Rove? Investigate?

I must admit to an odd palpitation of the heart when it was announced by the L.A. Times that the Office of the Special Prosecutor would begin an investigation into the machinations of Karl Rove. But after doing a bit of due diligence, it's beginning to appear as if Rove himself has engineered this move. It wouldn't be out of character. Once, in Texas when his client for statewide election appeared vulnerable, Rove bugged his own office and announced it to the press shortly before election day, allowing his candidate to squeak out a victory. Rove is entirely capable of launching a bogus investigation that originates in the Executive Branch, is conducted by a Bush appointee, and is intentioned to deflect the legitimate criticism that Rove is the White House nexus behind every issue currently under congressional investigation; the Valerie Plame leak, the Prosecutor firings, and five million "missing" e-mails.

Jason Leopold reports for Truthout.org, that Scott J. Bloch, the head of the OSC who announced the pending investigation, was formerly at the Justice Department's Task Force for Faith-based and Community Initiatives, and was promoted by Bush three years ago to his present post. What's more, Bloch himself is under internal investigation for his alleged "purging" of the agency of unlike-minded believers and complaints by his employees, ranging, according to Leopold, from "having an anti-gay bias to criticizing employees for wearing short skirts and tight pants to work." Does anyone truly believe that this "loyal Bushie" zealot is the one to investigate Rover's activities?

I have objected previously in this post that having the President's political advisor participate in national policy decisions and be privy to the country's most sensitive secrets is a threat to representative democracy. I likened it to setting up a whorehouse in the West Wing, as opposed to the ostensibly private trysts of previous Presidents. No one can move to impeach Rove because he's accountable only to the President, and after Bush's gangbanger-style loyalty he showed for Alberto Gonzales this week, the Dubya monster will never turn on Dr. Frankenstein. But there's a new sheriff in town and Rove has never suffered from such scrutiny since his plan for a permanent Republican majority came a cropper. No wonder he was so testy at Sheryl Crow and Laurie David at the White House Correspondents' Dinner, telling them, "I work for the American people." No he doesn't. Nobody voted for Karl Rove. He works for George W. Bush and the Republican Party. And why so mean to the ladies only a month after his dynamic appearance as hip-hopper M.C.Rove, at whatever that last press-politician Swinging Suarez was? More "hop" than "hip."

Speaking of the Correspondents' Dinner, I watched the proceedings on C-Span, dumbfounded. After the Steven Colbert skewering of last year, the administration made a "Beach Boys" decision and came up with the cryogenically preserved Rich Little for the alleged entertainment. I felt that he always took his name from Little Richard, but ironically, "rich little" describes the content of his act as well. When he began to sing a ditty; Sing a little song/All about the throng in Washington, I was reminded of the Chuckles the Clown episode of Mary Tyler Moore, when his motto was, Sing a little song/do a little dance/spray a little seltzer/down your pants. If the Correspondents' desire was to avoid a YouTube frenzy like last year, they succeeded. Although the video is worth watching just to see the audience gaping in shocked silence while President Jethro chuckles like he's watching a Hee-Haw re-run. It's been a long time since Rich Little dusted off the old Nixon impersonation, although he was never as good as David Frye. You could almost see President Zero mouth the words "I am not a crook," along with the botoxed comic, just in case he needs to practice it for the future.

So once again, the world paused for just a little while, so Washington reporters and Washington politicians could join together in a bacchanalia of self congratulations; evil actors and their enablers, locked in Rovian embrace while the world burns. The single ray of hope and peace at the dinner was Sanjaya Malakar. And after the Sheryl Crow-Karl Rove dust-up, and the numbing banality of the Lee Greenwood-like pandering to the shills by Rich Little, the President made a self-serving announcement "not to be funny" in deference to the Virginia Tech shootings. That never stopped him in years' past from filming a skit looking under desks and tables in the Oval Office for fictitious "weapons of mass destruction," while our soldiers were dying in Iraq looking for the real ones. To me, that was a far worse desecration of the office than Bill Clinton could ever have imagined. Rich Little was quoted as saying that the President approached him after the dinner and told him his skit was "perfect." That, in itself, is an impeachable offense.

Imus Out The Window

A friend, we'll call him Sardou, brought my attention to Don Imus in the early seventies because he said he had a funny radio show, but I had soured on him long before he brought his act to MSNBC television. I always felt Imus was never as clever as he thought he was and was an arrogant and shameless self-promoter. What's more, he's a trash talking bully who seems to have infatuated all the Washington media types by saying things they would sometimes like to, but are restrained by common manners. That never stopped Imus. Maybe that's why they think he's so hilarious. But need I remind anyone of his universally panned performance at the White House Correspondents' Dinner a few years back? Everybody's a comedian.

In the 70s, it became obvious that Imus fell in love with two things; cocaine and Richard Pryor. Anyone who heard his disastrously unfunny comedy album, circa 1979, would realize that Imus is not a racist, he's just stupid. He believed in his delusional mind that he would be the Caucasian Richard Pryor and had a nightclub act filled with the same racial epithets that Pryor used, and the same chronic use of anatomical terms. Coming from Pryor, the outrage and the irony made it funny. Only from Imus' mouth, similar words sounded sour and mean spirited. He was fortunate to have the radio voice to fall back on, but what he really wanted was a career in stand-up. As we now know, he is humor challenged.

There are sure a lot of people making apology tours these days. First, Mel Gibson with the Jews, then Kramer's night club rant and Joe Biden talking about how "clean" Barack Obama is. If Biden wanted to score racial points, he might have said that Obama is, "tired, but he's clean." Then there was the hilarious Hillary Minstrels in Selma, where Mrs. Clinton did everything but talk about her junk in the trunk. But why is it that every time one of these cracker assholes goes off the deep end, they are from Hollywood and Washington? It used to be just Southerners who were villianized as racist, but people from the south seem to have more inter-racial contacts than people elsewhere. Imus' stupid remark about the Rutgers girls' basketball team being "nappy-headed ho's," shows two things clearly; He still wishes he had the "street cred" of a Richard Pryor by attempting to sound radical, and he has no black friends or acquaintances.

Here's a little rule of thumb from the South. Remember when they told you, "If you're a child, then don't talk back?" Well, "if you're white, don't talk black." It is a condescending insult to intelligent black people everywhere to believe you think in order to communicate, you must slip into some racial patois you heard on Def Comedy Jam. People like Michael Richards and Imus may claim they are not racist and they well may be right, but their behavior shows an uncomfortableness with people of different races and a clear lack of contact with anyone other than those like themselves. This self-segregation is one of the major factors contributing to our country's racial misunderstandings, and a faux cowboy like Don Imus can say what a decent human being he is all he wants, but remove his "thug" language, and he still managed to insult a group of teenage girls without cause or concern.

I'm enjoying watching Imus squirm. I love to see a bully get their comeuppance. And if Imus is knocked from his perch of political insider, who put him there in the first place? The MSNBC two-week suspension says a great deal about that network as well. During an unprecedented call-up of National Guard troops for duty in Iraq and the Justice Department threatening to collapse under the weight of "loyal Bushies," MSNBC devoted a entire half of their nightly program, "Hardball," to the Imus story. Don Imus makes too much advertising money for them to fire him, so they must not care a great deal about offending any listeners. But corporate America always does market studies before it makes a move, and they probably decided that black people weren't their target demographic anyway. So who cares if another middle-aged white man is amused by the misogynist lyrics and language of a small group of self-denigrating people who have somehow captured the public imagination? When the hip-hop "gangsta" culture promotes this view of black women and receives billions of dollars in profits and sales, why is it surprising that an aging Richard Pryor wannabe should be emboldened to try it himself. The saddest part is that if a black comedian had said the same thing, everyone would have laughed. Imus thought he could get away with using racial humor because he is emboldened by its all too common usage in the culture. Problem was, nothing he said was remotely funny.

Go Tigers Go

Amid the excitement of the University of Memphis playing in the "Elite Eight" of the NCAA Basketball Tournament, I was trying to tell a new convert to Tigermania that you really needed to be a lifelong Memphian to fully appreciate the significance of this team to this city. It's not like Boston or Chicago where long suffering fans were devoted to their professional sports teams, in part because we have never been "long suffering" in our quest for a national title and have had glorious years and wonderful memories along the way. And our teams' athletes came from a cross-section of America, often unrecruited by the major schools, and accomplished amazing things along the way to establishing Memphis State as a basketball power. The bond between the city of Memphis and the basketball Tigers is far more intimate than that. And then today, in "News from Bygone Days," in the Memphis Commercial Appeal, it noted the huge crowd that gathered at the airport on March 25, 1957, to welcome home the Memphis State College basketball team, who's rise from nowhere and remarkable run had resulted in the runner-up spot in the National Invitational Tournament, losing to champion Bradley by one point. Among those present to greet the Tigers was Elvis Presley, who had a pretty good year himself. Legendary Memphis DJ Dewey Phillips constructed a goal on the set on his 1957 zany afternoon television show, "The Pop Shop," to entertain the Tiger players who regularly stopped by. Basketball became interconnected with the rising popularity of Rock and Roll in Memphis.

I watched that 1957 game from Madison Square Garden on my parents oval-screened, black and white Philco TV, and though I had not yet turned 10 years old, I remember the flickering images of Win Wilfong, the first of a family dynasty to play for Memphis, struggle for a rebound, and had the ball just bounced a little this way, the Tigers might have won the tournament that was every bit the equal in prestige to the NCAA tournament. My father did more than say "wait until next year." For the 1958 season in the campus' Field House, he bought the season tickets that he would keep for the rest of his life. I was one of those little kids under the bucket, grabbing stray rebounds and throwing them back to my favorite players in the warm-ups and half-times of the games. The players sat on a literal bench, completely accessible to the crowd. If things were going well, it was nothing for me to walk up behind the bench, sit on a railing, and ask Lowery Kirk or Jamie McMahon if they thought we were going to win. And how glorious when our little college defeated a ranked opponent, as they did with Dayton and Loyola of Chicago in packed to the rafters games with wild celebrations following. Then there are the names, memorable only among Tiger fans, now embossed with an aura of greatness; Gene Wilfong, Skip Wolfe, Orby Arnold, Jim Hockaday, Oscar Ammer, Hunter Beckman, Frank Snyder, and King George Kirk.

The move to the Coliseum in 1964 only added to the fortunate number who could now see the Tigers play in person. We went in ice or snow. Fans griped when a "no smoking" in the arena policy was initiated and took their habit to the concourse level, which often resembled the testing rooms at Phillip Morris Tobacco. I also noted that among season ticket holders, a Memphis State home game during half-time, often resembled Temple Israel on a Friday night. Then came the Moe Iba years, when a coach, heavy on discipline and a belief in a defensive game, often had his team hold the ball for five minutes at a time (no shot clock), which resulted in final scores of 36-33, or even 22-19. And although Iba was rightly criticized for wasting the talents of Mike Butler, one of Memphis' first home-grown heroes to play for MSU, the Tigers still packed the house. And Herb Hilliard became the first black player to wear the Tiger uniform.

When I returned to Memphis in 1971 after an absence of six years, there was a new coach, Gene Bartow, who had recruited players like Memphis' Fred Horton, and put a new excitement into Tiger basketball. I was in the balcony for the heartbreaking loss that year to #2 Marquette, where it seemed an incredible series of Tiger missteps gave Bo Ellis the chance to sink a last second, desperation shot to win the game and send the Marquette coach, Al McGuire, into a frenzied celebration, making the obscene "up yours," elbow and forearm gesture to the stunned Tiger crowd, over and over again. I held season tickets the remarkable year that Larry "The Legend" Finch and Ronnie Robinson came from Melrose High School to the Tigers, beginning a heartening trend that lasts until this day. And I was in St. Louis in March of 1973, in the hallways of Keil Auditorium at halftime when MSU was tied with UCLA for the national championship game, and thousands of Tiger fans were screaming at the top of their lungs, "Can you believe it?" I still wince when someone remarks that Bill Walton hit 21 of 22 shots from the floor to lead the Bruins to victory.

I also witnessed the most tragic incident to ever befall the team, which was on December 21, 1976. Shortly before the Tigers were to take the floor against Ole Miss, a hushed and unprepared crowd was informed of the death of John Gunn. Gunn was one of Memphis' all-time brightest recruits from Melrose High, when only a few games into the season he fell ill with a rare disease that no one had ever heard of, much less believe might be fatal. When announcer Fred Cook said, "Ladies and gentlemen, John Gunn just died," the soul-chilling wails and screams that arose from the student section are something I will never forget. Cook continued to inform the packed house that the Tigers had a meeting where they were given the option of postponing the game, but they decided to play in honor of their fallen teammate. In the end, when the Tigers won a close victory, 12,000 people stood cheering for the team and sobbing for the young man that we would now never know, who had unlimited potential, but died so young. To be in that crowd on that night was an emotional catharsis that touches me still.

Later that same year, my band, Randy and the Radiants, was playing at a nasty nightclub in North Little Rock called The Living Room, where the walls were lined with red shag carpet and the wet T-shirt contest was among the most smarmy I had seen. But that was Wednesday and this was Saturday, and the Tigers were in Little Rock to play the ranked Arkansas Razorbacks. It was a late night club, so we were allowed the privilege of staying in our lice-ridden trailer to watch the Tigers pull a gutty upset over a hostile Arkansas home crowd, and we were in good spirits by the 10:00 start time of the gig. In mid set, in walked Coach Wayne Yates and the rest of the Tiger team and staff. I announced their arrival over the microphone and welcomed them with a bit too much exuberance for the lounge hounds. Wayne Yates approached me and asked if I minded recognizing the assistant coaches. I was more than happy to, but I went on to say what a courageous group of young men these were, and how that gave their road win even more significance. The Tigers responded with hearty applause but when the band took a break, a burly, red-faced man reeking of sore loser whiskey rushed up to my face and said, "If you say one more word about the fucking Tigers, I'm going to kick your ass all over this club." I had already said enough.

When the Tigers fall just short of their intended goal, I don't sweat it too much. I have had a lifetime of "wait until next years," but what a ride this team has given me, and my father before me. So, I say thank you Tigers, for the years of exciting late-night airport welcomes. Thank you Dexter Reed, David McKinnie, Marion "The Elevator" Hillard, Billy Buford and Bobby Parks. Thank you Bill Cook, Johnny Hillman, and Phillip "Doom" Haynes. Thanks for "Keith Lee Day" in Overton Square. Thank you Elliot Perry and Andre Turner, Baskerville Holmes and John Wilfong, Penny Hardaway and Lorenzen Wright and Rodney Carney. And thank you to the outstanding players who took average seasons and made them great, like Omar Sneed and Jermaine Ousley, Shyrone Chatman and Steve Betzelberger. The team of 2006-2007 was one of the most exciting ever, and already their names are being mentioned with the great names of years past.

I used to have a pet theory that the dark cloud over Memphis caused by the King assassination in our city, could be lifted if the Tigers won the National Championship. That was when the city's spirits seemed to rise and fall with the fortunes of the team. But I now believe that the cloud, if not dissipated, has brightened considerably because of the way this community has joined ranks over this team. It is the brightest spot in our city's fractured racial history and a sign of the continued metropolitan-ization of our populous. When John Lennon sang, "Come together, right now, over me," I believe he must have been thinking of the Tigers.

When the team of 2007-2008 prepares for another run in the basketball wars, I'll be right there with them. They are already a part of a grander history that doesn't just include the team and the school, but our memories, our families and friends, our fathers and mothers and our children who have cheered for this team. We'll get them one of these times, I'm certain. I thought for a minute that this might be the year after the 1 point win over Texas A&M in front of 20,000 screaming Aggie fans, but the fact that they didn't make the Final Four this year is alright too. I see a pattern. First, they won the NIT, something the team of 1957 came so close to doing that it set off a Memphis basketball bonanza for the school, the program, and the city. With two solid appearances in the Elite Eight and the entire team returning, minus one, I have everything I need as a fan for next season; hope. It seems as if every Tiger fan I know shares that sentiment too. One of the greatest gifts that you can give to a community is hope. So, well done Tigers. You made us proud, and I can barely wait until next November.

Texas Justice

I'm not a lawyer, so it's alright for you to believe me, but it seems as if among all the clatter and chatter about eight fired U.S. Attorneys, the main point is being overlooked. Every incoming President appoints his own party's faithful to the offices of Federal Prosecutor. It's a perk of the office. But if I hear one more administration toady say they "serve at the pleasure of the President," I'm going to be ill. Ordinarily, that statement would be true enough, but in this Justice Department, the U.S. Attorneys serve to please Karl Rove and his ideological litmus tests. No, Monica Lewinsky "served at the pleasure of the President." These inept cronies of President Zero and his buddy, Shooter, are merely party hacks and sycophants with law degrees, who serve to advance their careers and further the ideological agenda of the ultra-right, to reverse the progressive societal advances of the sixties.

Their e-mails are damning and Karl Rove has been found in the middle of it, but the eight firings weren't the most egregious breaches of the public trust. Sure, Alberto Gonzales fired Carol Lam after she successfully prosecuted the "Duke-stir" Cunningham for lingering too long at the Abramoff cash cow teat, and her sights had been set on another Republican congressman. Sen. Pete Dominici phoned Karl to say he no longer could abide the obstruction of federal prosecutor David Iglesias, a Navy Reserve Commander, because he refused to speed up indictments of Democrats before the last election. And Karl pressured the DOJ and Gonzales to appoint his assistant, Tim Griffin, to the prosecutor's office in Little Rock, just before Hillary Clinton announced her candidacy for President. The discussions among the amateurs in the White House concerning whom to fire and why, were ugly and possibly illegal, but the nastiest part of this entire incident is that the Patriot Act was abused intentionally and without question, for domestic political purposes. The Patriot Act gives the President the right to fire any U.S. Attorney and put his own man in the office without congressional oversight only in the case of national emergency. Usually, Federal Prosecutors are chosen with the input of state and local government officials and the area's bar associations, even if it is a partisan exercise. The NSA warantless spying and the government's examination of personal citizens' financial records may be debated on what is the extent of the President's wartime powers, but this interference with the judicial system is a right-wing Republican power grab, pure and simple.

I asked in a previous post what Karl Rove, the president's political advisor, was doing with sensitive information concerning covert officers of the CIA? Why has Rove, elected by no one and thus accountable to no one, been given the right of selection over which U.S. Attorneys are fit to serve the Bushies? If this were the late 18th Century, an operative like Rove, who had pledged his loyalty to a solitary monarch and attempted to subvert and manipulate the nations' system of justice for political gain, would have been hanged for treason. Now, it will be difficult just to get him to testify under oath before Congress. How many more Michael Browns, Scooter Libbys, and now Gonzales' aide Kyle Sampson, are going to fall on a grenade for this American Rasputin? It is now past time to recognize that this is a rogue government that does not care about the last election, or the Iraq Study Group, or the 9/11 Commission's suggestions. They will attempt to seize more power, territory, oil, and cash until they are stopped.

God bless Molly Ivins, she tried to tell us. Before her death from breast cancer last year, Ivins reported on the career of George Bush longer and more insightfully than anyone else. Her bestseller, "Bushwhacked: Life in George Bush's America," (Amazon.com, $9.00) demonstrated, in Ivin's irascible prose, that every revelation of corruption and favoritism that is surfacing in the country right now, was first perfected in Texas, and with the same group of characters; Bush, Harriet Miers, Gonzales, Karen Hughes, Tom DeLay. And all these people shared the same thing in common; they were discoveries and clients of Karl Rove. That's why John Ashcroft was appointed Attorney General in 2000 after he lost the Missouri Senate race to a dead man; he was a client and fellow traveller of Rove. It was all there for anyone to see; the purging of the Texas Supreme Court of Democrats to be replaced by Rove clients, redistricting to try and insure a permanent Republican majority in the Texas legislature, and the unusual practice of smears and indictments being brought against political opponents just before an election, even if the charges mysteriously faded away afterward. This is just the way that Karl Rove conducts business. Molly Ivins' last column for Truthdig.com, was an exhortation to regular citizens to stand up and raise hell about this war and this administration.

I used to be in favor of a Richard Nixon national holiday, where every year on the anniversary of his resignation, his corpse would be exhumed and dragged through the streets of San Clemente. Then we'd always have Nixon to kick around. He was so much more hateable than the current bunch, what with his taking the unprescribed and then experimental drug, Dilantin, a strong anti-seizure medication to control his rage and depression, and the few occasions where he blackened Mrs. Nixon's eyes. Oh, you didn't know? I said you could believe me. But the Bush/Cheney/Rove troika are giving us all black eyes. At least, Nixon understood the need for diplomacy with other nations, if not his own wife. This regime has become a clear and present danger to our form of government, in both foreign and domestic matters, and it is the Constitutional responsibility of concerned citizens to see that they are removed before the 2008 election. In John Dean's words, this is "Worse Than Watergate."

Speaker Pelosi has said that, "impeachment is off the table." Perhaps it is time to get a bigger table, because impeachment may be the last opportunity to rescue our representative form of government from the clutches of these rapacious men. If I were a conspiracy theorist, I would be concerned that Cheney's bastard child, Halliburton, is moving from Houston to Dubai. If the United Arab Emirates were prevented from running our ports, Cheney will just bring the ports to them. And the 98,000 acres that the Bush family recently purchased in Paraguay wouldn't be so disturbing an investment had the Paraguayan government not just signed an agreement with the U.S. granting sanctuary and amnesty to any soldier, officer, or government official who may be inconvenienced by war crimes tribunals in the Hague over the Iraq debacle. To a conspiracy buff, it may appear that these guys are preparing to take the money and run. Bush has already been complimentary of the South American "carne." If Nancy Pelosi doesn't have the political will to press for impeachment, it is up to ordinary citizens to make enough noise to demand it.

Since these boys choose to go down the old Nixon stonewall road, the next thing we can expect is the banshee cry of "Executive Privilege," to keep the imperial advice of Karl Rove from becoming public. This is going all the way to the Supreme Court, so let the subpoenas fall where they may. It is well to remember that the Bush Supreme Court appointments began with Clarence Thomas, but might have ended with Harriet Miers were it not for the uproar of the populace and their representatives. Just because the Court appointed Bush, doesn't mean they will decide to keep him there. Judges don't usually take kindly to judicial demands by non-lawyers fiddling with the system, unlike the Attorney General and his para-legals who know no other way. Gonzales can go or stay, it doesn't matter. But piece by piece, the Bush team is unravelling. When all the layers are peeled away from an onion that has gone bad, you are left with the rotten core, which must be discarded lest it poison you. For the sake of our Democracy and the rule of law; Impeach.

Bloody Sunday

Thank goodness for C-Span. I enjoy my news non-filtered and preferred to watch the Showdown In Selma without Wolf Blitzer nattering on about how significant the occasion was. I remembered watching the original news about the Selma march in 1965 and being horrified, as was most of the nation, by the brutality of the police as they mowed down the marchers with horses and billy clubs. C-Span allowed me to hear the electrifying address by Congressman John Lewis and the always magnificent Rev. Joseph Lowery speaking about the "good crazy people," which the major networks picked up on, but without context. Barack Obama was invited to speak at the Brown Chapel A.M.E. Church by John Lewis, a hero of the Selma March who was beaten and bloodied on that dark day. Obama did not give a stem-winding speech, although his emotion rose several times during the address. Rather, he was measured and respectful, aware that he was only a child when the events of Bloody Sunday took place, but cognizant of the personal effect of the movement on both his life and campaign for the presidency.

If Obama came in humility, Hillary came in hubris. Uninvited to attend, Hillary leaned on Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth, another hero of the movement, to ask her to address his congregation, only 100 yards from where Obama spoke. As if that weren't chutzpah enough, she brought Bill along for the first time in her campaign. For Hillary to bring Bill for her speech to a black audience reminded me of President Bush insisting that he would appear before the 9/11 Commission only with Dick Cheney by his side. Her speech in the church was more minstrel show than commemorative address. It could only have been more entertaining if she had done it in blackface. Hillary is so scripted and managed, you can almost see the key in her back. And why is it that when white people from the North speak to black people from the South, they get a sorghum molasses twang in their voice and an exaggerated drawl that seems more condescending than a poor attempt to "relate?" Sister Hillary had the cadence going and the sing-song voice rising when she attached that bloody day in Selma to her own candidacy. She neglected to say that in 1965, she was a Goldwater Republican from a wealthy Chicago suburb. She was all call, and no response.

If Sen. Clinton is so committed to civil rights, how does she explain her recent co-sponsorship of a constitutional amendment to ban flag burning? And how can she bitterly critique the Iraq war without denying her vote helped enable BushCo. to launch this war of choice? She mentioned the Little Rock Nine and how they had been friends all these years, echoing the implied but unsaid, "some of my best friends are Negroes." But her Hambone routine reached its zenith when she went for the Bill Clintonesque recitation of the classic Rev. James Cleveland gospel song, "I Don't Feel Noways Tired." It sounded a little like Pat Boone singing "Tutti Frutti." If it's true that Bill Clinton was our first black president, then he was definitely in a bi-racial marriage.

I would welcome a woman president, as I would welcome anyone justifiably qualified, but Sen. Clinton is as calculated a candidate that's come along since Bill Clinton, only without the finesse. Her new nickname should be "Slick Hillie." The senator's supporters always say how intelligent and capable she is, but she plays dirty, as evidenced by the ridiculous attempt to insist Obama distance himself from David Geffen and his critical remarks about the Clintons. I don't know a whole lot of people outside of the music business who even knew who David Geffen was until Hillary saw a chance to pick a meaningless fight with Obama over Hollywood contributors. (Geffen was the recording executive that Joni Mitchell sang about in "Free Man in Paris"). She exudes falsity. Her statement that when attacked by a political opponent, "You have to deck them," sounds like it came from the thesaurus of Karl Rove. If she expects to win the womens' vote, who advised her to be so macho? She is certainly demonstrating more testosterone than John Kerry, but do the voters wish to continue down this same road of divisiveness we have experienced for the last fourteen years?

The "Thing That Wouldn't Die," Newt Gingrich, recently referred to Hillary as a "nasty woman." I believe Gingrich to be a "horrible man." But could it be considered "nasty" to attempt to cut the legs from your political opponent by crashing a commemorative day in Selma, a turning point in the civil rights struggle marked by the blood of martyrs, and turning the entire affair into a political carnival? Was it "nasty" to use the occasion to unveil Bill on the campaign, just when the polls show Hillary dropping among black voters? Was it "nasty" for Bill to call John Lewis before the event and instruct him not to endorse Barack Obama? Maybe I'm just suffering from Clinton fatigue, or an all-encompassing weariness with the dynastic politics of these times. I would hate to admit that I agreed with Newt Gingrich about anything. But on Bloody Sunday, it would have served Hillary well to remember that the civil rights struggle was about measuring a person by "the content of their character."

Al Gore,"Soul Man"

If Al Gore had listened to me, we would not be in Iraq today. It's not that I didn't understand the significance of a campaign theme song when I attempted to submit it to him in the election of 2000, I just couldn't find anyone to take me seriously enough. See, I'm a Gore man; have been since 1988 when I was fortunate enough to join a multi-religious delegation from Tennessee to the state of Israel, led by then Senator Gore, and accompanied by Tipper and his children. It was supposed to be a cultural exchange program with a grand concert in Jerusalem with a cadre of Nashville acts like the Charlie Daniels Band and the Oak Ridge Boys. Living in Nashville, I went to the promoter and begged to musically represent Memphis on the show, but when turned down, I joined the tour group anyway. In the end, not enough people signed up to make it worthwhile to take planeloads of country bands to the Holy Land, so the only musicians in attendance were songwriter Dave Olney, gospel star Bobby Jones, and me. We ended up performing in the courtyard of the Laromme Hotel in Jerusalem for the delegation, the Gores and their staff, Ambassador Thomas Pickering, and Mayor Teddy Kollak. It was good the country stars stayed in Nashville. On the same night as our courtyard concert, Bob Dylan appeared in Jerusalem.

Even then, Gore suffered from the "stiff" syndrome, but I was able to notice that it usually happened just for the cameras. When Gore was at ease with his family, being a tourist like the rest of us while instructing his girls about the meaning of the sights we were witnessing, he was approachable and affable. When Gore was briefed by the Israeli Government on the then novel idea of "land for peace," he took time to board our different tour buses and use the driver's microphone to brief us on what he had learned. During that trip, observing Al Gore in both formal and informal moments, I came to believe that Gore was the ablest, brightest, and most sincere politician/candidate in Congress. That's why I tried to help with a song for the 2000 race.

Every political theme song from FDR's "Happy Days Are Here Again," to JFK's "High Hopes," have had one thing in common. They are instantly recognizable and beloved songs that are adaptable for lyrical changes to promote the candidate. It's no mean thing to get Frank Sinatra to record your campaign theme as JFK did, and who can listen to that Fleetwood Mac song any longer without first thinking of the Clintons? Since I had described myself as a "Gore Man," it was easy to transfer that lyric to the Sam & Dave soul classic, "Soul Man." I rewrote the whole song, including a tag in the chorus to be sung by a woman to make the song gender neutral. Imagine these lyrics being sung by Sam Moore and say, Sheryl Crow;
He's coming to you/On a high road/brain power, he's got a truckload/ and when you get him/You got something/So don't worry/Cause Al's coming
chorus: I'm a Gore Man/ (female) and I'm a Gore Woman/
I'm a Gore Man, "play it Steve./"
bridge: Grab a rope/ He'll pull you in/give us hope/ and bring this country back again/ yeah, YEAH"

Would it not have been cool to have Sam Moore record that for a theme instead of the insipid "You Ain't Seen Nothin' Yet," by the stuttering Cheap Trick? Better yet, have Sam Moore tour with Gore and sing the song at every major rally. I imagine if they'd asked nicely, they might have gotten the Blues Brothers' Band to participate. I believe Steve Cropper is a good Democrat even though I once caught him in Nashville producing an album on Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker. Although song parody is legal, I even told one of the composers, David Porter, what I had in mind and he thought it was a great idea. I attempted several times to reach someone within the Gore campaign and was finally able to speak to a staffer who promised to forward the song to the person who could give it proper consideration. I admonished him to please tell whomever received the suggestion that it may sound like a joke on paper, but I was most serious in my intent to boost the campaign. I did not hear from them again. Who knows? "I'm a Gore Man," might have inspired a few extra Florida voters to go to the polls just for the soul music.

When 2004 rolled around, I dusted off the song and prepared to offer it again. I delighted in Gore's hilarious performance as host on Saturday Night Live and was sure this was the "new, relaxed" Gore preparing for a second presidential run. But, he said instead that he did not want to re-fight the election of 2000 and would not run. I wanted exactly to re-fight the 2000 election and I felt Gore would win in a walk and was bitterly disappointed by his decision. I felt he was making a political "Nixon calculation;" the one that says "if the people are tired of me then I will lay low and re-invent myself and fight another day." Nixon, like Gore, lost one of the most closely contested races in history. Close enough that Mayor Daley of Chicago and officials in Cook County, Illinois were suspected of padding the "zombie vote," enough to throw the election to Kennedy. After eight years of war and a fistful of political assassinations, the nation was so screwed up that Nixon was elected by the same razor thin margin that he lost by in 1960.

I believe this was Al Gore's strategy. I cannot believe that after a lifetime of being groomed for high office, Gore would just turn his back and walk away from the presidency after coming so close. If this was his calculation, it has proven to be a miscalculation, complicated by a factor Gore could not have seen in 2004. That "X" factor's name is Barack Obama. I don't think even an Academy Award could get Gore elected now. I only know as much about Obama as the next extremely well informed person, despite the reckless smear attempts by Fox News and Rev. Moon's Washington Times organization, to label him a Muslim who only conveniently converted to Christianity in time to run for President: all despicable lies, proven false by some simple decent journalism. I am impressed, however, with Obama's measured magnetism.

Obama's lack of experience is a false negative. What is appealing about him is his relative ease in his own skin and his forthrightness of speech. Obviously intelligent and thoughtful, Obama has a way of distilling his thoughts into succinct and direct answers to the questions asked of him without pretense or prevarication. The public response to Obama's steady assurance of confidence and calm has not been seen since the presidential campaign of Robert F. Kennedy. And regardless of his legislative experience, his middle name, his race,(I'm sure he'll be portrayed as an axe murdered before it's over),or his faith, Obama is the kind of candidate that appears once in a generation. And if the heavens line up as properly for him in the future as they have in the past, Barack Hussein Obama, is beginning to take on the appearance of that rarest of beings, an historical inevitability.

There's lots of time for faux pas and screw-ups for one and all, but Obama does not seem the type politician to be caught in a contradiction of principle. Kathleen Parker of The Washington Post made some prescient editorial comments yesterday when she said about the campaigns of Al Gore and John Kerry, "Both...were listening to their political advisers and pollsters instead of to their hearts. Trying to be what they thought people wanted them to be, rather than who they are," adding, "they may have wanted it too much." "Want has a scent. It reeks of rapaciousness and oozes from the pores of the overly ambitious. Others likely to make a run in 2008 are similarly malodorous, and you know who they are." I certainly do, but Obama is not among them. His reflective demeanor prevented him from acquiring the affliction that makes desire and desperation visible to the observer, like Al Gore demonstrated in 2000 with the "Love Story" Convention Kiss, or the invasion of Dubya's limited debating space. One of the reasons Bush was elected was simply because he was not devouring himself with desire. For now, I'm still a Gore man, but I'm watching carefully and worried that I may have to sing my Gore song alone. In that case, I may have to adapt the old Mexican song favorite "Manana," and change the lyrics to,"Obama, Obama; Obama is good enough for me."

The Fuller Brush Strategy

Imagine this Sunday, settling in to your favorite lounger with a bowl of potato chips and a soft drink to watch the playoffs when there is a knock at the door. When you answer, there are a group of swarthy men, each with an automatic weapon and a double bandoleer of ammunition crossing his Kevlar-coated chest, speaking in a foreign tongue, and demanding the whereabouts of any men, ages 14-50, that live in your house. I think even a reasonable person might have a Dick Cheney flashback and shoot somebody in the face over such an outrage. And yet, that is exactly what President Zero is asking our troops, your children, to do.

After the nation waited an entire month for Bush to listen to all the experts and revamp his Iraq strategy, the best he can do is send 21,000 more troops to Baghdad to go door to door, like Fuller Brush salesmen, embedded with Iraqi units asking for the trust of the populace. Is this not the most insane maneuver since lying us into this hellish war? What unlucky National Guardsman has been sentenced to their doom by this intransigent usurper of the Presidency? It's well to remember that one of the articles of impeachment passed by the Congress against Richard Nixon was abuse of power. Bush is like Nixon on steroids. He discards the advice and wishes of his generals, the Iraq Study Group (Daddy), the electorate, the soldiers on the ground, and now key members of his own party, to pursue a trail of tears that we have all witnessed before.

It wasn't necessary for Dubya to have actually fought in Vietnam; just paying attention would have helped. But this arrogant child of privilege was assured his non-lethal slot in the Texas Air National Guard, cushy even among Guard positions, so why would he need to concern himself about Vietnam? He just supported his president and wore his Guard flight jacket on campus, while his fellow students were demonstrating and dying. This ignorance of the past, not just from Bush but from his entire never-having served administration, is taking us down the same road as the LBJ escalation of Vietnam in 1965. That's when I began paying attention. 1965 was the year I graduated from high school and suddenly the abstraction that was Vietnam became very real. When your high school buddies began to ship out, or the guy down the hall in the dorm wasn't there anymore, war became personal. I doubt Bush ever even knew a peer that served in Vietnam, or he wouldn't be so cavalier with other people's children in the crusade to save his legacy.

Most people tuned out Bush long ago. Even the most patriotic among us have bullshit saturation levels. But last night Bush accused Iran and Syria of aiding "terrorists and insurgents" and said the U.S. will "seek out and destroy the networks providing advanced weaponry and training to our enemies." This sounds like the Nixon secret Christmas bombings of Cambodia in 1972. In a previous post, I noted that a flotilla of US warships were gathering in the Persian Gulf off Iran for maneuvers. Last night the president announced his orders for a carrier group to move to the area. And only a few hours ago, the BBC announced the invasion of an Iranian consulate in the northern Iraqi city of Ibril by U.S. troops, saying "The U.S. soldiers disarmed guards and broke open the consulate's gate before seizing documents and computers during the operation, which took place today at about 5 a.m. local time, the Islamic Republic News Agency said." The report added that five people, possibly diplomats, "were detained."

You need not have the imagination of John LeCarre to understand what is going on here. Bush has been provoking the Iranians for months, and today again violated international law by storming an embassy for documents and proof that the Iranians are aiding the insurgents; his very own Watergate break-in. Bush is itching to bomb Iran. He must know that Iraq is lost militarily because everyone tells him so. But if he can force Iran into a Saddam-like, "mushroom cloud" confrontation, he can bomb their nuclear sites, set them back ten years, and somehow redeem his disastrous and grievous adventure in the Middle East. He is sending 21,000 more troops to buy him time. If the Iranians take the bait, there will be wider war and the pressing need for even more soldiers. If they don't, Bush will run out the clock on his watch and leave his mess for the rest of us to clean up. I pray I am wrong; I fear that I am not. But an animal is at his most dangerous when he is cornered.

In the post, "First Things First," 11/14/06, I tried to make the point that there were more pressing issues in the Congress than Bush's impeachment. But, if he is determined to take the Nixon path, he must face the Nixon fate. If he refuses to stop his mad dash toward Armageddon, then the Congress must stop him, and, yes, it is now a most pressing issue. Last week, no one would have suggested that there were nearly enough votes in the Senate for impeachment, but after last night's science-fiction address, the head-counting, at least on the internet, has already begun. President Zero insists his "surge" is something new. Escalating a lost conflict is as old as warfare has been folly. Wire service reports now say "the surge" began last month and the soldiers are already arriving in the desert, just in case anyone believed protesting would do any good. It was a done deal before all the post 11/7 ruminating by "The Decider." He decided, once again, to listen to Cheney.

Meanwhile, last month down on the Bush "ranch" where all the "deliberating" was going on, the whole crowd came out for a Texas down-home photo-op. All the men wore jackets, no tie, with a single button fastened in front, except Condi, who hobbled in high heels in the gravel. They even managed to make General Pace look like a dork. It reminded me not so much of a president and his cabinet as the Clanton gang at the O.K. Corral. So did the stage-managed Rumsfeld resignation celebration at the Pentagon in November where Cheney, Bush, and Rummy walked the gauntlet of career diplomats in lock-step, even swinging their arms together like Goebbels, Goering, and Himmler. I usually detest comparisons of our politicians with the Nazis, but these boys are spoiling for another, potentially catastrophic and all-consuming war in the face of opposition from the American people and the best minds in the military. Let the investigations begin in earnest, and should the facts lead to impeachable offenses, in the words of our deluded president, "Bring 'em on!"

Dead Man Talking

It's a sad commentary when the Executioner of Austin can't even properly hang the Butcher of Baghdad. In one and a half terms as Governor of Texas, George W. Bush presided over more executions than the other forty-nine states combined. He was on a par with Judge Roy Bean with handing out Texas-style justice. They wouldn't allow him to hang anyone, although his "dead-or-alive" mentality may have preferred it. If he had to abide by that sissy lethal injection business, Bush was going to run the most efficient "stick-em and brick-em" operation in law enforcement. He did, however, demonstrate his compassionate-conservative side when supporters of the born-again Christian, Karla Faye Tucker, pleaded for leniency. Bush promised to pray for her before she was put to death, thus making her the first woman executed in Texas since the Civil War.

Of course the US Government says the hanging of Saddam was an Iraqi affair and they had nothing to do with it because they were too busy preparing to celebrate Eid. But the entire hooded, lynch-mob was helicoptered into the Green Zone and taken to the execution chamber by US forces. And what was to be a mark of achievement by the elected Iraqi government has been degraded and translated into more outrage and fury in the streets. Bush has managed to do what even Saddam's personal attorney's were unable to do at his sham trial; create sympathy for a tyrant and a killer, and make him into a martyr for Sunni Muslims all over the middle-east. Heckuva job, Bushie. And all over another pesky cell-phone video. Somewhere Michael Richards is saying "I know how he feels." Bush enjoys Western lore. Didn't he ever read the "Ox-Bow Incident?" Disciplined hangmen must be hard to find in Moktada Al-Sadr's army. But Dubya has achieved the motivating reason for his presidency; he's killed Saddam for Daddy. Do we feel better now? Bush used to enjoy showing Saddam's pistol to visitors in the Oval Office. Now, in the words of Lyndon Johnson, "he has his pecker in his pocket."

All of that controversy was unfolding while the Gerald Ford farewell tour dominated domestic news. It's hard to work up any animus over Gerry Ford. Even the sting of the Nixon pardon has lessened with time. What remains is the fact that Ford's actions regarding Nixon subverted the judicial process by offering a blanket pardon for crimes for which Nixon had not yet been charged. I'm no lawyer, but I watch "Law and Order." Nixon should have been required to allocute before receiving his pardon. Otherwise, what's to stop him from stalking and killing John Dean with his bare hands? But Gerald Ford did calm the post-Watergate vitriol as evidenced by George McGovern's confession that he voted for Ford over Carter in 1976, and did offer a soothing presence while presiding over the collapse of Saigon. Other than that, I mostly remember his policy to fight rampant inflation was to print up a bunch of buttons that said "WIN," for "whip inflation now." It didn't work.

Gerald Ford's comments to Bob Woodward published posthumously in the Washington Post show a deference towards the current administration that might have been courteous, but less effective than had they been printed while Ford was alive. Ford said he "very strongly" disagreed with the President's decision to invade Iraq and chastised his former employees Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld by saying, "Rumsfeld and Cheney and the president made a big mistake in justifying going into the war in Iraq." As the troika's excuses for war switched from WMD to the US' "duty to free people," President Ford said, "I just don't think we should go hellfire damnation around the globe freeing people, unless it is directly related to our own national security."

While Bush41, Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Goober eulogized Ford as a man of wisdom, newspaper readers were discovering that Ford had said "I don't think, if I had been president..I would have ordered the Iraq war. I would have maximized our effort through sanctions, through restrictions, whatever, to find another answer." While Cheney choked up at the funeral podium over the good old days with his boss, Ford had described him as "pugnacious" as vice president and agreed that Cheney had developed a "fever" about Iraq and the so-called "war on terror." The "Accidental President" never claimed to be brilliant, but he had wisdom tempered by war. Something that his proteges never experienced.

Now on the eve of the swearing in of the 110th Congress, Bush is earnestly appealing for bi-partisanship. He has seemingly rejected the Iraq Study Group Report and dawdled for the month since it was presented talking to anyone with an opinion about Iraq, until he heard the one he wants. Had he only spent as much time in consultation before invading Iraq. Now, he can't be rushed. Early reports say that Bush will do what he intended to do all along. He will ignore the American people, the "generals on the ground," particularly General Casey, the Iraq Study Group, and the soldiers themselves by committing up to 40,000 more troops to the flames to try and save face, Nixon style.

If the 110th Congress has been given any mandate at all, it is to bring this Iraqi horror to an end. If the president refuses to submit a plan for withdrawal, but a "surge" instead, he must be stopped, Nixon style. Not with impeachment, but the cutting off of funds for the war for any other purpose than evacuating our troops from Iraq and transporting them home. If Bush thinks he can play bully-boy to a Democratic congress, I believe he is in for a rude awakening. At least, I hope he is. It's too late in Bush's term to devote the daily attention and man hours needed toward preparing impeachment. In any case, we would have to impeach Cheney first, which would only allow Bush to appoint a caretaker vice president, just like Gerald Ford, that he trusts would carry on his tattered legacy and consider a pardon sometime down the road. In such a scenario, we may one day again hear the words, "My fellow Americans, our long national nightmare is over," from President Condoleeza Rice.

"Good Gawd," James Brown.

photo by Randy

James Brown nearly got me out of Vietnam. As an aspiring, teenage garage rocker who had seen James Brown for the first time, I understood that I needed to do more than just stand there and play the guitar. So, once a performance, I put down the guitar and attempted my white boy song and dance, and at a point in the song, I would tip the microphone stand, drop to my knees, and catch it in emulation of Brown. I did this each night until I developed a condition know as Osgood-Schlatter's disease where I had crushed the cartilage in both knees badly enough to cause a leg to give way in mid-walk. I entered high school and college with a doctor's note forbidding me to march with the ROTC. When I was called for a physical by the Knoxville Draft Board, I was armed with my bulletproof doctor's note. But there was a war on and they were pretty much accepting anyone with a pulse, even if you checked the "gay" box on the personal questionnaire. Disregarding the severity of my limp, the draft board ignored what, in essence, was James Brown Syndrome and marked me fit for military duty. I was forced to fight the draft in ways other than with my knees, but such was my devotion.

Like millions of fans, I went James Brown crazy for keeps after I heard the album "Live At the Apollo," in 1963. I was familiar with his hits, particularly "Lost Someone," where he wrote the lyric, "Ten thousand people/underneath my Father's sun, who need someone," and "Night Train," which was his biggest hit before the Apollo LP. But this new live album was something different, raw, and exciting, and the response from the audience becomes a part of the show. I always wondered why he said in his recitation of "Night Train" cities, "New York City, take me home." Now I know. The spontaneous outpouring of love from the people in Harlem when the white, horse-drawn carriage passed was something not seen since the funeral of Princess Diana. President Ford may have gotten a catafalque in the Capitol, but James Brown got center stage at The Apollo while a hundred thousand people stood in the street in lines that reached five blocks long.

My first James brown show was memorable for many reasons. After listening to the Apollo album a thousand times, (a must-have album for any fan of Soul music), I had to see what the audience on the record was screaming about. I snapped up a ticket for his show in the North Hall at Ellis Auditorium in late 1963 and took my seat. Every white kid in Memphis will tell you that he or she was one of only ten white faces in the place, as if they were venturing into the enemy camp. But everyone will also say that they were warmly welcomed by the black audience and even made to feel a little bit hip just by being in attendance. When the announcer finally shouted, "James Brown and the Famous Flames," a woman sitting behind me that weighed at least 250 pounds leaped up from her seat and landed on my back, knocking me to the floor. So while James Brown was sliding to center stage on one leg, I was on all fours, fumbling on the sticky floor for my glasses. It was my good fortune, however, to see him perform the entire "Live at the Apollo" show, with the cape and additional flourishes to boot. It was the most memorable concert of my life. By show's end, I was dancing in the aisle with the woman who had flattened me.

Of all James Brown's nicknames; "Mister Dynamite," "The Amazing Mr. Please, Please, Himself," "Soul Brother #1," my least favorite was "Godfather of Soul," because it was the most contrived. Only after "The Godfather" was the biggest movie hit of 1972 did James Brown appropriate the moniker for himself, a nickname more rightly descriptive of Ray Charles. James Brown was the Father of Funk. But in reality, the nickname that most accurately described him was "The Hardest Working Man in Show Business." On my old radio program, I used to enjoy contrasting the live performance styles of Ray Charles and James Brown. Ray would take a song like "Drown In My Own Tears," which he recorded in the studio with a waltz-time, mid-tempo gospel feel, and play it in concert so slowly and laid-back that it nearly falls off the bed. Thus, part of the enjoyment of hearing Ray Charles was the anticipation and suspense of his slower tempos. Before Ray delivered the goods, he made you wait for it, and you left his concerts, on a good night, feeling warm and satisfied. In contrast, James Brown played his songs at three times the tempo of his studio recordings, and the intensely tight band never stopped charging until the audience surrendered to the dynamism and unflagging energy of the performer. When a James Brown show was over, he was reputed to have lost up to five pounds per show and sweat straight through the soles of his shoes. The audience left stunned, exhausted, and exhilarated.

And though others preceded him, James Brown was undeniably of the South. His music wasn't smooth or jazz based like Ray's, but gritty and greasy and wild. And he never made the concessions to a white audience like Jackie Wilson or Sam Cooke, with bland arrangements and whitebread back-up singers. James had the Famous Flames, who's very name spoke of Brown's ambition. I wish I could properly credit the writer who said that "James Brown exuded Negritude." He was a black performer for a black audience, and the white fans had to come over to him; and they did in droves, especially in the South. When James' fame was already reaching a boiling point, he released the song "Out of Sight" in 1964 and started a revolution in popular music. He so noticeably changed the groove that at any dance in the mid-sixties, there was all the other music, and there was James Brown's. His songs immediately packed the dance floors and the dance that the people did was called, "The James Brown." Suddenly every white frat-boy from the Universities of Alabama, Georgia, and Tennessee, were hooking their thumbs in their belts and shuffling their feet across the floor. If you had the misfortune of wearing rubber soles, you had to kick them off to continue. Imagine the personal musical courage it took to change a successful formula into something untried and untested. But James Brown started as a shoe- shiner, a tap-dancer, and a prizefighter. It was his competitiveness and unschooled genius that propelled him. If he were a grammarian, he might have named his song "I Feel Well," but James had a language all his own. Even his ballads like "It's a Man's(4)World," and "Prisoner of Love" turned into screaming, sweat-drenched passion plays. As he grew older, the screaming grew more frenzied and sometimes over the top. It seemed as if James were reaching for a note that he was never going to hit.

The night that Dr. King was murdered in Memphis, James Brown was credited with keeping violence muted in many cities including Knoxville, where his radio station WJBE (for James Brown Enterprises) broadcast regular calls for calm. His public activism and appeals for racial understanding earned him accolades from President Johnson and rewards from Hubert Humphrey. His record company told him that if he released 1968's "Say It Loud, I'm Black and I'm Proud," it would cost him over half of his white audience. James Brown released the song and contributed to an unprecedented era of black pride. Stay In School campaigns followed and Life Magazine asked on it's cover if James Brown "was the most influential black man in America." This later added to the irony of his incarceration. The Memphis and Shelby County police always protected Elvis, and especially Jerry Lee Lewis and his entourage, from their most blatant transgressions. When Jerry Lee smashed his car into the gates of Graceland waving a pistol, the police took him home. Why then, would the South Carolina police fire twenty shots at James Brown in a high speed chase resulting from a domestic dispute and put him in prison for two and a half years if not for the continuing racial component? Perhaps James Brown wasn't a model citizen regarding his personal life, but I couldn't help thinking that they wouldn't have done that to Tony Bennett.

The crowds in the streets and the magnificent packed-house homegoing service in Augusta demonstrated the significance of this one determined man. The moving tributes by Reverends Sharpton and Jackson illustrated James Brown's appeal to the common man, and the presence and reception for Michael Jackson should erase the suggestions that Michael was ever insufficiently black. There are still huge gaps in Brown's digital discography that will now hopefully be filled. The box set "Star Time" on Polydor is a worthy attempt that was created in England. This is usually good news, since the British are among the most knowledgeable and loyal R&B fans in the world. But the James Brown phenomenon was a "you needed to be there" experience that could have benefited from a Southern perspective and not omitted regional classics like "Oh, Baby Don't You Weep," and "Three Hearts in a Tangle." However, it's a good place to start to hear how the music of this man with the humble name evolved from primitive R&B to rhythmic innovation and a place where it reached critical mass before exploding into the popular culture. The concert film, "The T.A.M.I. Show," 1964, has electrifying footage of James' performance in his prime. Finally, a word about these Republicans. Ray Charles died June 10, 2004, and Ronald Reagan died the next day. James Brown died on Christmas and Gerald Ford the following day. Not even a president can steal the thunder from a king. So, hey fellows, stop trying and "Let A Man Stand Up and Do the Popcorn."

Who's left of the Soul pioneers? We still have great voices like Jerry Butler, Mel Carter, and Bobby Womack, but the death of James Brown leaves an unfillable void. The greatest voice in Soul music with a live performance approximating James Brown's in excitement is Ronald "Ronnie" Isley, of the Isley Brothers. Unfortunately, like James in the past, he is incarcerated for income tax evasion and isn't singing for anyone. Doesn't the I.R.S. know that musicians get paid in cash? And isn't it pathetic to go after the entertainers who rose from nothing while corporate criminals like Ken Lay take the easy way out? For the sake of James Brown's activism on behalf of equal justice, Free Ronnie Isley! Meanwhile, God bless you and rest well, James Brown. You deserve it.
"Spotlight on James Brown ya'll/He's the king of 'em all ya'll/ Yeah yeah, oh yeah."...Arthur Conley; "Sweet Soul Music"

Oedipus Wrecks

The Baker/Hamilton Iraq Study Group report was only slightly less anticipated than the Starr report about Bill Clinton's sexual peccadilloes. Anticipated by all except the President, that is. This was Chucklehead's worst nightmare come true. Yet again, he has proven to be so completely inept at his life's undertakings that his father's old wizened aides have had to leap into the breach to save Georgie's sorry ass from himself. Only this time, he is sixty years old and at the end of his career road. I am certain that the thing George Bush detests most in life is to be lectured by his father and he has said as much in the past. They don't even talk shop, and his father won his war. This life-long characteristic of the prodigal son, Dubya, attempting to better his more accomplished Dad has become pathological to the most casual observer of psychology. What a tragedy, though, that this Oedipal drama must be played out on the international stage while stability in the world and our soldiers' lives are at stake.

Bush, Sr. went to Yale and played baseball, Dubya was a cheerleader who later owned the whole damn team; Sr. was a war hero, Junior supported the Vietnam War by wearing his Texas National Guard flight jacket on the campuses of those hotbeds of protest, Yale and Harvard; Sr. did well in the oil business, Junior had to be a wildcatter too and have his failed Arbusto Oil company purchased by Harkin Oil, his father's old associates; Sr. was elected, Junior was re-elected. This was because Junior had something not even Senior could abide; Karl Rove. Bush 41 fired Rove for dirty tricks before Rove discovered Junior's magical charisma and decided to make him president. No one knew Rove would upset Poppy's applecart again.

But the most telling and bizarre father-son episode I have seen was earlier this week, when Bush 41 broke down in wracking sobs while delivering a speech at an outgoing ceremony for Florida Governor Jeb Bush. Recalling Jeb's loss to Lawton Chiles in 1994 and vaguely referring to dirty tricks, Bush was overcome with tears and emotion at how honorably Jeb had handled defeat without complaining. Last week, Bush had to defend his son, Dubya, merely as an "honest man" to the foreign press. His emotional display in Florida causes me to believe that he wasn't as distraught over Jeb losing the governorship in '94, as he was that it upset the Bush legacy pecking order and the wrong son went and got himself elected president. And now Poppy has to cover that bounced check. "But Esau was an hairy man." I'd cry, too.

Dubya had himself quite a week, choosing to leave the country, Nixon style, rather than face the withering criticism of his failed Iraq policy. From Latvia to Indonesia and Vietnam, where he posed under a giant relief of Ho Chi Minh in a snappy native costume, he looked particularly ill at ease for someone who likes to play dress-up so much. He has dressed as a cowboy, a construction worker, a jock fighter pilot, and the President. Why should dressing in a silk, yellow gown with blue stars on it disturb him? A fashion reporter asked Bush, "Who are you wearing?" and he said, "Ringling Brothers." All he lacked was a big, round, red nose and a couple of bicycle horns to look like Clarabelle. He has become the Global Village Idiot and reflects that perception upon this country wherever he goes.

Then it was on to Jordan for dinner for two with King Abdullah at a table with three place settings. Can you imagine Lambchop refusing to talk to Shari Lewis? Or Jerry Mahoney not speaking to Paul Winchell? Such was the snub of Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki to Bush after the inner White House Steven Hadley memo calling Maliki a moron was intentionally leaked to the press. Bush had to settle for breakfast with Nuri, instead, because Maliki's strings are not merely pulled by Bush, but Moktada al-Sadr as well. Those Iraqis are just so ungrateful. I wonder if anyone mentioned "light at the end of the tunnel?."

Now the Baker-Hamilton report has repudiated the Bush plan in Iraq and calls for a troop drawdown by 2008. People everywhere hoped this study could serve as political cover for Bush to finally agree to changes in his imperial plans. So how does he react to the tough questioning of the British press about the report? He gets mad. He has the surliness of an drunk who hasn't yet treated the underlying causes of his alcoholism. Bush's performance since the release of the Iraq Study Group report has been that of a a petulant pissant. He is now cornered, and that is when he is most dangerous. His usual response is to lash out at his detractors, regardless of the damage it causes, and if that includes Uncle Jimmy Baker and the last, best hope for a graceful exit from Iraq, then so be it. Bush already plans to dump this mess into the lap of his successor if America survives him. And if you are counting on Bush to express appreciation to his father for throwing him a lifeline that could salvage his presidency, just remember, Bush "answers to a higher father." Dubya's "voices" told him to stay in Iraq until "victory is achieved." How will we know when that transpires, or if he is recommitting troops to their third and fourth tours in Iraq just to piss off Daddy?

First Things First

Glory! There, I celebrated. Now there is serious work to do, the first of which is to block the President's lame duck Congressional initiatives left over from the bad-old days of one party rule. Then in January, when the new Congress is seated, take Speaker Pelosi's advice and don't overly concern yourself with righteous outrage and tie up the government in committees and investigations about cronyism and waste. There are soldiers' lives on the line and the American public voted for the Democrats to find a resolution to the Iraq War. First, find the way to extricate us from the morass of violence that Rumsfeld and his fellow architects of destruction have placed us in. There will be time enough for investigations when this nation gets off the dime and stops with this ridiculous "stay the course" bullshit. Oh, I forgot. They're retiring that slogan with Rumsfeld.

I am pleased to see the British agree with my recommendations, (See "My Exit Strategy;4/7/06) to send Islamic peacekeepers to the streets of Baghdad and remove the bulls eyes from the backs of our volunteers. I am especially pleased that the power to wage war without oversight has been wrested from the Bush/Cheney team by the voters and placed back into the hands of Congress. Thanks to Jim Baker's Iraq Study Group, Bush the Lesser may still salvage a dignified retreat from his self-inflicted, shock-and-awe, cesspool. Although it must be a humiliation for the Bush Power Rangers and discredited neocons to see their power usurped by Poppy's men, and returned to the realists who knew all along that occupying Iraq was a bad idea. Everybody knew but Chucklehead, Cheney, Rove, Rice, Rumsfeld, Wolfe, et. al, who were the true believers in this Faith Based Presidency. As far as our generational Presidential culture wars are going, it's Hippies-1, Jesus Freaks-0. And it will be sweater weather in Hades when another self-confessed Evangelical Conservative Christian is elected.

The new Congress is not yet seated, however, and I am already tired of windbag Joe Biden, and Charlie "Mississippi" Rangel's tough talk about the retribution they intend to deliver. Not that I don't believe that retribution is richly deserved, but let us address the matters of life and death first, starting with replacing our soldiers in Iraq with peacekeepers, either from the region, or from the United Nations. If their troops can stand between Israel and Hezbollah, they can stand between the Sunni and the Shia. An equal priority should be the reconstruction of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast. Although it wasn't funny, it was heartening to see Comic Relief use their donations to build and rent affordable housing in New Orleans areas where city services have not returned. The Dutch built their system of dikes and seawalls for seven billion dollars. We spend that in Iraq in a week.

And let us recognize that Hillary Clinton was right about our broken and corrupted health management industry, but we thought it was presumptuous of her to delve into policy as an unelected official. At least Hillary was trying to bring help to ordinary people. We've seen the Karl Rove attempts at policy making and it makes Hillary look like Joan of Arc. It is an ongoing crime of the deregulation-crazed Republicans since Reagan, that Canada and other nations can provide affordable medicine and health care to its' citizens, and the United States outsources its' public health policies to the HMOs and the pharmaceutical industry. Call it Socialism or whatever you wish, but our present health care system is killing us.

Finally, let the investigations begin. I recall the lazy summer of '73, when I spent nights singing in an airport bar and days watching the Sam Ervin Watergate hearings. They remain the best reality television I have ever seen. So if John Conyers or John Murtha want to open investigations with the power to subpoena people to testify about the crimes of this administration, have at it. I'm sure they will make great entertainment. Seeing an evil liar get his comeuppance is always gratifying. But don't be in a hurry to impeach the President. First, remember any impeachment must be in tandem with all the co-conspirators who have infested government with their greed and lies. No one wants a President Cheney, in title if not in fact. Rather, allow the accumulation of the evidence impeach the President and all of his cronies. This election has rendered Bush irrelevant for the remainder of his two years. But he is an unpredictable radical who is capable of Nixonian insanity.

The filing of charges of war crimes against Donald Rumsfeld by attorneys in Germany whose clients were inmates at Abu Ghraib, proves that no one is immune from prosecution for their actions. If the information revealed by congressional investigation shows that there was a conspiracy to mislead the American people into a ghastly war and it's consequent casualties, the charges may well outlive this administration, but the administration will not outlive the charges. Terrible wrong had been done in the name of the American people, and there must be consequences.
Meanwhile, let no man harm a hair on my president's head. May he and his cabinet stay healthy and hearty for the trials yet to come. Democracy is a beautiful thing when it works. The Hindus believe that it is not only man who possesses karma, but nations, too. I believe we are watching national karma in action. Accountability has returned to government like a snarling, junkyard dog and a whole lot of folks are fixin' to get bit. Secure our nation, protect our military from fool's errands, and rebuild our treasured cities, and there will still be enough time to give Junior the spanking he so richly deserves.

It's the Stupid, War

Well, less than a day now and we'll see if this government rights its course or continues on the expressway to hell. Will you vote for more war, or endless war, or put the grown-ups back in charge? By now, no one is persuadable about who they will vote for and no words from me will make any difference. Who I wish to directly address are the 50% of eligible voters that just can't be bothered. They leave comments on this page all the time about how voting is a waste of time, each party is equally corrupt, the vote is rigged anyway, and one vote doesn't make a difference. There have been suggestions to drop out, start communes, or begin to drink heavily.

I have never understood this reasoning, although George Carlin, among others, professes non-participation. I have voted in every election that I was able because of the one time it would have mattered most, I was unable to vote. This was 1968 and I wanted to vote for Hubert Humphrey against Richard Nixon, but I didn't turn 21 until after Nixon won. I always found it ironic that the vote was granted to 18 year olds under Nixon, because if we had had the vote while attending college, Nixon would never have been elected. Imagine that. The difference between the candidates was only a few 100,000 votes. Voting students might have stopped Nixon and saved the additional 20,000 lives that were lost in Vietnam on his watch. If only.

This go-round, if you are registered to vote but don't bother, you're a fool and don't know it. But I'm here to tell you. This time the election is about peace and war, and life and death. If you're an Evangelical Christian who expects to be "Raptured Up" in the next few years, you already have a dream government and I'd like for you to leave me your car. The confrontation with Iran that I discussed in a previous post did not materialize, but it wasn't because the government wasn't trying. We conducted military maneuvers in dangerous waters only a week before an important election. The Iranians just shot off some intermediate range missiles in return rather than rise to the provocation. But these boys are just itching to do some "shock and awe" in Iran. Bush repeated yesterday that Rumsfeld and Cheney were doing "fantastic jobs," and he wants them on until the end. When the end is, will depend on the independent voter.

It's simple for me. A vote for a Democrat means the policy in Iraq will be reviewed and revised. A vote for a Republican means you're a collaborator. This wasteful war has taken so much more than is shown on TV or the Internet. Here are the most accurate figures to date that aren't discussed. On top of the 2,800 U.S. troops who have died in Iraq, there are an additional 48,000 non-fatal casualties serious enough to disqualify a soldier from further service. That's a whole football stadium full of our soldiers, friends. An astounding 650,000 to 800,000 Iraqi civilians have been killed since the American invasion. This study was done by Johns Hopkins University and the most startling thing is how non-plussed we are as a nation about this hideous number of "collateral" deaths. A further 1.5 million people have fled the violence in Iraq for elsewhere in the world, and because these were people who could afford to get out, they were the professionals and technicians needed to construct a viable nation out of the rubble we have created. In addition, there are as many American private contractors in Iraq as there are soldiers, often doing the same work for twice the money. This obscenity must end.

If you are able to vote and sit this election out, you deserve exactly what you get. The Republicans, for the last four election cycles, have demonstrated great ability in getting their voters to the polls. This election, too, is all about mobilization. Non-voters may not realize that the right wing and Christian conservatives have discovered the way to motivate their supporters and get them to the polls in great numbers. They are counting on you to stay home because the political season was the nastiest in memory. That's why they run those hideous ads; they work. But Karl Rove is not Superman and is not invulnerable. He will once again get the conservatives out en masse, and the only way to counter this is with equal determination from people wanting change. My hope is that every lethargic, cynical, and turned-off voter will wake up and realize this election is different from the rest. This government is using your children to die for a discredited ideology and only you can stop it. Will you? Tomorrow, you have the chance.

Boo!

I wake each day with trepidation knowing that earlier this month Karl Rove promised an "October Surprise" in a speech to his acolytes, and this is the last day of October. I think the preferred surprise would have been lower gas prices or a new record for the Dow, because these are things within the capacity to manipulate. The lower gas prices are due to the huge sell-off in oil futures by hedge funds thinking the Israeli-Hezbollah conflict would have lasted a few days more. The record Dow is just that; a record for the handful of blue chip stocks that make up the Dow-Jones Average. These are good days to own stock in Pfizer and Bristol-Meyers; not so good if you need the medicines they make and lack either the insurance or the means to buy them.

So if not cheap gas and high stock prices, what could Rove come up with that would be the Republican equivalent of the Rebel Yell? Only this; matters of war and peace. Since Chucklehead threw the phrase "stay the course" overboard, could an announced change in tactics be far behind in Iraq? Any timetable for troop withdrawal would please me, regardless of the cynical timing of the announcement. I've long ago given up the delusion that this government would not trifle with the safety of our soldiers for political gain. Especially when the expected death penalty for Saddam Hussein will be announced on Nov.5, in the face of projected riots. But a troop withdrawal alone will not stem the tidal wave of angry voters heading for the GOP, and something more electrifying than the thought of gays marrying must motivate a disillusioned base.

It is of some note that James Baker,III has returned to the White House as co-chair of the Iraq Study Group, a group of Poppy's Wizened Old Fixers who always kick in the door and take over whenever Junior has lost his way and needs rescuing by the grown-ups. So it wouldn't surprise me if Baker announced a plan for drastic changes in not merely Iraq, but the "War President's" cabinet as well. This may placate some conservatives, but it won't happen until after the election. The spookiest specter of them all is Henry Kissinger wandering around the West Wing, hands forever stained by the blood of Laotians and Cambodians, giving advice to President Cheney. Is there anyone remaining who does not see the parallels to Vietnam, including the very real possibility of a wider war in the Middle East? If not, here is a ghoulish scenario that only the Frankenstinian minds of Cheney/Rummy/Kissinger might have dreamed up.

All month I have been reading reports, the most alarming by former New York Times Middle East bureau chief Chris Hedges,

that speak of a large build-up of US warships in the Persian Gulf and the Straits of Hormuz near Iran. This flotilla includes aircraft carriers, guided-missile cruisers and destroyers, and fast attack submarines. This was done quietly since only tonight did CNN, of all the news networks, announce the presence of US warships in the Gulf for an "exercise to potentially intercept WMD." Would that be coming into, or going out of, Iran?

Bob Woodward has described Dr. Strangelove Kissinger in interviews as "getting to re-fight the Vietnam War" these days. In 1972, he said, "Peace is at hand," and then began secret saturation bombings involving three countries. But while our ships are on an "exercise" off the coast of Iran, I am reminded of how the whole terrible Vietnam War began; with the Tonkin Gulf Resolution of 1964, after an attack on US warships was fabricated by a hawkish Defense Department for political purposes. If the Bush's follow the LBJ mold, which worked once, any provocation, real or imagined, by Iran against our soldiers while they are rattling the administration's saber, will be considered the gravest of threats to mankind. Then when a "Cuban Missle Crisis" scenario is developed and a blockade against Iran is formed, Bush gets to attempt to re-enact a genuine JFK moment while a breathless nation watches on TV and decides to go to the polls and dance with those that brung 'em. With power at stake, anything is possible.

The brink of nuclear war is a sure enough scary Halloween trick, but with the possibility of Congressional investigations on the line, WWKD?(Karl). I hope President Shemp is forced to take the James Baker avenue. Baker, even though he lawyered Bush into the White House, is much less scary than the present occupants of the cabinet. Especially Dr. Evil; Dick "The Merciless". This evening when my doorbell rings, we have chocolate goodies for the trick-or-treaters. But if I open the door and see a group of children dressed as Bush, Cheney, Condi, Rove, and Rummy, I trust my wife will have the portable defibrillator nearby. In fact, with the ghost of Richard Nixon still haunting the White House, it might be a good idea to keep it close all week long. Happy Halloween, everyone. Trick or treat?

Jake "Fredo" Ford

After the last televised debate between the candidates for Tennessee's 9th Congressional District, I was enraged that Jake Ford, the "Fredo" of the Ford family, continues in his race-driven quest to siphon votes away from the rightly elected representative of his party, Steve Cohen. But after watching Jake Ford's press conference on WMC-TV, (the link for the whole thirteen minute mess is here: http://www.wmctv.com/global/video ,type in search for "Jake Ford"),my anger has turned to bemusement over the Ford Family Follies. In thirteen short minutes, I was convinced that Jake Ford is so slimy that he leaves a grease trail behind him when he walks, like a slug. This would all be a joke if he were not receiving the backing of Rev. LaSimba Gray and other prominent ministers, and leading voices in the community like Walter Bailey.

Don't the Fords believe that Junior has enough of a fight without the embarrassing electoral chicanery of his family? And doesn't Harold Ford, Sr. understand that this election is far too vital to the Democratic Party and the nation without his attempt to further enrich himself and his lobbying business by ensuring a son serves in each chamber, even though one is grossly unqualified? Only yesterday, (10/11), The Commercial Appeal had a front-page story on questions of impropriety between Harold Ford, Sr.'s business clients and their favors to Harold, Jr. Are the Fords so deluded as to believe that the Corker campaign won't go negative on them as well? Ford, Jr. bristles at the mention of his family by his opponent, yet his father is a lobbyist in D.C., his Uncle stands indicted, his Aunt was bounced from the State Legislature, his cousin Joe, Jr. was defeated in the Democratic primary, and now brother Jake threatens a once secure Democratic seat in the Congress with a vanity run. Harold Ford, Sr. is risking the labor of thirty-five years' worth of bi-racial cooperation within the Democratic Party for his personal purposes.

The outstanding Jake Ford press conference quote after admitting he was arrested "about" four times in Washington, D.C. for marijuana possession, ("It wasn't mine!"), assault, and DUI, he claimed, "There was never a conviction because there was never any proof throughout the process I'd done anything criminally wrong." He should have just gone ahead and blamed Clinton. When reporters asked why he didn't come forward sooner with this information, Ford shot back, "It's public information. You all have always had this information, but again, it was my opponent, Steve Cohen, who alerted you to it." Well, thank you Steve Cohen for pointing out a congressional candidate's arrest record. Ford certainly wasn't going to do those reporters' jobs for them. The Republican candidate, Mark White, owned up to the fact that he had been in trouble with the law as well over a tax "dispute" with the Tenn. Department of Revenue. With this bunch, Cohen's campaign slogan could well be, "I've Never Been Arrested."

My friends have accused me in the past of being what's known as a "Yellow Dog Democrat." If you didn't know, it means that I would prefer to vote for an old yellow dog over a Republican. I understand the importance of every single vote for the Senate seat being vacated by "Dollar Bill" Frist. But I have decided that unless Harold Ford, Jr. endorses the Democratic candidate, Steve Cohen, for Congress, or Jake Ford withdraws his candidacy, I will not vote for Ford. I won't be voting for Frist's man Corker either but I might write in Prince Mongo, the perennial protest candidate. If enough people become vocal, perhaps the Fords will come to their senses and realize a Ford in the Senate is better that two Fords working for their daddy's corporate clients until the next election cycle.

And should you believe my enmity towards the Fords is racial, I would point out that Cohen has received the endorsements of both Mayors Herenton and Wharton. In reference to Jake Ford's candidacy, Mayor Herenton said, "His qualifications are nowhere appropriate for him to represent the 9th Congressional District when compared to Steve Cohen." Herenton added, "I'm sick of the Fords." So am I. And should Junior lose to Corker as a result of his father's reckless choices, I will re-double my efforts in two years to see that Congressman Cohen is re-elected to the House of Representatives, and that the Ford political dynasty of Memphis, Tennessee, finally comes to an end.

Ford, Sr.'s Last Trick

I watched the television debate tonight by the three candidates running to represent Tennessee's Ninth District, Democrat Steve Cohen, Republican Mark White, and "Independent Democrat" Jake Ford, and I am upset. Not with my candidate Senator Cohen; he was succinct, knowledgeable, and showed a mastery over the issues; explained how he was the "real" Democrat in the race, and pointed out every falsity the Ford machine has thrown at him, all the while expressing his support for Junior's Senatorial bid. Cohen also refused to rise to the bait when young Ford attempted to distort his record, and Jake "Fraud" could only say in rebuttal, "he's too liberal, liberal, liberal." What a day when a candidate from the Ford family attempts to paint his opponent as "too liberal," for the District.

I backed Cohen in 1996 when he lost the congressional seat to Harold Ford, Jr. and was disappointed at his statements that a white candidate could not get fair consideration in the African-American community. Cohen has said in this campaign that his remarks ten years ago were from frustration and disappointment, but he has never wavered in his support for all candidates fairly elected in the Democratic Primary. After last night's debate, perhaps Cohen's election analysis of 1996 was more accurate than anyone thought. When Joe Ford, Jr. is fairly beaten in the primary, but Harold Ford, Sr. places his unqualified and undereducated son, Jake, in the general election as an independent stop-gap to preserve the family seat, there is something racist and obscene about such tactics that should be harshly dealt with not just from the State Democratic Committee, but from the DNC itself.

The headline of the debate came from Republican Mark White, and it's a slogan Cohen should use for the remainder of this campaign. When asked by Norm Brewer how he felt about Ford's independent candidacy, White replied, "I'm tickled pink that Jake Ford is in this race." And he looked it too, both pink and tickled. Ford claims to be an "Independent Democrat" and he has the backing of a group of ministers as well as some community leaders that actually don't feel that Cohen is too liberal for the district, he's too white. That's the self-admitted excuse for this group's allegiance to Jake Ford's candidacy, and Harold Ford, Sr.'s influence.

I have voted in every election since 1972, and some of those votes were for Harold Ford, Sr., Otis Higgs, D'Army Bailey, Willie Herenton, and A C Wharton. I have never felt these gentlemen were too "black" to represent me, and deserved my vote because of their qualifications. I did not vote for Junior in 1966 and I have been dismayed with the number of times he has voted with the Republican majority. The source of my disappointment in Junior's voting record is that I feel he really doesn't agree with the Patriot Act, for instance, but he does it because he is ambitious and eager to please the conservative voters of middle and east Tennessee. But how are you going to out-conservative a Bush man like Corker? Junior's strategy is to have his more "liberal" voters understand him while he conducts himself like another Joe Lieberman in dealing with the Bush regime, and his true Democratic colors will emerge once he's elected; unless, of course, he begins compromising his values in an immediate run at the Presidency.

I propose a remedy. After Frist, no one wants "Frist Lite." So my plan was always to hold my nose and vote for Ford. But I don't like it, and I am not above withholding my vote for him in the Senate until or unless he backs Cohen for the Congress. Although the latest polls show Ford, Jr. up a few points in his race, I would like for Democrats to insist through their local, state, and national committees, that if Harold Ford, Sr. doesn't cease and desist with his manipulation of the election in the Ninth District by attempting to split the Democratic vote, then real Democrats will withhold their votes for Junior in the Senate. This cynical maneuver to sneak his son into Congress' by undermining Cohen's candidacy is all about Harold Ford, Sr.'s power as a lobbyist in Washington and not for the betterment of the district, but for the family Ford.

In reality, Democrats have their best chance to reclaim power in the House rather than the Senate in November, and Cohen was a prohibitive favorite until the Jake Ford trick. Harold, Jr. has a tougher race and needs all the votes from West Tennessee that he takes for granted that he already has. Every Democrat should demand the support of their party for Senator Cohen. And I don't believe it is too much to demand party discipline for Harold Ford, Sr., who after all, built his political dynasty through the efforts of the Democratic Party. The party should unequivocally back their candidates straight down the line, and if they are too afraid of the Ford machine to act, the voters should take it upon themselves. I favor circulating an online petition, of which I will be the first signee, that says in effect to Harold Ford, Sr. that if you continue to push an independent candidate merely because his name is Ford, I will refuse to vote for another candidate merely because his name is Ford, and I mean Junior. I would prefer throwing the Senatorial election to Corker before I allow Harold Ford, Sr. to be the Ralph Nader of Memphis, and pass off another dubious member of his family as someone who is dedicated to public service, when opportunism is his sole motivation.

The petition should be forwarded to Democratic Party offices and precincts in the entire state. Democratic voters should be aware that Harold Ford, Sr. is using all his influence and power to see that one Ford enters Congress through the front door, while the other enters through the back. I will not stand for it. Neither should you. There are thirty days left to become vocal on this issue. Cohen did his job at the debate. It's time for true Democrats not to just speak up, but shout it out loud, "No support for Cohen? Then no support for Junior."