really needs is a big hug. So, how about this? For your decades of service to this community, thank you Willie Herenton. During your tenure as Mayor, you did many good things. May you enjoy your golden years in tranquility. Now, was that so hard?

Who Killed Michael Jackson?

"The pure products of America go crazy." William Carlos Williams, 1923

Only days ago, we were discussing the crackdown on dissent in Iran, a world mired in an economic slump, a pending Congressional showdown on health care, and the Argentinian adventures of Governor Mark Sanford, and then suddenly all that talk stopped. Michael Jackson had died. In another of those "where were you" moments, my wife rushed in with the news, and we settled in to watch the sad pageant of grief and shock. It takes a person of enormous influence to halt the 24 hour news cycle in its' tracks, and the filmed reports of people pausing worldwide, for even a moment, to acknowledge the loss, proves Jackson was such an individual. Love him or hate him, this single artist's contributions to popular culture are immeasurable.

Michael had become a touchstone in people's lives. Multitudes grew up with him, and though it's hard to imagine, there's another generation who missed his heyday in the spotlight. Can it really be 25 years since the release of Thriller? I always place myself between the bookends of Elvis, who was 12 years older, and Michael, who was 10 years younger than me. It's curious that shortly before Elvis' death, just before a major tour, he was bloated almost beyond recognition with the effects of narcotic painkillers, while Michael's most recent appearances showed him looking confident, if frail. So, even though Elvis died at 42 and Jackson at 50, Elvis appears forever older in my mind, while Michael remains eternally young. Coloring these images is the memory of Michael emerging as the leader of the Jackson 5 at age ten; so commanding as a singer and polished as a dancer, and so gifted a musical prodigy, that he made a good singular argument for the existence of God.

I confess to being an unabashed Michael Jackson fan, the only other artist of the age who belongs in the same category with Elvis and the Beatles, since I saw him on the Ed Sullivan Show in December, 1969. When the Beatles appeared on the same program in 1964, it was barely three months since the assassination of JFK, and they brought joy to a grieving nation. The Jackson 5 appeared on our TV screens just eight months after the murders of Dr. King and Robert Kennedy, and gave particular solace to young, black Americans who gained a new source of pride and inspiration. The corporate, white-dominated, music industry sprang into action and offered the Osmond Brothers as a squeaky-clean alternative. The Jackson 5 got a TV variety show; the Osmonds followed on their heels. A Saturday morning cartoon series was created around the Jacksons; the Osmonds had one within weeks. The Jacksons put Michael forward as their child leader; The Osmonds focused on Donny. It was the old practice of mediocre white artists ripping off black performers that dated back to before Pat Boone recorded "Tutti Frutti." But it was never a contest.

Michael's talent drew so much attention at such a young age, you just knew he would be a major adult artist if he could only survive the pitfalls that befell so many other child stars before him. Frankie Lymon, the MJ of the fifties, was devoured and abused by a music industry that drove him to addiction and early death. But Michael's 1979 Off the Wall solo LP, produced by Quincy Jones, was all the evidence anyone needed to know that the cute little boy had grown up. The Jacksons stopped at the Mid-South Coliseum for their Triumph tour in July, 1981, after Off the Wall had been released. Portions of the Memphis show were recorded for the follow-up Jacksons' effort, the double-album, Live, and though the show was critically hailed, it was clear that it was time for Michael to step out on his own.

No one could have predicted the massive response to Thriller, but something happened to Michael afterwards. Both Off the Wall and Thriller were essentially Rhythm & Blues records, but the international hysteria over Michael grew so far and so fast, that it was no longer sufficient to "cross-over" to a pop audience; he needed to dominate the scene, and he did. Jackson brought in Eddie Van Halen to play solos on guitar-based rock songs with a harder edge, and soon became the "King of Pop," but by the time Bad was released, Michael had begun his sad transformation from a vibrant, young, black man, into an old, white woman. I believe it was to make himself more race-neutral to his expanding international fan base, and the stories of him being teased by his father for his classic Negroid features are now legendary. But all his transitory cosmetic surgeries and eccentricities never compared to his lasting creative contributions to music and dance.

It was the personal oddities that fueled the tabloid fodder, and Michael became a target for opportunists. I truly believe that Jackson was an emotional man-child attempting to surround himself with the only group of people he felt he could completely trust; children. Only Michael could have been naive enough to admit in a documentary that he shared his bed with young boys in a non-sexual and innocent manner, like a childhood sleep-over, and expect people to understand him. Even his trust in children was betrayed when the boy he tried to help with medical expenses and emotional support filed criminal molestation charges against him. After the young man and his mother were proven to be grifters and Jackson was acquitted of all charges, Michael was forever burdened with suspicions of pedophilia, and became an object of ridicule. This trying ordeal led the former Jehovah's Witness into the world of prescription meds, painkillers, and "boutique" doctors. All the questions swirling around Jackson's sudden death have yet to be answered, but there is an object lesson in the latest saga of Scottish singer Susan Boyle. The only thing we English speaking followers of pop culture enjoy more than placing a hero on a pedestal to be worshipped, is to rip them apart when we realize they are not gods after all. In the aftermath of this tragedy, songwriter Don McClean's lyrics about Vincent Van Gogh seem most appropriate to Michael Jackson; "This world was never meant for one as beautiful as you."

The Alabama Extreme Makeover

Amid all the political vitriol of the past week, it's heartening to report the huge initial response we've received to our petition drive to officially rename the state of Alabama. Not merely in the Northeast and California, but people all over the world are writing in to endorse the idea that since Alabama is the cradle of the civil rights movement, and the scene of some of the era's most tumultuous events, it is only fitting that their citizens honor our 44th, and first African-American President, by formally renaming the state "Alobama." Since so many Alabama towns are named after European cities already; Florence, Athens, Birmingham, Oxford; the contributions from Europe, where our president is a superstar, have just been pouring in.

We, of course, realize that the name change will cause some inconvenience, especially at the DMV and official state buildings. But only one vowel has to be altered and our studies show that thousands of people can become employed rounding off "a's" into "o's." Hiring will be under a federally run public agency like the Works Progress Administration during Roosevelt's New Deal. Any map revisions can be incorporated in the next generation of cartography, however Alobama would lose it's alphabetical advantage to Alaska; a small price for historic change. In return, municipalities throughout France and Germany have agreed to build a series of Bistros and Rathskellers all over rural Alabama with authentic French waiters and Bohemian Frauleins, to introduce European cuisine to the natives. It will be a foie gras meets cheese-grits international smorgasbord. We predict European Socialist Tourism will increase ten-fold, especially during the year-long Obamafest planned to coincide with the name change celebration. It will be like Oktoberfest, only with Earth, Wind, and Fire playing instead of the oompah bands, and exclusively Mountain Dew, endive, and bratwurst in the dry counties.

Understandably, the state's land grant universities have to be treated with the sensitivity deserving of their legendary heritage. The former University of Alabama will be permitted to sell its' supply of red sweatshirts before beginning the new printings, and in honor of Bear Bryant and that song by Steely Dan, they will be allowed to retain the nickname "Crimson Tide." We would prefer, however, that the schools colors be changed to crimson and mauve to reflect the new multi-culturalism, and the football cheer "Roll Tide," be replaced by, "Roll Tide of Hope." The phrase, "Go Bama," is permissible, but the second syllable must be pronounced, "bomma," as in "Go Bomma." The guy in the elephant suit they use on the sidelines is easily swapped for a donkey in a red poncho. Since Auburn University can't decide whether to call their mascots "Tigers," or "War Eagles," a decision has been made for them. There are already too many schools using "Tigers," and we wish to de-emphasize the glorification of war, so to reflect the new patriotism, their sports teams will now be known as the Auburn Bald Eagles. Since nobody knows what a "Blazer" is anyway, UAB can remain the same, with commendations for their "green" theme.

We pledge not to alter the state flag, even though it's the same design as the Confederate battle flag, only with different colors and without the stars. It is a bit too antebellum, however, so the committee recommends co-state flags. We prefer adopting a flag with the Obama "O" logo, with the rising sun in red, white, and blue. Since the existing flag looks like a big, red "X" anyway, we will simply rededicate it in honor of the late Abdul Malik Shabazz, known internationally as Malcolm X. To assuage the concern of local citizens, we have been assured by the Nation of Islam that they will construct enough mosques statewide to accommodate all the new Muslim transplants, so that no one has to be inconvenienced. We further believe, to further the state's new, pacifist image, that flying an "X" flag next to an "O" flag, will also represent kisses and hugs. Henceforth, the Aloboma licence plates will read, "Land of the Tolerant," but that "Heart of Dixie" business has to go in favor of "I (Heart) Big Government." By popular demand, the official state song will be changed from "The Stars Fell on Alabama," to Stevie Wonder's, "Signed, Sealed, and Delivered." With the international attention this will receive, I can promise you that Birmingham will become the new Bangers and Mash capitol of the South, and Muscle Shoals can reopen their recording studios to tape large-group, Socialist anthems from Georgia.

Even George Wallace grew a conscience in his declining years and publicly rebuked his racist past. The old segregationist, who once stood in the schoolhouse door, cried like a woman and begged forgiveness for his sins before going to visit Old Scratch. Likewise, Alabama's day of redemption has come. Petitions are presently circulating in the state and we look forward to the Governor's support. It is hoped that the state legislature will address the name change, but we are prepared to have the name "Alobama" recognized by the World Court, as advised by our council from the ACLU, like Ceylon was changed to Sri Lanka. So here's to the "Yellowhammer State," which in the future will be known as "The Big 'O'," and the destiny that awaits you in the New World Order. Already, in keeping with the state's refreshing new post-racial attitudes, the City Council has voted unanimously to rename the Birmingham International Airport after Alabama's two most distinguished, and colorblind citizens. Henceforth, everyone will be flying into the Helen Keller-W.C. Handy Memorial Airfield in Birmingham, Alobama. "Yes We Can."

Osama Fears Obama

Memo to Osama bin Laden re: Your latest audio release; It ain't working anymore, pal. You've become like the Doobie Brothers and released one album too many, and now it's time to hit the Oldies Circuit. You're yesterday's news, with a strong, charismatic competitor for the souls of Muslim youth throughout the Middle-East. All over your imaginary Caliphate, young people are replacing the Osama wall posters with Obama posters. One offers hope, the other offers death. No wonder you released a frantic communique criticising Obama's historic address in Cairo to the Muslim world. If the enormous youth population of the Arab Crescent begin to believe that an erudite man named Barack Hussein Obama can be elected president, maybe the U.S. isn't the "Great Satan" their radical coreligionists have led them to believe.

Obviously, no single speech can erase the chasm that exists between cultures, or diminish the zeal of holy warriors on either side, but Obama's superb address did more to influence the next generation of Muslim youth than eight years of Bush's selling them Democracy as, "God's gift to mankind." Obama is uniquely qualified to deliver a speech of this magnitude, and approached his massive Muslim audience with two things they never heard from the last administration; humility and respect. Making the speech in Cairo must have been particularly galling to Ayman al-Zawahiri, bin Laden's Dick Cheney, who claims that turf like the Gangsta Disciples. Islamic extremists, who use a great deal of religious symbolism in recruiting, must have freaked-out when they saw the Obama-like hieroglyph in the Great Pyramid at Giza. I know I did. The Pyramid is known to have great mystical powers and astronomical accuracy, and is a recorder of the past and predictor of the future. If Obama is somehow able to jump-start the Arab-Israeli peace talks, this country's Evangelical right, already in a frenzy over his references to the "Holy Koran," will be holding the President down in order to shave his head and search for the sixes.

Regardless of your opinion of the President, it took some courage and finesse to speak those hard truths. Like Daniel in the lion's den, he said the U.S.'s bond with Israel was "unbreakable" in the capitol city of an Arab country, while insisting that Hamas and Hezbollah must reject and rebuke violence. Simultaneously, Obama insisted that Israel cease settlement expansion in the West Bank in preparation for a Palestinian state. He was the first President to use the word "Palestine," and also the first to acknowledge the complicity of the CIA under Eisenhower to topple the democratically elected leader of Iran, Mohammad Mossadegh, in 1953. That was our original beef with Iran, which was more pro-Western than not, when we feared our oil might become more expensive, and so staged a coup, giving them the Shah instead of the people's choice as leader. While some criticize Obama for "apologising," he merely owned up to some unpleasant history that needed to be addressed. The Iranian elections are coming, Ahmadinejad is in political trouble, and their young voters were paying close attention to this speech. Could it tip the balance?

President Obama also represents, as an honest broker, the best chance for peace in the Holy Land that we may yet have seen. The Netanyahu government of Israel will make a lot of groaning noises, but they have the proven alliance of Hillary Clinton to assure their interests are protected, and the persuasiveness of George Mitchell to begin the process. Netanyahu is like Nixon or Ariel Sharon, in that he is bellicose and unyielding right up to the moment he realizes history could record him as a peacemaker, then he's a realist. As a result of the positive reception to Obama's Cairo speech in the Muslim world, the Palestinians may begin to moderate their stance. It's only a beginning, but what an absolute dilemma for Al-Qaeda. When the U.S. is represented by a man who tells his Egyptian audience, "I am a Christian," yet is able to quote from the Koran, who will Osama bin Laden demonize to recruit new suckers? Other than the Republicans, who can hate this man? What a delight to have a leader who understands the benefits of community organizing.

Don't Take Your Guns To Town

In my career as a vagabond musician, I suppose I've spent a full third of my life working in bars and restaurants. I've seen some ugly incidents and brutal violence over the years, but aside from one or two times, it never included me. When a fight broke out, the band's policy was to keep playing unless the combatants rolled onto the bandstand at which point, all bets were off. I have used my guitar or microphone stand as a weapon, but we were fortunate to have a couple of big guys in the band who were our enforcers. I've actually turned my head to witness percussionist Skip Ousley catch the fist of an enraged person in mid-swing, right before it reached my face. We performed countless times at the Enlisted Men's Club at the Millington Naval Air Base where there were 200 men and four women, and a brawl erupted every ten minutes. I've watched teeth fly and blood flow, but nothing quite compared to the beat-down of an inebriated patron I witnessed at an all-night club in Little Rock called The Apartment.

Members of the Radiants were taking our parking lot break when a drunken fool was thrown out of the front doors by the club's immense bouncers. The drunk sprang up and attacked the two men, as drunks do, causing one of the bouncers to begin smashing the idiot's head with a lead-filled police slapper while screaming, "You done fucked up now, Bobby Gene!" When the other bouncer pulled a gun and began waving it in the air, we dove for cover behind the parked cars while the drunk continued to fight on. After a dozen more hard blows to the head, the man was beaten nearly senseless. When he tried to struggle to his feet he received a parting boot kick to the ribs that thudded across the lot and dropped him on his back. Still, the bleeding man struggled into his pick-up and managed to lay rubber leaving the club. It then became my job to get back on stage and reassure the freaked-out crowd that the danger was over and play some dance music, but midway through our second song, I saw a sort of panic sweep the room. It seems Bobby Gene had returned, only this time with a shotgun, and there was some sort of stand-off outside. For an agonizing moment, the nightclubbers, as well as the band, believed we could be part of a hostage situation. The police arrested him, but it was one of the few times in a club that I have been really afraid.

The common denominator in all of these incidents was alcohol, yet the Tennessee Legislature overwhelmingly passed new laws allowing handgun-carry permit holders to bring their weapons into bars and restaurants, supposedly for self-protection. So, on behalf of musicians, bartenders, managers, hosts, wait staff, cooks, cashiers, and busboys everywhere, I'd like to ask our distinguished state legislators a question. Are you people fucking crazy? Are you so deeply in the pockets of the National Rifle Association that you are willing to let someone die to keep the endorsements and contributions coming? Any fool can see that if this vote becomes law, somebody, and possibly a lot of somebodies, is going to be killed. The only people that should have guns in places that sell alcohol should be the owner and the security guard, just like at the liquor store. Anything else is inviting a disaster.

Governor Phil Bredesen has made the principled stand against this outrage by vetoing the bill, but there are powerful forces aligned against him and the General Assembly is prepared to override. The bill's sponsor, Republican Representative Curry Todd of Collierville is a former police officer and should know better, but a cursory exam of his voting record shows he wants handgun permit records to be closed to the public, he favors allowing loaded long guns in vehicles and the elimination of the thumbprint requirement for gun purchases. No wonder the NRA Political Victory Fund, which contributes to the campaigns of sympathetic legislators, gave Todd a grade of A+. The curious thing is that there was no demand for this bill. There have been no Luby's style massacres in the local cafeterias. The bill is entirely political and driven by the NRA to expand carry rights into every area of public life. A fear based campaign has already begun by the Tennessee Firearms Association and the NRA to urge their members to contact legislators to override, along with a blatant threat to the political futures of the police and law officials that stood with the Governor.

The gun-toters' argument is always the same: that carry permit-holders are law-abiding citizens that must pass a rigorous course in the use and safety of a handgun before being granted a licence to go strapped to Kroger's, and that they are our first line of defense when the armed drug gangs start to invade our Applebee's. Bullshit. In the past, someone had to show a legitimate purpose for carrying a weapon before being granted a permit. Now, anyone with a pulse and no felonies who can manage to act right for a few hours of training and keep from drooling over the paperwork has a gun in the glove compartment. Why do you suppose the number of road rage shootings has recently rocketed?

Instead of guns in bars, there should be more bars in guns. The last fatal shooting in a Memphis nightclub came from someone who was well-trained in firearm use and licensed to carry; an off-duty policeman who became enraged after a few drinks and shot two people over a parking space. Oh, I take it back. It was that hothead in Cordova, near Rep. Todd's district, who killed the father of two children in the parking lot outside a restaurant for a perceived insult toward his wife. He had a carry permit too, proving that what a handgun often does is turn a small man into a self-perceived badass. Add alcohol to that mix and what used to be a fist-fight will now become a shooting. The new law states that the gun holder is not supposed to be drinking in these "food-serving" establishments. Who's going to enforce that; the waiter or the bartender? This is one of those "contact your congressman" times for the sane people in Tennessee. For your own self-defense, find them at link, or www.tn.gov, and tell them that this gun legislation is a really bad idea. No one deserves to be shot over their creme brulee because of an NRA campaign donation.

Monkeys Be Losin' They Minds

First it was monkeypox and now this.I noticed a news headline not long ago that read "Australian Zoo Evacuated After Orangutan Escape." The ape showed no aggression, but the newsworthy part of the story was the 27 year old primate breached an electric fence by using a branch to scale its' way to freedom and avoid being shocked. Coming so close on the heels of the recent, hideous chimp mauling in Los Angeles, I saw a pattern and decided to do some research so you wouldn't have to. What I found is jaw-droppingly shocking. We are in the midst of no less than a covert, global monkey jihad. Especially among so-called pets or otherwise kept monkeys. Consider this:

5/17/08, Los Angeles News"An orangutan named Bruno escaped from his enclosure at the Los Angeles Zoo and went on a 25-minute jaunt...Bruno got out through a hole in his wire mesh enclosure...Zoo officials were not sure whether Bruno made the hole..or if the wire broke some other way"
1/30/09,blog.nola.com"Using only a stretched green T-shirt and powerful upper body strength, a Sumatran orangutan named Berani escaped from his Audubon Zoo enclosure..Employing a level of cunning that could come from a prison movie, the primate stretched the shirt, scaled a 10 1/2-foot wall to the top of the moat, wrapped the shirt around the "hot" electrical wires surrounding the exhibit and swung out."
5/11/09 Monkeyday.com"An orangutan in Heidelberg Zoo has attracted attention after teaching himself to whistle. Now the 14-year-old ape has recorded his first CD. Entitled "Ich Bin Ujian," The CD single by Ujian will go on sale in June. The song, a jaunty pop-rock number with reggae elements, features Ujian's melodic whistling..and a chorus including the lines: 'I am Ujian the orangutan, I am so cool, man, I am a star.'"

Obviously, the captive orangutans are up to something. They escape their Escarpments with ease, causing chaos but never harming anyone, but just to brazenly show us they can do it at will. Some are learning skills involving the disarmament of locked gates and electric barriers, while others are learning to whistle "(Sittin' on)the Dock of the Bay," and releasing CD singles to distract us from what's really going down and have us believe that they are cool with our values. This orangutan song-and-dance is really a smokescreen to cover-up what is happening at the tip of the spear of the monkey revolt; the angry, malicious, and revengeful violence of the world's chimpanzees. In this battle against their human captors, they are the guerrilla warriors of the simian movement; "The Simianese Liberation Army."

The Kolkata zoo in India reported that a mother and her six-year-old daughter were injured by rocks thrown from Babu, a male chimpanzee, who became "furious and retaliated" when visitors threw pieces of bricks at him. Zoo officials confirmed that Babu escaped his enclosure last year by breaking the lock. The victims were treated in the hospital and released. More ominous were the plans of the chimp named Santino in Sweden's Furuvik Zoo, who was observed "chipping at concrete to create discs to throw at visitors. He even made weapons at night to throw...in the morning." Santino impressed Swedish scientists who believe "this is the first evidence of a non-human animal being capable of making plans for the future." Thousands of miles away in Thailand, the monkey murders have already begun. Nature and Conservation reported in March that Leilit Janchoon purchased a monkey for $180 dollars to climb trees and fetch coconuts, but when the exhausted beast tried to take a break, Janchoon beat the monkey until he returned to his task. The primate, named Brother Kwan, promptly re-climbed the tree and "hurled a coconut straight down on Janchoon's head, killing him instantly."

Most pet chimp stories end badly, including Elvis' monkey, "Scatter," who amused the boys for awhile before becoming too aggressive. People who can't find human contact and acquire a monkey instead, often treat chimps like children, until they discover their pets are feral beasts with great strength and not a lot of conscience. The latest gruesome mauling of a woman in Los Angeles by Travis the Chimp is an example. We discovered to our immense discomfort that Travis' female owner bathed and slept with the chimp. (Isn't that how AIDS got started?). But might she not have imagined that giving drugs to the animal could cause problems? Did she not think that the simian brain reacts differently to Xanax than humans and, just possibly, her pet may become confused? She may as well have given the monkey LSD and turned on a strobe light.

Travis' owner might have consulted with St. James and LaDonna Davis, who put their pet chimp, Moe, in a California primate sanctuary in 1999 after he bit off someone's finger. The couple went to visit Moe on his birthday in 2005, bringing a cake to celebrate the occasion, when two chimps in an adjoining cage went berserk, broke free and viciously attacked the Davis's. St. James took the full measure of the apes' fury, who bit off a foot, chewed off his nose, and ripped off his balls, while his pet Moe merely sat back and watched. Something sinister is going on around the ape grapevine, and it doesn't seem to be good, but there's a lesson in this for humans. Remember when our government invaded Iraq and disbanded the army, the police, and the Ba'ath party, in effect disenfranchising tens of thousands of Sunnis? The result was an unforeseen and bloody insurrection. The moral being; When you go to a primate party, you better bring enough cake for all the monkeys or they'll be having your testicles for canapes and your face for an entree.

The Thing That Wouldn't Leave

If Warner Brothers is ever interested in a remake of "The Man Who Came to Dinner," the Monty Wooley role of the irascible, housebound, curmudgeonly critic could be perfectly filled by Dick Cheney. His continuing media appearances have become an irritant like a rash that just won't heal. As badly as I'd like to forget these guys, the former Vice President, sometimes known by his regal name, "Richard the Chickenhearted," refuses to go away. Every day there's another Cheney sighting and another microphone to assist Dirty Dick in sewing his discord. And now that he's linked arms with Rush Limbaugh, his white noise concerning "enhanced interrogation techniques" will always have an outlet.

It has to be a tough gig defending torture under any circumstances, but Cheney tries to justify his special methods because, "They worked." So does armed robbery, but the criminals are usually brought to justice after they confess. Now, separate reports have surfaced saying the Office of the Vice President personally suggested "harsh techniques" to be used on certain captives in Iraq, and not because of some Keifer Sutherland, ticking dirty bomb fantasy. Col. Lawrence B. Wilkerson, Colin Powell's former chief of staff, recently wrote in the Washington Note that Cheney's suggested "enhanced" methods used in April of 2002, before the President's legal council had spoken on the matter, were entirely for the purpose of "discovering a smoking gun linking Iraq and Al Qaeda." Wilkerson continues to state that the reason the country has been free of a terrorist attack since 9/11, "is due almost entirely to the nation's having deployed over 200,000 troops in Iraq and Afghanistan," and not as the result of Cheney's interrogation methods. So why does Cheney continue to parrot that the country is more vulnerable under Obama's non-torturing directives?

There is certainly no downside to Cheney predicting another terrorist attack on American soil. Most Middle East analysts agree with him, so if or when an attack is attempted, Cheney can say "I told you so," and be seen as a visionary. If another sneak attack should never come, he can say that he erred on the side of national security. Either way, Cheney can't lose and he believes history will absolve him of his crimes in the name of "vigilance." Of course, if you go above or around the law and, say, attack a sovereign nation without provocation, then you're merely a "vigilante." The fog of talk-show war that Cheney is churning out is for one purpose only; if he can get everyone to focus on the use of harsh questioning of perceived terrorists in defense of the country, attention is diverted from the larger issue of the initial decision to invade Iraq and the consequent sales pitch that preceded the bombing of Baghdad. Interrogating bad guys is an argument that Cheney can win, but busting him for torture is like arresting a man for speeding when he's been caught in a stolen car. Sending the armed forces into combat under false pretences is the real crime. The torture of prisoners was used to justify it.

There's a fierce storm a'comin. It's going to be more furious than Katrina, worse than the Clinton impeachment, and uglier than Watergate. In fact, you'll have to go back to the Grant administration and the trials of Jefferson Davis and the hierarchy of the Confederacy to find a parallel. But it is as inevitable as justice itself and the people will demand it. We've always known there would be a reckoning someday for all the destruction and death resulting from this misbegotten war; a war spawned by a political philosophy encapsulated in the "Statement of Principles" of the Project For the New American Century. (Click on title). Among the signers of that document, three years before Bush was appointed president by the Supreme Court, were Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, Scooter Libby, and Dick Cheney. Their imperialist desires were pretty much spelled out in advance, and Cheney, by necessity, had to emerge from his undisclosed location to defend what has become the indefensible; starting a war. And to think that if Karl Rove had achieved his goal of a "permanent Republican majority," through voter fraud and gerrymandering, this gang would have gotten away clean. All this clamor over harsh interrogations being spewed by Dick Cheney is the sound of a drowning man who realizes he's going under, but is treading water just as fast as he can to delay the inevitable; sort of like someone being waterboarded.

The Nouvelle Neo-Cons

When I walked in on the evening news and heard them say that Specter had become a Democrat, I figured Phil Spector was looking for a pardon. But the prospect of Penn. Senator Arlen Specter voting with the Democrats is equally chilling. Arlen Specter was already a registered Democrat when he made his bones as Junior Council to the Warren Commission investigating the Kennedy assassination. His eternal contribution was the concoction of the "single bullet theory," which claimed that the same bullet passed through the throat of the president, then through the car seat and into Texas Governor John Connelly, through the Governor's body, striking his wrist, and ending up on the floor of the presidential limousine in near pristine condition. Specter sold his theory to the Warren Commission, but couldn't sell it to the American people, or even Governor Connelly for that matter; the point being that Arlen Spector has been shovelling the same shit for nearly fifty years. A Republican since 1965, Specter's defection deprives the GOP of their last moderate senator in the Northeast and the infamous inquisitor of Anita Hill. His multi-party reversals are like a man who undergoes a sex change, then returns to the doctor forty years later asking for his penis back.

To drive a weasel like Specter from their ranks, the Republican Party must be seriously off the rails. Last week, members of the conservative wing of the Republican National Committee drafted a resolution to officially change the way they refer to the opposing party. It states:

RESOLVED, that we the members of the Republican National Committee call on the Democratic Party to be truthful and honest with the American people by acknowledging that they have evolved from a party of tax and spend to a party of tax and nationalize and, therefore, should agree to rename themselves the Democrat Socialist Party.

This week, a new initiative called The National Council for a New America hit the road with such fresh faces as Mitt Romney and Jeb Bush holding town meetings to "re-brand" the Republican party. The architect of the Council is Virginia Congressman Eric Cantor, who has been called the GOP's "rising star" and undoubtedly has ambitions of his own. Cantor hopes that trotting out John McCain to talk about the future, or Rep. Michelle Bachman telling Chairman Michael Steele that, "You be the man," will energise the teaparty-goers and give a focus to their anger. But re-branding this Republican party is about as useful as changing the wrapping on a can of Spam.

I think we should no longer deny the dead elephant in the room, and that the real name change should be considered by the Republicans. GOP makes a nice acronym for "Greedy Old Pigs," but they all got washed out in the banking collapse and are now on the government teat, and not in a position to complain too loudly. All that's left of the old party are the religious conservatives, gun zealots, and Old Dixie: the remnants of Richard Nixon's "Southern Strategy." After Lyndon Johnson signed civil rights legislation in 1964, he said to an aide that the Democrats had probably lost the South for a generation, but not even LBJ would have thought a Southern governor would suggest secession. And all along, when I heard the term "neo-con," I thought they meant neo-conservatives. Now, I understand that the term actually means neo-Confederates: the party of states' rights, only with a few constitutional amendments prohibiting certain behaviors they deem offensive. So why not just re-name the Republican Party the "New Confederacy?" It sounds a little better than Strom Thurmond's Dixiecrats in 1948, or George Wallace's American Independent Party in 1968, but it appeals to the same group; the red-faced mob screaming about taxes when, most likely, they just got a refund.

The lack of historical reference is palpable among the current batch of Republican legislators. If they had any sense, they'd reverse course now, but because they don't, they are doomed to repeat the past. In this case, the example is the Democrats. At the Chicago convention of 1968, the Democrats tore themselves apart over the issues of war abroad and equality at home. Beaten and bloodied by the overeager Chicago police, the chaos in the streets shocked the nation and helped elect the law-and-order candidate, Nixon. Rather than lick their wounds and take a centrist approach, the party lurched to the left, into the doomed candidacy of George McGovern, and became known as the party of political correctness rather than the party of inclusion. Now that the roles are reversed and the Republicans have had their heads handed to them in the last two elections, they will instinctively follow their gun-toting, frustrated, base on a march to the far right, and into the arms of Governor Sarah Palin, or someone like her, who will lead them to crushing defeat.

The GOP has become the party of the angry Southern white man, led by talk radio into ugly sloganeering against the current government, without offering any solutions other than tax cuts and torture. The Boehner obstructionists need to either adjust or start learning the lyrics to James Taylor's "Steamroller Blues." Senators Arlen Specter and Al Franken will give the Democrats their filibuster-proof majority, and the Republicans, like the old Confederacy, become the defenders of yet another "Lost Cause." With no moderates remaining in the party, I only hope there is someone left who can discourage the Palin voters and the hysterical cultural crusaders from armed rebellion.

Tortured Logic

So the news is all atwitter over recently released memos that prove that the hierarchy of the Bush government sought out and approved methods of "enhanced interrogation techniques," particularly Cheney and Rumsfeld. Tell me something I don't already know. One witness after another has refuted the Rumsfeld "few bad apples" explanation for institutional torture in American run prisons. If Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was the mastermind behind the 9/11 attacks, I personally don't care if they pull his teeth one by one, each representing 100 victims inside the World Trade Center, to get information or exact revenge for that matter. If he was responsible for the sneak attack on this nation, then he is an enemy combatant deserving of retribution. It's disturbing, however, to learn that the White House was inquiring about which "harsh techniques" they could legally use on prisoners three months before they had anyone to interrogate.

Focusing on the Bush government's sanctioning torture of detainees in the midst of this ghastly enterprise is like quibbling over the preferred thumbscrews used during the Spanish Inquisition. The My Lai Massacre occurred within the massive horror that was Vietnam. Violations of international law concerning treatment of prisoners happened in the greater atrocity that is the American invasion of Iraq. The continuing reports of prisoner abuse in Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib while under U.S. control are worthy of examination, but they are misdemeanors when compared to the Bush government's larger crime. They conspired at the highest levels to willfully and without provocation, invade and occupy a sovereign nation, cynically using the 9/11 attacks to mislead the American people and the Congress into believing we were living under an imminent threat of nuclear attack from Iraq. All they needed was a major Al Qaeda leader to confess a confederacy with Saddam Hussein, and that would seal the deal.

I'm no seer, but I saw through the obfuscation the day the entire Bush cabinet fanned out to the Sunday talk shows to warn of Saddam's "mushroom cloud." In a time of patriotic fervor, this previously unutterable phrase sounded like obvious bullshit to sell the public on a war that's execution had already been decided. Why else would they send Colin Powell in front of the United Nations to display pictures of "rolling biological weapons labs," and "aluminum tubes used in the manufacture of nuclear materials," when U.N. weapons inspectors were still on the ground? But, according to the Downing Street Memo, the timetable had already been set for March, 2003. White House chief of staff Andrew Card famously told The New York Times in 2002, "From a marketing point of view, you don't introduce new products in August." Even when Bush gave the Husseins 24 hours to get out of Dodge, the invasion was set. In the final hours when asylum was offered and accepted by Hussein, Bush blocked his exit. Cheney and Rumsfeld were going to exorcise the demon that had haunted them since the first Bush presidency ended; after a brilliantly executed war against Iraq, they had allowed Saddam to remain in power, and Poppy's critics called him a "wimp."

If the Justice Department wants to look at who approved waterboarding, have at it. After all, they finally got Al Capone for income tax evasion instead of the St. Valentine's Day Massacre. But there are larger issues here. Taking a nation to war through lies and deception is a more serious infraction to me than smacking someone upside the head. Conducting a military exercise that kills over a half-million civilians and foments an insurgency that costs our soldiers 35,000 casualties is a higher crime than placing a dog collar on a detainee. The best estimate I've found of prisoners that have died in U.S. custody is 108, and that was four years ago. Of those, the Army admits that 34 are homicides. Our government's agents have done far worse than lock a man in a box with insects. We have tortured people to death, and it is documented. It's best that we, as a nation, address this egregious breach of civilized law ourselves, rather than have an international court parade the Bush lawyers who justified torture before the world. They were just the good Germans. The criminal conspiracy that took over the highest offices of government are the evildoers. I'm sure, however, that comfortable accommodations can be arranged for the Secret Service within Federal Prison grounds. Better locked-up in Leavenworth than renditioned to Romania.

Forget the Alamo

I enjoy telling my Texas friends that if it weren't for a few brave Tennesseans, they'd all be speaking Spanish. But to hear Governor Rick Perry talk these days, they'll have to choose a national language when Texas re-secedes from the Union. Then they can build an electric border fence as high as they want and reassign the beleaguered Border Patrol to hold the line against Oklahoma. But, according to the treaty admitting the Republic of Texas to the Union, they would be required to break up into five separate states, and then who would cheer for the Texas Rangers; either the ball team, or the lawmen? What manner of insane, combustive, prattle is this from an inane public servant who is a "Rebel Without a Clue?" It has reached a point where it may be necessary to require every seeker of public office to first take a remedial class in American history, just to keep them from self-humiliation.

"Texas is a unique place. When we joined the Union..(the treaty said), we would be able to leave if we chose to do that. We've got a great Union and there's no reason to dissolve it. But if Washington continues to thumb their nose at the American people, who knows what might come out of that?" Gov. Rick Perry

It's not that Texans alone continue to elect absolute dumbasses for Governor. After all, Tennessee elected the crook Ray Blanton, not to mention Rod Blagojevich in Illinois and Eliot Spitzer in New York; first-rate political jackalopes all. But not even Huey Long suggested that Louisiana should declare its' independence. Texas has also produced master politicians like Sam Rayburn, LBJ, Ann Richards, and the distinguished Congresswoman Barbara Jordan, who had the intellectual capacity to become the first woman, and black president. The good people of Texas have merely been duped like everyone else by the malignant political theories of Karl Rove. The Rove philosophy is not to be overly concerned with a political client's particular opinions on the issues as long as they meet three criteria; they must be pro-business, which also means anti-tax and anti-regulation; culturally conservative and demonstrably Christian; and have good hair.

This methodology emerged with Ronald Reagan, when the GOP found a man with one, great, "gut," principle, and the rugged, good looks that Americans like in their movie stars and father figures. When Bush the Elder, who fired Rove for dirty tricks, was presented with a choice of worthy candidates to nominate for his Vice President, he said, "I'll take the peachy blond who looks like Dennis the Menace." Molly Ivins has described Rove's first star-crossed meeting with Dubya when he was assigned to pick up the younger Bush at the D.C. train station. Rove was taken aback by the Texas Air National Guard flight jacket, the steely, blue eyes, and the cowboy hat on the man from Harvard Business and thought, "I can make him president." After Rove stacked the Texas statehouse and Supreme Court with his clients, and was about to do the same to the country, his hand-picked successor to Bush, Rick Perry, moved into the Governorship. Kay Bailey was a local TV anchorwoman with good hair before becoming a Rove client. In the upcoming gubernatorial election between Rick Perry and Kay Bailey Hutchison, how can Karl Rove lose? Rove's clients still occupy positions and seats in overwhelming numbers in every aspect of Texas government, including Senator John Cornyn III, who's hair is not as great as his right-wing politics.

Former and future Texas roach killer, Tom DeLay, came to Rick Perry's defense by saying, "This is a governor standing up for the sovereignty of his state," and claimed he was caught up in the tumultuous hysteria of San Antonio's recent "Tea Party." In a demonstration so incoherent that the GOP should stand for "Gut Obama's Policies," Perry was more likely attempting to appeal to the malcontents who, without proper stoking, might be inclined to vote for the slightly more moderate Hutchison. At least as a former Senator, Hutchison must know that seceding from the Union is unconstitutional. Perry probably knows as well, only he doesn't give a damn when it comes to fanatical, redneck populism. Either way, Texas' next governor will be a Rovian creation. So what if one seems like a rabid disciple of John C. Calhoun, and the other is like, well.. a TV anchorwoman? With an unprincipled State's Rights fanatic as governor, the criminal Dubya and Karen Hughes planning the Bush Policy Institute in Dallas, "The Hammer" DeLay plotting a comeback, and the Ron Paul Revolution, I say, "Let Texas Go." Fence it, put a moat around it, build a great wall; just stop sending Rove's politicians to Washington, and please grant passports to my cousins so they can visit me in free Tennessee.

Brand Loyalty Oaths

What ever happened to soap? I envision some genius in the marketing department at Proctor & Gamble saying, "You know, our soap smells far too pleasant and produces a rich lather. Let's change it to a slick bar with no discernible scent that leaves an oily residue that is hard to wash off, but also put specks of grit in it that are uncomfortable on the skin and tell the public that it's good for them." Before you know it, every bar in the soap aisle is either anti-bacterial, or Ivory, which brings back bad memories of childhood punishments for cursing. I gave my heart to Safeguard, and then they took it away from me. The whole concept of lather disappeared in order to sell you a new, gel "body wash" in a plastic, disposable container. Of course, that makes the puffy bath net on a rope a necessity and then you're into a whole new category of bathroom accessories. A similar thing happened with Vanilla Pepsi. I had finally found the proper mixture of cola, carbonation, and taste and was pledging my loyalty to Pepsi by listening to Michael Jackson records and watching old Joan Crawford movies, when they cut me off cold-turkey. I protested the bait-and-switch like a true Southerner and turned to Royal Crown Cola. It's hair tonic today and Bug Be Gone tomorrow. Packaged groceries are shrinking in size, trusted brands are disappearing from the shelves, and somehow the Watson's Girl just doesn't seem as sexy in her new incarnation as the Family Leisure Woman.

That's why, ever since the age of awareness, I have tried to be cautious of developing brand loyalties. But then I'm not like other people, if only for the fact that I put my pants on two legs at a time; always have. I sit at the edge of the bed, britches in hand, rock back and place both legs in at once, and spring to my feet fully trousered. I figure it saves me 15-20 seconds a day, which may not seem like much, but accumulated over many years it gives me an extra few hours at the end of my life to just mess around. That sort of thinking, plus a few college advertising classes, made me cognizant of tricks used by image peddlers who know that if they hook you young enough on their product, they've got you for life. Joe Camel was no accident. Neither were subliminal images contained within advertising, mostly in popular magazines. I saw devil heads painted into ice cubes in liquor ads without actually having to drink the stuff. I once considered advertising as a career for a minute until I realized I'd be lying for a living, and had I wanted to do that, I would have gone to law school. Over the years, I cast away the brand name products for common sense, but there was a time when brand preferences went a long way in determining social acceptance.

I wore a uniform back then, just like all my friends. But we weren't in a military academy or assigned a school uniform; just in Junior High, trying to be cool. We created a self-imposed, official, "cool" outfit and became slaves to fashion and the brand names. I wore Oxford cloth, Gant, button-down collared shirts in white, blue, yellow, or pink, H-I-S slacks in navy or khaki, Burlington Gold Cup socks, and Bass Weejuns. Upon enlightenment, I shed the uniform for simpler garb; the light blue workshirt, bell bottom jeans, and chukka boots. Then one day I looked around and realized that everyone was wearing exactly the same outfit and that I was back in uniform again. My clothing decisions these days are based more on comfort than style, but I have steadfastly refused to display a designer label on my ass or be anybody's walking billboard; Marvin Gaye and Barack Obama T-shirts excluded.

Back when American cars were the world's standard, they produced the fiercest brand loyalties. Beginning in 1934, my grandfather owned one long series of Buicks for his entire life. My first car was a Pontiac Tempest Le Mans ragtop and I loved it dearly. I had read in one of my big sister's "Teen" magazines that a gentleman should keep a scarf in the glove compartment so his female passengers wouldn't have to mess up their hair when the top was down. I had a variety of colors. After a few hundred trips back and forth from Knoxville, however, I began to notice something known within the industry as "planned obsolescence." Without constant maintenance, these cars weren't designed to last very long, and the ragtop wasn't so impressive at 85mph on the interstate. I would shove in an 8-Track of the Steve Miller Band and let him and Boz Scaggs battle the howling wind for noise dominance in the vehicle. Major mechanical problems began to develop in the car's third year, and that's only because it sat idle in my parents' driveway for nine months while I obeyed the UT rule forbidding freshmen from having cars on campus.

After an angst-ridden stretch in a doomed 1969 Mercury Cougar and a hippie pipe dream gone horribly wrong with a stripped-down, short-lived VW Minibus, I abandoned buying American cars completely for an alternating group of Hondas and Datsun/Nissans, the last of which I drove for ten years. I lease a car now, and I guess we show a little Honda favoritism since Melody drives the Accord and I drive the Metropolitan scooter. In the cola wars, I prefer to drink whatever is on sale that week. I am very fond of the Fender electric guitar, although I have owned others, but I have played the same cracked, hollow-body Gibson acoustic for 47 years. To power my home stereo, I still use the Marantz amplifier I bought for $75 from my former college roommate in 1972. That was a good deal, but the one I'm not so proud of was selling a 1962 Fender Stratocaster to Buddy Davis for $175. He was a good guitarist, I wasn't, and I thought he could make better use of it. That same guitar is worth over $12,000 today. Buddy ultimately sold it too, so there's someone out there with a prize. I only hope they know it.

As I have aged, my brand loyalties have dropped away one by one; Ultra-Brite toothpaste, Mennen Speed Stick, English Leather, any razor of any type, and since I've been married; Stouffer's Lean Cuisine and Sweet Sue Chicken and Dumplings. I have no favorite football team although I can't say the same for basketball, and I always root for the old hometown, as difficult as it sometimes gets. I seldom read fiction unless it is forced on me. I have owned both Apple and PC computers. Because I have 1000 songs at my fingertips at all times, I have no need for an iPod and I never listen to music through headphones or when I'm in public. I hate the cellphone and I refuse to text because that's essentially typing on the phone. I've entered the digital age, but saved my albums, and yes, I'll probably end up buying the newly mastered Beatles albums for the fifth separate time. All it takes to make me happy these days is a box of real Kleenex with Aloe and my remaining three undying brand loyalties which perfectly illustrate my priorities; Charmin Ultra, Jockey, and the Democratic Party.

All-American Murder

The "Hello-Kitty AK-47"

When Charles Whitman lugged a duffel bag full of high-powered rifles to the top of the clock tower at the University of Texas and began picking off unlucky bystanders, leaving 14 dead and 32 wounded, the country was brutally shocked and our collective psyche was forever scarred. There had been mass murders before, but nothing like this: a random spree killing of innocents. The killer never discriminated between young or old, man or woman, he just shot everything that moved. The year was 1966, and for years following the disaster, a macabre national obsession with the tragedy produced a best-selling, minute-by-minute novel and a made for TV movie, creating stars out of the Texas Rangers that finally took the sniper down. Everyone knew from the Kinky Friedman country song that Whitman had a brain tumor and was an Eagle Scout, but only insanity could explain his murderous rampage. I recall news footage of the day of horror being repeatedly broadcast with each gruesome detail examined. The name Charles Whitman entered the lexicon as the prototypical mass killer and an avalanche of psychobabble followed concerning how to identify and stop these potential time bombs in the future before they exploded. After 43 years of heated discussion, we are now experiencing a Charles Whitman-like massacre once a week. Rage and spree killings have become as American as Mom, apple pie, and methamphetamine.

Consider:

3/10/09; Sampson, Ala. "The worst rampage in Alabama history" began when a man described by friends as "a nice, quiet kid," armed himself with two military assault rifles, a handgun, and a shotgun, and began a multi-town slaughter that took 10 lives, including his parents and four relatives. When he opened fire on a True Value Hardware store, the owner said, "we realized what it was and grabbed our guns, but he was gone." A witness said he was wearing earplugs.

3/23/09; Oakland, Cal. A violent felon on parole used a handgun to murder two motorcycle policeman who had pulled him over for a traffic stop. When a SWAT team entered the apartment in which he was hiding, he killed two more before being shot himself.

3/29/09 Santa Clara, Ca. Six are killed and one injured in an upscale townhouse community by a man who shot his two children and three relatives with a .45 semi-automatic weapon, legally purchased two weeks previous.

3/30/09; Carthage, N.C. A nursing home is attacked by an armed man whose wife worked at the facility. An employee and 7 residents are killed and 4 wounded before the spree ends. A policeman is shot subduing the shooter. The victims' ages ranged from 78 to 98.

And that was only March. This month's tally so far:

4/3/09; Binghampton, N.Y. A man blocked a rear exit of the American Civic Association and killed 13 immigrants taking a citizenship test. Four are wounded. The center had tried to help the unemployed immigrant whose two handguns were properly purchased and registered. The killer boasted of his murders in a letter to the newspaper.

4/4/09; Pittsburgh, Pa. A gunman in body armor and "lying in wait" ambushes police responding to a domestic disturbance with an assault rifle and two guns, killing three.

Am I the only one seeing a pattern here? Yet it seems like the debate about restricting gun sales has already been settled. You rarely even hear it discussed anymore. It takes a high profile shooting or a massacre like Columbine to get our attention, and then the NRA moves in and showers money on the Congress, both Democrats and Republicans, and the problem quietly goes away until the next time. Is it a coincidence that after Bush the Merciless allowed the Clinton era ban on assault weapons to expire, the incidences of multiple victims murdered in a short period of time, from Virginia Tech to Northern Illinois University, began to spike? If someone who is mentally disturbed can act right for a couple of minutes, they can buy a gun in America. Or perhaps all these rampage killers went crazy after they purchased their weapons. It's also worth a reminder, before someone goes all racial about it, that with a few notable exceptions, serial and spree murder is almost entirely the province of angry white males. Yet the Obama administration has expressed no desire to bring up further restrictions on assault weapons, or the kind of "street-sweepers" that should only be in the possession of SWAT teams or the military.

The war news continues to report murders, kidnappings, and beheadings, and that's just in Mexico. Aside from Coke and Colonel Sanders, weapons are the US's most popular export, including assault weapons like the AK-47, which is the preferred weapon of Somali pirates, thug gangbangers, and Mexican drug lords as well. The AK-47, or Kalashnikov, was adopted by the Soviet Army after the Second World War for its killing effectiveness. After the fall of the Berlin Wall, it became accessible to American "collectors." Now, there are more than 70 million in production and they even make them right here in the U.S.A. Some have Chinese wood stocks, but that's globalization for you. Secretary of State Clinton was criticized for admitting that assault weapons enter Mexico from the United States. Where else would they come from? We want the drugs, and guns and drugs go together like peanut butter and jelly. The automatic weapon and the handgun have replaced the automobile as the iconic American image. Our auto industry is on life support but the domestic sale of weapons is soaring, partially because of right-wing media goons spreading a mantra that says, "Obama is coming for your guns."

America is armed like never before and a rash of paranoia is spreading through the populace, the television news spends 50% of their airtime reporting crime, and carry permits have exploded in number. In Memphis, men packing weapons at restaurants are killing over parking spots, and you can't tell me that if someone has a gun in his glove compartment and feels threatened in a road rage incident, his first instinct won't be to reach for the weapon. I still recall the woman who put her purse on the counter of a Baskin-Robbins store, discharging her pistol and killing a high school coach who was buying ice cream for his children. Now there is a measure to allow permit holders to carry a concealed weapon into a bar. Even in old Dodge City, they collected the guns at the saloon door. I understand anyone's desire and right to possess a handgun for protection or a rifle for hunting, but no one needs an infantry weapon to ensure their family's safety. I am not the first to point out that if cars must be registered and drivers licenced, certainly firearms deserve the same serious attention. What sort of hypocrisy allows a nation's weapons manufacturers to churn out guns like Dunkin' makes doughnuts, but the switchblade is illegal? Commerce will triumph, but recent history shows that desperate times produce desperate people. We don't need to resurrect the Tommy Gun to accommodate their twisted revenge fantasies.

Hello Liverpool!

I would never send out two posts in the same day were it not for the fantastic news I wish to share with my friends. I received a call early this morning, noon London time, from my man at Ace Records UK, Alec Palao, who was the producer of the CD: "Randy and the Radiants: Memphis Beat, The Sun Recordings 1964-1966." He had told me it might take a year or two before word of mouth spread about the disc, but a pirate radio station, broadcasting from a ship off the UK coast, began playing a song last month by Bob Simon called "Nobody Walks Out on Me," written in 1965, and it has become the most demanded and downloaded song in the English Midlands. It appears that after forty years, we may have a hit record on our hands. But here's the exciting part.

The surviving Radiants, plus Reni Simon, have been invited to participate in an event called the "Liverpool Renaissance" in the fall. Liverpool is completing a year as the official "Cultural Capital of Great Britain," and all the renovations have been turned into pedestrian malls, shops, and areas for concerts by the Mersey River. There is also a large entertainment district with a variety of nightclubs, but the buzz has been about a club called "Mania," with a limited partnership that includes Ringo Starr and Paul McCartney. The 1,200 seat club will feature music from the 1960s era performed by both vintage and contemporary groups. Somehow, Sir Paul heard Bob's song on the radio and called Ace Records to get the story, and he was fascinated that Sun Records and Sam Phillips ever recorded a "garage band." Because of his fondness for Sun, (he owns Bill Black's "doghouse" bass), the Radiants will perform at "Mania" during their opening week. Every celebrity from rock royalty to real royalty are rumored to be attending, but that's not all.

Sir Paul has become interested in the Radiants' history, especially that we persevered for thirty years, and believes that since Liverpool and Memphis are similar, the stories of the Beatles and the Radiants are likewise similar. So, Apple Corps. has decided, along with my friend Isaac Tigrett, to fund a project that will bring famed British artist and documentarian Alan Aldridge, editor of "The Beatles' Illustrated Lyrics," to Memphis over the summer to film black-and-white scenes at local 1960s hotspots like the former T. Walker Lewis YMCA, Clearpool, and the Mid-South Coliseum. The plan is for the yet untitled film to be debuted at "Mania" in September before the Radiants' performance. But, and this is important, here's where you come in.

Mr. Aldridge has asked for everyone that participated in the Sixties' scene to be part of a "Battle of the Bands" recreation at the former T. Walker Lewis YMCA, now the Ira Samelson Boy's Club, behind Treadwell High. He will intersperse scenes of young dancers with the actual people who were there at the time. The filming will be on a Sunday evening when the facility will be available and everyone who shows up will receive an "extra's fee." Those willing to share their memories of the time and be interviewed on camera will receive a standard actor's fee, plus a royalty if the film is picked up for distribution. They are particularly looking for stories concerning the wildness of the place to compare to the Cavern Club. After the interviews, the Radiants will play T. Walker Lewis one more time, and we're hoping to convince the original Flash and the Casuals to join us in the "battle." Of course, we're supposed to win.

I know you are as excited to take part in this unbelievable event as we are, and we all hope to have our own
"Magical Mystery Tour" right here in the River City. I understand a special guest or two might be coming from London, but that's all I'm saying. I can barely believe it myself, but I will notify everyone when the occasion draws near and we can all make plans to go to T. Walker Lewis again, but this time, no fighting or making-out in the parking lot. The film crew should be here in early June, after Memphis in May wraps up, which only seems just around the corner. We can already start counting the days. If the British arrive on June 7, then that's only...let's see what today is. Oh yeah, April Fool.

And Cal Taketh Away

photo: Commercial Appeal
Since my statcounter showed that my last post regarding basketball was the least read or commented upon in recent months, let's do another. I don't know whether to be sad or mad about this John Calipari situation, but here is a message I received on March 22nd from my cousin Bob who lives in Boston and, as a fan of Umass, has experienced this same drama before. I don't think he'll mind if I demonstrate his prescience.

Cousin Bob said...
Randy,
For years, I've been advocating a rule change that would really make the fouling team think twice. Award the shooting team two points if the first foul shot is made for any foul committed in the last minute.
I usually agree with everything you write, but I wouldn't pop the champagne corks yet if i were a Memphis fan. No doubt the bad taste that remains from Calipari taking UMass far but ultimately nowhere, then skipping to the NBA (and to the Nets at that - it would be like leaving Gonzaga for the Grizzlies), makes it hard for me and many others in New England to root for a Coach Cal team. Which does not mean that I'm picking UConn, which (as Dan Shaughnassy pointed out the other day) might as well be on Long Island as far as Bostonians are concerned. I'd like to see Pitt win, and as for Louisville, if you think Calipari left a bad taste...
Keep up the great work, a sentiment seconded by Denise./Bob

I don't begrudge Coach Cal accepting the premier head coaching job at the University of Kentucky, but does he have to wreck the Memphis program on the way out the door? My understanding is that U of Memphis backers were prepared to match whatever lucrative offer made by Kentucky. The big dog, FedEx Fred Smith his ownself, went to visit Cal's home to convince him to stay. So, most likely, money wasn't the motivator. At some point, however, it would seem a coach whose star has already risen would ask himself how many times can you start over and at what price? Everything Cal could want was here for him in Memphis; a new arena, new on-campus practice facilities, a devoted fan base, a rich recruiting environment, plus all the money he would ever need to commit the remainder of his career to the university, and have the building named after him when he retired. Is the fame or respect so insufficient here that you need your name to be whispered in the same sentence with Adolph Rupp or John Wooden? Without question, Cal turned the U of M into one of the nation's elite basketball programs, but that elitism just caught the last plane out.

The pain of losing so dramatically in the NCAA tourney was assuaged by Cal's statement that Memphis was where he wanted to be, and that next year's recruiting class was ranked among the best in the country. Now, Cal leaves with the staff, the recruits, and the reason for the remaining players to want to stay here. After Memphis dominated the C-USA Conference for years, sports radio announcer George Lapides says that instead of competing again for a national title, the Tigers will be fortunate to finish in the conference's second tier next season. Kentucky gets their man, but Memphis fans get to see a wrecking ball taken to their beloved program and the resulting rubble will take years to clean up. John Calipari has become the George W. Bush of basketball. There is no questioning Cal's civic contributions to our city, and I'm sure he'll continue to do the same in Lexington, but to discover he "chased" vacant coaching jobs at Pittsburgh and St. John's in recent years confirms that nagging doubt that while Cal was our Dixie Chicken, his heart was always in the northeast.

Thirty-five million for six years at UK is one sweet deal and it will make Cal the highest paid coach in college basketball history. But what price can you place on the loyalty of the Memphis fans who, in these difficult times, were willing to pay whatever the cost to convince him to stay? After nine seasons, Cal understood that one of the remaining joys in this "Town Without Pity" is University of Memphis basketball, and he was the parade's Grand Marshall. Where is his loyalty in return? While watching this year's tournament, I couldn't help but take note that the most successful coaches in college basketball; Gary Williams at Maryland; Mike Krzyzewski at Duke; Jim Calhoun at Connecticut; Jim Boeheim at Syracuse, are coaches that have devoted decades to their respective institutions. Recently retired coaches like John Thompson and Cal's arch-enemy John Cheney, became famous for taking relatively small schools' basketball programs from obscurity to prominence. When Cal came to Memphis, he promised a national championship. We nearly got there, but he didn't deliver, especially in the final seconds of last year's championship game. But then, he made the same promise to UMass before he split for a dismal tenure in the pros. Will Kentucky be his final stop, or does Cal secretly want to be Pat Reilly? Same hair-do.

I suppose Cal deserves thanks for the nine exciting seasons he was here. He hit the gold-mine with his connection to Laurinburg Prep, the basketball preparatory institute who's starting five all came to Memphis. Season ticket costs plus the extortion to the Athletic Department were jacked up and television was limited, but Cal could sure recruit. Thanks for one year of DaJuan Wagner, who's Dad you hired to assure his attendance, and is now out of basketball after a stint in Poland. Thanks for one year of Derrick Rose, two for Darius Washington, and now one-and-done for National Freshman of the Year, Tyreke Evans, who said, "If he (Calipari) leaves, then I'm not staying." And thanks for sneaking away from Galloway Drive under the cover of night without saying a word to the fans who supported you, while simultaneously deserting the team who played for you. When I received the above message from Cousin Bob in Boston nine days ago, I initially felt it was just sour grapes. Now my own grapes are making me feel a bit queasy.

I am sure that John Calipari can resuscitate the storied Kentucky basketball program, yet I'm still reminded of a former Memphis coach, Gene Bartow, who didn't find UCLA nearly as hospitable as Memphis, nor as patient, and ended his career in Birmingham. Calipari was already a legend in Memphis. Now, he risks his legacy to reach for, what? So once again, the U of Memphis must start from scratch. According to my pal Billy in Florida, the quickest way to return to national attention is to recruit Michelle Obama's brother, Craig Robinson, now the head coach at Oregon State. He didn't have much of a season last year, but at least we'd have one very high-profile fan. But what prominent coach would want to come here to the OK Corral and play in a mediocre conference with a decimated team anyway? The answer may lie right in our own backyard; tanned, rested, experienced and ready. It's time to forgive and forget. Re-hire Dana Kirk.

Basketball's Longest Minute

If I'm ever informed that I only have one minute to live, I'm heading straight for an NCAA basketball game. Not just because I'm a fan, but the final sixty seconds of a college game can seem like an eternity. Anyone who has ever waited for their team's game to be televised, while an already decided contest bogs down into a parade of free throws and time outs, knows the frustration of watching thirty seconds on a frozen scoreboard turn into ten minutes of futility. During a game's thirty-nine other minutes, the personal foul is considered an infraction, both for the individual player and the team. A foul is supposed to produce a penalty, yet in the final minute, a foul is encouraged and rewarded by stopping the action and giving the losing team the chance to steal a victory through, essentially, breaking the rules. It transforms a team game into an individual free throw shooting contest, and worst of all for television, it is intensely boring. It's time for a rule change.

A mild case in point was Saturday's Michigan-Oklahoma game. With 59.4 seconds to go and ten points down, Michigan called a time-out. That final minute took six minutes to complete and, guess what; after three more fouls and another time-out, Michigan lost by ten points. It was like watching water evaporate. Why should something considered a liability for the rest of a game become an asset in the final seconds? Other rule changes have only benefited the game. I can recall when the dunk was illegal, and any player the referee believed a little too aggressive around the rim could have his shot waved off. The slam dunk electrified the game when it was finally permitted, but the strategy changed from the jump shot, to throw the ball under to Shaq and let him break the backboard. To correct this, the three point shot was added to reward the long jumper and reclaim the game from the behemoths lurking beneath the basket. Now, the excitement of a timely three-pointer rivals the dunk.

The shot clock sped up the game and ended the strategy of stalling and sitting on a lead. No one knows the pain of holding season tickets for a team who's game plan is to hold the ball for extended periods of time and only shoot if it's a lay-up, like the fans of the Memphis Tigers during the mid-1960s. Moe Iba, who was hired as coach because he was the son of legendary coach Hank Iba, proved that none of his father's success wore off on him by routinely producing games with final scores like 27-24. In the process, he ruined the career of Memphis Prep star Mike Butler, who, with the proper coaching, might have looked something more akin to Pete Maravich. But the fans endured until Iba was finally shown the door and the shot-clock made certain that such an abomination would never happen again. The excitement returned with a team that wanted to win and not merely try not to lose, and the problem was fixed. Now, it's time to address the game's final flaw, the excruciating, final second foul-fest and crawl to the finish.

These last minute touch fouls that kill the action and make the game resemble the Bataan Death March should be called by the refs as what they are; intentional fouls. Just because a foul doesn't knock somebody down, it's still committed with the intent and purpose of stopping the action. Rather than put the fouled player at the free throw line for a one-and-one, change the rule to make every non-shooting or open court foul in the final minute to be an intentional foul, and give the offended team an automatic two free throws. Or better still, do what they do in soccer. When a foul occurs in the open field, the offense just throws the ball back in and play continues. If there's no reward for fouling, the action goes on and the losing team actually has to play defense and sink the three-point shot.

Anything would be better than the interminable wait for the final ticks to expire on a game who's outcome has already been determined. The better team should win, and no basketballer who plays his heart out for forty minutes should have a game rest on his free throw unless he was fouled in the act of shooting. Ever since he removed the bottoms of the peach baskets, I don't believe Dr. Naismith intended for his fast-paced game to be decided at the charity stripe. And, need I add, that if this rule change had been in place last season, my Memphis Tigers would be the defending national champions. We ended, however, as runner-up to Kansas after owning them for thirty-eight minutes, and then the fouls began. But did you see the way the Tigers shucked Maryland and ate all their oysters on Saturday? And we're a much better free throw shooting team than last year, so until enlightenment strikes the NCAA rules committee and they decide to give the long-suffering fans a break, Go Tigers Go! In the meantime, please make your foul shots.

The Terrorists Won

"Happy birthday Osama,
We hope it's a blast.
But cover your backside,
It might be your last."
RJH

Doggone it. I forgot yesterday was Osama bin Laden's birthday and now I'll have to send one of those belated American Greetings e-cards. I think the NSA still forwards his correspondence. Osama has disappeared like Howard Hughes, supposedly in the "Mad Max" region between Afghanistan and Pakistan. But they ought to check out the penthouse suites in the high rise hotels of Islamabad, just to see if anyone has tin-foiled the windows. Osama's probably up there, kicked back with his dialysis machine and a hookah, watching a Blue-ray of "Ice Station Zebra" on the 50" flat screen he just got for a steal at the Kandahar Circuit City. I think the cave search should be about over, now that bin Laden is the hero of the Muslim world and could be given shelter and protection just about anywhere. I noticed that no one has yet ventured a claim to the 100 million dollars that was offered by the Bush Regime, "Dead or Alive," for his capture. His devotees are busy celebrating the 57th birthday of a sick man who has been fighting in the mountains since the 80s. He's been the subject of a supposedly intense, worldwide manhunt, and has already lived fifteen years longer than Elvis.

Al Qaeda's stated objectives for their attacks on the U.S. were to draw the nation into their apocalyptic visions of worldwide Jihad, entrap the military in an extended guerrilla war on rugged terrain, and drain the nation's economy. I recall thinking at the time that if these lunatics believed knocking down the World Trade Center would alter our way of life, they had badly underestimated the United States. But bin Laden and his personal Karl Rove, Ayman al-Zawahiri, used the same playbook that worked with the Russians in the 80s. Back then, when the Afghan mountain resistance was known as the mujaheddin and were being armed and supplied by the Reagan government, we called them "Freedom Fighters." The bloody and costly ten year Soviet stalemate in Afghanistan did far more to bankrupt the Soviet Union than Ronald Reagan's' "Tear down this wall" speech. U.S. troops have now been in Afghanistan for eight years.

Look where George Bush's "International War on Terror," has brought us. The Iraq war and the resulting atrocities have been a breeding ground for terrorist recruits like a fetid swamp for mosquitoes; 17,000 more troops have been ordered to Afghanistan to attempt to return the situation to the status quo that existed several years ago; and the American economy, in the words of Warren Buffett, "has fallen off a cliff." Wall Street greed, the housing debacle, and Reagan/Bush economics certainly contributed to our financial collapse, but no U.S. president in history has ever tried to fight two wars, while simultaneously granting massive tax cuts and not requesting sacrifice from anyone but the military. Our financial institutions are in shambles, our armed forces are pushed beyond their capacity, the Taliban has returned along with the burka, and Pakistan has granted safe haven to "suiciders" and "evil-doers" in the Swat Valley, adjoining Afghanastan. One would have to surmise that in the past eight years, every one of Al Qaeda's objectives has been met. And bin Laden is still alive somewhere, with his pal Ayman, carving up a birthday cake in the shape of Pakistan like Hyman Roth in Cuba.

All this could never have been possible without the myopic George Bush and his militaristic neocons. In fact, if al Qaeda had hand-picked and trained their own accomplice, like a Manchurian Candidate, and placed him in the U.S. Presidency, they could not have found a more hapless and predictable foil than the crusader Bush and the other two stooges, Rummy and Cheney; Curly, Larry, and Moe, in that order. To paraphrase the old country song by Roy Clark, "Thank God and Greyhound They're Gone." There is still this thing called "accountability," however, and in the name of "keeping us safe," some evil deeds were committed in our Halliburton sponsored war with Iraq. Somebody's got some 'splainin to do and someone needs to inform all the Bush lackeys screaming "executive privilege," that the executive they speak of just left town.

In addition to the "Truth Commission" that Sen. Patrick Leahy has introduced to determine who did what in the phony, "mushroom cloud," Iraq War build-up advertising campaign, the United Nations has just begun an investigation into the Bush kidnapping and rendition policies, stating, "The change in administration will have no effect on our decisions." I know that Dubya wouldn't understand irony if it hit him in the presidential library, but who would have believed that Osama bin Laden would plot and execute an attack on this country that claimed 3000 lives, and eight years later, the wanted man is George Bush. In the world at large, Osama is a hero and Bush is a zero. The Leahy Commission and John Conyers' House Judiciary Committee are slowly chipping away at the Bush regime's wall of silence. It might be time for George to mosey on down to those imaginary 75,000 hectares that he denies buying in Paraguay, where they have no extradition agreements. It's beginning to appear that the Bushes should either go on the lam, enter Witness Protection, or flip on Cheney, or our 43rd President stands a good chance of going to jail. Happy birthday, Osama.

What, and Get Out Of Show Business?

Bob and Randy
East High School
Dec. 1960

I had always heard that musicians do well in a Depression because everyone wants to be entertained, but I never imagined I'd be testing out the theory. I thought if bad came to worse, I could always ramble from campfire to campfire, like Tom Joad, and maybe get a skillet of stew if my song was spirited. It's not like I haven't done it before. So, a couple of weeks ago, I stepped away from whining and opining to emerge from semi-retirement and return to my real job as a singer. The semi-retirement wasn't really my idea. I'm just at that awkward age where I'm too old to be musically relevant but not old enough to be rediscovered as a curio by a younger generation. Fortunately, our audience for this gig was there to celebrate an old friend's sixtieth birthday, so we were practically on the cutting edge.

I performed with my old partners, Bob and Reni Simon, with John Grosse on bass. Since tinnitus prevents me from playing in an electric band, we did a seated acoustic show that travelled farther down memory lane than anyone cared to admit. It had been a year since we played together, so a couple of rehearsals were necessary to get our harmonies right and because we refuse to go anywhere and suck. But our main repertoire was at our host's request. We sang songs by Mary Wells, Ruby and the Romantics, the Impressions, and the Four Tops. We played some Carl Perkins and Buddy Holly and a short set of early Beatles, plus my favorite Ray Charles impressions and Bob's note-perfect Isley Brothers' version of "Shout," complete with the Little Richard "Whoos," that had some of the less inhibited souls doing the Bulldog on the living room floor. We even sang a couple by the Tymes and the Fleetwoods; and no, kids, I'm not talking about Fleetwood Mac. I had a great time and no one had to take me to the hospital or give me oxygen. Before the gig, however, I was a mess.

Musicians have a saying, "The music is free. You pay us to set up and tear down all that damned equipment." Although we were well compensated and I'd had two run-throughs, the day of the gig I developed a severe case of shpilkes, and by the time I loaded my own car, I was already exhausted. I refused Melody's offer to call an ambulance and boldly drove through the rain to my afternoon, early set-up rendezvous with my bandmates which, unfortunately, was my idea. I'm a little older than the birthday boy, so I required a nap immediately after all the stuff had been plugged up. I awoke to the intestinal spasms of which I have previously spoken, caused by the criminal Bush, and for a moment, I thought I would have to call in my apologies. But I've never missed a gig. Never. Besides, the host was giving away Radiants CDs as party favors and I already had a gig shirt picked out. Once we started playing, though, I was fine, and the crowd's good spirits lifted me.

The guests came with the intention of having a good time and a main topic of conversation was that there is no place in Memphis to hear this kind of acoustic music anymore. There are still good clubs that cater to younger crowds, but when I went to the Hi-Tone to hear the Iguanas, the opening band roared like a jet and sent me hurtling from the room wiping the blood from my ears. I can dish it out, but I can't take it anymore. My friend Jay Sheffield has generously offered a tour of area Huey's, but I just no longer have the desire to be background noise for family supper. Bless him and good old Thomas Boggs for providing the venues, though. The last time the Simon-Haspel Trio played Huey's midtown, Thomas sat at the end of the bar staring at us intently while the customers were noisy and indifferent. I was certain he was thinking that our act was too tired for the room. When we took a break, Thomas approached and said, "If you ever want a drummer to play that song list with you, I'm your man." I really miss Thomas. Especially when we were reminiscing at the birthday party about our club-going years at Overton Square, when Thomas was often my boss.

On some brisk, March, Saturday night in 1975, six great bands would be playing on Madison Ave. alone. Beginning near McLean St., you could hear Jimmy Buffett, Taj Mahal, or one of the funniest bands I've ever seen, Darryl Rhodes and the HaHaVishnu Orchestra at the Ritz, a club born to fail, but beautifully furnished, both aesthetically and acoustically. Across the street, new bands played in the underground Procope Gardens while upstairs, Fantasia was Memphis' only club featuring live classical music. Perhaps Rick Christian and the White Boys with the late Mark Sallings on sax, or Joyce Cobb and Hot Fun would be playing at Trader Dick's while headliners like Billy Joel, Kansas, or Minnie Ripperton held forth at the lost and lamented Lafayette's Music Room. Across the street at Bombay Bicycle Club, the acoustic group St. Andrew's Fairway was thrilling an audience with harmonies, while, if you were lucky, you might hear a late set of Larry Raspberry and the Highsteppers at Godfather's. Walk the extra blocks down South Cooper to the High Cotton and maybe catch a night when Don Nix or John Mayall was hanging out. Those were wonderful times for live music, but I needed to remind my enthusiastic and nostalgic friends that our audiences from back then are usually in bed by 10:00 these days. And Tunica has laid such waste to the Memphis nightclub business, who would gamble on a music room in this economy?

Still, it would be great if Overton Square could recover like Beale Street, or maybe they don't want it to. Old folks still like music too, however, and most of them carry credit cards. Any potential investors for Randy's Acoustic Deli? Last week's gig was also a milestone of sorts, and I tell you because many of you have listened to us for a very long time and wouldn't otherwise know. Bob Simon and I started the Radiants in 1962 with Howard Calhoun and Mike Gardner, but it was already our third band. After the Silvertones and the Dynamics, with John McNulty on drums, we started the Casuals with David Friener and Gary Hofman in 1961. David Fleischman joined the band as a back-up singer, and became "Flash" when I was grounded for poor grades. But Bob and I started playing and singing together in 1959 and made our first appearance that same year at a summer camp. Now, I'm not fishing for attention or accolades, certainly not from any show-biz type organization, and wouldn't accept any if offered, but the first gig of this year marks fifty years that Bob Simon and I have been entertaining together, and without a single fistfight. Of course, it ain't over yet. I guess someone must have told us somewhere along the line to never give up. Questionable advice. It took me a week to recover. Next time, please let me know well in advance if you want to book us so I can start doing sit-ups.

Doctors Without (Ethical) Borders

"(Health Care) is a cost that now causes a bankruptcy in America every thirty seconds. By the end of the year, it could cause 1.5 million Americans to lose their homes...It is one of the major reasons why small businesses close their doors and corporations ship jobs overseas...Given these facts, we can no longer afford to put health care reform on hold. So let there be no doubt: (it) cannot wait, it must not wait, and it will not wait another year."
Barack Obama: Address to Joint Session of Congress 2/24/09

Considering that I have lived without health insurance for seventeen years, last week's check-up was pretty good. When I told the doctor that I was excited about the prospect of finally obtaining insurance, he replied that he hoped Obama "wouldn't make him into a federal employee." I would have argued with him, but he was examining my prostate at the time. The doctor knows better than to believe he is about to be drafted into some triage system for the wretched, but he defended his ground because he has been a part of the problem. And the problem has existed for thirty years. Doctors are sort of like truckers: once, a long time ago, they were courteous. Since I am now a "retail" patient, who's insurance cannot be exploited, I have received second-class treatment and taken my seat in the back of the medical bus. I have to enter a doctor's office, hat in hand, and ask for favors and discounts, and thus, have not received the same treatment as an insured patient. Melody urges me to go to the Church Health Center, but I feel I would be taking the place of someone who is truly destitute. I can afford insurance, but the HMOs have determined me "uninsurable." I can't buy it at any price.

Since all the current institutional and infrastructural decay can be traced back to the Reagan administration, that's when the crisis in health care began as well. The nation voted for "less government," and that's what we got. Reagan, the Great De-regulator, was saying it was "Morning in America," but that was mainly for opportunistic capitalists who could see their dreams of unfettered greed finally realized. So the big insurance companies, in collusion with the medical/hospital industry, and the American Medical Association, allowed the formation of the HMO and began herding all citizens into groups of managed care. That was the Conservatives' version of "socialized medicine." I recall having to join the National Council of Jewish Women to get a group rate, but the premiums grew so astronomically that the insurer finally thought better of paying the medical costs for a bunch of elderly, Jewish woman, and dropped the whole group.

Since then, I have been considered an "untouchable." Millions of people take anti-depressants and still obtain insurance. Because mine was initially prescribed by a psychiatrist, I have what is considered a "pre-existing mental condition," which disqualifies me from consideration by the beancounters who decide who's a bad risk for the insurance company. My internist told me to transfer all my records to him and he would prescribe the medication, allowing me the extreme Freudian pleasure of firing my psychiatrist. But when I again applied for coverage, the doctor sent in the same old records and I got the same old answer. So, I am one of those people who fear a catastrophic illness, only more financially than physically. It amazes me that those who can get health insurance are granted it through the workplace, or otherwise have to prove themselves healthy, while others who actually need medical attention are routinely denied. But as long as those papers kept shuffling between doctor's offices, insurance companies, and the government, it was a sweet deal for everyone but the patient. Doctors were so well compensated, they began to think more about Medicare payments and profits than patients. That's why, when you walk into a doctor's office, the first thing they examine is your wallet. And why is it that every time you're in the waiting room, a tight-dressed, spike-heeled, drug representative pulling perks on wheels gets ushered right in?

While the Medical/Pharmaceutical Complex was pulling in huge profits, they failed to re-invest any of it in the upkeep of hospitals. Once the avant-guarde of innovation, hospitals across the country lie in states of decay with antiquated equipment and intrusive devises that are monitored from an understaffed nurses' desk. How could hospitals become the last institutions to embrace new technologies? Confining the ill to be monitored may be a convenience for the doctor, but it has become the equivalent of checking into a seedy hotel for the patient. The last time a relative was at Baptist East, they charged extra for cable on that Motel 6 TV that's been mounted in the corner since 1972. The understaffing is another result of greed within the industry. I'm of an age to have observed several loved ones go through the hospital "system," and their halls are full of only bad memories for me. I only hope that if I'm incapacitated, rather than be hooked up to all that pre-historic shit and left to linger, that I be allowed to go home and die in my own bed. Of course, the technology exists where you could be monitored from home, but where's the profit in that?

I was delighted to hear President Obama announce that health care reform was among his priorities. The Conservatives can scream "socialized medicine" all they like, but that's exactly where we were going with health management organizations that had nothing to do with health, and everything to do with maximizing profits on the backs of the ill. The Right can't tolerate socialistic ideas because they believe they all lead right to Mussolini. But the Bush regime's hands-off, business first policy created no incentive for reform and so health care costs have exploded during the past eight years. Bush's statement that "Too many good docs are getting out of business...Too many OB/GYNs aren't able to practice their love with women across this country," wasn't out of concern for doctors or their patients, he was defending the insurance companies.

Now that we're all in a mid-sociological bungee jump, I wonder how that first big drop is treating everyone's stomach? I first developed stomach problems several years ago and when the doctor asked if I was experiencing any unusual stress, I told him, "I don't know Doc, but it didn't hurt during the Clinton administration." Since then, I've experienced enough invasive procedures to add a wing to his clinic, but they found nothing and since I had no insurance they wanted to spare me the expense of an Ultrasound. Ultimately, the Ultrasound I was forced to purchase turned up an ulcer so aggravated, it even surprised the doctor. It's been treated, but I've been left with a gastric condition that was further enflamed by the stress of no health insurance and no hope of getting it under the previous administration. I can't afford any more "oscopies," so I live with the condition. I have, however, named my pain. So until I am able, and hopefully soon, to obtain some health care coverage, when I am stricken with sudden gastric distress and have to excuse myself, I plan to say, "Pardon me. I have to go take a Bush."

You Talkin' To Me?

I wouldn't suppose anyone likes to be called a coward, even if you are one. Yet Attorney General Eric Holder said we were a "nation of cowards," when it comes to discussing matters of race. I understand Holder's purpose was to chastise and challenge people of all races about our national unwillingness to have a dialogue about what is really going on in our society, but only a month after we elected our first African-American president with an unprecedented outpouring of good will, and only two weeks since Holder was sworn in as our first black Attorney General, was "cowards" the wisest terminology to describe American society? Where I come from, those are fighting words. I recall another first, Andrew Young, who became Secretary to the United Nations under Jimmy Carter, and in debate with the British delegation said the English were intimately familiar with racism since "they pretty much invented it." What he said may have been factually correct, but his job description was supposedly to be a diplomat.

Perhaps I've lived in the South so long that I've developed a touch of redneck, but Holder's comments unexpectedly made my blood rise. It was akin to being a kid on the playground being pushed to the ground by the class bully. You can either sit there and put your cowardice on display, or charge the bully and try to inflict as much physical pain as possible while simultaneously praying that someone is there to break it up. There are, in fact, readers of this post that if you called "cowards" to their face, your next act would be gathering your teeth from the floor. I'm a pacifist who understands the intention, but Holder's unfortunate choice of words served to inflame many of the people who were already on his side and feeling uplifted over our historical national achievement. The really unfortunate part of this episode is that Holder is right about the need for racial dialogue, but his message was lost in the rancor of his clumsy and intentional provocation.

Holder succeeded in pretty much offending everyone, including, I imagine, President Obama. The President has so far been very careful to be non-confrontational and inclusive in his speeches, I wonder if Holder ran that little doozy past him first? In a joint appearance shortly after the inauguration, when Joe Biden joked about Chief Justice John "No Notes" Roberts mangling the Oath of Office, Barack grabbed his elbow and gave him a glance like a parent would a feckless child. I hardly believe the President would approve of his new Attorney General, in one of his first public speeches, making well-intentioned but ultimately divisive remarks. A racial discussion would be a good thing, but just right now, it's a few notches down in urgency than the economy, health care, and fending off an impending Depression. First, clean up the Justice Department, then we'll talk.

In fact, had Holder taken the long view, he might have seen what I have in recent years. I am among the remaining members of a generation who never sat in a classroom with a black student until I reached college. Attempting inter-racial friendships took some outreach and understanding on all parties, but I was never afraid to discuss race with anyone. Early on, I noticed a curious thing about both whites and blacks from a segregated society attempting to talk to one another for the first times. Whites would adapt some imagined hip-patois or jive lingo trying to relate to blacks, while blacks would become stricter and more pronounced in speech with white people than they were with each another. I managed to find a way to be constant in my behavior with everyone while resisting the temptation to perform multi-layered handshakes. An entire generation of people are still awkward around each other simply because of their forced separation in childhood. Such is not the case with young people like my step-son, Cameron, who know not the curse of segregation.

I marvelled at the seamlessness of his friendships with people of all races. Cameron didn't have "black" friends, or "Asian" friends, they were all just his friends. Holder's "nation of cowards" is of a certain generation, a remnant from the past when races were separated by law, along with the casualties of the "Reagan Revolution" who were either enriched or institutionally impoverished by "trickle-down" economics. Like 1968, we are a nation divided by young and old, rich and poor, black and white, Christians and everybody else. But the warriors of the Civil Rights movement, as well as their opponents, are rapidly aging now, soon to be replaced by this post-racial society we speak of, but have yet to experience in our time. Since Eric Holder was being blunt to make a point, let me be blunt as well. General Holder, before you come out swinging wildly and calling people of good will "cowards," you may wish to first display some personal courage yourself. The conflagration at Waco and the storm-trooper mission to retrieve Elian Gonzales are not sterling references on your resume. I already know you will be a wiser Attorney General than John Ashcroft or Alberto Gonzales by default, but maybe you should shut up until you have at least passed the Janet Reno threshold.

The Simmering Pot

Thank you, Michael Phelps, for pointing out the most glaring hypocrisy in American life that we have now lived with for over forty years; the foolish and childish demonization of marijuana, existing cheek by jowl with the romantic and seductive image of alcohol, created and sold to us since birth by the liquor industry. The Olympic star is 23 years old. Old enough to be responsible for his decisions. But the only misjudgement I see here, is that he trusted his rat bastard friends to not take cell phone pics of him, thus proving Cindy Lauper's warning, "Money Changes Everything." Sure, pot is still against the law, another sign of the failure of my generation, but suddenly Phelps' photo is all over the world, as if he were caught in a Chinese opium den, and he is being forced to grovel before the cameras to save his sponsorships. Kellogg has already announced they are dumping him. If I wasn't hooked on Raisin Bran, I'd consider boycotting the company.

And all this was simply over a photo. I thought it was only illegal to possess marijuana, but Phelps is being persecuted for a picture of him smoking sometime in the past. The reactionary governing body of some obtuse organization called U.S. Swimming has suspended Phelps for three months, cancelling several meet appearances and cutting off all financial support, "effective immediately." The board's statement could have come right out of 1968:

"This is not a situation where any anti-doping rule was violated, but we decided to send a strong message to Michael (Burt Bachrach take note) because he disappointed so many people, particularly the...kids who look up to him as a role model and a hero."

Spoken like a true member of the 50% of American society that still denies trying pot. Are those hard-won gold medals less worthy because of a bong hit? Fools! Your children already know more about it than you do. I understand that still developing brains have no business trying any mind-altering substance whatever. That's why we don't sell whiskey to children. But it's easier for your children to get pot than alcohol, especially with the profit motive and the outlaw mystique that comes along with the procurement and use of the illegal herb. And the smoking of anything is not healthy for the body, but a lung full of pot is far less harmful than a gut full of whiskey. Had Mr. Phelps been photographed at the same party with a large tumbler of scotch, no one would have raised an eyebrow, and that's just asinine.

Eric Schlosser has written the book, Reefer Madness: Sex, Drugs and Cheap Labor in the American Black Market, where marijuana is claimed to be the largest cash crop in the country. At the same time, Schlosser claimed in 2003, that "there are more people in prison today for violating marijuana laws than at any other time in American history." First outlawed by the states in the 30s to threaten illegal migrant workers not yet sufficiently exploited by their employers, with arrest as well, a government sponsored misinformation campaign of marijuana hysteria continued unabated until the Beatniks and Hippies exposed it as lies and propaganda. According to Schlosser, "The war on drugs launched by President Ronald Reagan in 1982 began largely as a campaign against marijuana, organized by conservative parents' groups." When Reagan secretly supplied the Contras in Nicaragua with weapons, we now know those supposedly empty CIA planes came back to this country filled with cocaine which, depending on who you ask, created the nationwide crack epidemic. Yet, the know-less-than-nothing Reagan began his War on Drugs on a weed that grows wild in almost every continent. He may as well have declared war on Kudzu.

The cultivation of marijuana is now an American industry. In the mid-60s, they once estimated that three million people had smoked marijuana, now it is estimated that three million people grow it. Entire counties in Northern California have been given over to pot farming and the legalization of medical marijuana has not just brought relief to sufferers of a variety of maladies, from Glaucoma to symptoms of AIDS, it has made pot as easy to obtain as a pizza. Still, the federal laws clash with the state laws and the DEA goes in periodically like the bull in the china shop to bust everything up on principle. And marijuana laws in other states, particularly in the South, are as draconian as ever, despite the ever-rising number of pot-related arrests. With the out-of-proportion public flogging of Michael Phelps, perhaps the indignation will be sufficient enough for the public to be amenable to the reform of marijuana laws. Ohio State University scientists have recently shown marijuana has the capacity to reduce memory impairment in the aging brain and those few who still claim that pot is a "gateway" to more dangerous substances have yet to discover that the gateway leads to a bag of Fritos and a Snickers Bar. Wouldn't it be something if there were a movement underway to re-educate the public, decriminalize, regulate, and tax marijuana? Well, there is.

Reps. Barney Frank and Ron Paul have introduced bi-partisan bills: H.R.5842, which allows the states to decide to decriminalize or allow medical marijuana without interference from Federal authority, and H.R.5843, officially called "The Act to Reform Federal Penalties for the Personal Use of Marijuana by Responsible Adults." The intrepid people from NORML helped to write the bill, which would end the criminal prosecution of Americans in possession of 100 grams, or nearly four ounces, which would be considered as personal use. Presently, the government classifies pot as a Schedule 1 controlled substance, just like heroin and PCP. The Marijuana Policy Project states marijuana arrests "outnumber arrests for all violent crimes combined," yet I never knew anyone who ever held up a liquor store because he was out of pot. Barney Frank said, "The vast amount of human activity should be none of the government's business." The Congressman added, "I don't think it is the government's business to tell you how to spend your leisure time." With all the problems on the new President's shoulders, it would seem that an innocuous weed would be a low priority. But if President Obama is looking for new and profitable businesses, he need look no farther than California, where an already burgeoning marijuana trade, if properly regulated, just might take a huge bite out of the national debt. This is one project that is literally "shovel ready."

Cyber Self-Gratification

Everybody does it, they just don't talk about it. It's a natural occurrence that is done almost exclusively alone, but it's a dirty little secret people like to keep to themselves. Even those who claim no curiosity know in their quiet moments that the urge is there, and sooner or later, they succumb. People wait until their privacy is assured and they won't be interrupted, then they surrender to their yearnings and do it. They Google themselves.

I'm guilty, too. But ever since I began posting online and The Memphis Flyer has been thankfully printing my articles in their popular weekly paper, I've gotten all Googled up and, like B.B. says, "The Thrill is Gone," or perhaps, just de-glossed. But the first time I Googled myself, my throat constricted and my face froze. After I had typed in my name and pressed "enter," the first headline that came up said "Dead in Memphis 6-19-70." For a moment, I thought I was living in an alternate universe until I read the article. It was from a 1995 Flyer story about The Grateful Dead coming to Memphis, and the reporter contacted me about attending a Dead concert in the Mid-South Coliseum in 1970, where they bombed. At this Vietnam era show, it looked like every sailor in Millington had come to see the Grateful Dead, and they all just sat there. I and several other hippies hung around afterward to offer our condolences to the band and apologise that our city wasn't more receptive. Phil Lesh told me that "Memphis is the most soul-less city we've ever played." Ah, the good old days.

After I had realized that it wasn't actually me who was dead, there were several other "hits" referencing my 1960s garage rock band, Randy and the Radiants, with links and listings about Sun Records. I discovered that our 1965 Sun single was selling online for $65.00, which indirectly led to a full compilation by Ace Records. I was also amazed to learn from Google that I was a member of the Jackson, Tennessee based Rockabilly Hall of Fame. I suppose admittance is granted to anyone who ever released a record on the Sun label which, after the "Million Dollar Quartet," includes a long list of my fellow unknowns. Although the Radiants came along ten years after Rockabilly, a term that Sam Phillips hated, I was honored by the association. If they're still in the planning stages for our induction ceremony, however, they'd better hurry.

My last name is uncommon, but Google introduced me to a slew of prospective relatives, from jocks to doctors, and even actors that play doctors. It turns out there are Haspels all over the place. I know for certain that some actually are unknown cousins because someone has to be making those seersucker suits. I wonder if when they Google themselves, they wonder who in the hell I am. Seeing all that potential kin is interesting, but not enough for me to actually try and contact anyone. In this climate, they'd probably just hit me up for money and who needs that aggravation? I have other cousins who I actually like. Why ask for trouble?

It was likewise frightening the first time I typed in my name and clicked on Google "images." I expected to see an aging guy with a disheveled white beard, like my driver's license photo, but the first picture that came up was Osama bin Laden. Now my paranoia was confirmed. I had been scooped up in the Bush administration's net and the NSA was monitoring my computer activity. I had used too many of the Echelon project "code words," and now they were lumping me in with Al Qaeda. I was hesitant to even click on the picture, thinking that a giant eye would appear on the screen and order me to the courthouse to receive my bar-code, but it turned out to be just a picture from the Flyer from an issue in which I also had an article.

I enjoyed the Google re-affirming my identity for a time. Having online references about yourself is like a little droplet of immortality, until the next technology comes along. But things have changed and Google is not as kind to me as it once was. It seems writing for The Flyer is a mixed blessing. I enjoy having my thoughts and opinions considered by a wider audience and the Flyer pays me for my work, but it also brought me out of my tiny, blog bubble and the greater access has invited more criticism. As a songwriter in Nashville, I used to eat criticism on my cereal for breakfast and developed a weatherproofed, leathery hide. I've been disappointed more times than a Manson woman at a parole hearing, but when the criticism is printed, that goes up on the Google as well. Now, just after a music site that says my voice is interesting, there's a reader's comment that says I'm also ignorant. After such a blissful spell of happy Google searching, I have lost control over my cyber identity, and with each published article, the number of people who consider me an idiot has grown in tandem.

So, I had to give up Googling myself. It felt good for a while but I needed to stop. I was beginning to go blind and hair was growing on my keyboard. Every now and then I'll check to make sure I still exist, but my self-Googling verve has diminished with time. At first, it was a gentle ego massage to see my name on the World Wide Web, but it's not as thrilling when your name is followed by the word "fool." Googling is such a tough habit to break, it should have it's own 12 step program. "My name is Randy and I'm a Self-Googler." Although I haven't given it up completely, I'll stop cold turkey before I let that damn Google start talking back to me. If I allowed that, it would then cease to be self-gratification and something more akin to masturbating with steel wool. It feels so good when you stop.

This Hussein's For You

I feel badly for those people who can find no joy in the inauguration of Barack Obama. Not enough to sympathize with their sour, sick and sorry asses, just regretful that they insist on going through life without a soul. If not for the mere history of the event, can they feel no grudging happiness for a people disenfranchised for centuries finally feeling the pride in their country that comes with inclusion? The possibilities now seem so limitless, one day we may even get a Jew in there. Hell, who am I kidding? But here are some choice excerpts from The Commercial Appeal's letters to the editor the day after the inauguration:

If Dr. Martin Luther King really believed what he preached, Tuesday would have been a sad day for him rather than a jubilant one.

I did wonder... if the new president would wear a golden crown, or continue with the halo...my feelings toward our new president have changed-I have no wish to even see his face with its arrogance, or the smirk on his wife's face.

..we have finally sworn in Barack Obama as savior of our country. I regret...he was not inaugurated sooner,...he could have walked on water to save the passengers of the U.S. Airways plane.

And this was before Obama had spent a single day in office.

With such gravely serious problems facing the country and the president, any sane person would wish him success, if only for their own self-interest. The most visible exception is Rush Limbaugh, whose latest ugly, narcotised ramblings should even give the "ditto-heads" pause. When Limbaugh was asked by a publication to write 400 words about what he hoped from the Obama administration, instead of enumerating political differences, Rush went into a sputtering rage saying, "I don't need 400 words. All I need is four; I hope he fails." What manner of patriot is this who's chief concern, in the face of worldwide financial catastrophe, is the reconstruction of his failed and broken political opinion? I became aware of Limbaugh the day after Clinton's election, when the swarthy egomaniac went on the air declaring "America Held Hostage: Day One." He beat the drums for Bush and cheerleaded for the Iraq War, and when the GOP lost Congress, he admitted that he had "carried water" for ideas and politicians with whom he did not agree. In other words, he's a tool and a liar. Were John McCain elected, can you imagine a single liberal pundit wishing him failure in a national crisis? It's time that local radio stations realize they have another Father Coughlin on their hands and kick Rush to the curb. Who needs this crap anymore?

I recognize well who these bitter radio talk-show callers are because I live among them. I find it prudent, however, to disassociate myself from those who can't bear the reality of President Barack Hussein Obama, because one thing I learned from the Bush regime; If someone strikes you on your left cheek, burn their houses, poison their wells, bomb their villages, and take all their shit. Then, if they should happen to turn out not to be the ones who struck you to begin with, oh well, "stuff happens." I choose to give the new president the time to prove himself and, for all of our sakes, I want him to succeed. But as for Limbaugh, who's verbal mung has finally sunk to Ann Coulter levels, and other blabber-mouths that agitate for the government's failure as an industry, the cheek-turning days are over and it's time to strike back. Hard. Amidst all the general good feeling generated by the Obama election and inauguration, the tolerance level for the old-school hate speech disguised as dissent is very low. Since we are still Born-Again Hippies, we say it with love; "Don't Tread On Me."

The Overground Railroad

I guess you have to be over a certain age for the full symbolism of the Obama's train ride into the Capitol to hit you right in the heart, so I hope younger readers will indulge me if I get a little misty. Although Obama's trip from Philadelphia to Washington was fashioned after a similar inaugural Lincoln journey in 1861, only those over 148 years old will remember that a decoy train was used so Lincoln could be snuck into the Capitol under cover of darkness by the Pinkerton Company. Obama took the same journey in the light of day and arrived in exaltation. I only hope some aide is whispering "glory is fleeting" into his ear for humility's sake, although he seems to have plenty.

There is only one other similar train ride in my memory where ordinary people stood ten deep to catch a glimpse of their hero, and that was the funeral train of Robert F. Kennedy from New York to Washington, D.C. in August of 1968. It was the most poignant and tragic public event I had ever witnessed, and since I was young, and felt in the thick of current events, I was crushed by the promise destroyed and the hope denied. I'll admit that several years passed before I was able to watch news footage of that sad, solemn train and all those broken-hearted people standing by the tracks without weeping. But Barack Obama seems indeed inspired in his use of symbolism. Just as Grant Park in Chicago, a place infamously barred to protesters at the 1968 Democratic Convention, was used for Obama's election night victory celebration, so this jubilant train trip, lined with exuberant well-wishers, only with tears of joy in their eyes this time, stands in juxtaposition to that painful memory of so many years past. It's almost as if something that was taken from me a long time ago has, in part, been given back.

I suppose I understand a bit better how Evangelicals must have felt when George W. Bush was elected, only without the accompanying dementia. I have no illusions that Barack Obama is the "messiah," I just believe he is the right man for this extremely difficult job, and I feel grateful for his election and confident in his abilities. Aside from electing a black man, I still find it astounding that the country elected an intellectual. It wasn't so long ago that "intellectual" was a dirty word, as in "pointy-headed," and other scornful descriptions used by the Tom DeLays and Karl Roves of this world. Clinton had an enormous intellect, but he was too much of a razorback, redneck-yahoo to be an intellectual. Kennedy was a brilliant rogue. The last Democratic intellectual to run for President was Adlai Stevenson, and the scorn from his political opponents over his braininess was sufficient for every candidate since to dumb down the message. Not this time. And people seem to be responding well to being talked to like adults.

Despite these desperate times, the excitement over the Obama inauguration is palpable and Rooseveltian in its scope. Yesterday's speech in Philadelphia contained these majestic words:

"And yet while our problems may be new, what is required to overcome them is not. What is required is the same perseverance and idealism that our founders displayed. What is required is a new declaration of independence, not just in our nation, but in our own lives — from ideology and small thinking, prejudice and bigotry — an appeal not to our easy instincts but to our better angels."

Language like this, with an historical echo of Lincoln, if taken seriously, could well save not just this nation, but save us as a civil society.

I don't usually like to kick a man when he's down, but in the case of George Bush, I'll make an exception. There's a final irony to this entire scenario and it's that the Bush presidency really began with a catastrophe in lower Manhattan, and it ends with one as well, only with an entirely different result. Bush's tough-guy image was built standing on the rubble of the Twin Towers, but his "farewell" speech to the nation, with its' supporting cast of human props, resembled the final episode of "Seinfeld." There was the old fireman that Bush draped his arm around on top of the pile, there was the Katrina survivor who's arm someone must have been twisted to be there. The only old face missing was Lyndie England giving a "thumbs-up.". Only hours before, some sort of miracle had occurred in the Hudson River and a true American hero emerged in pilot "Sully" Sullenberger, but Bush was too self-absorbed and oblivious to even acknowledge the event and, of course, it's far too late for him to exploit it now. Obama already called. It reminds me of the Iranian militants waiting for Jimmy Carter to leave office before releasing the hostages. Whatever the significance, I'd think it serendipitous to begin a new administration after a miracle than after a disaster any day. Perhaps an era of new heroes has begun.

Check, Please

That was one hulluva soiree, but now it's time to fold the chairs, pay the band, and settle the tab. Let's see, you had the economic collapse and deepening recession, the housing crash and implosion of our financial institutions, the corruption of the Justice Department and the renegade Vice President, two ongoing wars with a side order of torture and a generous helping of CIA secret prisons, warrantless wiretapping, the destruction of the middle class, and the city of New Orleans. All told, your share comes to 1.2 trillion dollars. Do you think we should leave a tip with that?

With yesterday's eye-popping, head-shaking press conference, Bush leaves the presidency just as he arrived, full of it. Full of self-absorption without reflection, and full of pride, who's consequences a man familiar with proverbs should understand. But Bush was never one to dwell on consequences once his "gut" told him what to do. From the very first prime-time televised speech about his "Great Stem-Cell Compromise," Bush has played the presidency as a performance piece, where he goes out, day after day, and plays an amiable Master of Ceremonies to the nefarious deeds being done behind the curtain, just like Chuck Barris putting a smiling face on all the bizarre Gong Show activities going on in the background. He memorably said in 2005, "See, in my line of work you got to keep repeating things over and over and over again, to kind of catapult the propaganda." Bush certainly catapulted it with the best of them, I only wish someone had informed him beforehand that the President's job was more than Huckster in Chief.

When Bush was asked about Obama's campaign pledge to restore the Unites State's moral standing in the world, he replied, "I strongly disagree that our moral standing has been damaged. It may be among the elites," he continued, "or parts of Europe." Who is it that Bush considers "the elites?" Oh, I remember, it's that Eastern Establishment from whence he came that now disdains him. Bush continued that he was "aware that some of them don't like me; the writers and opiners," almost poetic in blaming the messenger. In fact, Bush blamed everyone and everything except himself for the chasms of neglect that define his presidency. From bad intelligence concerning WMD in Iraq, to bad judgement over the aircraft carrier "Mission Accomplished" banner, to bad advice about the economy, nothing was his fault. Bush was merely a victim of circumstance, like a college fraternity president, embarrassed by a cheating scandal perpetrated by a few of the brothers. Of his time in office, Bush said he "had fun." At least someone did.

A question about a proposed, legal "Bush Doctrine" of pre-emptive pardons for his inquisitioners caused the President's hackles to rise and he abruptly dismissed the question, meaning "it's supposed to be a surprise." If someone's own conduct in office is felonious, do his pardons count later? Finally, addressing the viciousness of what passed as political discourse during his tenure, Bush had the gall to again compare himself with Abraham Lincoln, saying, "There was harsh discord (sic) at #16, and harsh discord for #43," neglecting the fact that aside from being President, the only thing Bush has in common with Lincoln is the hole in the head. The delusional Bush's final press conference was truly "The audacity of dope."

So far, President-elect Obama has been low-key in discussing future investigations of the Bush abuses, saying only, "No one is above the law," but there is a groundswell of people demanding accountability. I don't believe we've seen the last of George Bush in Washington D.C., only next time he'll be answering questions under subpoena in front of a congressional committee. Until that day arrives, as it surely will, my parting wish to George W. Bush is that he gather up all his American flag lapel pins and leftover "W" stickers, his jeans and boots and concho belts, all the Western-themed art and cowboy memorabilia, his "Shakespeares" and biographies of George Washington, the flags, the drapes, and that goddamned rug in the Oval Office and get the fuck out of my White House. Make room for someone who understands that the job is greater than the self-exaltation of one flawed and foolish man who remains thick as a brick until the bitter end. And I do mean bitter.

Happy New Year From Father Farken

This is a special guest blog from Father Ferhgus Farken. The good Padre is an ordained minister of the gospel, presently living in New Jersey.

"OH NO! NOT CLOWN SHOES!"
Johnny*Burnette!!! Bless me Sputnik for I have sinned! In my New Year's sermon I told my congregation That the economy was so bad that I partied like it was 1929! I was about to credit the SPUTMEISTER but all that laughter...well it caused me to gloat instead... as if I had an original thought! Forgive me my good friend! I owe you big!

The New Year's party @ St Louis reminded me that there is a lot of room for song & dance in Catholic, Eastern Orthodox & Jewish theology. Matter of fact its a sin not to enjoy the presence of others. True spirituality is life affirming....Calling us to be fully human & fully alive. Hell is the absence of love...Heaven is where G*d's Love reigns. Like singing Danny Boy to the GREAT MONSIGNOR CLUNAN. (My favorite versions of DannyB are sung by Elvis Presley, Jackie Wilson & Mario Lanza but I'm sure Randy's rendition is right up there. Never heard Carl sing it!) And Clunan! Well he was like an uncle to me! My good friend Ernie Pecker did a charming painting of the old saint. By the way! Did the good monsignor lead the Love Train? Which reminds me... I meant to mention something in your last blog (which dealt with homosexuality)!

I took some courses @ Memphis Theological Seminary & my professor of Church & Culture challenged us..."To love others! You've got to spend time with them". He had us dress up as homeless paupers & go begging on Beale St. with the poor. (I made a butt-load of beer money that night but I don't recommend sleeping on the sidewalks in front of Silkey's!) The late Dr. Paul Brown assigned McGirk & me to go to a gay bar some where near SUN RECORDS(This was in 83) & give a report the next day! I confess I didn't want anyone to recognize me so Shecky McGirk & I dressed up like clowns thinking we were incognito. Every thing was going alright till I had to go to the restroom. This guy follows me in & stands right beside me & sez " I couldn't help noticing the shoes!" (Me big ass clown shoes) Then he starts staring at me privates & sez while shaking his head "All shoes & nothing to show for it!" I thought this was no time to be competitive. Then I hear all this moaning...I turn around & there were about 12 guys doing the weirdest love train I have ever seen...they all had their pants down below their knees holding on to dear life to the person in front of them! They were all connected! This was no Little Eva's Locomotion! It was more like a Boo foo choo choo! It was not pretty! To be honest! I got the hell out of there before that LOVE TRAIN ran over me! Then I find my way to the bar only to discover that its open mike night & Shecky Kierkegaard McGirk is singing the worst version of Danny Boy that I have ever heard! Thank G*d Clunan wasn't there to hear that!

In my report the next day I disagreed with the professor. When you are in love...love is blind. When you are serving in a soup kitchen...Love has no nose! When it comes to loving our brothers of a different orientation...stay away from that boo foo choo choo...for it might make one a wee bit judgemental...let us not forget... we all fall short. Love unconditionally!The Peace of the Lord! Fr.FerghusFarken

Wednesday, January 7, 2009 12:51:00 AM CST

Shock and Oy

Hamas rocket

There is no questioning Israel's right to defend itself against Hamas rocket attacks from the Gaza Strip, but the ongoing aerial assault and ground invasion is Bush-like in its' conception, and Rumsfeld-like in its' execution. It is as if the caretaker Olmert government wants to unleash one last spasm of violence against Hamas while they have the blinkered Bush still in office. But the lame duck Olmert, like Bush, has nothing further to lose except his legacy. After the disastrous incursion into Lebanon in 2006 which empowered Iran and strengthened Hezbollah, Olmert's popularity among Israeli's fell to 3% and, also like George Bush, he became the subject of a Hebrew Google search where his name was synonymous with "miserable failure."

The violation of a truce by Hamas and their indiscriminate firing of Qassam rockets into Southern Israel as a foolhardy provocation needed to be addressed. But if you have a sniper in a tall building, you take out the sniper- you don't level the entire building and hope the sniper is killed in the explosion. The massive ground invasion proves that the Olmert government is still fighting last century's wars and hoping for new results. The outrage has been the civilian casualties of the bombardment. U.N. observers have stated that as many as 1/3 of the total deaths in Gaza are women and children. This philosophy of "destroying the village to save the village" was discredited in Vietnam, and if they're keeping score by body count, the Gazans are losing 540-5. The blockage of a cease-fire demand in the United Nation by the U.S. further inflamed humanitarians, Muslim and Israeli alike, for abandoning the Gazans to the cold and dark.

My father used to tell me that it wasn't wise for Jews to publicly criticize other Jews, because there were so many others eager and ready to do so. But American Jews need to make the same differentiation between the founding principles of the Jewish State and the succession of transient power-holders in the Knesset, as was done in this country with the Johnson/Nixon Vietnam era, and the current war of choice in Iraq. I consider that Americans like Richard Clarke and John Dean, who were among the first to criticize the Bush war policy, as the true patriots of this dark period. In Israel, even the frontrunner for next Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said that the Sharon/Olmert Kadima Party government was a "total failure." It's normal and understandable for Jews everywhere to wish to defend Israel against all naysayers, but in the succession of larger-than-life Prime Ministers, from David Ben-Gurion, to Golda Meir, to Itzak Rabin, Israel has come to Olmert, an official who has already formally resigned his post over suspicions of corrupt activity while in office.

There will be no Mid-East peace until a new group of actors take their places, but it's hard to imagine that the Hamas government, even if physically destroyed, will be discredited in the eyes of the Palestinians. Israel has had peace governments and war governments, and it hasn't seemed to make much difference because of one fact of life; the Israeli people and their government have shown the desire to live in peace since the nation's founding in 1948, while the acting governments in Gaza, the West Bank, Iran and Syria and massive portions of the Arab populations that surround Israel, live to kill the Jews. The original conflict has turned into a blood feud. It's unfortunate, then, that the image of the heroic Israeli fighter in the War of Independence, and the bravery of Jewish soldiers during the Six Day War, should fall victim to this current image of aggressor and occupier resulting from the poor judgements of politicians seeking short-term gain. As the U.S. sheds itself of the Bush Doctrine of pre-emptive war, so Israel should examine its response of massive retaliation which has caused a humanitarian catastrophe and is in danger of transforming the Gaza Strip into a new Warsaw Ghetto. The Gazans must be responsible for electing Hamas as their representatives. Israel must realize, however, that every Gazan is not Hamas.

Ringing Out The Old

Happy New Year to One and All
Melody and I had an old fashioned New Year at home. We partied like it was 1929. As we stirred our pot of gruel simmering over an open fire in our den, I reminded her that we didn't have a fireplace. So after we stomped out the ashes, so as not to cause smoke damage to our High Definition television that I purchased right before the prices dropped like the Dow on a day when Bush holds a press conference, we settled in to watch how Dick Clark's attendants were going to dress him this year and wait for my balls to drop. But only Ryan Seacrest and Fergie showed up. I guess old Dick finally took the hint that the public doesn't want the New Year counted down by the Cryptkeeper. I still recall the New Year's in Times Square when the pickpockets were so aggressive, they tore the entire back pocket out of my friend Larry's pants. When they say that you must spend at least one New Year's Eve in your life in Times Square, they lie.

We were invited out by friends, and I appreciate them thinking of us, but like my Daddy used to say, "The only thing worse than staying home on New Year's Eve is going out on New Year's Eve." Add that to the fact that in my years as a working musician, every single New Year's was an adventure waiting to happen. Some were terrific, like playing the Hard Rock in New York with Isaac Tigrett acting as host. And some were nightmarish, like the private corporate party we played thrown by a CEO big shot who got shitfaced and insisted on singing "Summertime" with the band. The poor slob got up to "and the cotton..." and he could go no further. He just stood there slumped and numb, mumbling "and the cotton...," over and over. Finally, when a couple of his employees were helping him off the stage, I said into the microphone, "Hey, don't quit your day job," at which point he broke loose from his handlers like James Brown and charged the stage, jacking up Bob Simon by the shirt collar screaming, "What did you say, you sonofabitch?" Bob was beet red before the enraged and drunken man who was going to pay us could be torn away from his throat, proving that even in the most miserable of circumstances, there can still be amusing incidents.

I've seen the combination of an anxiety-producing overemphasis on having a good time, mixed with a "drink quick and suffer later" philosophy, end badly and early for a whole lot of people. Musicians refer to New Year's Eve as "Amateur Night." One thing I'm assured of by staying home is that I won't be killed on the road. I have no objection to anyone drinking, but I don't drink because it has an unpleasant effect on me. I wish I could achieve a little pleasure in drink, but I only get ill. I go directly from being straight to being sick, with no euphoria in between. That's why it's particularly difficult for me to be around drunk people on this night. It's like back in the 70s, when you walked into a party and everyone was high on Quaaludes but you. Unless you're part of the orgy, it's a gruesome sight. Melody and I even forgot to open the champagne at midnight sent to us by Father Farken, but that only means Mimosas tomorrow, headache or no.

Among the best New Year's parties we ever played, was for the congregation of St. Louis Catholic Church on White Station Rd. No one was drinking except for what they were sneaking under the table because they were in the Parrish Hall and the retiring Monsignor Clunan was in attendance. I got to sing "Danny Boy" for him. It turned out that several people I knew from high school were there and they were so happy the band turned out to be us, that they turned it into a 60s style sock hop. I've never seen sober people with so much abandon. They even did the "Love Train" all around the room. Of course, I've been on the other side of the coin until I realized that alcohol wasn't my friend, and have been carried from a few places, or woken up with my head bobbing from the back seat of a strange car in an unknown location among people speaking in a foreign tongue, but why dwell on that? The sick part was never worth the momentary fun part for me. I envy sociable drinkers. It's that glassy stare that gets to me.

My most memorable New Year's gig involved our late drummer, Mike Gardner. An agent had booked us at the Officer's Club in Millington, on the naval base- always a fun bunch. We needed passes to be admitted and when it took too long, the ever impatient Mr. Gardner got into an argument with a guard after calling him an "Anchor Clanker." Things got no better from there. The Naval officers and their wives had to have had the tightest collective sphincters of any group we ever faced. They refused to have fun. They hated everything we played. Our calls for them to hit the dance floor were met with icy stares. We played "Auld Lang Syne" at midnight and the place was empty by 12:05. We were unloading equipment through the front door and down a long sidewalk covered with an awning and into our vehicles when it began to rain. Mike got in his black pick-up truck and backed it into one of the rod-iron, decorative pillars that held up the entryway, bending it in half and collapsing the entire awning. We looked around, but the area was deserted, so we piled in our cars, booked for Memphis, and cashed the check. One of the few times I've enjoyed being with someone who had too much to drink on New Year's Eve was that night when Mike Gardner literally brought down the house.

I wish a very good new year to everybody, may the hangover be brief, and may the pain be made durable by the promise. If you wish to leave 2008 with a little hope, look at the face of this child gazing at our new president. May we all be so inspired in 2009. Randy

Don We Now Our Gay Apparel

I'm not gay, but I support the "gay agenda." I wonder, if you're only pushing one issue, do you have an agendum? If so, gay-bashing would seem a failed, Rovian political stratagem that should have receded along with the power of the bitch-slapped GOP after the last election, so that gays and lesbians might enter a new dawn of equal protection under the law. It would seem, that is, until two things happened; Proposition 8, an initiative banning same-sex marriage, passed in California; and Barack Obama invited one of the bill's primary advocates to deliver the invocation at his forthcoming inaugural. To paraphrase the Three 6 Mafia, "It's hard out here for a gay."

While the majority of the populous is preparing to celebrate their new president, homosexuals must endure the galling sight of Rick Warren, pastor of the ironically named Saddleback Church near Los Angeles, delivering the invocation. Warren is the author of the bestseller, "The Purpose Driven Life," which received a lot of press a couple of years ago after that woman in Georgia read it to a rapist-killer, and he decided, with the assistance of a little meth, to allow her to live. Warren's philosophy may work for outlaws, but Rachel Maddow has reported on the fine print, now removed, from the Saddleback Church's website that said homosexuals who were unrepentant of their gay lifestyle would not be welcomed as congregants. (Did you notice how I so delicately avoided saying "church members?") That's reminiscent of a country club that bans Jews, or putting up a sign that says, "We Reserve the Right to Refuse Service to Anyone," and Warren is supposed to be one of the newer thinking evangelists that believe that climate change and the AIDS scourge are worthy of Christian attention. I suppose that gays are the last minority at which you can still throw stones, even forty years after the 1969 New York Stonewall riots. Before that, police were allowed to rough up and toss someone in jail for being publicly gay. You haven't come a long way, baby.

We were discussing how downright sorrowful it is that in this year of societal evolution, gays should suffer such a setback that rights granted them by the power of the state, could be taken back by a fear-driven ballot initiative. Melody said that everyone knows that you are born gay, and this discrimination is like hating someone because they have green eyes. I answered, "Not exactly, we all know what's at the core of this hatred, and it is "the act." Melody replied, "If that's what it is, then you're spending way too much time thinking about something that's not your business." But if it's not the act, why is it that so many homophobes seem to have no problem with lesbianism, especially if the chicks are hot? Melody is correct. Someone is born gay or they're not. Who would ask for all that tsuris? We all knew gay children with whom we grew up, but in the immortal words of Chris Rock, "they just didn't have anyone to be gay with" yet.

Candidate Obama could be infuriating, even to his most ardent supporters, during the campaign when he refused to engage his detractors. Then, after he won the nomination by running to the left of Hillary Clinton, his sprint back to the center was rivaled only by Ussain Bolt. I understand what Obama is attempting to do with the Rick Warren invitation. He's trying to bridge a gap between himself and "people of faith" who didn't vote for him in the first place and never will. But aside from Rick Warren's public comparisons of homosexuality with incest and pedophilia, Barack Obama is playing politics with God. This Saddleback symbolism may pacify some, but it violates the human code of conscience which demands, "First, do no harm." Not even the benediction by the sainted Reverend Joseph Lowery can't gloss over this bit of "scratch my back" politics with the Evangelical Right. It's sort of like putting lipstick on a pig.

Obama defended his choice of Pastor Warren and added that the message of the campaign was to promote dialogue between differing groups. Barack added that he had been "a fierce advocate for gay and lesbian Americans," while simultaneously opposing gay marriage. With heterosexual marriages failing at the rate of one out of two, and the out-of-wedlock birth rate skyrocketing even while the stigma of unwed pregnancy fades as we watch the gestation of the Palin teen, shouldn't we, as a society, be encouraging long-term relationships between loving couples, even of the same sex? Wouldn't that dampen the sexual promiscuity that the fundamentalists so despise, and lower the risk of acquiring AIDS in homosexual men? For those who consider same-sex marriage a threat to the public good, others still believe in the pursuit of happiness and the redemptive power of love. I think either John Lennon or Jesus taught that, too.

In this festive season of goodwill toward men, that should include gay men and women as well. And in this time of political renewal and the promise of a more just society, I take President-elect Obama at his word that he will be a "fierce advocate," for the only dis-included group at his upcoming gala. I understand that gays will march in the inaugural parade, but at the risk of aggravating straights by acting-up. Their mere presence has already been unjustly illuminated. Mainstream society's delusion is that this Rip Taylor, gay caricature has been accepted to be the norm, rather than the low-keyed, respectable citizen working at the desk next to yours, who also happens to be gay. That is who I wish Obama had considered before extending the invitation to Rick Warren to utter the opening words of a new era. A far better choice for the invocation would have been the Reverend Al Green of Memphis. Reverend Green has made it abundantly clear through his ministry and his music that his major concerns are "Love and Happiness." It makes you want to moan for love. The constitutionality of Proposition 8 will yet be tested by the California Supreme Court, so Merry Christmas everybody, and fight the power.

Magical History Tour

The criminal Bush has been making the rounds lately, trying to convince everyone that he wasn't that bad, but at every turn he continues to step on his dick. Bush told Fox "News," "I didn't compromise my soul to be a popular guy." What soul? And now that Sen. Carl Levin has mentioned the potential for indictments concerning cases of state torture and violating the Geneva Conventions, Bush can look forward to being a very popular guy in Federal Prison. Leaked GOP talking points encouraged Bushies to say that he "maintained the honor and dignity of the office." I guess that means he didn't diddle an intern on his desk. But I would have much preferred he screwed his secretary instead of the Constitution. We're all the blue dress now. Fortunately, George picked up some Iraqi shoes to match.

The shoe dodging video is like a good Beatles album where you recognize something new with every listening, in this case viewing. My initial reaction was shock and outrage. After all, Goober is my president, too. And although I detest the man, his smug, willful ignorance, and the wreckage he has created in the world, I never wished him personal harm. I've often thought that perhaps if someone had kicked his ass 35 or 40 years ago, it might have done wonders for his humility problems, but what purpose would that serve now? Still, the shoe tosser might have heaved something more dangerous while the Secret Service was having a coffee klatch in the back room. I understand they scanned the crowd for weapons and the Iraqi journalist was known by the people in attendance. They said the same thing about Jack Ruby.

Bush passed it off as a messy expression of democracy. Hell, he never even stopped chewing his gum. In true Democracies, however, you don't hear the protester's screams in the next room while the Prime Minister's bone breakers assure him an extended stay in the hospital. Now, the Iraqi journalist/shoe tosser is a folk hero in the Arab world, and even much of the Western world, for one reason; he is the only outraged civilian Bush has had to face in eight years. In my questioning of the Secret Service's reactions, I'd forgotten that there are millions of angry people in the world who would literally die for proximity to Bush, and the true miracle of the Service's protection is that the only harm done to the President in his entire term was by a pretzel.

For eight years, Bush's audience's have been so carefully screened, if they were not big money donors or soldiers, he couldn't get a word out for the shouts and boos. His bubble is so thick, he hasn't so much been heckled in public, and yet he continues to portray himself as merely a victim of circumstance. All those bad things- war, rendition, wiretapping, corruption, economic collapses, hurricanes- just happened to take place while Bush was busy doing the nation's business. Only that one lonely protester in New Orleans that shouted, "Go fuck yourself, Mister Cheney," got through to this gang. Cheney is so contemptuous of the public and the law, he's admitted approving "harsh interrogation techniques" against detainees. In effect, Cheney is saying to the next Justice Department, "bring 'em on." Thus far, Cheney has been accountable to no one, so let the investigations begin, the subpoenas fly, and the chips fall.

This group still believes that in ten years, if Iraq is self-governing, that they will be vindicated by history. Kissinger thought that too, about the carpet bombing of North Vietnam. In the end, it's the casualties that can never be forgiven, and to date, there are 4,209 U.S. soldiers confirmed dead, and another 30,000 wounded. JustForeignPolicy.org estimates 1,284,105 dead Iraqi civilians, (other estimates go from 100,000 to 2 million. The figure is not officially recorded), and an additional 2.5 million people displaced. In that light, "A kiss goodbye from the Iraqi people," in the form of a flying shoe is a fairly mild protest for a "dirty dog." It's a good thing that when someone says "lame duck," Bush takes it literally.

Governors Gone Wild

Imagine this as a screenplay. Right before Christmas, a factory in Chicago gets their credit cut off by a greedy banker, played, of course, by Michael Douglas, and the company fires the entire workforce without even the benefits they have worked to earn. The workers, led by John Leguizamo and Jamie Lee Curtis, urge their companions to protest and, just like Rosa Parks, they finally get tired and decide to sit down. They believe they're going to jail, but the sympathetic police captain, Morgan Freeman, who used to be a working stiff, is hesitant to arrest anyone so close to Christmas. Two days later, the factory is surrounded by media and supporters and even the newly elected President, Denzel Washington, voices his support. But here's where the plot gets tricky. The workers' sit-in gets so much attention that the Governor, already under investigation, decides to get involved.

The arrogant Governor of Illinois, played by Alec Baldwin because of the hair and the temperament, comes to the workers' aid and puts pressure on the mega-bank, in this case we'll call it the Bank of America, to come off of some of the $25 Billion they've just been given by the government, to help out the working man. This makes the CEO of BoA, Kevin Spacey, worried about company image and his pension, and the Board goes into conference to consider the Governor's threats to cut off all state business with the bank. The next morning, the Governor's threats look like extortion as he is hooked up and carried away by the FBI who have been listening to his conversations, just as he invited them to do. Gary Hart appears here as himself. They even hear his greedy wife screaming in the background about appointed jobs and lucrative positions. I know it sounds impractical, but I really believe Kim Basinger could give an Oscar turn in this role. But just as things look grimmest for the factory workers, and they watch as their main supporter does a perp-walk, the bank decides it's Christmas time and peels off a few singles from their wad of billions and gives it to the company owners, Ben Kingsley and Judd Hirsch. I haven't decided yet if the bosses will give the money to the workers, or buy them each a Christmas turkey and kick them out the door.

Cut to a dimly lit office with a smiling President Denzel sitting with his Chief of Staff, portrayed by Hugh Laurie. They are both Chicago politicians and should be concerned that the Governor's arrest will rain on their inaugural parade, but they are chuckling. A recording just turned up where the Governor referred to his former colleague, the President-elect, as a "motherfucker" who would not give him what he wanted, and a no-nonsense Special Prosecutor, Nick Nolte, holds a press conference shredding the disgraced Governor's reputation and exonerating the new President. But here's the kicker. It turns out that the old bareknuckled Chicago poll, the President's Chief of Staff, was the one that blew the whistle on the Illinois Governor in the first place to protect his new boss. The two men clink snifters of cognac before a roaring fire while a montage shows all the factory workers' kids getting just what they wanted for Christmas and the company owners basking in the warmth of their generosity. As Sonny Corleone said to Michael just before he shot the police captain, "Yeah, they just might like a story like that."

Governor Rod Blagojevich, if not ending the Obama honeymoon, at least flushed the toilet while the Love Train was still in the station. He proves that greed, arrogance, and idiocy know no party, yet he is in a class all by himself for naked corruption. I had just written about former Tenn. Governor Ray Blanton and his pardon-selling scandal when Blagojevich goes and puts Obama's former Senate seat on eBay. Tennessee has had corrupt officials, but we only put them in jail one at a time. If, wait-who am I fooling, when Governor Blagojevich is sentenced, he can do time with Illinois' former Governor Ryan, a Republican. In fact, justice would dictate that they be cell mates, with conjugal visits from Bubba and Eugene. This blatant contempt for basic honesty may not taint Obama, but it certainly embarrasses him at an inopportune time, and gives ammunition to his enemies when his concentration needs to be elsewhere. If Blagojevich had a shred of decency, which is questionable, he would take the Elliot Spitzer route; apologize profusely, resign, and disappear. Or as they say in Texas, make like horseshit and hit the old, dusty, trail. The sooner the better.

Singing In The Rain

This is going to be a great Depression. Not with a capital "G" like the 30s, because the tech economy is real and the Depression will be blogged. I heard a TV economist say in regards to the recession that, "it will be longer and deeper than initially imagined." That's what I told my wife on our wedding night and I was lying, too. There is too much entrepreneurial spirit out there to keep the American economy stagnant for long and once we chase the money changers from the Temple, perhaps free enterprise will be a bit freer for all without the old fix in place. Watching the Obama administration come together has been exhilarating just for the pleasure of watching a President who actually knows what he's talking about and can string more than two coherent sentences together. The economy is kicking the crap out of me, but I have such confidence that conditions will improve. It's like when you have a terrible cold and you smoke a joint. You still have the cold, only you don't care as much. I have no health insurance, but Sasha and Melia are adorable.

The question is, can't we speed this thing up? If you've been following the final days of Chuckles, you're aware that Bush would strip mine Jellystone Park if he could get away with it. He's attempting to turn as much public land over to his oil buddies as will fly under the radar and trying to see how many animal species he can bring to the brink of extinction. Tennessee used to have a governor named Ray Blanton who was as crooked as a spring twig. It was discovered that in his lame-duck days, he was selling pardons, or technically, his staff was shopping pardons that he then approved. The citizens of the Volunteer State ended up having to jerk his ass out of there and swear in the new Governor several weeks early to end the crime spree. Al Capone finally went down for income tax evasion, can't we arrest Bush for loitering?

Even the massive bailout of the economy doesn't overly concern me, except for I'd like to know where this barrel of money is that they're doing the bailing from. To paraphrase the late Illinois Senator Everett Dirkson, "Twenty billion here, twenty billion there, soon you're talking about real money." If the banks are hoarding the money, print notes with Bush's picture on them, call them Bush Bucks, and the banks will work late to get them out the door. The Big Three automakers are deserving of scorn for their thirty years of neglect, but I know that they already possess the technology to turn on a dime and start making solid vehicles. It's the oil and gas lobby that has kept the internal combustion engine king, although its planned obsolescence was probably considered along with tail fins. There is a 2006 documentary that you need to see, now on DVD, called "Who Killed The Electric Car?" directed by Chris Paine. These emission free, silent, and powerful vehicles already exist and are in need only of battery charging stations instead of gas stations. Here's a thought: Give them the loan, but put Arnold Schwarzenegger in charge of fiscal discipline.

This dire economy and grim retail season have shown us one thing. If you want the price to drop on a certain commodity, stop buying it. I received dozens of emails about boycotting Exxon or just buying gas on Wednesdays when all that was required to make the price of oil drop like the Times Square New Year's Ball was to stop driving. Oil prices dropped so precipitously, they had to put Ahmedinijad in the hospital for nervous exhaustion. We are a one car family now. I purchased a Honda scooter that gets 85 mpg. Want to know how to decrease the price of electronics, computers, and televisions? Stop buying that shit for awhile, and even customer service might return. My stepson was ultimately glad he didn't buy the iPhone on it's first day of release. So long Circuit City, so long Rite-Aid; you could have done so much better.

The Obama team has shown great skill already in warding off what potentially could have been a general panic and run on the banks. And in foreign affairs, those "Extenze" male enhancement tablets Hillary has been taking finally paid off for her. Now she's got the biggest balls in the cabinet and a job to match. Her selection as Secretary of State was inspired, as was Bill Richardson at Commerce. And you can't help but admire Robert Gates for his patriotic service in staying as Secretary of Defense while we wind down Rumsfeld's and Cheney's dirty business in Iraq. Despite the debris field caused by the Bush era, the cleanup feels well under way. It almost seems like prosperity's just around the corner, every man's a king, a chicken in every pot, and some pot for every chicken. I plan to endure the entertaining economic chaos with my chin up and my eyes open, and if I should falter, tell my family that I fell with my face to the enemy.

Since beginning Born-Again Hippies in 2005, this is my 101st posting. Thank you for reading and all your comments, Randy

Sympathy For The Doofus

White House staffers have been revealing a "genuine sadness" around the West Wing these days. One report said that Bush was concerned that his presidency is being compared to Herbert Hoover's, but that would be an insult to Hoover. His morale was reportedly so low, he practically gushed when honored by the Intrepid Air & Space Museum that everything was "fabulous," from the brave troops to his fabulous Dad. Sarah Palin went out of her way in a Miami speech to thank Bush for keeping the nation safe from another air attack of hi-jacked domestic carriers, while our currency sank like the Lusitania. An anonymous assistant explained that Bush is so distraught because they had planned to spend his last few months in office doing "legacy stuff," but the sudden economic collapse prevented them from accomplishing much. Let me clue the Bush folks in, the economic collapse is his legacy.

While all crashes down around him, Bush still persists that a de-regulated free market is the soundest regulator of itself, a true believer until the bitter end, just like Herbert Hoover. No, Bush's "legacy stuff" consists of criminal capitalism masked by a populist concern for small "bidness," the war in Iraq, torture, rendition, Abu Ghraib, Gitmo, Blackwater mercenaries, illegal wire-tapping, the corruption of the Justice Department, and the No-Fly List. And who doesn't know in their heart that it was Dick Cheney who ordered the outing of Valerie Plame to get even with his critics, and it will only be a matter of days before the criminal Bush gives a full pardon to the patsy, Scooter Libby? And now we're treated to a battery of headlines in the conservative media about how horribly Bush has been treated by all parties in the recently concluded election.

Are we supposed to feel sympathy for Bush because his name was exceeded in toxicity only by Cheney's, and no one wanted to be seen with him, including McCain, who's tardiness to the White House endorsement created the opportunity for us to watch the Buffoon in Chief do a little of the old Shuffle-Off to Buffalo? Bush was the Bubonic Plague, the kiss of death, and the Evil Eye to any Republican who dared utter the name. All he has attempted is in tatters, especially the Constitution, so that it will take the new President at least half his first term trying to unravel Bush's political dingleberries. But now he's feeling lonely because he's no longer popular. This from a man who came to the office with no vision, only a cult of personality that carried him along like a leaf in a gutter after a rain-storm for his entire career. The Bush Presidency was the biggest farce foisted upon a gullible populace since Milli Vanilli, and the full effects are yet to be felt by all those hapless loyalists who have lost their jobs and don't even know it yet.

Possibly Bush's greatest accomplishment, aside from re-starting the Cold War, is his escaping impeachment. When Speaker Pelosi announced in 2006, that "impeachment was off the table," I remembered Tip O'Neill, who said in reference to Nixon in similar circumstances that, "the best interests of the country must come first." Nancy, you're no Tip O'Neill. And Bush's most egregious and visible violation is that he betrayed his Oath of Office to protect and defend the Constitution and he knows it. That's why he's working double time to write immunity for himself and his cronies into law before he leaves office. Bush envisions a leisurely life commuting between a home in Dallas and the ranch, when he's not off on a lucrative speaking tour to "fill the old coffers," in the President's words. But I envision Bush answering summons after summons without protection from John McCain, like Gerald Ford was to Richard Nixon. This is a man with questions to answer and it's best that they be asked under oath.

George W. Bush is the Frankenstein monster created by the unholy alliance of Fundamental Christianity and a Godless Corporatocracy. He was a Pied Piper, born-again Evangelical Christian, ruthless free-market capitalist who granted access to untold riches for the already rich, while preaching that "government is the problem" to the "social" Conservatives. Even now, while jobless claims are skyrocketing, retail sales are plummeting, and the GOP coalition has been shattered, a Pew Poll found that 60% of people who identified themselves as Republicans, believe the party should go in a more conservative direction. Nixon's 1968 "Southern Strategy" has come to its' fruition, the GOP has become the party of the Old South.

Mine is not the only family who has decided to cut back this Christmas. Instead of lavishing presents on everyone, we're going to draw names and buy one nice present each. Other family's are teetering on the verge of bankruptcy or foreclosure this holiday season with nothing to hope for but a new administration and the departure of Bush. So when Bill O'Reilly revs up his annual "War on Christmas," he need no more than look in the White House to see the Grinch. Sympathy for Bush? I have no pity for this reckless man who, even now, can't bring himself to admit his part in the disaster his policies have caused. I merely worry over the old adage about the cornered animal being the most dangerous. When Bush was elected, he joked that among his first orders of business before moving in after Bill Clinton, was to give the Oval Office a good cleaning. I suggest that before the Obamas move in, they should acquire the services of an exorcist, and that's no joke.

Election Reflection

Did I dream it, or did what I see really just happen? The citizens of the United States not only elected the first African-American president, but Barack Obama's race seemed only a peripheral issue at best. This nation just decided to return to excellence and voted for the most capable candidate. The old smear and fear politics did not work this time, young voters came out in record numbers, people withstood multiple hour waits to cast their votes, and there was jubilation in the streets of major cities in this country, and all over the world. I must be dreaming.

We had the political equivalent of a Super Bowl party here. My friend Dave the Dog drove in from Nashville, as he did in 1992 for the Clinton election, Larry took his customary spot, Melody put out hors' doevres, but I held my breath until 10:00. Even when Pennsylvania went to Obama, I had seen too many voodoo elections to ever get comfortable. When the West was declared, we jumped up and down and yelled and cried, but the spectacle in Grant Park was breathtaking. The symbolism in Obama's historic run kept grabbing me; He began his campaign in Illinois, on the court house steps where Lincoln stood, and he ended it in Manassas, Va, where the documents ending the Civil War were signed. Then he held his victory celebration in the very spot where young anti-war demonstrators were beaten and maced exactly forty years ago. The tears of the greying eminence, Jesse Jackson, spoke more eloquently to the moment than any words, and every citizen, regardless of party, should take a measure of pride in this fulfillment of America's promise.

John McCain ended his quest on an honorable note, with a more than gracious concession speech, that I'm certain reminded more people than just me of the genuine man that he used to be. But that was before he handed his campaign over to the former Bush/Rove operatives, just to let them screw up one last thing before they leave town. In half the McCain rallies that I saw, I thought he was doing a Walter Brennan, "Grandpappy Amos" impression. "Hehhh?" Dirty tricks backfired on Elizabeth "Sugar Lips" Dole as well, and MSNBC reported that for the first time since 1952, a Bush or a Dole will not be on Capitol Hill. Just a little icing for us. To see Obama win North Carolina, Indiana, and especially Virginia, where Robert E. Lee is still worshipped and revered, was simply astounding. I believe this election gave birth to a new electorate which will not revert to the old game of the selling of the president, and we picked the right man that we need for these perilous times.

Even in my little blue corner of a solid red state, people have seemed nicer the last couple of days and I detected a general feeling of, "Things will be better now." We have chosen the candidate that offers the best chance for change, but now the real work begins. Bush/McCain voters will find that Democrats are more gracious in victory than the Republicans could ever imagine, so there will no payback or purges (save Israel's favorite Senator, Joe Lieberman, who has it coming), or "Revolutions" like the GOP Congress attempted in 1994. I only ask of Republicans the same civility and neutrality that I tried to adopt when George Bush was first elected, before he lied this nation into the invasion and occupation of Iraq. So, before the Limbaughs of this world attempt to dismember him, I hope the new president will be given the chance to implement his programs without the same whiplash resistance we have seen in the past.

My initial election night joy was sobered by Obama's magnificent speech concerning the magnitude of the problems we face as a nation, until the emotion I can best describe about this entire ordeal for me, is relief. For those with ears to hear, Obama referenced both Dr. King and Sam Cooke, but broadened the context. I'm happy to be alive to witness the ascension of an African-American to this nations' highest office, but I was so uncertain that it could really happen that I continued to see the dark cloud behind the silver lining. When the moment actually arrived, I, probably like you, thought of a lot of people who would loved to have seen this day. Now, I feel as if I'm undergoing whatever is the male equivalent of post-partem depression. We did this improbable thing, so now what? I trust this good man and his advisers to chart a new course for the nation, freed from the same political battles that have raged for the past thirty years, but I don't trust a recalcitrant congressional minority who's purpose is to thwart and block the new president's agenda.

Obama's victory must also be seen in the light of the 48% of the public that voted for John McCain. They had their reasons, but in light of the brutal recriminations coming from the McCain camp directed at Sarah Palin, I believe we dodged a bullet. And it is troubling that otherwise rational people would even consider placing the government in the control of this cartoonish and inept person. Almost half the country bought that bullshit, when it has been proven in this week's "Newsweek," that Palin is definitely not smarter than a 5th grader, and was ignorant about even the most commonplace facts of geography. Worse still, she took an arrogant pride in her stupidity in favor of "Wasilla Main Street values." If the right-wing Evangelicals want to make her into the future of the GOP, "bring 'em on." Meanwhile, we have a very capable man about to assume the office of President, who was put there by the most committed group of voters I have ever witnessed. So, may I just say, "God bless us, every one," and please diligently protect the Obamas.

The Joe "The Plumber" McCarthy Tour

So it's come to this. Desperate and panicked, the former Bush operatives now surrounding Sarah Palin have sent her out to stoke the mob by quoting Karl Marx. Initially, Palin thought Karl was the fifth Marx Brother after Zeppo, but she can see remnants of Marxism from her official state sponsored trips to the Bering Strait with the "First Dude," so she seemed a natural at calling Obama a Communist. Nodding agreement was added to her quoting of the Communist Manifesto by the gravitas of her chief surrogate of the day, Hank Williams, Jr., who was standing next to her in cowboy hat and customary shades. I always take sociological advice from a country singer who once sang he was, "Whiskey Bent and Hell Bound."

Just like the other day, when Palin appeared with the vapid Elizabeth Hasslebeck. Who better to introduce a candidate who acts like a game show host than a "celebrity" who's claim to fame was being a game show contestant? But Hasslebeck should spare her lectures on Dialectic Materialism for The View, where she can be debated by a real authority, Whoopie Goldberg. Should McCain/Palin lose the election, I'd like to pitch the networks a reality show where Hasselbeck, Palin, Ann Coulter, Michelle Malkin, and Laura Ingraham can sit around a table and excoriate those abortion loving, liberal, women feminists types. We'll call it "Mean Girls." Better yet, allow the gun worshippers and abortion zealots to follow Sarah, Todd, Trigg, Track, Piper, Willow, Levi, Bristol and the baby back to Alaska to wait for the Rapture. There's tons of room and some oil too, whose revenues Palin "redistributes" among her constituents. The Mormons have a state; the Jews have a state; The Catholics have a whole country; let's give Seward's Folly to the right-wing Christians and survivalists, and call it Evangelaska.

Palin's red-baiting and accusations of un-Americanism bring back chilling memories of Republican Senator Joe McCarthy of Wisconsin, who went on a Communist "Witch Hunt" in the fifties that ruined people's lives, reputations, and livelihoods. For young people who don't remember, McCarthy was a bellicose, hawkish, former pilot, super-patriot who, along with his overtly Jewish sidekick Roy Cohn, slandered all those he considered sympathetic to the country's enemies. Sort of like John McCain and Joe Lieberman today, minus the charm. But since the military was one of McCarthy's targets, John McCain should have known better than to unleash this lowest and most dangerous of attacks. Sarah Palin, having no knowledge of history, has no problems slinging around venom like this, but McCain is old enough to know that there are still people alive today, especially in the creative arts, who suffered irreparably from the unspoken "Blacklists" that resulted from McCarthy's inquisitions. It worked for old Joe awhile, but McCarthy's name is forever associated with disgrace and zealotry. This is dangerous stuff for a V.P. candidate who believes that she's the future of the Republican Party to be spouting.

Speaking of Joe, I still can't understand how McCain's entire economic plan is encapsulated in "Joe the Plumber." In fact, if he refers to "JTP" one more time, I'm going to need a plumber. It was bad enough until JTP started showing up at Palin rallies and offering opinions on everything from Socialism to how a vote for Obama assures the "Death of Israel." And to cap it off, country singer Aaron Tippen has signed JTP to a management contract for a future album project. I guess I didn't make it big as a country songwriter because I was too honest. I stood in a room full of Nashville writers who were in my same publishing stable and expressed the opinion that, "Country Music is a celebration of poverty and ignorance." At least that's what Nashville turns out, so Joe The Plumber will not only fit right in, he'll be treated like visiting royalty. There's already a Larry the Cable Guy, so why not?

McCain chose Palin in a fit of pique when the Bush/Rove boys that manage his campaign, refused to let him pick Joe Lieberman. McCain, himself, won the nomination by default, because no one could appease the beast. First, Rudy was a shoo-in until he refused to campaign and began accepting calls from his wife in the middle of important speeches. Then it was Mitt Romney until his magic underwear failed him. Huckabee was too Huckleberry and he didn't believe in evolution, and Fred Thompson was so bloated and gaseous it made you wonder how his trophy wife endured the excessive belching. It was McCain by elimination, and Palin in order to throw the lions to the Christians. That's why at McCain/Palin rallies, you hear a lot of boos, while they are cheering at Obama/Biden events. The Democrats present initiatives and plans, the GOP offers invective and poison.

I am not sorry watching the patchwork Republican majority of free-marketeers, right wing Evangelicals, rich people who hate capital gains and inheritance taxes, anti-abortionists, and xenophobes that has existed for 30 years begin to implode. But it's not enough to merely defeat a party. The philosophy of Gingrich and DeLay, Dobson and Robertson, Limbaugh and Hannity, and Cheney and Bush must be crushed absolutely with a wooden stake driven through it's cold, shrivelled heart. I watched the Democratic Party completely unravel over an unpopular war and ominously repressed societal problems. An Obama victory is not guaranteed, but should the Democrats win, the ultimate irony is that the President-elect will address the nation from Chicago, where exactly 40 years ago, blood ran in the streets and the old Democratic cooalition was trampled and scattered after the brutality and chaos of the 1968 Convention. The mayor then, as now, was named Richard J. Daley. Only this time the candidate is Barack Obama, and he has a clarion call to unity.

"Power concedes nothing without a fight" Barack Obama 10/29/08

An Appeal To Youth

While speaking in Florida a while back, John McCain said, "I'm sorry to tell you, my friends, but there will be other wars." Who's supposed to fight in these wars that McCain speaks of? Not our current military, stretched to the limit. Not me, or my entire generation. We're still busy fighting over the Vietnam War and the domestic cultural shifts that arose because of that bloody conflict. We've been doing that for forty years now, partly because of the disrespect directed toward the military, including the soldiers, who were sacrificed by the "Greatest Generation" for dubious causes, and also the fight over "patriotism," when you find your country is engaged in a murderous and immoral conflict. The American participation in that war ended in 1973, but not before 58,000 men, average age 19, perished. The terrible psychic costs of Vietnam were never resolved at home. We decided it was better not to talk about such unpleasantness and went on a decade long Disco and cocaine bender instead.

I once swore that when I grew older, I would never say "When I was your age," to a young person. When those old geezers were my age, they were still listening to Jack Benny and FDR's Fireside Chats on the radio. How could they possibly relate to my life in the modern era? Having said that, "When I was your age..." we were at war, with a despised president who put us there, when an attractive candidate emerged who was adored by the young. He was a champion of the destitute and the downtrodden. Bobby Kennedy promised to end the war and bring our soldiers home in order to concentrate on the growing domestic unrest exploding in every major city. The similarities between 1968 and 2008 are striking with two exceptions: the draft was feeding my peers who weren't able to take refuge in college into a meat-grinder, and the voting age was 21. Despite being only 20, I had been drafted because of a university's computer glitch, and was emotionally invested in Kennedy's election. You can imagine how crushed we were when Robert Kennedy was murdered in Los Angeles, the first act of Palestinian terror on American soil.

Deeply dispirited, my generation chose to withdraw from politics, insuring the election of Richard Nixon, five more years of war and 20,000 more American soldiers dead, plus the beginnings of the nasty, partisan political world that we inhabit today. There are a lot of "what ifs" in this life. Young people voting in large numbers then could have literally saved lives, and my generation, who once believed we were going to transform the world in the cause for good, blew it...big time. Nixon's bag of "dirty tricks" soon turned people cynical about their government and the tactics of "wedge politics;" topics meant to divide people, were used for the first time; and they worked. The Rovian position of "political strategist" has become the politician's preeminent advisor and we have been divided ever since. You can change that now if you remember two things: Assume nothing, this race is far from over; and do not discount the importance of your actions. Go to the polls as if your single vote were going to determine the outcome, and bring a friend with you.

You've seen the best and the worst of my generation. We had a brilliant policy thinker and communicator who couldn't keep his pecker in his pants, and a moral absolutist and former drunk who took this country to war because his Nixon-worshipping neocons convinced him that it was the Lord's will. To paraphrase JFK, it's time to pass the damn torch already. We have lived too long with prejudices that the young never had to experience, and it clouds our thinking. Can you imagine that I never sat in a classroom with a non-white person until college? Once again, we desperately need to alter our nation's course, but still I wonder if the young are aware of the potential political clout that rests within them. Being disqualified from voting in 1968, when my ass was personally on the line, changed me. I am one of the laziest men walking, (it took 28 years to complete my Bachelor's Degree), but I have never missed the chance to vote in a single election since. Now, it's your future that's at stake.

It's this simple. If young people come out in numbers and vote, Obama will win. If they don't, he won't. And history is not on your side. Young people might have saved us from a second Bush term, but registering on campus is not the same as going to the voting booth and pulling that curtain shut. In every election since Nixon, young voters have disappointed those candidates who depended on them. Just ask Al Gore. Early voting seems to be the way to go, but first-time voters might enjoy the chaos of election day. If you don't know, you must call or Google your city or state's Election Commission to find out your polling place. Don't wear your campaign gear or some zealot will make you turn your T-shirt inside out, and bring an ID and prepare to do battle with those who would challenge your rights. You have the power to decide this election, and if we do it right this time, you also have the ability to redeem a lot of forgotten or discarded dreams. If I could, I would come and beg each of you individually, please vote.

If you don't receive this message, it's because your parents wouldn't send it to you.

The McCain Mutiny

I haven't seen rats desert a sinking ship this fast since we sank the Bismark. Kathleen Parker was first to say the V.P. nominee had no mental clothing, followed by George Will, Charles Krauthhammer, Christopher Buckley, David Brooks, and finally Peggy "1000 Points of Light" Noonan. In other words, the "Intellectual" Conservatives that the red state voters so disdain, have thrown in the towel on the McCain/Palin ticket. So who's left? The Evangelicals who believe that Jesus is a Republican and Palin would just make a nifty president; the fat cats who not only will get fatter in a GOP administration, but will escape further investigation for their nefarious deeds; followers of particular "isms," from Protectionism to Zionism; and pocketbook voters who can't stand the thought of their taxes supplementing anyone's food stamps. And I am so weary of listening to rich people whine about Capital Gains Taxes. A capital gain is free money that your existing money earned for you while you weren't looking. Another of my father's sayings: "This is a great country, but the dues are expensive." Why not just be grateful for any capital gains and pay the fucking tax?

In the final Presidential debate Wednesday, I fully expected McCain to begin rolling steel marbles in his palm, turn to Obama, and say, "Ahh, but it was the strawberries!" Nothing has worked for him. Not Bill Ayers, or "Lipstick on a Pig," or suspending his campaign to fix the economy, or his latest manufactured outrage about Rep. John Lewis. And certainly not the selection of Sarah Palin, who has proven to be Bush in Spanks: just as dumb but twice the ambition. From simply a visual point of view, McCain's pallor made me question the wisdom of High Def TV. At times he alternated from appearing like Casper, the unfriendly ghost (or was that Spooky?), to becoming so red-faced, it looked like his head was going to explode. No wonder they prop Cindy up there at every, single speech. She would have sat at the table with John on Wednesday, but she has already become the Yoko Ono of the campaign.

Senator McCain has made the classic Hillary Clinton mistake in his run for the presidency. He altered who he really was and accepted a persona created by Karl Rove and his hapless, outdated advisers in the belief that the old politics would get him elected. Even his colleagues said they don't recognize the current John McCain, and that's a shame for those who have followed his political career. If you were able to see McCain's comments at the Al Smith Dinner in New York last night, after the hilarious jokes, the Senator paid a genuine and heartfelt tribute to the achievements of his opponent, ending with "I can't wish you good luck, but I do wish you well." This is the honorable John McCain that I remember working with Sen. Feingold for campaign finance reform, or saying that this country does not torture for the reciprocal safety of our own soldiers. It's sad to see him end his career like Bob Dole, wandering around muttering "Where's the outrage?"

I give credit to Sen. McCain for not shoveling through the Rev. Wright muck again, but the constant references to "Joe, the not-quite Plumber," more than created an alternate living, breathing straw man upon which to base a bogus argument. McCain may have been aiming for the "Joe Six-Pack" vote, but he lost every former Hillary supporter when he mocked a "woman's health" in air-quotes as a potential reason to have an abortion. Personally, I believe that life begins when the doctor slaps your ass, but what I, or anyone else thinks is irrelevant to the woman facing that decision. It's not the government's business either. But Obama is the first Democrat yet I have heard say that "Nobody is pro-abortion," and tackle the issue. McCain also doesn't understand that his $5000 tax credit to buy health insurance does no good when HMOs disqualify anyone with pre-existing conditions. There are thousands just like me who can't purchase health insurance at any cost. For the past several weeks, McCain has been asking crowds at his rallies, "Who is the real Barack Obama?" The shame of this election campaign is that we never got to see the real John McCain, until it was too late.

Raiding The Whorehouse

It was one of my father's sayings about stock market declines; "When they raid the whorehouse, they take the pretty ones along with the ugly ones." They all look suspect to me now, but in the case of AIG (American International Group), that's one particularly ugly whore. Only days after receiving an $85 Billion dollar bailout from the Fed to keep from going belly up, the company spent a half million dollars on a "retreat" for company employees at an exclusive California resort/spa. Congress is insisting they pay back the half-mil, while approving another $35 Billion for the company in additional aid. Of course, it's beyond outrageous, but a revealing glimpse into the mentality of today's corporate America. Talk about a group of people who have become dependant on government largess, and they're all wearing suits and carrying Blackberries.

My sincerest sympathy goes to those who have been crack-backed by the decade of gains that have just been wiped out. I feel your pain. I retired from the field of play after the tech stock bust of 2000 and am still licking my wounds. That's when I finally realized that the market; the Dow, NASDAQ, futures, commodities, you name it, was an insiders' game. If you're someone like me, the only way to make money is if you're lucky enough to bet on the insiders' side. It's like the casinos. It's a rigged deal and the odds favor the house. And just like the casinos, market institutions are always coming up with new ways to bet. Only instead of Blackjack, Keno and craps, they call them financial instruments, derivatives, puts, and calls. You can make money betting a company's stock will go down. In fact, that's probably one of the only ways left to make money in stocks.

I come from a family of investors. When I was a little boy, my parents had to explain to me why my Grandfather had given me 50 shares of Nabisco for my birthday instead of a toy truck. After I understood, when my Mother took me to the grocery store I would always insist she buy Vanilla Wafers, just to support the company. The stock market seemed like a private club, or some mysterious Masonic order with closely held secrets. My Grandfather, who came to this country with nothing, would buy a stock and hold it for a quarter century before he sold. He taught my father the same principles of buying shares in a solid company with a future and holding on to them forever. That sort of conservative wisdom helped put me through college, but the internet age changed everything.

Part of the insiders' game is that they don't teach you about the stock market in school. You have to learn it from other insiders, or go to special schools where they teach this stuff exclusively. I learned from sitting with my father about the intricacies of the game. I entrusted my investments to him my entire life because he was better than any broker; he was smarter than most, did better research, and he actually cared. He kept books of moving averages that he would track using his own methods. When a stock broker would show him his new car, my father would say, "I want to see your clients' new cars." He would explain he was such a conservative investor because, "My father got wiped out in the Stock Market crash of 1929. A broker jumped out of a high window and landed on his pushcart." It was the same for 70 or so years. Then he got an online account.

My father had persuaded me that my intuitive judgement was as good as anyone's and if I did the proper research, I could make money in the market. When I pulled the trigger on my first online trade, it was as big a rush as drawing a straight-flush. It was like having a loose slot machine in the house. I was way up for awhile and began imagining myself as having some latent ability to think a step ahead of the herd, but then the herd trampled me. I'll spare you the gory details, but I was left bewildered and feeling guilty that I had failed because I was too impulsive or my research was flawed. I had read books by everyone from Lee Ioccoca to Melvin Van Peebles. I looked at as many as five separate sources for expert opinion before making a trade, but made the mistake of falling in love with the "pretty ones" and holding on to them too long. I took my lumps and bailed out, no wiser but certainly sadder. I didn't even get a free buffet out of the deal.

Imagine my surprise when I found out that my online brokerages, first Donaldson, Lufkin, and Jenrette, and then Harris Direct, were under investigation for their sales practices. It seems that some of the "experts" giving presumably impartial advice had financial interests in many of the stocks they were supposed to be reviewing. Both companies promptly went under and class-action lawsuits were filed, but because of lack of a paper trail and institutional candor, I could never prove that the shares I purchased were tainted by someone else's personal interest. It helped my pride to know I wasn't a total fool, just a sucker and a mark. But it hurt my pocketbook just the same. That's how I know they're a bunch of thieves going in. In the end, they even got to my father. Dad, had who maintained the same investment philosophy his entire life, was lured into a group of clients given exclusive access to IPO's(Initial Public Offerings), which created so many instant millionaires in the 90s, and soon found out that part of his ass was missing. Dad was smarter than me, he had other assets. My financial plan is now probably much like yours; vote for Obama and pray.

"That One"

Here we were all settled in to watch a civil debate and John McCain goes all Uncle Remus on us. His referral to Obama as "that one" can be interpreted one of two ways. First, as an elementary school teacher would refer to a class of mischievous children, or worse, as someone who has a little Joel Chandler Harris (Uncle Remus) in his soul. "That one." It's ugly. It's a dehumanizing remark and suggests the referenced person is somehow "the other." At best, it is sneering condescension, and at worst, McCain may as well have called Obama "tarbaby." That was another old Uncle Remus tale that Disney made one of their classic full-length animated movies about, but they only break it out for White Citizen's Council meetings these days. Try buying a copy of "Song of the South" online while singing "Zip-A-Dee-Do-Dah."

The things that seep from the subconscious when you're on live TV are amazing. McCain told one audience member that he had probably never heard of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae before the current economic crisis. Why would he assume that? The young man was sitting there in a jacket and tie like everyone else, and he had just asked a question about economics. Oh yeah, he was black. Who let the dogs out? Whoo, whoo, whoo. "That one." What else could explain McCain's contempt for Obama except an old boy mentality of exclusivity? Over the course of the debate, McCain's voice grew into an urgent whisper, like an exasperated Washington insider who can't believe he is about to get his ass kicked by a black man still in his first Senate term, sort of like Hillary Clinton in wing-tips.

Last night's debate in Nashville only solidified the image of John McCain as old grouch. He kept referring to the country's need for a "steady hand on the tiller" while he is already being coached by Cindy like Nancy Reagan giving Ronnie his cue. Melody asked me, "Why is she up his ass all the time? No one else's spouse has to stand there like an attendant." I answered, "I guess his advisers must think it makes him look younger." When McCain's prima facie case for bad judgement, Sarah Palin, said, "I think the American people are looking for something fresh and new," she couldn't have been referring to McCain. God help us if McCain should die in office and leave the country in the care of the weather girl.

Speaking of weather girls, there was no mention in the debate of Bernadine Dohrn or William Ayers, which was a welcome respite from Palin's obnoxious repetition of Obama "palling around with domestic terrorists." There you go again, Joe, pointing fingers at the past. Personally, I would enjoy meeting the Ayers' to talk about back in the day, but I doubt that I would walk away from the meeting with a desire to bomb the Pentagon. "That one." And if McCain knows, as he assures us he does, how to capture or kill Osama bin Laden, why doesn't he go ahead and tell somebody? It didn't help matters that the McCains immediately left the hall, leaving the Obamas the opportunity to shake hands and generally look gracious on television. Who's really "that one" in this contest? "Thar he," spoke the pointing man while McCain exited, stage right.

The open contempt John McCain displays towards his opponent is disturbing, and his dismissal of Obama as a worthy adversary is insulting, especially on the heels of the "Bailout/Rescue Plan" that McCain "suspended" his campaign for, failing to stop worldwide markets from going into freefall. I much preferred Obama's choice of Warren Buffett as Treasury Secretary over McCain's suggestion of the woman who founded eBay on the same day that eBay laid off 1,000 employees. When the hock shops are hurting, you know times are hard. If this were a movie, Obama came off as William Powell and McCain looked like Al Lewis as Grandpa Munster. Tonight, I saw John McCain do an illusion worthy of David Blaine; he turned into Bob Dole. And by the way, the Beach Boys' version of "Barbara Ann," that McCain sings "Bomb Iran" to, is a weak cover of the original, doo-wop classic by The Regents, 1961. JFK was President and John McCain was already in the Navy. Just wanted to clear that up.

Hotty Toddy

Hotty Toddy, Gosh Almighty
Who in the Hell are we?
Hey!
Flim Flam, Bim Bam
Ole Miss, By Damn.

Just writing the words gives me a queasy feeling. They echo in my childhood memory from the many football games my father took me to between the Ole Miss Rebels and the Memphis State Tigers. We hated everything about them; how they came to town with their Confederate flags and pep band playing "Dixie" and took over the Peabody Hotel and turned it into a scene from the Old South with annual drunken arrogance. But we hated that damned southern aristocratic cheer most of all. Even before the Coliseum, back when the games were played in Crump Stadium, when the Ole Miss side started up the "Hotty Toddy" cheer, the stadium thundered with boos and the Memphis crowd shouted back, "Go to Hell Ole Miss, Go to Hell," which was considered somewhat scandalous for the time. Mississippi, and it's University, were the last bastions of white supremacy and the plantation mentality. I grew up hating Ole Miss.

In my sophomore year at Christian Brothers High School, I was sitting in a history class, staring out the window at South Parkway in awe as an endless convoy of military vehicles, heavy trucks and tanks, and Federal troops with U.S. Marshals caravaned South in front of the school on the avenue that became old Highway 51 into Mississippi. It was October of 1962, and the resistance of Gov. Ross Barnett to the integration of Ole Miss by James Meredith had touched off deadly riots on campus. President Kennedy had assembled a massive number of troops, which were passing before my eyes on the way to Oxford, when I felt a hard blow to my forehead. The Brother had hit me with a fast-thrown eraser and admonished me to pay attention to my history lesson.

That was an ugly time at Ole Miss. People died and numerous U.S. Marshals were injured by gunfire coming from the angry mob of segregationists. I had some knowledge of the state, travelling with my father on his sales trips when I was a child and performing throughout the Delta when I was a teenager. Although the high school kids seemed more interested in music, sports, and fashion than segregation, the older generation, and by only a few years, seemed to seethe with racial hatred and the potential for violence. At one Delta dance in 1965, a group of greasers at a diner yelled at us, "Where you Beatle boys from?" Thinking I could disarm anyone, I shouted cheerfully, "Memphis," to which the greasers responded, "Well, get your goddam asses back up there then," and we retreated in a hail of rocks and full cans of beer. They were just rednecks who wanted to fight. The same kind that nearly burned down Ole Miss in 1962.

I had no intention of playing at Ole Miss again until I met Holmes Pettey in 1972. Holmes was the scion of an old Mississippi plantation family and booked entertainment as a student at Ole Miss. He heard me play acoustic solo at the old Looking Glass in Overton Square and insisted that I play for his fraternity, SAE. I couldn't imagine that an Ole Miss fraternity, famous for their drunken Bacchanalias, could possibly want to hear me sing protest songs, but Holmes convinced me to come. I drove a VW Minivan full of hippies for moral support to Oxford and set up in the living room of the frat house.
Randy and friends at Ole Miss, 1972 (Melody above Randy holding beer mug w/ head back)
My friends and I could not have been treated better, and found a new generation of Mississippians who were eager to put Ole Miss' racial history behind them and join the rest of the nation in the Twentieth Century. I sang Dylan's "Oxford Town" in a frat house in Oxford, something I might have been beaten up for only a few years before. In short order, my friend Holmes had me opening for the Allman Brothers in the Oxford Coliseum, and pretty much fed me for a couple of years by continuing to book me throughout the state.

It's taken a long time for the stars and bars to disappear and the band to stop playing "Dixie" at athletic events, but under Chancellor Robert Khayat's leadership, even the die-hards came to realize that the Old South symbols were counter-productive for the University and needed to go. The success of that campaign was on full display as Ole Miss applied its finest spit and polish to the campus in preparation as host for the opening Presidential Debate. Just seeing the diversity of the student body that gathered in the Grove for spirited political rallies proves that the University has come a very long way. And it was not lost on some that the school that erupted in violence over the admission of a black student 46 years ago, would now host the first debate that included an African-American candidate for President of the United States.

Ole Miss may always be The Rebels, but the national attention focused on the campus last week was entirely positive. I realize that the significance of football is dwarfed by the pressing issues of our time, but for the unranked Rebels to travel to Gainesville the day after the debate and upset the Florida Gators by one point must have seemed like a sign from the Lord to Ole Miss fans. I will own up to rooting for the Rebels for the first time in my life, just because I know folks like Holmes Pettey and the other alumni, along with the students, faculty and debate organizers, will be walking on air all this week, if not all year. So, before we return our attention to the looming economic abyss, it's worth mentioning that during the vicious 60s, Ole Miss saw a bloody weekend that this nation will never forget. Now, 46 years later, Ole Miss had a weekend that school supporters, students, and officials, can always remember with deserved pride. I never thought I'd say it, but "Well done, Ole Miss." Now, if you could only change that goddamned cheer.

Daydream Believer and a Homecoming Queen

John McClane(L)
John McCain(R)

I believe this election is still close because a great number of the voting populace have confused John McCain with John McClane, of the "Die Hard" movies. We certainly need a "Yippie Ki-Yay" kind of guy right about now, but I think Bruce Willis is in a House of Blues somewhere blowing harp. So we're left with surly tough-guy John McCain applying for the lead role in the next disaster classic, "Soft Money Dies Hard." He's going to "clean up Wall Street" and "reform the Old-Boy Network in Washington." He's going to "follow Bin Laden to the Gates of Hell," because, as McCain/McClane says, "I know how to win wars." Like that one against the villian who blew up an office building. Now that he's cast Sarah Palin as his wisecracking, gun toting, sidekick, we have either a blockbuster, or a sit-com waiting to happen.

There's nothing like a total economic collapse to re-focus the attention. As a lay observer of the Bush economy, I posted an article about this a year ago that I encourage you to revisit by clicking on the title of this piece. But that great ship, the no-holds-barred U.S.S. Free Market, has hit the iceberg and there aren't enough life rafts to go around. And then, the deregulating, anti-government greedheads who have placed us all in this rudderless boat, have the fucking gall to come before Congress and ask for $700 Billion dollars to pass out bail-buckets to Wall Street, but only if no questions are asked, and we must act immediately. Sec. Henry Paulson, the one doing the asking, is the former CEO of Goldman Sachs and has surrounded himself with GS execs to assist him in the current crisis, even while Goldman Sachs is one of the firms in danger of collapse. I don't see any brokers jumping off the ledges yet, so shouldn't we all just stop and take a deep breath?

I'm the first to admit I don't know Freddie Mac from Bernie Mac, except for they both recently died, so I appreciate John McCain's honesty in admitting that economic matters aren't his strong suit. But to suggest a "9/11 style commission" to study the problem when you've just been told the economy is teetering on the verge of the Great Depression Part II, is the equivalent of sitting in a classroom reading "My Pet Goat" when the country is under attack. Now, McCain is eviscerating the very culture he helped to create in his "Maverick" days as "The Great De-Regulator." Only Ronald Reagan patented that fake cowboy stuff 30 years ago, and what Bush the Elder once called "Voodoo Economics," has now come to its' full fruition. Things finally "trickled down" alright, all over me and you. But I don't want Dr. Phil Gramm, the architect of removing institutional regulation like stripping varnish, to be Secretary of the Treasury after the "Ownership Society" has just become the "Borrower Society."

The implosion of the McCain campaign is further evidenced by the Disneyesque, manufactured Sarah Palin bubble that is just about to burst. After being secluded like a college student cramming for finals and being tutored in politics by former Bush operatives, the Palin camp made a serious blunder in trying to manage the media on her meet-and-greet at the United Nations. Attempting to ban a pool reporter from the room while allowing photographers to capture the friendly smiles is an old Soviet-style propaganda stunt. Someone should remind the Governor that in the lower 48, we still maintain that quaint "Freedom of the Press" thing, and sooner, rather than later, she will have to subject herself to the same scrutiny every other candidate must face. In 1980, Geraldine Ferraro's glow fell victim to her husband's sleazy business associates. Should the "First Dude" receive a similar examination of his secessionist views since his wife wants to hold office in this country? Tomorrow, Sarah has a photo shoot with Bono, who's a pacifist, so I hope she washed the blood off of her hands after meeting with Henry Kissinger today.

How anyone could support a candidate who's entire political career has been a trajectory leading to the current crisis is beyond me. His answer to provocation is force; his answer to fiscal crisis is committee. I don't know about you, but I am not a Georgian today, and I will not send my stepson into another politician's misguided war. Our country is being drained, financially and militarily, by the expenses of occupying a sovereign nation and our collapsing financial institutions, but John McCain "can't wait to introduce Sarah Palin to Washington." It's too late for introductions, but I'd like to get in my request. I am an entertainer who serves a societal purpose, and I made some bad investments several years ago that have affected my ability to perform happily. I would like the government to bail me out and reimburse my losses, or I could be too stressed to sing at Woofstock, the music festival for pets, in Overton Park next Sunday afternoon. That would be a huge loss for canine morale, and payback is a dog. This might be a job for John McLane.

Lipstick On Your Collar

This signed photo has nothing to do with the current circus clown pie-fight over lipstick, pigs, mavericks, and pit bulls. I just wanted to show you how nice Connie Francis is. When I was a little kid, I got hold on one of my big sister's "Teen" Magazines, and found some publicists' addresses for the current stars and I chose to write my beloved Connie. Weeks later, when I had forgotten about it, I received this picture in the mail proving that Connie had not forgotten me. Since she sang "Lipstick on Your Collar," I figure she knows more about it than most and, in any case, I believe she is far more qualified to be Vice President than Sarah Palin. Concetta Franconero rose from her small town roots in Newark to make albums in over 13 languages, including Yiddish and Russian, and has travelled all over the world. She once appeared in Romania and did a concert in the native tongue. She's dealt with some of the toughest men of her generation; Dick Clark, Ed Sullivan, Don Kirschner, and Bobby Darin, who learned about her family's position on gun control the hard way when Connie's father brandished a shotgun and threatened Darin's life. That's more hard core than shooting wolves from a bi-plane with an AK-47.

The collar that bears the lipstick in this current nastiness sounds like it belongs to Karl Rove, who has admitted "assisting" the McCain team and would prefer the media indulge in another tabloid campaign than one of substance. So, first the Murdock machine jumps on the false outrage concerning Obama's "lipstick on a pig" remark about McCain's economic policies and then the rest of the media, being in the entertainment and ratings business, follows suit. It's too juicy a story not to say that Sen. Obama referred to Governor Palin as a "pig," and then let him deny it, without reporting the full context and the asininity of the assumption. They're fortunate the language of the Nashville songwriter was avoided. When we found ourselves trying to dress-up something that was fundamentally flawed, we called it "polishing a turd." This campaign trick equivalent of throwing sand in the referee's eyes only deprives people of a serious debate on the real issues.

The GOP seems so giddy over their V.P. nominee, they don't quite know how to behave. The last time I witnessed public hysteria like this build over a public figure in a period of ten days, it was called Beatlemania. Only it's the adults doing the screaming this time over their working class hero. But when they throw big Fred "Hoss" Thompson in front of the cameras to rage about "vicious" attacks on the Governor, and McCain insists she is owed an apology, it merely illustrates how they know nothing of feminism, and are even oblivious that their frantic leaps to "defend the little lady" are nothing but chauvinistic insults to women who actually think for themselves. Still, Obama was forced, first thing, to address the "Old White Men Gone Wild" videos, which the cable networks, in turn, spent the rest of the day gnawing on and the politics of Rove lived to fight another day.

This is why Obama made a mistake in waiting a month to reach out to the Clintons. Only today, will he be having lunch with the former president, while Hillary begins to campaign on his behalf. A valid point that Hillary made during her primary run was her experience in dealing with the Republican attack machine. During Bill's two Presidential campaigns, the "Rapid Response Team" was a hallmark of his organization, and an unsubstantiated claim rarely lasted a news cycle before being firmly addressed. Maybe Obama did not feel the urgency to mend fences, but on a day like yesterday, he badly needed Hillary Clinton on the stump to explain how the other party was exploiting their own nominee. Forcefully saying "Enough!" is not sufficient. It's time to release the hounds.

The saddest part of this is that it seems to work. These irrational GOP attacks become water cooler fodder and blend into the general hum of election discussion. The party apparatchiks, like Marsha Blackburn (a genuine Republican woman), go on talk shows with talking points, screaming "sexism" every time Governor Palin's qualifications are questioned, just like John McCain deflects criticism with his POW credentials. McCain promised a dignified campaign, but I suppose it's clear how this is going to go. The baffling giddiness over Sarah Palin will even out after she answers some tough questions about her vision for the country's direction and some explanations regarding her personal beliefs, but the sneering, self-righteous attacks from the GOP will not stop. Meanwhile, both Palin and McCain have repeated their St. Paul speeches for a week now. It's time to get some new shtick.

I have no doubt that the Governor will do well with reporters, having once been one of them, but I hope no one falls for this Sir Walter Raleigh defense that is now filling the airwaves. I'm sure Sarah is entirely capable of leaping over her own mud puddles, and it will be interesting to watch. Then, women offended by "lipstick" references will see that Palin stands pretty much in opposite of the causes for which others struggled so mightily for so long. At present, her party is trying to portray her as the heroine of another song about lipstick, Benny Spellman's New Orleans classic, "Lipstick Traces," where he says:
"Lipstick traces on a cigarette/every memory lingers with me yet/I've got it bad like I told you before/I'm so in love with you, don't leave me no more."
Sort of like Governor Palin, I disagree with most of what she says, I abhor everything she stands for, yet somehow, I can't quite seem to get her off my mind.
If the McCain/Palin campaign really believes that stunts like this are not going to backfire on them in this important election, I've got another Connie Francis hit for them to listen to. It's called, "Who's Sorry Now?"

Citizen mcKane

After all the speeches are over and the confetti has been dropped, this election comes down to who would you prefer to be your king, the Warrior or the Scholar? Certain times require each, so where is America facing now? The Warrior sees things strategically with the objective being the conquest and domination of his enemies. He closely examines the parts in furtherance of his mission and, when achieved, it is considered "victory." The Warrior sees cubes, while the Scholar sees circles. The Scholar can conceptualize an issue or policy in its totality. He sees the whole rather than the parts, and not just the acts, but their ramifications. The Scholar understands that, rather than confrontation with a belligerent government as a first resort, the power of diplomacy and the application of true American ideals in the world will win us allies and partners over the long run. In other words, "you can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar."

The personal courage and conduct of John McCain while serving in the armed forces is unassailable. I had never heard him speak, before tonight, so personally about his experiences as a prisoner of the North Vietnamese. I'd seen the clips and read the accounts, but nothing could have been as stirring as McCain's moving description of not only his suffering, but the bravery and honor he both witnessed and exemplified in that terrible place. For enduring that alone, McCain is a great man and a true American hero. But even while McCain was being tortured in Hanoi, a groundswell of social and political change was sweeping America, rejecting the militaristic mindset that fed 58,000 members of my generation into a mindless war machine that was of both parties making. When I reflect on my personal changes between the years 1967-1973, the Summer of Love to the summer of Watergate, I can't possibly conceive what it must have looked like to a man who missed it all; the growth of the anti-war movement and LBJ's abdication, the King and Kennedy assassinations, the Chicago Convention and Nixon's election, to Cambodia, Carpet Bombing, Kissinger and Kent State. None of these events informed John McCain's world view while imprisoned in Vietnam.

Like other military families, especially generational ones, McCain was infused with Naval Academy dedication to duty. By his own admission, he went into the war and came out of it with the same military bearing, and fought in the U.S. Senate against corruption and political financial abuse only after being implicated in the "Keating Five" Savings & Loan scandals of 1989, where he was cleared of wrongdoing but criticized by a Senate Ethics Committee for using "poor judgement." Now that he has made "judgement" a major issue in this election, there was a stark contrast between McCain's words, and the image of Governor Sarah Palin standing in front of the lights that spelled out the campaign's theme; "Country First." In this case, McCain did not put "Country First" by well considering his own mortality in placing a half-term governor and political unknown within one breath of becoming leader of the free world. He put "Election First" and made a "McGovern Picks Eagleton" decision.

The Governor made a great speech, electrified the base, and established herself as a new political star on the scene. She is, however, the anti-Hillary and though I'm sure Republicans love her, it's got to be love at first sight since no one outside of the 49th state knew her name before last week. Does it sound wise that the very first time the country lays eyes upon, or hears the voice of any aspiring politician, it's during that person's acceptance speech for the nation's second highest office? At least Dubya ran for, and won re-election to a second term as Texas Governor before Karl Rove set his eyes on the White House. Governor Palin is not yet into her second year. Even Dan Quayle spent a decade in the Senate before Poppy Bush picked him as, "My Favorite Blonde." Everyone held their breath for four years and prayed for Poppy's safety, lest the "potatoe" head assume power.

Senator McCain may have chosen an engrossing new personality, but he has grossly underestimated the intelligence of women with this calculated choice. In the last post I said that if McCain had a lick of sense, he would put a woman on the ticket, but I was thinking of Elizabeth Dole, Olympia Snowe, or even Susan Molinari. I didn't mean the first one passing by. But McCain caved to the Evangelical right and picked a hyper-Christian "hockey mom" who is to the womans' movement what Clarence Thomas is to modern jurisprudence. And I'm weary of hearing voters say, "We can identify with her because she's just like us." When I vote to elect either member of the Executive Branch, God help this country if he is just like me. I don't want some slacker like me as President, I want someone smarter than me and with more discipline and dedication than me. I want someone rooted in the present with an imaginative vision for the future, and I want someone who is for peace instead of more wars, and diplomacy rather than threats. And I want someone who finally knows how to use the damned internets.

That's why, although this was the most remarkable GOP Convention in memory, I've decided to vote for the smart guy this election. So, rather than compare the candidates' hobbies and hypothetical judgements, let's compare their SAT scores. I'm voting for the guy who came from nothing to graduate Magna Cum Laude from Columbia on scholarships and student loans, rather than the legacy admission who graduated near the bottom of his class at Annapolis. I am not afraid of the word "intellectual," and I want the once president of the Harvard Law Review who taught Constitutional law to be the Head of State this time, rather than someone who seems like a good guy or looks like he/she could kick ass. I want my president to be "elite." And despite the heroic record of John McCain while in captivity, I am tired of fighting the Vietnam War. McCain has contributed honorable service to this country and is 72 years old. By any measure, this will be a change election. I hope voters can summon the will to put one-issue, divisive politics behind and move into the new century with forward thinking, accompanied with a much needed dose of humility. We are presently engaged in a world war of new ideas, so who shall lead us; the Warrior or the Scholar?

We Overcame

I never thought I'd live to see it. I'm not talking about the Barack Obama nomination, I'm talking about Patrick Buchanan's effusive praise of his populist speech. If Obama can win over Pat Buchanan in a night, imagine what he can do in the next two months. America's fiercest culture warrior deemed the speech "magnificent." I have watched conventions since 1960, but I have never witnessed anything like last night. And after Obama's speech about the specifics of his direction as contrasted with the Republican agenda, I can't understand why anyone wouldn't wish to cast their vote for him. Oh, wait a minute. Yes I can. I live in Memphis, Tennessee, where racism burns like an open flame that some recoil from, while others can't help but draw near to stoke.

The headline of this post is both simplistic and in error. Only, as a songwriter, I couldn't resist a catchy title. But I know that despite the historic event we just witnessed, 45 years to the day of Dr. King's "I Have A Dream" speech, scores of people refused to watch while others watched while muttering obscenities under their breath. Racism lives all around me, and soon, maybe in the comments to this post, you'll see it raise it's pock-marked face once again. I received an anonymous message after Obama won the Iowa primary stating that "America will never elect a black man as president." I told the sender to get used to saying President Obama, but of course I am not that naive. The Old South will never surrender an ingrained white supremest mindset and embrace racial harmony until the last old dog dies. Why do you suppose Ronald Reagan opened his campaign for the presidency in Philadelphia, Mississippi?

But I have just seen a crossroads moment in history presented to the American people for their ratification, and I pray we don't blow it this time, like we did in 1968 and 2004. Last night, Obama said, "Let's not have a big election over small things." In the middle of two wars, the populace re-elected the criminal Bush to halt gay marriage. Then, after Obama's triumphant speech in Berlin, where 250,000 Germans stood and waved American flags, he was ridiculed by his opposition as merely a celebrity. I saw in the negative GOP ads every subliminal way to turn that triumph into a hollow moment, just by appealing to the good old boy American hatred of foreigners. Did you ever notice that those that scream, "This is the greatest country in the world" the loudest, are the one's who've never been anywhere else?

But this country is the only place I can think of where something like last night could have transpired. I read an editorial earlier in the day that spoke of the struggle from "the middle passage" to the present moment and realized, that's just it. Neither Obama's Kenyan father nor Kansan mother had anything to do with the "middle passage." That's why Jesse Jackson and the old guard of the Civil Rights Movement at first had such difficulty moving to his side. Obama was a child during the sixties and was not a participant in the physical, marching reality of the movement, but he is a child of Dr. King's dream nonetheless.

There has been much talk about a post-racial America, and although Obama may be the living representative of such a notion, the country is a long way from that day. As evidenced by recent political activity in Memphis, racism exists on all sides of the skin pigment spectrum and black racism is as insidious as white. But racial politics did not work in Memphis this time. It seems that people are sick to death of it, as well as all "identity politics." They simple wanted to elect a person with their best interests at heart, and not beholden to some party ideology. That is why Obama's multi-racial perspective gives him the ability to speak authoritatively about the subject to all races. I am supporting Barack Obama for the same reason that Oprah stated, "Not because he's black, but because he's brilliant." Don't believe, however, that it will happen without a fierce struggle. But isn't it great that the Democrats finally found a nominee who is prepared to fight back?

All About Hillary's Eve

There were rumors on the internets and from the mediates that there was the potential for 1968-style demonstrations at this years' Democratic Convention, but so far it's been the feel-good event of the summer, right after the Olympics, murder aside. Sometimes it seems there's a Leon Klinghoffer on every cruise. And instead of angry crowds chanting "The whole world is watching," the masses are gathering around the brightest new media star, Rachel Maddow, and chanting "MSNBC." A younger generation assumes everybody is either watching already or can catch highlights on YouTube. And on Maddow's new cable show, they should make Pat Buchanan play her Ed McMahon. He's the perfect foil, but can he say "Hi-yo?"

Melody and I like to watch the direct feed from C-Span, without the commentary about what we are currently seeing for ourselves, or distracting graphics on a crawl like, "Senator McCain sends Cindy to Georgia to access civilian casualties." Barbie is going to wake up in Tbilisi and wonder what happened to the uprising in Marietta and Buckhead. I wept through most of the Kennedy portion and felt it was Teddy's finest hour. I imagine that you have to be of a certain age to feel the full impact of seeing the last of the Kennedy brothers in his final campaign. It tugs at your own mortality to comprehend that the legislative accomplishments of the younger Kennedy, who was kicked out of Harvard and who's own presidential ambitions drowned with a young girl in Chappaquiddick, dwarfs the combined lasting achievements of his martyred brothers. It's nearly enough to erase a lifetime of personal sins. When Michelle Obama spoke, Melody noted that the only people crying were African Americans, women, and me. But I cry at old Gene Autry songs, too. I have the emotions of a woman trapped in a man's body, and she's pissed and wants them back. But, how could you not love those two children who were, literally, adorable?

We watched tonight's featured attraction, the Hillary Moment, after hearing James Carville say the Democrats "wasted a day," by not attacking BushCain enough. What's the point? This country's on the precipice and everyone knows it. In any case, first blood was drawn by Montana's Governor Schweitzer, who used a rapier rather than a bludgeon, and then we settled in for the main event. After watching Hillary's speech without punditry, I thought her endorsement of Obama was lukewarm and Melody said, "It was all about her." When we switched back to MSNBC to see what the gang was saying, Keith Olbermann called it "a 5-run home run," and Eugene Robinson declared it a "turning point." At first I wondered if I had watched a different speech. I felt portions of the speech were very moving, especially the Harriet Tubman bit, but even that seemed directed at her own supporters. But after hearing all the superlatives heaped in her direction, I started questioning my own experience.

Perhaps I've grown so cynical that I can't see sincerity in a politician anymore, or maybe it annoys me that after 35 years, Hillary still stomps all over her own applause lines, but I do not understand the emotional investment a lot of woman had placed in her candidacy. I'm not a woman, but I thought I was a feminist. I have some knowledge of the Suffrage Movement, but I believed that Hillary, in her Senate record and in her candidacy, ill-served the feminist ideal by being a war hawk with our children and presiding over a sleazy attempt to villainize Barack Obama, which his opponents are now using against him. If John McCain had a lick of sense, he would now nominate a woman to be Vice President, but he doesn't, so we don't have to worry. Still, the most significant line of Hillary's speech was, "Were you only in it for me?" She did what she needed to do and then some, and she became, like Teddy Kennedy, a potentially formidable force in the Senate, while still keeping her options open for 2012, or even 2016.

If Obama is elected, and that is no sure thing for sure, perhaps Hillary, like Kennedy, can be liberated in the Senate to allow her true self to shine through without the political calculations. Then she can begin to sponsor progressive legislation, rather than flag burning amendments and sabre-rattling in the Middle East, and with such a record, she could again ascend the heights and still become the first woman president. She made a good speech tonight and began the process of reconciliation among the Democratic factions. I wrote in a previous post (6/5/08) that had Hillary voted against the war in Iraq, she would be the nominee today. But she didn't, and she's not. Barack Obama is the nominee, and if half the voting population wish to protect their hard-won gains, voting for John McCain is antithetical to the cause. For the future of feminism, "Now is the time for all good women to come to the aid of their party."

Remember When?

I love to receive those nostalgic emails about life in the Fifties. All the Teabury Gum, and nickel Cokes, and wax lips, presented in a Rock n' Roll wonderland where all the guys acted like Fonzie and high school was exactly like "Grease." Ah yes, the innocent Fifties, where virginal Bobby-Soxers abounded and life was "On the Beach" and survival was in a fallout shelter. I guess it's in my nature to remember adolescence a bit differently, so I present to you a different view of that Dick Clark decade, and wonder, do you...

Remember When
the first time your parents told you, "everybody dies?"

Remember When
Your pajamas with the built-in feet were recalled for lack of flame retardant?

Remember When
Every other commercial on television or ad in a magazine was for cigarettes, and they told you they were good for you? Now, 50 years later, and you can still recite tobacco slogans like, "LSMFT," "Winston Tastes Good Like A Cigarette Should," and "Call For Phillip Morris." You've come a long way, baby.

Remember When
You were taught in school to hide under your desk in case of a nuclear attack, and you figured out by age 7 that your ass was as good as fried and the human race could be obliterated at any moment, so what the hell?

Remember When
The air-raid sirens on top of public buildings went off every Saturday at noon, and you were never sure if it was a test or if the Russians figured out the best time to attack was noon, Saturday?

Remember When
Ike's government electrocuted Julius and Ethel Rosenberg for show, setting off a wave of anti-Semitism and orphaning two children, when the "atomic secrets" they passed to the Russians were the same "secrets" that the Soviet's Nazi scientists were only a few months behind our Nazi scientists in discovering in the first place; and no one said a thing about it.

Remember When
You were taught to believe that dropping two atomic weapons on a civilian population was justified, and saved lives?

Remember When
All your grade school and high school teachers were borderline senile Christian fanatics and they were allowed to beat you?


Remember When
You were taught that the police were your friends, until personal interaction proved they were liars, thugs, and racists?






Remember When
Hitching a ride was considered to be safe until that guy grabbed your inner thigh and you had to fight him to get out of the car?




Remember When
That first time you found your Dad's dirty books?

Remember When
If you dropped the phone, you could break your foot?

Remember When
Every family on your street had a maid that worked for wages so low, that if your parents tried to pay that today, they would be arrested. And since there were no retirement plans or Social Security, the maids worked until they died?

Remember When
The racist system threw Chuck Berry in prison because he drove across the state line with an underage girl in the car?

Remember When
The government drafted Elvis into the Army, when no one famous ever got drafted, effectively ending the rebellious age of Rock n' Roll and killing Gladys Presley in the process, and The Colonel let them do it and insisted that Elvis go along and be a grunt?

Remember When
Your city government started to tear down 100 year old palatial homes and historic buildings to make room for fast food restaurants, until every major city has turned into the exact same aesthetically offensive strip mall.


Remember When
Most of the public school Art and Music teachers were gay, but nobody made a big deal about it?




Remember When
Your Dad used to curse at the "women drivers?"



Remember When
You had to re-learn the silly, sing-song "Pledge of Allegiance" because the politicians voted to put the words "Under God" in there, and you couldn't understand why you were swearing personal loyalty to a piece of cloth in the first place? And finally.......

Remember When
You grew your hair long, and your parents kicked you out? Oops sorry, that was the 60s.

The Fifties; that grand decade right after the Forties.

Cohen's Big Win, Bigger for Memphis

The spirits were high at the Steve Cohen victory party tonight and the numbers were so astounding, the huge crowd of supporters seemed almost giddy. After all, these are people unaccustomed to political victory celebrations, but when Cohen's winning margin reached 80%, even those seasoned by years of disappointment had to marvel at this achievement. The majority African-American District 9 had rejected racial and divisive politics and voted in overwhelming numbers to re-elect Cohen, amidst the nastiest campaign by a congressional candidate since the race baiting days of the Fifties. Only the race baiting, and Jew-baiting, were put forth this time by the minority candidate, who's entire campaign could be summed up by the slogan, "Vote for me. I'm black,"

Cohen couldn't have scripted a better closing week to his campaign. First, every news camera in the city recorded him bodily ejecting the Armenian Stalker from his home, an incident so bizarre that a knowledge of the Ottoman Turks is necessary to understand what it was about. And then it was revealed that the Armenians were contributors to the Tinker campaign. But whoever dreamed up the two repugnant Tinker attack ads that were so inflammatory they drew national media condemnation, ought to be taken out and shot, just like Walter Bailey's credibility. The "Prayer" ad caused Keith Olbermann to declare Tinker his nightly "Worst Person in the World," (video above, click on title), and on the eve of the election, Tinker's tactics were publicly repudiated, not just by Barack Obama and her benefactors, Emily's List, but by her former mentor, Harold Ford, Jr. It was fitting that her election night reception should be in a place called "Ground Zero." That describes her political career after tonight.

Cohen's huge margin of victory should be examined carefully in future races because it sounds the death knell of dynastic politics in Memphis and proves that the old racial politics, whether practiced by a black or white candidate, will no longer be rewarded. It's greatly encouraging to see a district dominated by the Ford family for 30 years, decide that they are best represented by the middle-aged, bespectacled, Jewish guy who had proven his mettle in his Freshman term and deserved another. If Nikki Tinker is genuinely interested in public service, and not just a short-cut to Washington, she should run for Ophelia Ford's seat in the Tennessee Legislature and serve for a quarter century, like Cohen. Then she might have the foundation to run for national office, instead of the bile, gibberish, and venom she had to offer this time. Meanwhile, I'd keep my day job, if Pinnacle Airlines would still have me after that classless performance.

Great credit should go to Cohen's staff, in D.C. and in Memphis, for operating an efficient Congressional office and a near flawless campaign. This victory must be particularly sweet for them. But the lion's share of the credit should go to the candidate himself. The House's passage of Cohen's bill offering an apology for slavery may be meaningless to some and purely symbolic to many, but it is an issue that has been festering for a long time, and it took Cohen to accomplish it. His voting record, as well as his initiatives, show that he will fight for his beliefs, even when unpopular, and he has become that rarest of politicians; a conscientious and incorruptible public servant whose first duty is to his constituents. What a novelty in this age. I'm feeling a little like Michelle Obama tonight, and if I could paraphrase her; I'm proud of my city for the first time in a very long time. Well done Memphis and Congressman Cohen, and keep on keeping on.

"Lost Travelers of the Time Horizon"

Do you think there's an office in the White House where someone's job is to sit there and make up this crap? Now, the administration reports that the Bush and Maliki governments have agreed on a "time horizon," for the withdrawal of US troops. Who's their sloganeer, H.G. Wells? How long do they expect the American people to buy this brand of bullshit? After trotting out slogans like "The new way forward," "Return on success," and "We'll stand down when they stand up," you would believe that Bush's message was controlled by a slick, Madison avenue-type advertising agency. If you believed that, you would be correct. Somewhere in the White House is a large storeroom for janitorial supplies where Frank Luntz lurks in the semi-darkness, laboring over a computerized thesaurus to find softer language to describe the crimes of the Bush administration. In Frank Luntz's world, Bush is "making love" to the country.

Luntz, a Republican pollster and language doctor for corporate interests, takes credit for changing the administration's position of total denial of global warming, to owning up that there has been somewhat of a "climate change." And rather than have the Oil Twins, Bush and Cheney, and their surrogates going around advocating drilling for oil in the Gulf of Mexico or otherwise offshore, Luntz suggested they say that they are in favor of local "energy exploration," and if it's near someones beach vacation spot, it's merely "deep sea energy exploration." What could possibly be wrong with that? It's not like oil spewing into our scenic shores from a pipeline break, it's just looking for energy. Luntz has appeared on every cable show from "Hardball," to "Real Time with Bill Maher," and I have some language to describe his appearance; "toupee challenged," or "the man with the coonskin hair." Hey pal, just admit your bald and get a decent piece. Then tell people you do it for your own psychological well-being and not theirs. It always worked for me.

This applies to the other "Orwellian" language that Luntz has defended in the past as a good thing; "Compassionate Conservative," "Homeland Security," "The Surge," and now the Star Trek-like, "Time Horizon." Has anyone referred to their country as the "Homeland" since the Nazis? The "surge" was just an escalation of troops, and "Time Horizon," is something you wish you had George Carlin still around to deal with. He might say something like, "Time is a human creation to measure our days, and since our days are transitory, and maybe our race too, time is an illusion. The 'Horizon,' is at least something you can see, but it still depends on conceptual human belief. You can start walking towards the horizon and drown before you ever get there. In other words, it's all total bullshit, and it's bad for ya'."

Now the bullshit torch has been passed to John McCain. To hear him tell it, the "surge" was such an enormous success that it has allowed us to "win" in our fight for Iraqi democracy and the right for them to sell us oil. If that's the case, in the words of Pooty Tang, "Let's wrap this shit up, G," declare the war over and won, and withdraw the troops. McCain instead, while his political rival is out of the country on a trip that McCain goaded him into taking, has decided to impugn Obama's personal ethics by saying, "He would rather lose a war in order to win a political campaign." I understand Karl Rove is currently advising the McCain campaign but, have they gone insane? Is McCain so aggrieved at Obama's popularity that he is now planning to employ the entire Bush Bullshit Battalion to attack his loyalty?

McCain the "maverick" is gone, replaced by McCain the "new sheriff," who "knows how to win wars." Which war is he refering to? "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss." Wesley Clark caught a lot of flack for saying being a prisoner of war is not a presidential qualification, but if you consider McCain's role, had his plane not been shot down by the North Vietnamese, he would have just been another silent, and anonymous, killer in the night. The period of McCain's captivity assured that he missed the profound sociological changes that took place as a result of the Vietnam War, and he returned, a war hero to be sure, but with the same militaristic mindset with which he left the Naval Academy. It's ironic that the non-soldier Obama's assessments about the Middle-East were castigated as "appeasement" by the same administration that now embraces his ideas,(only using their own clumsy, self-serving linguistics), while the old soldier McCain is hung out to dry and left to defend his Nixonian visions of "winning with honor" on his own. There is no honor in withdrawing forces from a country that you have invaded and occupied for six years.

If Frank Luntz and Karl Rove can brainstorm some slogans for John McCain's hardline views, they'd better do better than "Time Horizon." They should call back Peggy Noonan to refer to Baghdad as, "A shining city in the sand, at least for a few hours a day," or, "Last chance for cheap gas." If the rest of Obama's Middle East trip goes as well as the opening week, perhaps the message masseurs should refocus their attention on the Bush legacy. I know the plans for the library are underway and the Bush Cult is concerned about how history will refer to Junior. Like Luntz, I was in the word business too, as a lyricist for popular music, and I've created some epithets that history can co-opt when referencing our lamest of lame duck presidents. 1) "George the Terrible" 2) "Bush the Merciless," and my personal favorite, 3) "George the Scourge." That's what's in my "time horizon," along with maybe, "Inmate Cheney." Keep hope alive.

Starring George Bush as James Dean

I stumbled upon some psychological insight into the chuckleheaded mass of protoplasm known as George Bush. I was watching him cross the White House lawn after getting off of his helicopter, making those inane hand wiggling motions he uses for a wave, and then he did something that looked sophomoric but vaguely familiar. He held his hand out, palm down, and made a scooping, circular motion that ended up as some type of greeting. I knew I had seen it in the distant past, but I couldn't quite remember where until it occurred to me that it was the wave James Dean used in two different movies, most notably "Giant." I used to think it was cool, and did the scoop wave myself until I outgrew it in the seventh grade. It was then that I realized; "This dumb son of a bitch thinks he's James Dean."

To prove my theory, we acquired a copy of "Giant," the George Stevens four hour soap opera of the Edna Ferber book, and it views like the George W. Bush story. You can almost picture George in 1956, wearing his coonskin cap, mesmerized by the big screen's version of the Lone Star state. Filmed in Marfa, Texas, "Giant" is the huge, sprawling tale of the Benedict Ranch, starring Rock Hudson and Liz Taylor as the ranch's proprietors, and James Dean as the ne'er-do-well roustabout Jet Rink. Jordan Benedict (Rock) lives on the ranch with his silver-haired sister, Luzz, (read: Barr), who is Rink's benefactor and surrogate mother. She even looks like Barbara Bush and has a bad temper and an intolerant streak for Mexicans, to whom she refers to as "those people." Luzz pampers Rink/Dean, but surrogate daddy Rock wants him the hell out of there. When Luzz dies, she leaves Jet a small parcel on the larger ranch which he calls "Little Reata," just like "Arbusto Oil."

Surrogate Dad is a successful, old-school cattle man, but Jet wants to be a wildcatter, and sure enough, he strikes oil, which leads to one of the films memorable scenes. Jet drives his jalopy right up to the big house and tells Jordan, "I'm a richun', I'm going to be even richer than you." It gets stranger when Jordan and Leslie (Liz) have twins, just like the Bushes, and they name one of the girls Luzz after the silver-haired old bat, just like George and Laura named one of their daughters Barbara. The good son, played by Dennis Hopper, doesn't want to work the ranch and runs off to marry a Mexican woman, just like Jeb Bush. Remember when the elder Bushes referred to their grandchildren as "the little brown ones?" It's right there in "Giant." Even Georgie's Oedipal struggle with Dad is portrayed by Jet Rink's crush on Jordan Benedict's wife, Leslie, who's too good for him.

In the movie's conclusion, Jet Rink gets drunk and passes out at his own testimonial dinner, showing all of Texas that he does what he damn well pleases. Just like the dry drunk George Bush, who's manic antics have made him the Global Village Idiot, and caused international ridicule and shame over the morally and emotionally bankrupt child we elected as our president. Jet Rink, like George Bush, believed that money could buy him respectability. Poppy's money and assorted henchman even made Georgie the President, but respectability alludes him. He is still the oafish, immature cowboy, Jet Rink, and nobody tells him what to do. For Bush's first forty years, he imitated the fast cars, boozing lifestyle of James Dean. That's what caught the attention of Karl Rove and made him believe he could make Bush president. Only, James Dean wrapped his race car around a tree and made an early exit. George just got a DUI. Had Dean lived to see George the Jackass assume his mannerisms and his dress, he might have concluded what everyone else has by now; that George W. Bush is a punk-ass chump.

July 4th, Memphis Style

Happy Independence day. In Memphis, the local news crews requested that people not fire their guns into the air because the ammunition will ultimately come down somewhere. But I suppose that demographic wasn't watching the news and shot up the place anyway. A man ate some Bar-B-Que with his ex-girlfriend's family in Overton Park, then shot her and killed himself while children played nearby. A man was struck in the leg while mowing his yard, a mother and her young child were grazed by bullets as they celebrated in a downtown park, and my stepson, Cameron, and two of his friends were robbed at gunpoint in an elevator of the parking garage at Peabody Place. There were no security cameras present in the elevators or the garage. We are technologically able to watch a man on YouTube spend forty-eight hours in a New York office building elevator, but the proprietors of Peabody Place can't stick a security camera in the parking lot.

As usual, I wasn't going to answer the 1:30 AM call with the unknown number on the caller ID, until Cameron said, "If you're listening, pick up." He was unhurt physically, if not bruised morally, and was calling mainly to tell me to cut off the service to his stolen cell phone. He had no keys and needed to come by and asked me to tell his mother. I awoke Melody first with the news that he was safe, then filled in the details. I shared her outrage, doubly so, because this is the second time in two years that Cameron has had a gun pointed in his face.("Baghdad On the Mississippi;" 8/6/07). When Melody asked me the race of the gunman, I said, "Black." Only then, because I've somehow retained some semblance of sensitivity, did I realize that Cameron had never told me the armed robber's race, I had merely assumed he was black, and pointed out my own racial prejudices to my wife.

Of course, the gunman was black. There are no Caucasian armed robbers preying on innocent people who came downtown to see the fireworks and celebrate the Fourth. My black friends and acquaintances know that I am not one to launch into some quasi-racist tirade for two reasons; I would never say or write anything I would not comfortably discuss face to face, and I do not generalize. As part of a group that has been generalized about, I recognized that brand of foolishness long ago from being Jewish, and though anti-Semitism was never as virulent in the South as racial hatred, I understand the injustice of painting any group of people with so broad a brush as to deny individuality. Having said that, allow me to delve into a topic that may be none of my damn business; the crisis among young black men, and the affects on the larger community.

Cameron is of a group now called the "post-racial generation." While I never attended classes with anyone of a different race than me until I reached college, Cameron has always been part of a racially mixed social and scholastic group. He has as many black friends as white, and I can honestly say that even as a teenager, he was the least racially conscience person I'd ever met. So I asked him, "What is it? Is it a generational thing? Is it this insane "thug culture?" Cameron suggested people were getting held up when I was a kid, and I replied, "Never like this. There were never so many guns on the streets." The result is that Memphis ranks #1 in property crimes among major cities, and is among the top five cities in violent crime. Once gang free, Memphis is riddled with gangbangers killing each other and the occasional innocent child on the swing set.

Then Cameron made it plain for me by explaining that it is several decades of teenage mothers having babies that fall immediately adrift; homeless, helpless, aimless. It's too much drug abuse and pointless existences among young men that prefer to victimize others rather than gain for themselves. It's a gang mentality that stresses "revenge" as manly and studious pursuits as "white." But it's not so much a societal thing as just plain ignorance. Among an older generation of black people, there is great dismay and confusion that has been unreported by the media until only recently when certain famous celebrities spoke out. Even Jesse Jackson admitted to his own embarrassed relief, when he found the group of men that were walking behind him to be white and not black. Is it fair to blame the entertainment media's glorification of the "gangsta?" In my young days, we all watched "Shaft" and "Superfly," but it didn't cause a rash of young men to go out and become pimps and private dicks.

I have no answers. I only hope this violent era passes with the violence that provoked it. Sensible whites and blacks feel the same about this crisis that stares us in the face down the barrel of a gun. The handgun manufacturers and their enablers, like the Supreme Court, won't be satisfied until we're all sporting side holsters like in Old Dodge City. Then, by God, nobody dare tread on us. Or on our neighbors' yards either, as was the case in Texas last week when a man killed two men running from the house next door, and wasn't charged. This may mollify some, but I don't want to live this way. I told Cameron that perhaps the election of Barack Obama will inspire a new generation that doesn't want to live this way any longer either. He just said, "Don't count on it." Meanwhile, Cameron says he's, "outta' here. I'm going home." He is joining the Peace Corps, and by "home," he meant Mother Africa, where he has requested to be located. We hope he'll be safer there.

To: God, Re: George Carlin

Dear Lord,
Please look after the soul of one George Carlin, who probably passed customs and should be coming your way about now. I know he vehemently denied Your existence, going so far as to say, "There is no God, none, never was," but I know these folks are your favorite kind. Besides, any one soul who brought so much laughter and cheer to so many others is deserving of favor, and he was merely railing against the God he was taught about in Catholic school, rather than the God he talked about in his act; "The Big Electron," The Sun, Joe Pesci. His indignation was about organized religion's version of God; the vengeful, white bearded, invisible man in the sky who's spying on you all the time and who decides the outcome of athletic events. But anyone as observant and perceptive as George Carlin saw the larger frame surrounding the smaller picture, so he never claimed to be an atheist, just a pragmatist. And anyway Lord, he's already been in front of one Supreme Court.

My friends and I who grew up in the sixties thought George Carlin was the funniest man alive. After his first album release, teenagers were quoting from his routines, like "The Wild Willy West Show on Radio WINO, (Wonderful WINO, in Western Walla Walla)," or "Al Sleet, your Hippie Dippy Weatherman, (Today's high? Whenever I get up)." When the times grew turbulent, we were delighted to see Carlin take off the coat and tie and grow his hair long. He was one of us, and he was still funnier than hell, deconstructing language and pointing out oxymorons like Jumbo Shrimp, and Military Intelligence, so that you can't hear some absurd phrase without thinking of him. How many times has someone thought, "That would be a good one for George Carlin?"

And the older he got, the more outrageous he became, and we loved him for it. No subject was beyond examination; Cats and Dogs, Baseball and Football, Religion, Advertising, and a lot of humor that was just plain crude. But God, could he make you hold-your-sides laugh. After he became famous for his "Seven Words" routine, he updated the list on his next HBO special, unrolling a long scroll and naming in rapid fire diction every slang term ever used for any known body part or bodily function, and I was left, doubled over in the chair, gasping for breath. But he was also a deep thinker, and agree or not, he could provoke you to consider another point of view. He claimed he didn't do political humor, but his comedy was deeply political and often radical. Lenny Bruce may have opened the door, but it was Carlin who came through.

I heard Jerry Seinfeld say that Carlin recently spoke of being relieved that this season's current death wave seemed to have passed him by, but he ended as part of a troika with Bo Diddley and Tim Russert anyway. I think he might have liked the company because, although the three men excelled in vastly different arenas, they all shared a singular defining passion about what they did. But Carlin's sudden death was similar to when Johnny Carson died; there was no time in advance to consider a life without him. You could prepare for Richard Pryor, but Carlin? And in the middle of this political season so rich with humor? He didn't "pass away," or "expire, like a magazine subscription." He up and died.

If I said that I feel like I lost an old friend yesterday, George Carlin would have thoroughly mocked that, since we were never in the same area code, so far as I know. In the 1984 HBO show, "Carlin on Campus," George said, "I believe in live and let live, and if anybody doesn't believe that, we'll take him outside and shoot the motherfucker." (Excuse me Lord, that was one of the seven). On this occasion he might say, "Go ahead back to your blog (and he would make exaggerated belching noises since the word is funny), and if it makes you feel any better to write a little something about me, have at it." So I did. And I will remember George Carlin with gales of laughter, and hope he is now in the process of being pleasantly surprised. In the name of Joe Pesci, we all say....

Amen

Air Sickness

Can the airlines possibly make it any more unpleasant to fly? I understand how nineteen guys with boxcutters altered our way of life, but the airline industry's reaction to the first multiple hijacking, in lock step with the government, is insane. Some fool tries to set his shoes on fire over the Atlantic and before you know it, we're all tiptoeing barefoot through a gauntlet of idiots who can prevent you from flying if you look at them cross-eyed. A rumor runs rampant that terrorists are individually smuggling various chemicals on a plane that will explode when mixed up together in the air-toilet, and suddenly a high school drop-out in a uniform is confiscating my Mother's hand lotion. And have you ever been in an airline toilet, much less consider mixing volatile salves in there? Soon enough, we'll all be required to wear pocketless, translucent leotards to board, making air travel not merely annoying, but disgusting too.

Because you have somewhere to go, you stand and silently accept their abuse as you are herded into a metal tube reeking of jet fuel, gaseous emissions, and body odors. Your cramped seat hasn't been wiped down in five years and there's an oil slick on the headrest, but you can't sit down until the aisle clears of passengers trying to stuff their oversized suitcases into the overhead bins to avoid the extra charge for luggage. You wish you had some water, but they took that away at the gate and the two dollar cokes won't be served until the plane is airborne. If your plane backs away from the gate quickly, there is no assurance that you will take-off anytime soon. In fact, if there is a long delay, the airline will not inform you in advance, but hold you hostage on the tarmac and not permit you to leave the plane for as long as it takes, even eight hours or more. I believe if an airline held me against my will that long, I would be either getting arrested, subdued, or faking a seizure.

My Uncle Gene's example is typical. He had accumulated enough points to qualify for a discounted ticket from Dallas to Memphis. In the past, that ticket would have cost $300-$400, but had my Uncle needed to walk up and buy a ticket, yesterday's price was $945 for coach on American Airlines. His early flight from Dallas was cancelled for unknown reasons and delayed Uncle Gene by four hours. There's a saying in Texas; "Fool me once...," so he called American in advance for his return trip and was assured the flight was on time. But when he got to the Memphis airport, it had been cancelled again, delaying him an additional four hours. Who needs this aggravation anymore? They treat you like cattle but charge you like kings. Ticket prices fluctuate wildly from day to day in unusual symmetry within the industry, so you're forced online to "phish" for a fare like a bidder at auction, but there is still the chance that the plane has been "oversold" and you'll be left at the gate, e-ticket in hand.

I understand that oil and oil products are at record highs, but the airlines have been in decline for thirty years, coinciding with their virtual monopoly on public travel. It was not an accident that the airlines soared while the railroads decayed and died. Harry Nilsson sang, "Nobody Cares About the Railroad Anymore," mainly because they lacked good Washington lobbyists. A collusion between the airline industry and the oil companies sounded the death knell for rail travel, and putting Amtrak under the government's supervision was a fool's errand. We became wholly dependent on the airlines while countries like Japan and France were developing light rail travel and bullet trains that arrived into the heart of the city without polluting the air.

The airlines were deregulated in 1978 to promote regional competition, but when Reagan took office in 1980 and fired striking air traffic controllers and busted their union, it was a clear sign that regulations were for sissies. Before 1980, the airlines provided student and military discounts, and there were enough vacant seats to fly "stand-by," and still get on the plane. Ticket prices did lower for a while, and personal service was acceptable, if spotty. But the establishment of monopolistic airline "hubs" and the popularity of regional airlines caused the giants to fall and, one by one: Braniff, Trans World Airways, Eastern, Pan American, the industry's pioneering companies, began to disappear. As in any unregulated business arena, corporate Darwinism then took affect and the big fish began to devour the little fish. What happened to the airlines is the same thing that happened to the music business, the entertainment industry, the printed press and broadcast media, the news networks, and the Mafia. It all got shrunken down and divided into the control of around five families.

So now, flying is a test of will and endurance, and worse, it's the only game around. Every time an airline decides to charge passengers by the pound and forces families on vacation to choose between packing the souvenirs or the shoes, they further alienate their customers. Can it get better? Yes. Barack Obama gave a speech in Flint, Michigan last Tuesday that was ignored by the mainstream media because it lasted an hour and went into great detail regarding his economic vision for the future. Thank goodness for the C-Span, because the only reason I saw it was that it was broadcast at 3 AM, and I was being diligent for my readers. Obama spoke for the first time as a candidate in 40 years of linking our major cities with light rail that will rival the speeds of an airplane while providing an alternative to air travel, minus the fuel costs. He spoke of creating these "green" jobs in cities like Flint, or Gary, or Allentown, that have suffered the worst from corporate abuse by being used up, discarded, and abandoned. Offer some competition to the airlines for the travellers' dollar and watch their services improve.

Still, the talking heads repeat that the populace doesn't know Obama. If any network, other than C-Span, would present the candidates in a forum undominated by the need for soundbites, perhaps we could know the candidates better. At 3 AM, however, Obama's vision for the future of this country was rich with possibility and delved deeply into the serious problems we face. His willingness to invest in clean rail travel in an age of airline dominance is reason enough to examine his other ideas, but you'd never know it reading or watching the news. Unless he peppered his speech with pander, it would not be considered newsworthy. Meanwhile, Melody and I will be spending our "staycation" in the backyard this year, watching the airlines overhead revert back to their original state, as purveyors of aristocratic travel. Welcome the return of the "Jet Set."

Why Hillary Lost

When Hillary Clinton entered the Senate, had she voted her conscience, rather than her ambition, she would be the nominee of her party today and the next President of the United States. At the end of her non-concession speech on Tuesday night, after she reiterated her long-held determination to end the war, Hillary spoke with genuine passion about representing the voiceless, the disenfranchised, and the "invisible." This is who I have believed Hillary Clinton is all along, and my criticism about her campaign, as well as her Senate career, is that she ran away from her self. Like her husband, her votes and opinions were often motivated by personal political positioning planned to make herself palatable to the greater populace for a presidential power play. Only, the old politics didn't work this time.

Living in the adjoining state to where Mrs. Clinton served as First Lady, I don't recall a single negative story written or spoken about her during the entire tenure of the Clinton governancy, as opposed to the Fordice soap opera in Mississippi, which was weekly news fodder. Mrs. Clinton was regarded in Arkansas, and the South, as a champion of education and a spokesperson for children in need. As a 45 year old college senior completing a journalism degree begun some thirty years previous, I covered Hillary's visit to the U of M campus for the school paper in 1992, when she was campaigning for her husband. At the time, I said that although she lacked great public speaking skills, there could be no faulting what she was saying. She was a "New" Democrat, and her concerns for early education and health care were as passionate as her valedictory speech was at Wellesley. My disappointment over the route she chose to take while in the Senate was obviously not an isolated emotion.

Rather than risk being labeled a "liberal" in the Senate, she co-sponsored anti-flag burning amendments and took a decidedly militaristic tone. The politically expedient move after the attacks of 9/11 was to grant Bush his war powers request for pre-emptive strikes at perceived enemies at his discretion. The conscientious thing would be to realize that the guiding foreign policy imperative of the United States throughout its history is that, we don't start wars. Hillary backed Bush and defended the war until her run for the presidency, when she became solidly anti-war, although she could never bring herself to apologize for enabling Bush like John Edwards eventually did. Recalling her earlier activist years, how can you be against the Vietnam War and in favor of the one in Iraq? That's maturity in reverse.

At the beginning of the primary season, Hillary refused to even acknowledge the possibility that she would not be the nominee, and was certain the whole thing would be wrapped up on Super Tuesday. When it wasn't, she began a slash and burn, negative campaign that bordered on race baiting and nearly destroyed the years of goodwill between black America and the Clintons. Obama wasn't a Muslim, "as far as I know," and "working, hard working, white Americans are voting for me." Bill's rhetoric was worse and controversial enough that he ended this political season, and possibly his career, travelling the hustings of small town South Dakota. Labelling Bill Richardson as a traitor while having surrogates rummage through Obama's kindergarten essays wasn't such a good idea either. And the 18 million votes Hillary claims come along with the inclusion of two primaries that didn't count, and one where Obama's name wasn't on the ballot. How many more voters might have turned out in Florida and Michigan if they knew their votes were really going to matter for something?

Finally, these news footage scenes of menopausal "Women Gone Wild," are baffling to me. I had previously written that one day, I would like to see a Jewish president, but you won't catch me voting for Joe Lieberman anytime soon. The comparison works for Hillary as well. The claims that she was "disrespected" come directly from the criticisms about her message and the way she conducted her campaign, and as far as Obama is concerned, I have never seen a politician so genteel toward his rival. I have no doubt, as evidenced by Hillary's gracious gesture toward Obama at the AIPAC conference yesterday, that she will fully support his candidacy. I can't say the same for the mostly white women who claim they will be voting for McCain in the fall. Only Hillary can facilitate that, and it is past time for her to shed her Maggie Thatcher, chain-mail image and begin to follow her truest self; a lesson learned, if at all, too late.

Scrap NASA

I believe that in a severe fuel crisis, the first two things we can do without are NASCAR and NASA. NASCAR is inherently pointless, as well as being an enormous waste of fuel, but I still haven't figured out what was the point of the moon landing. Still, I understand congratulations are in order, we just landed a bush-hog on Mars. Of course a radio glitch held up Mission Control's orders to start up the robotic arm, which will ultimately scoop up a load of red dust that will be analyzed and tested and found to be Mars dirt, much like Moon Rocks.

I appreciate the breakthroughs in communications and technology that the space program has given us. Thanks guys, for the cell phones. And cable television is groovy, but we've had man-made Earth satellites buzzing around since 1957. These public relations based manned missions to the space station have offered great experiments in weightless mice with cancer and entertaining space walks, but now they can't even fix the toilet, giving new meaning to the phrase, "That shit don't fly." The space race is over when we have to float on over to the Russian Soyuz laboratory to ask to use the crapper.

All that phantasmagorical ruminating about our destiny being beyond the stars has caused us to fry up over a dozen astronauts in high gimmick looksies. And other than Tang and "A-OK," what has it gained us? Our multi-trillion dollar Space Patrol is a machismo remnant of the JFK era that made our country feel good once upon a time when we could afford it. That time has passed, and we could use the jet fuel to avoid paying $15.00 for a suitcase to ride in the cargo hold of one of our clueless airlines. And what is it the Phoenix Mars Lander is looking for? Ice. Someone should tell them there's a new thing out, it's called a 7/11.

I know; If there is ice, perhaps there were primitive lifeforms on the planet millenia ago, but is this meaningful in our understanding of our human beginnings? Instead of Ray Bradbury, our country's scientists should have read more Plato and his commentaries on Atlantis. Myths and legends have surrounded the sunken continent since before the printed word, indicating that an advanced civilization existed in the time before the Great Flood that gave birth to all the societies we know today. Had we spent the resources exploring the mysteries of our own oceans' depths, we may well have advanced knowledge in medicines and increased our understanding of the origins of the species. I'll repeat; our rockets have been pointed in the wrong direction.

We have had a cultural fixation with outer-space since Orson Welles and the flying-saucer craze of the Fifties. A cottage industry of movies, music, TV, and fiction have all grown around it. I think we can pretty well conclude that, despite all the testimony of anal probing, nobody's watching us. Let NASA keep sending us the pretty pictures of deep space and the birth of galaxies, but enough with the Flying Wallenda stunt flights. I don't care what Cheese Whiz looks like in space, but I'm pretty sure that's what is stopping up the commode. Can you imagine what a plumber is going to charge for a house call to the space station? Now that's what I call government waste.

Bush Commits Sedition

Sedition: Any action in speech or writing promoting discontent or rebellion; An attempt to impair the well-being of a state to which one owes allegiance. (Merriam-Webster)

What ever happened to "politics ends at the waters' edge?" After more than sixty years of bipartisan agreement, President Chucklehead not only launched a domestic partisan political attack from a foreign platform, he did it in Jerusalem and invoked the fucking Nazis! This proves that even a lame-duck idiot can still be dangerous, like venom from a dying viper. And Joyboy proved again that, in his dimwitted capacity, he is still entirely capable of launching another unilateral act of war against Iran before he leaves office, the public be damned.

It's superfluous to point out how despicable this act was, done to frighten American Jewish voters away from Barack Obama with malice aforethought. But Hitler? This idiot bastard should be the last person to mention appeasers of Hitler since his grandfather, Sen. Prescott Bush, was a director and shareholder of companies that had intimate dealings and profited from the financiers of the Nazis. Do a Google search for Prescott Bush and Hitler and be amazed for yourself. The senior Bush was such a war profiteer, one former U.S. Nazi war crimes prosecutor argued, "The late Senator's actions should have been grounds for prosecution for giving aid and comfort to the enemy,"(The Guardian UK:9/04), and his company's assets were finally seized by the U.S. Government in 1942 under the Trading With the Enemy Act.

Wouldn't Bush think twice before comparing Barack Obama, or whatever other phantom Democrat's name someone whispered in his ear, to appeasers of the Nazis? His grandfather was worse than an appeaser; he was a collaborator. A civil suit was filed in Germany in 2004 by former Auschwitz inmates against the Bush family for amassing a portion of their fortune with slave labor. But Bush the Lesser was nonetheless welcomed like a conquering hero in the Israeli Knesset, praised for his wisdom and courage in not spending a day of his wretched term trying to broker peace in the region, and enabling the right-wing Israeli government to use the tools of the military to achieve their political ends with impunity. Basically, Bush was being honored for doing nothing, and the shaky, conservative Likud party will accept support from the President, even if it's driven by visions of an Apocalypse where an angry God demands the Jews' conversion or death. Bush's speech was supposed to be about honoring Israel's 60th anniversary, but the press was alerted that he planned to say something to "raise eyebrows." Bush raised only further contempt for himself and this country. His only defenders were the lunatic media fringe, John McCain, and his personal handler, Joe Leiberman, the Senator from Israel.

Bush's international outrage was made worse when his smug references to Neville Chamberland and Nazi tanks were reaffirmed to the press at home, this time in the Rose Garden. You see, this human failure actually believes that because it appears he will escape impeachment, he is going to get away clean with his reign of horror. But if this Republic was founded in a government of laws, and not of men, its' continued existence as a genuine democracy demands that the Bush regime be brought to account. Otherwise, who are we? The Nixon resignation proved that no man, even the president, is above the law. Only Bush won't have a sympathetic successor to grant him and his henchmen a pardon for their legal and moral transgressions.

That's why I suggest keeping Guantanamo Bay open. A facility that large will be necessary to house all the members of the Bush Regime who are guilty of crimes against this nation and others. That goes for the Iraq Study Group, Rumsfeld's Pentagon, The Neocon signers of the Project For a New American Century, Karl Rove and Karen Hughes, and the faith-based Justice Department. Also, the small group, including Cheney and Condi Rice, who discussed and approved waterboarding and other torture in closed meetings in the White House should be aware that the U.S. Government executed a Japanese military officer at the end of WWII for waterboarding an American soldier who died. The Nuremberg trials determined that the unprovoked invasion of a sovereign nation was a crime against humanity, punishable by hanging. The slaughter of Iraqi civilians by Blackwater merceneries, and the rape of their own women employees by American contractors from KBR have yet to be fully investigated, nor has the obscene war profiteering of Halliburton or their no-bid contracts. But they will be, and soon.

Bush and Cheney have repeatedly violated the Constitution under a war hysteria power grab, but like George H.W. Bush said, "This will not stand." They have broken international law to the extent that there is already a warning that Bush officials travelling in foreign lands may be subject to arrest for war crimes. An unsubstantiated rumor began last year when a South American newspaper stated that the Bush family, represented by Jenna on a UNICEF tour, arranged the purchase of a 75,000 acre plot of land in Paraguay. It's hard to believe, just because no one could imagine Jenna handling a real estate deal of that magnitude, but it's intriguing to imagine a South American newspaper's desire to report about the Bush family's need for a potential refuge somewhere without an extradition agreement with the U.S. Meanwhile, the only "appeasers" still around that I know about, are the spineless members of the U.S. Congress that gave this reckless, careless, sociopath the power to make war. Sam Cooke may have sung "A Change Is Gonna' Come," but it was his protege, Bobby Womack, who sang;

"You run to the rocks/To hide your face,
The rocks they cry/ No hiding place."
"What You Gonna Do (When You're Love Is Gone)"

Rednecks: The Other White Meat

That was quite a resounding win Hillary Clinton achieved in the West Virginia primary yesterday. My understanding is that her margin of victory increased because her staff spread the rumor that Obama had fathered two black children. I once spent a week in Parkersburg, West Virginia and it was the longest decade of my life. It was akin to visiting a creepy Appalachian theme park where you can observe people ravaged by poverty in coal country in their natural habitat. Not to suggest that all West Virginians descend from generations of mining families that were forced to put hard work before education, there's just a bunch of them there. Which shouldn't diminish Hillary's huge win, or the need for the Obama campaign to recognize a problem with rural whites, but the troubling rhetoric that dominated the primary should concern all Democrats looking toward the general election.

Hillary entered West Virginia comparing herself to JFK and his 1960 upset win over Hubert Humphrey that helped him secure the Democratic nomination. Kennedy's major challenge in W.VA that year was the controversy surrounding his faith. In W.VA, in particular, it was speculated by his opponents that were Kennedy elected, he would owe his allegiance to the Pope in Rome, rather than the Constitution of the United States. Kennedy replied that if the allegiance he swore to the Constitution was false, he would never have come to West Virginia. After his nomination was secured, JFK said, "Contrary to common newspaper usage, I am not the Catholic candidate for president. I am the Democratic Party's candidate for president, who also happens to be a Catholic." Hillary, in turn, was in pure divide and conquer mode, playing up the fact that her lesser educated, white supporters are Obama's Achilles heel.

The 1960 battle in West Virginia, though a victory for Kennedy, was bitter and divisive to the extent that JFK was forced to make additional and extended comments regarding his religion. He said, "Whatever issue may come before me as president, on birth control, divorce, censorship, gambling, or any other subject, I will make my decisions in accordance with what my conscience tells me to be the national interest." Kennedy added, "If the time should ever come...when my office would require me to either violate my conscience or violate the national interest, then I would resign the office; and I hope any conscientious public servant would do the same. In contrast, Hillary said, in a bizarre interview with USA Today last week, that support for Obama among "working..hard working Americans...white Americans..is weakening again," and how, "the whites in both states who have not completed college are supporting me." If this a valid point upon which to bolster a faltering campaign, then "Senator, you're no Jack Kennedy."

The educated women over sixty who have attached themselves, cult-like, to the old guard sisterhood, have not yet realized that the argument over Hillary Clinton is not one of gender, or race, or age, or experience. It's about principle. Is it comforting to be attached to a demographic of lesser educated, rural, white men? Would you vote for a man who co-sponsored an amendment to the Constitution to ban flag burning, but voted in favor of the war and enabled the rogue Bush regime to shred the Constitution? There are many things I do not understand, and this is one of them. Maybe I need to be educated by some kind woman as to why electing a female president is more important than JFK's stated "national interests."

We interrupt this post to announce that with current trends holding, the BAH can now project the next President of the United States will be Barack Obama, and the next American Idol will be David Archuleta, thus ending the George Bush/Taylor Hicks mentality that has infected our country like NASCAR. We now return you to your regularly scheduled blog.

I'm all for Hillary staying in the race as long as her money holds out. She will win more states before its over, but the mathematics are not kind to her. Her remaining hope is that the Obama campaign has a secret so dark that they will implode upon revelation. Wait a second, I have been getting email claiming that Obama is a secret Muslim with a grandiose plan to undermine our cherished U.S. of A., or else a closet Black Panther who has pledged allegiance to Africa. You say you've been getting them, too? What's more likely to happen in the next few weeks is that Hillary will continue her machete wielding campaign until either she, or Bubba, makes another unforgivable remark that further divides the party. It's either that, or the Clintons are hoping against hope that the Reverend Jeremiah Wright has an evil twin. Meanwhile, my new bumpersticker slogan is, "No More Drama, Vote Obama."

Rep.Cohen's Uncivil War

Dear Friends, The time has come to defend what was rightfully won in the last Congressional election, and put an end to the Ford family's stranglehold on Memphis politics. It was a great day for representative democracy when Steve Cohen won the District 9 race over a Ford brother, cousin, and Jr.'s protege Nikki Tinker to fill the unexpired term of Harold Ford, Jr., but that was two years ago. We always knew that when re-election time came, it had the potential of becoming very ugly, very fast. But who could have imagined that Cohen would be targeted by a local group of "ministers," as well as the Ford family, from his first day in office? Memphians remember Cohen's courage in accepting an invitation to speak before these "ministers," only to be humiliated and attacked in public. And who can forget the awkward and embarrassing spectacle the Ford family caused during former President Clinton's visit to Memphis in 2006? The following is the text of a letter written to MoveOn.org on behalf of the Cohen campaign. Please use the link to visit Cohen's website and to volunteer or donate. We must fight for our incremental gains in the political arena, and Steve Cohen is a warrior deserving of re-election. Thank you, Randy
http://www.cohenforcongress.com

May 2, 2008


Adam G., Eli, Karin, Daniel, Patrick S., Ilyse, Justin, Peter, Laura, Lenore, Tanya, Nita, & Anne and the MoveOn.org Political Action Team

Dear Friends,

I am writing as a MoveOn.org Member and a volunteer supporter of the re-election campaign of Rep. Steve Cohen of Tennessee’s 9th Congressional District, where he won his seat the old-fashioned way, he earned it. In an historical political year, fraught with racial and gender overtones, Rep. Cohen is under attack by an unusual group of people; a cabal of long standing Democratic family political machine operatives, in league with the Memphis Baptist Ministerial Association, a group of right-wing preachers who lament the loss of a traditionally African-American seat in Congress to a white man, and a Jewish one at that.

That is not an opinion. Here are their words: “He’s not black and he can’t represent me, that’s just the bottom line,” Rev. Robert Poindexter, Mt. Moriah Baptist Church; or the open letter sent to Cohen from Rev. LaSimba Gray, of New Sardis Baptist Church, where he protested, of all things, Cohen’s support for the same federal hate crimes legislation that was backed by the very organization Gray represents in Memphis, Operation Rainbow/ PUSH, and demanded that Cohen protect their “Christian Values” to preach against homosexuality from the pulpit. A former and future contender for the seat, Jake Ford, brother of former Rep. Harold Ford, Jr., has publicly declared that Cohen’s intention in Congress is, “Not to get money for black people, but only for Jews and Israel.”

Cohen won election to Ford, Jr.’s old seat by defeating Ford’s protégé, Nikki Tinker, an attorney, and Joe Ford, Jr., his cousin, in the Democratic Primary. Then, in a desperate move to hold the seat, the Ford family ran Jake Ford, a high-school dropout with an arrest record in both Memphis and Washington, as a “Democratic Independent.” This maneuver cost Cohen the endorsement of Harold Ford, Jr., although Cohen unreservedly endorsed his candidacy for Senator. Imagine the dream team of Ford campaigning with Cohen in west Tennessee, but as a result of unintended consequences, Ford’s refusal to support Cohen only angered local Democrats, which may well have contributed to his loss for the Senate. Although the national media fell in love with Harold, Jr., many local Democrats, like me, viewed him as a Joe Lieberman acolyte.

Now, Steve Cohen again faces Nikki Tinker in the Democratic Primary over his re-election. Ms. Tinker is a well financed, attractive, and intelligent woman. Her problem as a candidate is that she is supported by the same Ministerial Association that has been attempting character assassination on Rep. Cohen for two years, and her major financial backer is her boss, Phillip Trenary, President of Pinnacle Airlines, who was a major contributor to the campaigns of Bob Corker and George W. Bush, and other Republican causes. Ms. Tinker’s law degree speaks to her scholastic ability, but her legal work is, and has been, on behalf of the management of Pinnacle Airlines and to the detriment of labor. The help Tinker now promises the workingman have been prefaced by years of working on the wrong side of the table.

In contrast, Memphis Mayor Willie Herenton, Shelby County Mayor A C Wharton, and former NAACP National Secretary Maxine Smith have all endorsed Steve Cohen, as has his Congressional mentor, Rep. John Conyers. Marion Wright Edelman’s Children’s Defense Fund has given Cohen their highest rankings, as did the Sierra Club, Planned Parenthood, and the Genocide Intervention Network, which works on behalf of the humanitarian crises in Darfur. Cohen is a vocal advocate for our military’s prompt withdrawal from Iraq and publicly defended MoveOn.org during the Petraeus ad controversy. He has endorsed Barack Obama, while himself being endorsed by Bill Clinton, who was quoted as saying “Steve has done a fantastic job.”

We are in danger of this honorable man going down to defeat at the hands of conservatives masquerading as Democrats with a heavily financed campaign of smear. He will be attacked by ministers of the gospel for being “pro-gay,” for his support of the hate crimes bill, and pro-Israel because of his religion. In this historic election, when the nation will be concerned about our ability to transcend racism, in the 9th District there will be racism and sexism of a different sort; directed at an able public servant, because he is white, and because he is a Jew. Unlike the situation with Harold Ford, Jr. and the slavish media attention he received, and still receives, this race needs to be brought into national focus to illustrate how the Ford family will use their power and influence to defeat a true Congressional Liberal, and replace him with a conservative, “Blue-Dog,” surrogate. As a Democrat concerned about fairness and our progressive values, I implore you to make news with the situation about Congressman Cohen’s struggle for re-election in Memphis against devious forces, and let others know what is being attempted in the party’s name. Should this good man be punished for doing a “fantastic” job?


Thank you most cordially for your attention,



Randolph J. Haspel

The Wright Stuff

CNN has finally done some journalism on behalf of the public good by showing Rev. Jeremiah Wright's speech in its entirety, with plenty of commercial interruptions, to the Detroit branch of the NAACP. I promptly re-upped my membership. I found, on the one hand, that Rev. Wright can be just as sanctimonious and pedantic as most ministers, (Father Farkin, Padre Patro, and Rabbi Greenstein excluded), but in the context of an entire speech, he can be fascinating as well. The general theme was, "A Change Is Gonna' Come." How can you dislike someone who quotes from one of Clarksdale, Mississippi's finest poet laureates, Sam Cooke? The speech, though fiery and uncompromising, went a long way toward shaving the devil horns from Wright's head. And if you listened through the bombastic, roof-raising, preachers' style of oration, what Rev. Wright said was entirely conciliatory.

The Reverend pointed out that change will come when we alter the way we think of one another and come to realize that, "different does not mean deficient." He pointed out many differences inherent in African and European cultures, including the European tendency to keep rhythm on the 1st and 3rd beat, while people of African heritage clap on the 2nd and the 4th, but it's merely different, not deficient. I disagree with the Rev. on this point. I believe white people who clap on the one and three are inherently inferior and hopelessly Caucasoid, while the two and four are the enlightened beats of life. Other examples using various regional speech sounds and studies showing differences in learning patterns between the races were enlightening, and Rev. Wright can be very funny while making his points. His theatrical comparisons of the Michigan State marching band with the band from Florida A&M were worthy of a Cosby routine. Some pertinent observations were that whites do not understand the nature between the Black church and the community, and that Arabic is not a religion, but a language, as he repeated the name Barack Hussein Obama again and again, as if to exorcise it of negative connotations.

The audience of 10,000 was appreciative of Wright's digs at the mainstream media's obsession with his viral remarks, but emphasized the change that's coming "when we are committed to changing the way we look at one another," and understand that "difference is not deficience in all children of God." Of specific interest to me was Wright's statement that "We should understand that we are people of faith who share this planet with people of other faiths," and "We should commit ourselves to change the way that Christians treat Jews." That's quite a distance from the Christian Supremist teachings of John Hagee and his homophobic extremism. I believe that Barack Obama, as a young community organizer on Chicago's south side, joined an activist church where the congregants were the people he worked with, and the charismatic minister appeared, much as he did tonight, like an intelligent and insightful man and someone who would be interesting to know.

Reverend Wright will address the National Press Club later today, where I'm sure the audience won't be nearly as friendly, but I am happy that he has begun to speak in public again. Although he was introduced to the NAACP audience as "the hottest brother in the country," the more he speaks, the more he begins to sound just like another television preacher, and unless he starts asking God to damn America again, the average viewer will grow bored as quickly as an atheist in church. Like Hillary says, you choose your pastor, so you may as well pick one that keeps you awake. Personally, I miss Doctor Gene Scott in his funny hats, chomping on a cigar and cussing into the camera. Now play "I Wanna' Know," and you people in Indianapolis better phone in your damned pledges or I'm going to pull the plug on the satellite. Now get out there and speak your mind my brother, and Wright on.

Ben Her

I guess we can pry that gun out of Charlton Heston's hands right about now. Hillary Clinton has picked up the mantle for him. The mayor of Philadelphia, a Clinton supporter, has proposed sweeping new laws to get the most lethal automatic weapons off the streets, and at the same time, Hillary is making speeches about learning to shoot out back of Grandpa's barn. Is it too far-fetched to imagine her showing up next in a camouflage pantsuit and orange vest with something dead strapped to the hood of her pick-em-up truck? This woman, who has been a sponsor of gun restrictions in the past, is suddenly praising Pennsylvania's rich gun culture that has been passed down from father to son. Hell, my great-grandfather used to shit in an out-house until they invented indoor plumbing. Killing animals in the wild should have gone the same way, but someone forgot to tell the hunters about that new thing, the grocery store. I suppose snuffing out wildlife was just too damn much fun for the "gun culture" though, so they decided to call it "sport." Only, the mayor of Philadelphia says he's just tired of people getting shot.

Has anyone but me noticed the two movies set in Pennsylvania that Hillary is re-enacting? She began her campaign invoking "Rocky," but it has rapidly turned into "The Deerhunter." Set in rural Pennsylvania and seeminly going on forever, a group of young patriots go to Vietnam and come home bitter. "Fuckin' A." They gather in the local bar to knock back shots of whiskey with beer chasers, but they only succeed in getting drunk and more bitter. Hillary knocked down a Crown Royal yesterday along with a frosted mug. The last presidential candidate to do that was U.S. Grant. They tried to persuade her to have a few more, but her assistant interceded and reminded everyone that when Hillary gets a buzz on, she goes on and on about Bill and his women and hallucinates about being under sniper fire. But she was at the bar and the cameras were on, so she took it like a man. I'll bet the last time Hillary took a shot of straight whiskey was Jan. 17, 1998, right after she read the Drudge Report. If this campaign continues much longer, the movie will morph into "Misery," with Hillary starring as Kathy Bates and Obama as James Caan.

The only thing "bitter" Obama said about people in small towns abandoned by their government was the truth. The mainstream media is hyperventilating over this as if it matters. If it gets a six point or a ten point win for Hillary in the Pennsylvania primary, it will be forgotten by the time the media focuses on Obama's twenty point lead in North Carolina. Still, it amuses me to see the Clintons, who attempted to portray Obama as a House Negro in South Carolina, now try to paint him as an "elitist," out of touch with the average Joe or Jane. The last time Hillary Clinton held a job without government support was as a lawyer for the Rose Law Firm in Little Rock. Then for the next twenty-odd years she was, in turn, First Lady of Arkansas and then of the United States, with no official duties other than those delegated to her by her husband. Being stoic under public humiliation won her a New York senate seat, and her voting record, which would make a liberal gag, is supposed to win her the affection of the working man. But her tax return says the Clintons made $104 million in the last few years. That beats minimum wage. It also beats someone who only recently finished paying off their student loans.

Perhaps attending Harvard makes you an elitist. If so, I know several and am related to a few. Hillary did go to Yale, and took a shot at Harvard man Al Gore during CNN's "Compassion Summit," where Clinton alternated between personas resembling Our Lady of Fatima and Linda Blair. Bill's been unleashed and back on the stump reminding voters that his wife may be 60 and forgetful, but she's a woman of the people. By the time the Pope arrives, she'll be a Catholic. This primary can't get here quickly enough for me. I have Clinton fatigue and I'm ready for Hill and Bill to pack up the magic show, face reality, and stop doing the Republicans' dirty work for them. The dismissal of Mark Penn as her advisor for lobbying for a trade deal she opposes may have stopped him, but what about Bubba, who's accepted nearly a million dollars from the government of Columbia for pushing for the same deal?

If you'll allow me a boxing analogy, I'm reminded of the great Cuban welterweight of the early 60s, Benny "Kid" Paret, who died in the ring at the hands of Emile Griffith. In fact, it was the first death shown on live TV until Lee Harvey Oswald came along. In the twelfth round, Griffith pummelled Paret unconscious, but his body was held up by the ropes and before the referee finally stepped in, Griffith had hit him thirteen more times. Paret's lifeless body slumped into a comatose crouch and he died of his injuries a few hours later. The referee said that Paret was known for absorbing punches, but in his previous bout, he had fought the great Gene Fullmer and was knocked down three times while taking a brutal beating. Some boxing analysts say that Paret would not have been murdered in the ring had not he first been softened up by Gene Fullmer and then rushed into the championship fight. In my analogy, Hillary is Gene Fullmer, Obama is Benny "Kid" Paret, and John McCain, playing the part of Emile Griffith, is waiting in the wings. Griffith was a haunted man and never the same after the Paret fight. In this case, though, we can prevent a foreseeable tragedy. Unlike referee Ruby Goldstein, who stepped in too late to save Benny Paret, we have the power to say, "Enough!" and stop this foolish fight before it becomes fatal. It's time for Hillary to hang up the gloves.

Sniper Fire

Previously, I had suggested that Sen. Obama might need divine intervention to overcome the Reverend Wright hysteria. The Lord works in mysterious ways, and it seems He sent an Easter miracle in the person of Gov. Bill Richardson. Richardson's endorsement was important on several levels, including his influence with Latinos as a border state governor and his high level of regard as a statesman. But most importantly, as he presented a memorable image with the Senator at a packed Oregon campaign rally, was his personal political courage, something that Sen. Obama seems to inspire a lot of these days. Richardson owes his career to the Clintons and served in two positions in the Clinton cabinet, but it's one thing to owe your loyalty to Bill, and another to owe it to Hill, and Richardson chose to do what he felt was best for the country and endure the wrath of the Clintons. He spoke of the anguish that went into the decision, but claimed Obama to be a "Once-in-a-lifetime leader."

Like Richardson, I was more than moved by Obama's speech on racial reconciliation. I was shocked that a leading presidential candidate would speak up to me instead of down about a matter of great importance; something to which I am unaccustomed. I disagree with some of the pundits that it was another Gettysburg Address, but it was a thoughtful and challenging statement that rebuked his pastor's divisive words and called the nation to a higher purpose in confronting racial resentments on all sides. This is what caused Bill Richardson to cut his vacation short and, as the old saw goes, come to the aide of his party. His belief in Obama's leadership outweighed his loyalty to the Clintons, and his endorsement came during the Obama campaign's darkest hour. The fact that Richardson resembles Horatio Sans only ads to the endearing candor of his remarks.

At first, the oily Clinton strategist Mark Penn tried to air off the Richardson endorsement as ineffective, but the old reliable Clinton Yakuza, James "Snakehead" Carville, soon offered up the real and nasty resentment. By saying Richarson was a "Judas who sold out for thirty pieces of silver," Carville put the proper Easter spin on it, and managed to imply that Richardson was somehow on the take at the same time. Bill was out on the stump looking less like an admired former president and more like Spiro Agnew. And when it appeared as if the pastor controversy, after a week of endless reruns, was on the front burner only on Fox News, did Hillary decide to weigh in on the matter. Just when you believe she might do the decent thing, she re-inflames the conflict about her Democratic opponent to detract from her own embarrassing gaffe.

Hillary's battle stories about her tour of war-torn Bosnia show that it's not enough for her to be the next Maggie Thatcher; she sees herself as Douglas MacArthur. But then Ronald Reagan always wanted to be the Duke, too. Her memories of corkscrew landings under sniper fire and running for armored vehicles didn't look as dramatic in the actual footage where Hillary and Chelsea accepted kisses and poems from an eight year old girl greeting them on the tarmac. How lame must your story be to be refuted by Sheryl Crow and Sinbad? At least Sheryl Crow once had the guts to stand up to Karl Rove. Down here in the South, when someone embellishes a story with a straight face and then is caught in a gross exaggeration, we have a name for them; liars. Hillary blamed sleep deprivation on causing her to "misspeak," but she looked bright-eyed in her St. Patricks' Day shamrock scarf when she related her war story like a Vietnam vet with the Thousand Yard Stare. Was she also sleep deprived on the other two occasions when she mis-remembered? You can almost measure the size of Hillary's lies by the number of times she says, "you know," in the explanation. "It was, you know, a long day."

This exaggeration over Bosnia, or her role in the Irish Peace Accord, or her consistent "opposition" over NAFTA, would all be forgivable as election tactics were it not for the unyielding ugliness of her campaign. Clinton's supporters say she is receiving tougher press scrutiny because she is a woman. I maintain that the media has allowed this unwinnable, disintegrating campaign to continue exactly because Hillary is the first viable woman candidate for president and it is too good a story to extinguish with reality. The math says that Clinton cannot catch Obama in elected delegates and her last hope is to paint him as one of the south side Chicago Blackstone Rangers and a danger to civilization. Then, with a series of primary victories, the superdelegates will turn to her, Hill of Arc, to deliver the Democrats from this wild radical.

Four weeks until the Pennsylvania primary is a long time for Obama to endure the death by a thousand cuts, and recent events show there is no depth so low that the Clintons will not go. Even the hapless Lanny Davis, so eloquent in defense of President Clinton while he was under siege, is sent out to shill for Hill and trash Barack. It has become embarrassing to watch people you once admired debase themselves in the name of loyalty to a political faction. While Obama's campaign seems to elevate people, Clinton's diminishes them. And even though there are not enough delegates left for her to win the nomination, Hillary will keep clawing forward, like Jason Voorhees or Freddie Krueger, until someone puts the metaphorical wooden stake in the heart of her campaign, if there, in fact, is one. Is there not a Democrat with the influence to face down Bill Clinton, or a group of senior party officials who can step in and declare "enough?" If not, Hillary will continue this kamikaze campaign, sending shrapnel in every direction, right up until the election of President McCain.

Many thanks to Wintermute of The Daily Docket for the improvements and upgrades to this blog. Because I had inadvertently enabled a comment monitoring system, several comments were omitted from the last post. I apologise and hope I have corrected the problem. RJH

Barack, We Hardly Knew Ye

"I gave them a sword."
Richard M. Nixon

The first election in which I was age eligible to vote was the Nixon-McGovern contest of 1972, and I'll own up to being a McGovernite. Nixon, after saying he had a "secret plan to end the (Vietnam) war" in 1968, instead added 20,000 more American fatalities, carpet bombed the North, and invaded Cambodia in his first term. George McGovern seemed the serious and sober anti-war candidate, capable of inspiring young people back into the fold after the death of Bobby Kennedy, and bringing the war to a quick conclusion. After the excitement of the Democratic convention, compared to the Nixonian, obnoxious, "Four More Years!" balloon drop spectacular, the polls gave McGovern a decent chance to win the election. I recall the morning I picked up the newspaper and saw the headline, "Eagleton Admits Shock Treatments," and I knew it was over. Although Sargent Shriver was hustled in to try to add some Camelot pixie dust as a second Vice Presidential choice, the damage was done. In George McGovern's first major decision as his party's nominee, he had chosen Sen. Thomas Eagleton of Missouri as his running mate before discovering that Eagleton had undergone electric shock therapy, and that error in judgement proved politically fatal. After seeing the televised portions of the sermons of Reverend Jeremiah Wright last night, I had that same heart-sinking feeling about the campaign of Barack Obama.

I've heard more than my share of black preaching for a white boy, because I like it. I've heard preachers reach peaks of hysteria where you're sure their next stop must be the emergency room. But Rev. Wright's expurgated sermons are so inflammatory, they include something to offend nearly everyone, and regardless of Obama's denunciation of the words but not the man, he should have distanced himself from his pastor long ago. This reflects poorly on his judgement. Did Obama not see this coming? It wasn't as if these sermons were surreptitiously taped and leaked to the media. They were for sale to the general public, and the Rev's words "God damn America," regardless of the context, will be ringing in voter's ears right up until the election. I am an unabashed liberal, but I'm also a realist who has lived his entire life in the South, and I believe the words of Rev. Wright have just blown up the Barack Obama campaign.

Obama was quick to appear with Keith Olbermann on MSNBC and Anderson Cooper on CNN to denounce his pastor's incendiary remarks, but his reference to Wright as "an old Uncle who sometimes will say things that I don't agree with," stumbles on two fronts. For whites who are blind to the anger in the black community that Rev. Wright expresses, but who are considering a first time vote for a black candidate, Obama's remarks at this date may seem too little, too late. For black voters, the word "uncle" has negative connotations of its own. As in the case of George McGovern, this goes to the heart of the issue about Obama to undecided voters, his judgement. He can distance himself from Rev. Wright to the earth's end, but he has given his political enemies enough ammunition to torpedo his chances. I can see Fox News, or any swift-boat type ad now: regardless of what Obama says, they will show his minister saying, "Goddamn America," along with the photo of Obama embracing him. Some will argue that John McCain has accepted the endorsements of John Hagee and Pat Robertson, but it's one thing to accept the backing of a controversial preacher and another to be his congregant.

And it's not as if Rev. Wright was unaware of the impact of his words. His post 9/11 sermon about "Chickens coming home to roost," triggered a memory of the exact same expression being used by Malcolm X following the assassination of John Kennedy. He was referring to the CIA attempts to kill Castro, but his words were interpreted by the public as showing Malcolm X as unsympathetic to the Kennedy family and a nation in mourning, and won him the enmity of all. Rev. Wright did not choose those words carelessly in reference to 9/11. His opinions regarding this country's conduct in past wars are validly debatable, but most folks will hear his comments as meaning, "We had it coming," and that's the one statement that 3,000 innocent lives refute in the public mind. In light of the uplifting campaign Obama has run so far, this is worse than blood in the water. This is like throwing giant buckets of chum to the circling sharks.

These pronouncements, along with the Rev's conjecture that "We started the AIDS virus...We are only able to maintain our level of living by making sure that Third World people live in grinding poverty," are going to make white Christians lose their minds. The whiplash over this is still simmering, lost momentarily in the basketball playoffs, but come next week, and the week after, Obama will be able to speak of nothing else, and engage in nothing other than damage control for a damage that may be beyond controlling. Hillary won't have to do a thing but sympathize because Fox News, Hannity, Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Coulter, and O'Reilly will do all the necessary butchering for her. I watched Obama at a rally in Plainfield, Indiana today, and though he was relaxed and seemed non-plussed, and the crowds stood and cheered as always, there was something amiss in the room, as if the electricity had been displaced by anxiety. Perhaps I'm wrong, but I think Obama needs divine intervention to recover from this. And I wouldn't be asking Rev. Jeremiah Wright to perform the intercession.

You Might Be A Racist, If..

"If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position. And if he was a woman (of any color) he would not be in this position. He happens to be very lucky to be who he is. And the country is caught up in the concept." Geraldine Ferraro

Is it too late to rescind my vote for Geraldine Ferraro for Vice President in '84? I believed she had some damn sense at the time, and I voted for her because she was a woman trying to make history, running against the "Cinemascope" Reagan production. But her latest comments on behalf of the Hillary Clinton campaign are so repugnant, that as a person of color, I find them to be ghastly offensive. Never mind that my color these days is a translucent, pinkish tan. Hillary managed to call the statements "regrettable," but did not totally repudiate them, just as she said that Obama was not a Muslim, "As far as I know."

When confronted about her remarks concerning Obama and asked to apologize, Ferraro said she not only "stands by her statement," but added this:

"I have to tell you that what I find is offensive is that every time somebody says something about the campaign, you're accused of being racist."

Examine Ms. Ferraro initial words carefully. When you opine that a person has accomplished his achievements only because of race, and he could not have reached that high place but for his race, if you're not speaking of the President of the NAACP or Clarence Thomas, then you might be a racist. And,in Maureen Dowd's words, the "shoulder pad feminists," including Gloria Steinem, have rallied to her defense.
These are not idle words, and if the Clinton campaign is in control of their message, as they say, someone should wrest control of the attack machine before they start a gender war and elect John McCain by default. Hillary's bloodletting and ruthless march through the primaries may well allow the criminal presidency of Dubya to enter its' third term, with a geriatric fighter pilot at the switch.

I am continually baffled by Hillary Clinton's sway over women past 60. I know it's the truth, because after my vocal support for Obama, neither my mother nor my sister would tell me who they voted for in the Tennessee primary. And there's a growing trend that says if you dislike Clinton, you're anti-feminist. Here's some breaking news: Hillary Clinton is no feminist. Her hawkish war views and the enabling of President Zero to threaten Iran, along with her co-sponsorship of a constitutional amendment about flag burning, were all political calculations designed to appeal to the most machismo quasi-patriot and characterize her as another Maggie Thatcher. But after seven years of the Moronic Chucklehead, people are tired of militarism, fear, distortions, and lies and Hillary finds herself, like so many other sucker Democrats, with her faulty judgement that followed the false drumbeat of the Bush regime into an immoral war, on full display.

Bill Clinton's presidential campaign was remarkable because he usurped all the Republican party's election tactics. He raised more money, took more contributions from PACS, infatuated Hollywood to part with enormous sums, and co-opted the GOP's pet whipping boys; welfare, rap music, free trade, and law and order, until he could present himself as a "New" Democrat and get elected. But that was then and this is now, and after this last food fight of a presidency, I want an "Old" Democrat, not Joe Lieberman lite. Clinton's slash and burn politics are of the past and are beginning to smell of rot. It's not that Clinton is opposed because she is the first woman to run for the nations' highest office, it's because she's a lousy candidate, worse than John "Lurch" Kerry, pandering and pontificating, desperate and derisive.

Bill's hatchet job on Obama in South Carolina, comparing his candidacy to Jesse Jackson's, and the recent Ferraro outburst, are intentionally designed to marginalize and diminish the Senator in the eyes of the electorate. Ferraro's indignant defense that it is "she" being attacked, demonstrates the mentality of otherwise "good" people encapsulated in their own privileged worlds. To paraphrase the comedian Kat Williams, "She needs to get her some Negro friends." No one appears more ridiculous than someone making an overt racist statement and then trying to explain how some of their best friends are black. Ask Don Imus.

The complete implosion of Governor Eliot Spitzer is, to me, mainly a New York story that proves that hypocrisy knows no party and arrogance has no gender. But I am sure there are others, like me, who are reminded by the Spitzer episode of exactly why they don't want Bill Clinton back in the White House. Spitzer proved he is just another Jimmy Swaggart in a starched shirt and should have nothing to do with the election. Only these New Yorkers; Spitzer, Clinton, Ferraro, Giuliani, Bloomberg, Kerik, have collectively lowered the national discourse to such a gutter level, that Barack Obama seems like St. Jude in comparison. And, let's face it, the despicable tacticians behind the Clinton campaign, Mark Penn and Howard Wolfson, are an embarrassment to the Jews. Spitzer, however, might really be a stealth civil rights pioneer, who's blatant stupidity made way for the first black governor of New York.

Hillary's staunchest supporters don't get it, or don't want to get it. Like Clinton, they believe it is her turn and her time. But that time has past while she was pandering to the right. She had the money, the organization, and the media ready to coronate her as the candidate, but from DAY ONE, when she entered the Senate, every vote and every speech was designed to advance her political career, regardless of her personal principles. She figured that if she positioned herself as a "new" Democrat, which means demonstrating all the false patriotism and jingoism of the GOP, she would be palatable to Republican voters and merely assume all the Democratic votes were hers for the asking. But she figured wrong. Time and tide wait for no woman either, and Hillary Clinton has landed on the wrong side of history. In fact, without any further election shenanigans or manipulation of "Super Delegates," Hillary, herself, is history, and, hopefully, the era of blood sport politics along with her.

Turning Sixty

I'm writing a new country song, so if you steal it, you have to credit me. It's called, "I'm taking the mirrors out of my house, 'Cause I can't stand to see a grown man cry." For the past several years, I've become accustomed to looking in the mirror and seeing my father's face, but lately I look and see someone else's Dad; one of those old guys in the health club at the Jewish Community Center who wanders around in a towel searching for his locker. It began in December when my drivers' license expired on my 60th birthday and I was required to have a new photo taken. Over the years, my photo IDs have looked like a rogues' gallery of pirates and smugglers, but this time I looked like a demented department store Santa in a fright wig, called into the manager's office for psycholological evaluation. I asked Melody why my beard looked so white and bushy in the photo when I had just trimmed it, and she assured me it was because my big smile accentuated the beginnings of what the pro wrasslers used to call a "turkey neck." In forty years, I've morphed from young Ben Franklin into sinister Sinter Klaus.

When Melody and I run into an old friend we haven't seen in a while, our response is usually the same; "Can you believe how old he looks?" quickly followed by, "Do we look that old?" After we reassure ourselves that our zaniness keeps us cute, we forget it, until I notice that the bags under my eyes have turned into two-suiters and gravity has taken such a toll on my face, I've decided to walk on my hands for the next twenty years. When I glance in a mirror, for an instant I wonder how the basset hound got into our house. Of course, the problems with internal plumbing started years ago. My friends and I used to get together and talk about politics, women, and sports. Now we discuss our prostates. It seems a lifetime ago since I was a teenager, but wasn't I just 35 and moving to Nashville? I used to thrive on steak and eggs at three in the morning, and now, in the past five years alone, I've helped build a new wing on my Gastroenterologist's clinic, and the sonuvabitch won't even name it after me.

Before turning sixty, I had every bodily orifice probed, prodded, or peered into, and been told I had a floppy colon, IBS, a spastic colon, internal hemmorhoids, enflamed intestines, and an ulcer. These are usually considered the easily rectified problems of aging, unless you don't have health insurance, and then you have to pick and choose which among your orifices you wish to treat. I used to have group insurance with the National Council of Jewish Women, but the premiums grew so dear, the underwriter dropped the entire organization, sending a bunch of old ladies, and me, into a frenzy. I have been paying retail for my medical expenses ever since 1991, because I made the terrible mistake of having anti-depressants prescribed by a psychiatrist.

I feel like an anti-depressant pioneer, and I also believe they saved my life. I took one of the first tricyclic medications in 1987, under a doctor's care, who carefully monitored my blood for the proper levels. When I returned to Memphis, I was on my own. I found a doctor to prescribe the medication, but was required to make periodic office visits to show I could still speak in sentences, even though they knew of my insurance woes. Then I got a notice in the mail that said a new office policy required them to charge a fee for refilling prescriptions. It reminded me of what Tony Soprano's mother said in Season One; "Psychiatry is a racket for the Jews." My internist suggested that if I transferred all my records to his office, he could prescribe and I would be able to procure insurance. Who says therapy doesn't work? I felt very empowered when I fired my psychiatrist, but when I applied for insurance, it was the same answer; pre-existing conditions, and no one, and I mean no one, would cover me. My new plan was to wash my hands alot and stay off of high ledges until I was 65. But something happened.

Every young boy claimed the ability to write his name in the snow, but I used to do it in bold, cursive letters and my name is Randolph. Now, as they derisively say in the South, I was "squattin' to pee," and my wife stopped worrying about the toilet seat being up. A bad PSA level caused me to see a specialist who found the cause to be a prostate the size of a ripe kiwi. It was treatable with medication, but the side-effects from the sinus remedy I was using contributed to the bladder restriction. I was given Flomax for that, but the doctor told me I had a choice between peeing and breathing; so I breathed on MWF, peed on TTS, and Sunday I reloaded. He substituted prescription Flonase for my over-the-counter sinus medicine, until one day I confused the Flomax with the Flonase, took out a handkerchief, and inadvertently blew my penis. The problem got worse until I visited a reknowned urologist who said my prostate had indeed shrunk, but the medication had also restricted my urethra and it needed to be widened.

When the color ran from my face, the doctor told me it was an out-patient procedure; all they had to do was arrange an operating room and an anestheologist to put me out, and not only would I not feel a thing, I could go home the same day. When I said I had no health insurance, he said, "Oh." The doctor said he could do a discounted procedure in the office with local anesthetic and get the same result, and nothing I treasured would be punctured, merely inserted. I disrobed and a paper sheet was placed in my lap when, to my alarm, the doctor's young and homely female assistant came in with a needle. She tore a hole in the paper sheet, as if that would be less humiliating, and exposed me like a spring toadstool, but her aim was bad. With terror, I watched the whole tableau turn into the shower scene from "Psycho," and was prepared to bolt when the drug finally took effect, but because I lacked coverage, the doctor didn't use a surgical tool, but widened my urethra with a rusty old shovel. Then he had the temerity to suggest that I have more sex as recovery therapy, which pleased my wife, but was the equivalent of telling a man just out of electro-shock therapy that he's appearing on Jeopardy! next week. Intimacy sounded good, but the tension had weakened my lower spine and I wasn't sure if my back would peter out, or vice versa. (Thanks for the joke, Dad).

I walked around in a daze muttering, "The horror," for a month. I would have sued the doctor for physical and emotional distress, but he was doing me a favor. Things have returned to relative normalcy now, but every once in awhile, I'll pee a little gravel. On the positive side, since I'm a late bloomer in nearly everything in life: college, marriage, career; post-sixty looks bright. I've nearly reached emotional maturity and feel at the peak of my mental abilities. So I guess I'd better start writing faster. All in all, turning sixty beats the alternative, but unless a Democrat is elected and does some fast work on health care, Melody and I will be supplementing our income with a new line of bumper stickers for sexagenarians and new grandparents, saying; "I'm spending my children's college tuition," "Sixty is the new sixty," and, "Ask ME about my colonoscopy."

Super Sisters' Sunday

It was a great game and the commercials were entertaining. People around here seem to like nearly anyone named Manning, and the brothers made their own history. My sympathies to my kith and kin in the Northeast since Memphis is also partial to the Patriot's "Flying Elvis Head" insignia. I've heard of leaving everything on the field, but the losing coach left his entire team out there. And what was the deal about going for it on 4th and 14? For the only pro football game I've watched in its' entirety all year, this was a good one, but I've been more fixated on the other contest.

Earlier in the day, instead of watching beefy, steroidal men without necks exchange their opinions about what was only just about to happen, I watched C-Span so you don't have to. There was another sort of pre-game pep rally going on at UCLA, where thousands packed an auditorium for an early morning Barack Obama campaign event. While the men were tailgating, four strong women orchestrated one of the most significant political events of the year. Energized by Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg's endorsement of Obama in last week's New York Times, the women made a full frontal assault on Hillary's claim to "California Girls," and the rally began to take on the air of an evangelical tent meeting.

Caroline Kennedy spoke first. At the risk of sounding sexist, there is a certain sweetness to her in the discomfort she feels in the spotlight, and I understand what Neil "The Real Deal" Diamond had in mind. Motivated by her children, this is the first time Kennedy has taken so active a role on behalf of any candidate, so her boldness is thus meaningful and admirable. Saying that this was "the first time I get to introduce someone who's not my Uncle Teddy," Caroline brought out the undisputed champ; Oprah Winfrey. I've discussed Oprah's influence in an earlier post, but nowhere was it more evident than in California. A confidant Oprah strode to the stage to thunderous applause and worked the crowd like the pro she is, with lines like, "I have followed the truth and it has lead me to Barack Obama," and "I'm not voting for Barack Obama because he's black. I'm voting for him because he's brilliant." A rapturous, rainbow-coalition audience responded with delight to the most influential media figure in America, who then introduced Michelle Obama.

Any doubts I had about the perceived reluctance of Michelle to stand by her man were forever put aside by her electrifying address, which was part advocacy and part defender against the Clintons. Entering the arena with Stevie Wonder on her arm, Michelle provided the first serious drama of the day. While ascending steps to the speakers' platform, Stevie slipped and fell sideways off the staircase. I was reminded of a similar event in the North Hall of Ellis Auditorium in 1963. Unlike that shocking memory, someone was there to catch him this time, and after retrieving his glasses he was non-plussed about the whole thing. Stevie spoke of peace and love and sang his new Barack Obama chant. Stevie Wonder is another person who's influence should not be dismissed. After all, who was mainly responsible for the MLK holiday?

Michelle Obama displayed an informal earthiness along with the gift of communication that reflected her Princeton education and had the crowd on its' feet with every poignant remark. She opened by saying that, "Only in America could Michelle Obama follow Caroline Kennedy, Oprah Winfrey, and Stevie Wonder." She made the case that Barack did not concoct his convictions on the eve of a Presidential run, and his choice to work in the communities on Chicago's South side, rather than Wall Street, made him better qualified to understand the realities of life than any other candidate. She even made a lawyer joke. Michelle repeated Barack's truthful observation of a "deficit of empathy" in this country, and is the only politician or political advocate who has publicly said that a society is measured by how we treat "the least of these" since Jimmy Carter. She also came up with the line of the day; "Americans can handle the truth. Sometimes we don't know what the truth looks like because we haven't seen it in so long." Every sentence was punctuated by Michelle's graceful pianist's fingers making her points in the air.

The surprise of the day, after Stevie, was the introduction of Maria Shriver, who claimed to have arrived from a horse show with her daughter without changing clothes or applying make-up. Shriver said her daughter had told her, "If you feel like you should be at UCLA," to officially endorse Barack Obama, "You have to go." So there was yet another dynamic Kennedy, standing with Michelle, Oprah, and her cousin Caroline, in a picture of feminist unity that must have sent chills through the Clinton campaign of quite another kind than the ones experienced by those in attendance. Also, the endorsement of Obama by California's First Lady pretty much terminates the buzz over Arnold's endorsement of John McCain.

These four women, all with something to lose, were putting themselves on the line for a cause. Kennedy-Schlossberg must step out of her comfort zone and sacrifice her anonimity; Oprah, who has never campaigned for a political candidate, puts her considerable clout and reputation at risk; Michelle Obama sacrifices time as a mother and a professional for a greater good; and Maria Shriver shows personal and political courage by "following her heart," and standing in opposition to her husband. On this "Super Sunday," while the men were making beer runs, a small coterie of women were trying to wrest the female vote in California away from Hillary Clinton, and if they succeed, as Maria Shriver said, "As California goes, so goes the nation." Now that the game is over and the Giants are the champs, we can refocus on the real contest, Super Tuesday. Don't look now fellows, but today, while you were staring at a zombie jamboree collectively known as Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, the ladies might have gotten together and wrapped this whole thing up.

There Will Be Blood

Now that the Democratic candidate's herd has been thinned, my analogy of the debates as "American Idol" is no longer valid. Especially after last night's bloodletting in South Carolina, which was more reminiscent of the old "Monday Nitro" World Championship Wrestling matches than a variety show. Bill and Hillary had conquered the countryside of Nevada and entered the S.C. primary as the grizzled old tag-team known as "HillBilly," famous for their sneaky and aggressive tactics and taunts to their opponents. Their target was the up-and-comer, the All American Boy, Obama, who was threatening to capture HillBilly's fan base. Hillary immediately attacked Obama with such ferocity that I half expected Bill to run out from the wings and brain him with a folding chair. Wolf Blitzer would make a great pro wrestling referee. He is the Jimmy "Mouth of the South" Hart of broadcasters. I can't decide whether he is a whimpering simp, or a simpering wimp. Hillary shed the softer, indoor voice she had discovered in New Hampshire and returned to form. She and the former President are considering changing the name of the act to Shrillary and Billious.

In the week leading up to the debate, I was reminded each time Bill Clinton turned red in the face and wagged his finger, how much I do not want him back in the White House. Hillary explained that she and Obama both have passionate and supportive spouses. Michelle Obama, however, is not the former president nor a practiced negative campaigner, as evidenced by the hatchet work Bill did on Barack in his wife's behalf. The dislike between the two camps was made clear with every charge and explosive counter-charge, like two nuclear powers practicing brinkmanship with Mutually Assured Destruction. Obama said he was a community organizer while Hillary was "a corporate lawyer, sitting on the board of Wal-Mart." Hillary countered with charges that Obama did work for a law firm that defended a Chicago slum lord. Both charges were spurious. Barack's law work was for his firm, and Hillary, as First Lady of Arkansas, assumed that included Bentonville and the Waltons too, who were just down-home folks and constituants. All this bitter back and forth between Clinton and Obama made one thing clear; John Edwards deserves a second look.

While the revolutionary candidates were bludgeoning one another, the white, Christian, male candidate steadily made the case for carrying out the ideals of Dr. King on his birthday. Edwards is the only candidate who has spoken passionately about ending poverty in America, something that was abandoned after the death of Dr. King and the absorption of the nation's resources into the Vietnam War. Edwards is the only candidate who has pledged not to have former lobbyists work in the White House and to tackle the problem of corporate money influencing our elections and those we elect. In addition, Edwards has promised to remove our troops from Iraq within his first year without equivocation. While Obama was extolling the abilities of Ronald Reagan to a Reno newspaper this week, it is worth remembering that John Edwards began his candidacy for President in the 9th Ward of New Orleans. Ronald Reagan announced his candidacy in Philadelphia, MS, home of one of the most infamous killings of the civil rights era, and symbolism only an Old South, Son of the Confederacy could love. Obama disavowed any admiration for Reagan on this Dr. King's day. Edwards did long ago.

CNN mercifully allowed the candidates to sit after a commercial break, and civility seemed to break out amidst a bar fight. The rivals became more measured and respectful to each other, and even spoke candidly and with humor about their differences. It is exhilarating to see these three unique people, each qualified in a special way and eager to serve in a manner the Bush crowd could never fathom, and have gender and race secondary to the discussion. That is remarkable enough to distance themselves by light years from the Republicans without endangering the party by behaving in debate like Curly, Larry, and Moe, with Bill Clinton waiting in the wings as Shemp. And anyone who thinks Bill Clinton was our first black president hasn't really heard him play the saxophone. After tonight, independent South Carolinians, including many African Americans, may well swing Edwards' way just because of the content of his character. Then we will have a real race heading into the Super Tuesday debates. My only suggestion; less glares, more chairs.

Slick Hilly

"But she breaks just like a little girl"
Bob Dylan: "Just Like A Woman"

Forgive me if I've become so cynical that I mistake a genuine emotional moment for a slick piece of political theatre, but for the past seven years, I've gotten used to listening to "The boy who cried Wolfowitz." Before Hillary's emotional crying game in the middle of a public Q&A, I could swear I saw her reach up and pull a single hair from her nose before the tears began to form. Even the question, "How do you do it," seemed like a plant from a staffer; a trick she has used before. I have difficulty believing that anything that happens in the Clinton campaign goes unscripted. This is the woman that remained stoic even after being publicly humiliated by her husband, and now she tears up saying, "I just don't want to see the country fall back?" If someone spends her entire senate career amassing votes to appear like the "Iron Lady," then you're not allowed to cry when your positions are criticized. And you set yourself apart when you pick a favorite color for your campaign staff to wear. At least we don't have to listen to the wretched Celine Dion tune she had previously selected as her theme song.

Hillary continued to refer to her "35 years in public service." Thirty-five years ago in New Hampshire, the front-runner was Edmund Muskie of Maine and his openly weeping over an editorial that vilified his wife cost him the primary and the nomination. So much for the double standard. Of course, Bill could weep on cue so perhaps it's a shared trait. I don't mind a politician crying. I even find it refreshing. But crying at inappropriate moments is as shallow as laughing at the wrong time; something else Mrs. Clinton does when under pressure. Sure, the guys ganged up on her at the debate, but she gave as good as she got. What raised sympathy was the moderator's remarks to her about other candidates being more likable. Is there a more foolproof way to insult a woman than telling her she is unliked? And would the moderator have framed his remarks the same for the men?

Give credit to the Clintons for being fast learners. In one day, she changed her message from being the tested candidate with all the political experience, to the candidate of "change" who's appeal is to the young. The visage of her Iowa concession speech with a virtual morgue of supporters standing with her, including Bill, Madeline Allbright, and Wesley Clark, had been totally revamped for this evening. No one that stood behind her tonight looked over twenty years old, even though their on-camera hijinx began to distract from the candidate. The original "Comeback Kid," was told to get out of the way, while Hillary said that listening to the people of New Hampshire caused her to "find my own voice." Say what? Where's her "own voice" been for the thirty-five years of political change she continues to mention? It was elaborate stage-management, right down to her notes.

John McCain read an acceptance speech also, but not as well as Hillary. Still, the sight of the winners reading with their heads down made them appear as stiff as Al Gore. The speech of the night, of course, belonged to Obama who did not use notes. Visibly disappointed, Obama delivered another stirring and emotive speech that offered a slogan for the remainder of the campaign; "Yes we can," which was reminiscent of MLK in his prime, and left his audience rapturous. Since Obama spoke before Hillary, I was reminded of the famous story from the Fifties about the fight between Jerry Lee Lewis and Chuck Berry over who was going to be the closing act on a rock show. Berry refused to go on before Lewis, so Jerry Lee literally delivered an incendiary performance. At the end of his set, with the crowd going wild, Jerry Lee doused his piano with lighter fluid and set it aflame. As he was leaving the stage, he walked by Chuck Berry in the wings saying, and I'm paraphrasing, "Follow that you sonofabitch." Tonight the part of Jerry Lee Lewis was played by Barack Obama while Hillary sang, "It Goes To Show You Never Can Tell."

So the fight is on and it looks to get quite interesting. Will the Goldwater girl who served on the House Committee to Impeach Nixon change her scarf color from green to pink to appear more vulnerable? After saying that "all candidates records should be open," do we get to see the Rose Law Firm billing statements? Did Bill create sympathy by saying that he couldn't make her younger, or will machine politics yet again vanquish a children's crusade? Since I began with a Dylan quote, allow me to end with another:
"The order is
Rapidly fadin'.
And the first one now,
Will later be last
For the times they are a-changin'."

The Dawn

While watching the news last night, I experienced an emotion that was so foreign to me, I had to pause a second in order to recognize it. It's called hope, and it is alive. The Obama victory in the Iowa caucuses said volumes about in which direction this country wants to go. Going into election day in a dead heat, Obama didn't merely win, he trounced his opponents and pushed the proverbial lady in waiting to an undistinguished third place. If that weren't history enough, the rousing spectacle of Obama's victory speech in front of a cheering audience bordering on ecstasy was something I have not seen since 1968. If it's always darkest before dawn, Bush is the darkness and Obama is the sunrise.

I admit to being an emotional man who is both gladdened and saddened far too easily, but Obama's electrifying address caused me to weep at the realization that this improbable candidate is both the political and spiritual heir to Robert Francis Kennedy, and our nation finally has another chance at redemption from decades of hubris, arrogance, and greed. Obama put together a coalition of old and young, and rich and poor. I would say black and white, but there aren't many African Americans in Iowa. I have visited Iowa in winter and its' citizens this time of year are mainly blue. But the most astounding number of the night was not that Barack won by eight points over John Edwards and nine points over Hillary, but that he won 35% of the woman's vote compared to Clinton's 30%. Can you say Oprah?

Only a few weeks ago, the mainstream media was speaking of the Clinton inevitability, thus proving the openly and often spoken suggestion that network and cable news programs are bad entertainment who's spokesmen are mainly full of bullshit, and once courageous and groundbreaking newspapers like the Washington Post and the New York Times are now merely shills for their corporate masters. So the Obama thumping caught them by surprise and left them wild-eyed with fresh speculation. Columnist Eugene Robinson of the Post made the Robert Kennedy comparison and presidential advisor David Gergen referenced Martin Luther King in Obama's speaking style. But thanks to C-Span, the no commentator network, it was clear that something electric, extraordinary, and groundbreaking was happening in that room during Obama's speech.

I trust the speech will be shown again and I hope that you are able to see it. I know the Orange Bowl was more important to some than the Iowa caucus, but something akin to a movement was born last night that will only grow larger with time. With the New Hampshire primary only five days away, I see no way for the Clintons to regain any momentum. She is the establishment candidate and the populace is sick of the establishment. Her entire senate career of triangulation and calculation has come to naught. All those carefully calibrated Senate votes in trying to show herself as the candidate with the most machismo has come a cropper. Didn't Dorothy Rodham ever tell her daughter "To thine own self be true?" My wife, Melody, called Clinton, "Bush in a pants-suit." By contrast, Obama is the real deal; consistent, eloquent, inspiring.

One additional bit of amazement for me was that Obama's race was barely a factor in voters' minds, as much as the need for sweeping change. If whites in Iowa will vote for Obama without a second glance at this country's ever-lingering racial discord, then something truly historic has happened. MSNBC analyst Howard Fineman described it as a generational shift where racial differences just aren't that meaningful to young people who grew up in an integrated society. I see it in my own step-son whose friendships with his peers, both white and black, are seamless. It would be well to remember, however, that scores of past campaign trails are littered with those sorrowfully unelected who depended on the support of the young. If Iowa is an indicator, maybe it will be different this time around. Maybe.

If young people would come out and vote, I would gladly relinquish the reigns of power that my generation seized, but badly misused. My generation was split in twain a long time ago and the two sides of that divide have now been represented by the brilliant but morally flawed Bill Clinton, and the maritally faithful but grossly incompetent George Bush. It's time to turn the page on the Bushes, the Clintons, and their respective philosophies of centrist pandering and right-wing extremism. I am tired of fighting the Vietnam War over again and arguing about someone's personal sexual decisions, especially now that there's a democracy to be saved; ours. For the so-called "values voters," who twice elected re-born Bush, don't dream of a Huckabee presidency. Though Huckabee talks more like a Jimmy Carter Christian than a George Bush Christian, President Zero has tarnished and distorted the faith and proven the absolute necessity of separation of church and state. It will be sweater weather in hell before a self-proclaimed Evangelical is elected president again on the basis of his religion. And to the Bush supporters, if there are any left who will admit it, allow me to quote Sir Paul McCartney;
" Boy, you're going to carry that weight a long time."

Al Gore Broke My Heart

I want to thank you folks for not pointing out that my future as a political prognosticator has been irredeemably scarred by my wishful thinking toward an Al Gore candidacy. I thought I had it all figured out. But like someone that can't accept Lee Harvey Oswald as the lone gunman, I could not believe that a statesman who's political trajectory had propelled him to win the popular vote for the presidency could turn his back on his destiny and merely walk away. I thought Gore certainly must have some grand and Biblical strategy that would swallow the other candidates like Jonah by the whale. My scenario was this; John Edwards wins Iowa, Hillary wins New Hampshire, and Obama wins South Carolina. Then in the midst of this turmoil would come Al Gore, organization at the ready and with a chest full of medals, prepared to assume his rightful place in American history as the redeemer of the thoughtless and slayer of the Bush philosophy of government by the corporation.

America believes in redemption and needed Gore to cleanse the collective guilt felt by those who voted for Bush, actually believing he had integrity. It would have been a national do-over, like a football sideline review, where an historic wrong might finally be righted. In every interview, when asked about running again, Gore always said, "I have no plans to be a candidate." That's quite different from saying, "No, I will not run." But then came the news that Al had accepted a partnership in a Silicon Valley venture capital firm that specialized in helping innovative start-ups that were energy efficient and potentially profitable. Before I could become too indignant about Gore cashing in on his environmental advocacy, however, I read he is donating his salary to the Alliance for Climate Protection. Still, he started the Alliance, and venture capitalists usually get stock in the company. I'm sure he's not working for free.

Silicon Valley is also within proximity of Gore's San Francisco based cable network, "Current," which plans to combine the best features of television and the Internet. Now you can watch multiple reruns of "Law and Order," while simultaneously seeing the most popular Google searches. Gore has been a noble, lifelong public servant and deserves to financially capitalize on an historic year of achievement. I'm certain the speaking fees of a Nobel Laureate are considerable, not to mention the Oscar and Emmy, but I can't help but feel disappointed as a citizen.

If Al Gore is on an urgent mission to decrease global warming, it would seem the most direct way of affecting polic