Ichabod's Kin
A place for politics, pop culture, and social issues

Apr
23

The Power that Dares Not Speak Its Name

2 Comments

The past week called to mind the anniversary in 1912 when the world’s greatest metaphor hit an iceberg–and our ax deadline. The latter refers to the power that dares not speak its name: that of government  to levy and collect such duty. That of course was before modern so-called conservatism, lacking coherent ideas by which to inspire and govern, decreed that taxes are but unwanted pustules on the body politic.

It is easy to view taxes as democracy’s demon necessity because they are easy targets, as in the truism, “nothing’s sure but death and taxes” (to which may be added. that a Kenyan will win the Boston marathon). Well, yup. With great privileges go certain responsibilities which, by the way, are not as great as we think.

We are the least taxed of all modern societies but you wouldn’t think so, since the wingnuts–of whom there seem to be a frightful number in the land today–began to wag and gag about them, ad infinitum, ad nauseum, their first complaint being that we were overtaxed–before moving on to the complaint of being taxed at all. Many believers in wealth really don’t care if the U.S. were to become a banana republic of a rich few and the rest poor–as long as they are among the former.

The less people have in terms of wealth, the more they feel the pinch of taxes but such is, in truth, a scapegoat. What’s hurting us more are interest rates–or what was called “usury” in the old days, and that’s how conservatives got rich and richer: by gouging consumers through mortgages, loans and other lending. But so far they’ve dodged that rap and distracted voters with loud beefs about taxes.

Hence the great divide in America. Imagine for a moment two children of the same family. One identifies with rich people: i.e., wants to be one of them, and is an easy mark for the rhetoric that other people are poor because they deserve to be. The other child identifies with the poor, which is not to say wants to be poor, but considers poverty an unjust condition in a society as wealthy as ours. When all is said and done, the financial status of the two may be negligible though they were committed to opposite ends of the economic spectrum.

This is the state of America today: many people who work hard but are subject to harsh realities of the economy fail to realize that the rich have created a financial game, or club, that is difficult to break into. When the working poor fail to do so, they buy the fat cats’ rhetoric that it’s because they are over-taxed and too much is given, undeservedly, to the poor in the form of welfare and other entitlements. When the ruse works, the working poor tend to vote with the rich.

The really poor live with a different reality: that regardless of economic conditions, they will remain poor because the gulf between them and financial well-being is an even bigger stretch, and the rules even harsher.

Regardless of rhetoric, a certain political creed wants to do away with taxation altogether. Be not fooled by the jibberish of those who call for “limited taxation.” Look closely and you will realize that they would quash taxation completely if they could but get away with it. In their minds, the cry for fewer taxes is but a first step to getting rid of all of them, expressed often as the wish to get rid of the IRS.

The meaning of taxes is that we are all in this together. We do not need to be rid of taxes; we need tax reform. As Obama goes about this delicate surgery, you can hear the howls and screeches from those whose wealth is harmed neither by taxation nor recessions: they just don’t want to part with a single dime of what is so much easier for them to get than it is for others.

Greed is a terrible thing. Witness all the Enron-type messes and, more lately, AIG-type crashes and Goldman Sachs mischief–not to mention the need to bring us all back from the brink of disaster by means of bailouts.

Fareed Zakaria has suggested, and not without merit, that we could join those hundred nations that have a national sales tax of less than 20%, which would indeed allow a drop in income tax rates and add hundreds of billions yearly to our coffers. Or, like no few Scandanavian countries that have enjoyed as much growth as ours for over thirty years, we could have value-added taxes as high as 25% that would pay for our health care and do away with income taxes for those who earn less than $100K.

The problem however is to manage being heard over the shrieks of right-wingers who, having nothing in common with the average American, are adept at scaring the hell out of them.

But there’s nothing wrong with taxation. It’s okay to say the word. We just need the right kind.

Categorized in Politics and Social Issues
Tags: , , ,

Apr
20

Tea and No Sympathy

Leave a Comment

Freud did not say we are just a herd animal. He said we are one with a leader. And therein is the solvent of the celebrated and so-called Tea Party, running on angry fumes whilst hoping and praying for a figurehead. Sarah Palin’s not it, since she’ll take anybody’s money in exchange for a whoopee-speech. They are also looking in other wrong places–among them, notably, the Republican Party.

A foreign visitor asked if the Tea Baggers have the makings of a third party in America; I said no: masquerading as “independent,” they are parasites looking for a host to which to attach themselves. Thank god it’s not the Democrats; the GOP, on the other hand, plays with fire by jumping in on their parades in hopes of snatching a vote or two.

Put another way, the Baggers are Republicans in Independent drag, like Scott Brown, as we now know. When they say throw out the entire government and Congress, they mean Democrats, of which Obama is the face. Everything is their and his fault when in truth the Bag Ladies and Gents are ten years and two presidential terms late with their bile and bluster, having sat on their hands while George W fought wars in the wrong places and sprang the first Stimulus on us. But, oh, never mind.

After all, memories are short when you’re having a good time, busin’ everywhere, waving hostile posters, and pretending to know all about political theory. At heart, “Down With Up” is just about the gist of their nasty little revolution: throw everything up in the air and let God sort it out. I’m reminded of my interview with premier Ky of South Vietnam following that war; after a series of ass-kickings by the North, he discovered that his defense minister’s strategy was based on astrological charts. Political astrology may well be at work in those given to the bitter tea of our day and time .

America was blind-sided by the Tea Party and it is only natural they are still trying to understand it, albeit in an atmosphere of tension and bullying on the part of the latter. It is hardly the first time impudence has intruded on the body politic and this too shall pass, like Spirit Rapping and, more scarily, the Commie witch-hunt led by the drunken, brain-damaged gambling addict, Sen. Joe McCarthy. We need someone like the Army’s Joe Welch and his celebrated retort of many years ago, to say today to our modern Party-ers: have you no decency, sirs and ladies; have you at last no decency?

Had they a real message and plausible solutions, they would certainly have gained at least our thoughtful attention, especially if accompanied by respect for other citizens. But, no, they arrived in cities and towns, ganged up outside meetings of, yes, Democrats, verbally slapping them with jeers and taunts. Why? Because they have no manners and were looking for a fight from the git-go. The rest of us stay away from all such behavior of both the right and the left because we’re careful who we run with.

When divisive elements emerge in societies, it means they were there all along but suddenly found each other. Emboldened by numbers (though a minority) they let fly with irresponsible and reprehensible behavior, each egging on the other with their antics.

At present the Tea Party is flush with apparent success. The rest of society is being civil; they are not. Tea and No Sympathy. They’ve had no setbacks– yet, and the day is coming that we will see how they handle such. In truth, they are riding a wave of shock at measures that were necessary to correct Bush’s Folly. But as the economy rights itself, jobs return and the stock market returns to health, their message will fall on deaf ears. Then when asked if they were once tea-drinkers, they will blush with embarrassment and change the subject.

History will see this as the era of Americans Behaving Badly. For now, the Tea Party will press its takeover of the GOP, a not-so-odd couple but one that will get odder by the day. Certainly they deserve each other.

History is irony if nothing else. Dick Nixon proclaimed a “Silent Majority” that, at last, amounted to nothing. It would be ironic to the max if, in November, those who have been silent while the Baggers misbehaved, were to surprise them by throwing out the real bums in Congress. My money’s on that, since much can happen between now and then.

So go ahead, Bag ladies and gents: wake the sleeping giant.

Categorized in Politics
Tags: , , , , , , ,

Apr
17

The Truth About Sarah

6 Comments

That Palin gal’s a piece of work. She was already on the ropes as guv of the Frozen State and would’ve quit anyway after her most recent term–now she’s the toast of the (tea) party: here, there and everywhere, speakin’, talkin’, cheerin’, signin’ books and stuffin’ dough in her bloomers.

She’s “a brand plucked from the burning,” if ever there was one, courtesy of John McCain’s Straight Talk Express as it headed toward its doom. His very gray campaign was going nowhere but down, and he fancied that a little spice would at least make the inevitable somewhat endurable.

So he foisted Sarah on us and the rest, unfortunately, is not only history but–god help us–the forseeable future. I liked the ol’ trucker-guy voice that Robin Williams put on to say raspily, “Mmmm…yeah, I can vote for that.” At a McCain rally in Tucson, with Sarah in tow, one woman told national tv she was really voting for McCain’s opponent. “You’re just here to see Sarah, aren’t you?” asked the interviewer. To which she rplied, “You betcha.”

Sarah has various things going for her, none of which will help any decent Republican running for office, since she’s succeeded Hillary Clinton as the most polarizing person in American politics. But two, um, virtues strike a chord to the broader audience: one is sex appeal, and the other her being, in truth, a different kind of Old Fashioned Woman.

As we know from past female tv anchors and Hollywood hotties, the first is a slippery slope indeed: Sarah Palin will be timing out about when Sarah Jessica Parker does. That this is unfair is patently clear but also a harsh and unrelenting truth, given another built-in timer, that of the American male who likes to shag such gals for a while but later can’t seem to find their phone numbers.

As for a different kind of woman: surely we all knew that behind the feminist parade first led by Gloria Steinem would be that of Ann Coulter and her ilk. People already forget Gloria’s name, sorta like the Third Tenor; and Coulter, though more current, grates a lot of people–regardless of politics–like chalk-squawk on a blackboard.

Enter gun-slingin’, moose stew-cookin’, quick-with-a-quip Sarah: did she not exist, we would have had to invent her. Her kind has always been around, say, the southern U.S., but never got anywhere because they weren’t seen as lady-like. Their real liability was they didn’t have Sarah’s gams, either.

But times have changed, and feminism did not guess that the gauntlet it threw down to women in general, hoping to inspire their allegiance, would be picked up by gals who had absolutely nothing in common with it but hoped dearly for a voice they could recognize and own.

So now they’ve got her and couldn’t be happier. They dream of being Sarah, of looking like her in hotpants and of stickin’ it to da Man–meaning, we think, men who aren’t their kind of guy. But the hunks in their slice of Americana still tend toward the insensitive sort that pays no real attention to them, and always count on the li’l wifey to know the right moment to back down and not throw the Old World Order into a tailspin: to wit, a non-threatening new kinda gal.

All of which is to say that Sarah’s followers are not really fighting  liberals and Democrats, but for their own prospects–and for their own men, for whom their hopes spring eternal, but men who will tolerate their efforts as long as a chick like Sarah’s leading the pack. For now, if Palin wants them to cheer for right-wing rhetoric, they will, but that has a timer on it, too, and if Sarah doesn’t know that, she needs to read the fine print in her political playbook: the Fates that cast Sarah into the spotlight are as fickle as those that served men in the past.

There is so much that will come to a head between now and midterm elections. No doubt everyone will pay a price and take their lumps. For now we abide the circus underway, but one thing is for sure: no one really stands a chance except those who have the best long-term, strategic, and realistic plan. Playing to emotions and following flashes in the pan, however, will bring the greatest heartbreak of all.

The greatest irony falls on McCain. As he and Sarah sat together at his rally, it brought to mind what Jon Stewart called a photo op from the Visiting Nurse program. Time may be a great healer but it’s a lousy damned beautician, and John is the latest notable victim.

Fifty years ago McCain was unarguably a hero. Now he relies for help on a little tart whom her followers think is a better man than he is.

That too has gotta hurt.


Categorized in Politics
Tags: , , ,

Apr
09

Baseball Is Not Too Big to Fail

Leave a Comment

Spring is in the air, as is the repulsive scent of performance-enhancing drugs–temporarily in disuse but awaiting the go-ahead to resume juicing.

We used to think baseball was the cleanest of sports–certainly the easiest for fans to monitor: players are yards apart except for brief intervals– compared to basketball where players are always at push-and-shove range and we wouldn’t know most fouls were it not for the refs. Football is a blur of flying bodies and even replays on 46-inch home tv leave us wondering exactly who-done-what on any given down.

Oh, baseball’s had its moments, beginning with the Black Sox, but memories are short, not to mention dulled by beer, and we forgive easily if the the game will just resume so we can forget our lives of quiet desperation.

Two things regarding players are hard to see with the naked eye: 1) bribes and betting–and 2) juicing, which affords a leg up on other players. But you could be blind in one eye and unable to see out of the other and still know when A-Rod went from his already Adonis-like body to that of the half-man, half-horse of myth and fable. I waited for announcers to mention he had become twice his size, and to joke that maybe he was putting in extra hours at the Yankee’s gym, but they have jobs to hang onto, so we need not look for truth, let alone courage, from announcers’ booths .

Thus A-Rod continued to cut a fine figure at the plate for his adoring crowds, as did Jason Giambi and of course Andy Pettitte on the mound–till fate caught up with them. But after a brief gasp from the public and near heart-attacks from the lords of major league ball, all continued their merry way, Barry Bonds, Manny Ramirez and others in tow. The lesson was not: stop the cheating in baseball! but “I’ll hold up the rug and you sweep this crap under it.”

At this point I pause to honor all those dads who hate this kind of talk, insisting that we must turn our heads and shut up because our precious kids must not lose their faith in this grand old game that is so wonderful to see. From whence cometh this brand of ethics, I have no idea, but will say that when we teach kids to ignore truth for the sake of appearances, we’re doing them no favors whatever. Tell them rather of Bart Giamatti, the late baseball comish, whose name should be over the gate to every major league stadium because he blew the whistle on the most sacred of cows, Pete Rose, and stood up to a storm of criticism that I am convinced is what killed Giamatti.

And while I’m knocking our selective memories, I remind us of Bart’s gutsy predecessor, Pete Ueberroth, who in the mid-1980s invoked a series of sanctions against players involved with “cocaine and other drugs” in response to trial testimony of six players regarding a Phillies caterer who sold coke to payers.

Ueberroth was convinced that drug abuse by players was a “serious threat to baseball’s standing with the American people,” and vowed to “eliminate drugs from baseball (and) be relentless until that is done.” Players Joaquin Andujar (A’s), Dale Berra (Yanks), Keith Hernandez (Mets), Jeff Leonard (Giants), Dave Parker (Reds) and Lonnie Smith (Royals) were cited as having “a prolonged pattern of drug use and…in some cases facilitated distribution.”

Ueberroth offered to withhold their suspension for the ‘86 season–IF the players agreed to donate 10% of their salaries to antidrug programs, take part in 100 hours of antidrug community programs for two years, and submit to random tests through the balance of their careers. All Hernandez idolizers out there: please recall that he got the largest fine–$135,000 on a salary of $1.35 million. After first threatening not to comply he quickly and wisely relented.

Such leadership is the kind that can save baseball–if allowed to, but here’s the kicker: Ueberroth also ordered random testing for all employees of baseball, including management (and for minor league players) but was blocked by the players’ union and its exec director Don Fehr (may his name live in infamy). Thankfully, such was not the consensus among all players, a number of whom voluntarily submitted to tests–the Orioles doing so as a team.

Whoever thinks baseball is too big to fail is living in a dream world, but the current bosses of the game, via delay tactics and reliance on the unethical tolerance of American fans, are striving mightily to let all big fish off the hook.

If they succeed, not only will we witness the death of a great American game, but its demise will be a slow and agonizing one.

Categorized in Sports
Tags: , , , , , , , , ,

Mar
25

Here Come Da Judge(ment)

1 Comment

We moderns despise the notion of judgment. To our minds, no one is Up There watching and there are no paybacks. But something there is that likes to imagine both ultimate comeuppance and just reward–and more than just “bad” and “good” cholesterol.

That the foregoing requires a Mr. (or Ms.) Big (as the case may be) in charge tempts also the notion that such god, being good, would tend to let people off, a la a permissive parent, while “natural” justice would be deservedly harsh. This is based on the idea that natural justice derives from what humanity, over its long journey, has fashioned into necessary standards– like laws, rules and policies. Such justice would be, at the least, tough love, by cracky, and not to be messed with.

The fun begins with breakage of standards–e.g., lies…no, more than that: political lies, since the latter prejudices the larger number of people. This is a timely suggestion, given our long national nightmare that began with last year’s Town Hall Meetings from Hell, to the rise of the Tea Party, and now finds its full flower in the current legislative blocking of health care reform. At the center of this obfuscation has been FauX News and its pseudo-journalists, all in harmony and in lockstep with GOP/Republican/conservative/right-wing/wing-nut rhetoric.

Exhibit A in this jackassery are the aged. Jon Stewart, bless his soul, and his Daily Show staff, are the only ones who avoid what St. Exupery said of the media: that they do not report “matters of importance.” Stewart showed how the GOP and FauX News has been on a tight script from which none deviate–use of words to describe the president’s health bill like, “ram…shove…push” and ending with “down our throats.”

This has been repeated on every FoX broadcast by anchors, commentators, and political guests for the benefit of its vast swarm of impressionable listeners; at last it was possible to interview nursing and retirement home residents and hear them regurgitate the same spiel. These are known of course as the Repetition and Bandwagon effects, the irony being that these same elderly have long benefited from, and will continue to, terrible “socialist” programs like Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

This is a far departure from the days of Rep. Claude Pepper (but who remembers him?) who educated his Floridian retirees to vote for and protect their real self-interests. But the Big Lie has since taken root, and die-hard capitalists for whom there is no end to greed, have convinced average people, for whom they care not a fig, that it is possible to have a world without taxes and to trust only Republicans with interest rates.

I apologize for simplifying the dumbing-down of America as a one-year siege. My bad not to mention Lee Atwater, the GOP creator of the politics of personal destruction, or fail to harken to their 1964 national convention when Nelson Rockefeller’s speech was drowned out by yelling and foot-stomping crazies whose antics foretold the future of political discourse in the U.S. No wonder that Roger Ailes and Pat Buchanan always called Reagan a “sweetheart”: Ronnie was well-taught to read a script and when handed one by them, could be wound up and turned loose to deliver it with  flourish and fervency.

It is curious that only two years ago the populace was clamoring for health care reform–until the right wing began to scare them with untruths and misrepresentations, and with the mantra that ours was, very suddenly, “the best health care system in the world.” And foreign policy, long a conservative concern, goes unmentioned now that Obama has his administration and the military on the same page with a reasonable plan in which both have had part. Compared this with George W’s abrupt beginning to his infamous “call to war in Iraq” cabinet meeting by daring Sec. Powell with, “Well, Colin, are ya with me er not?” There’s leadership for you, and from the lips of an eternal frat boy.

Now the worst for last: once Republicans lost a crucial vote on the Congressional reform bill, it’s no surprise that with their minions whipped into a fury, heightened rhetoric from the Tea Party, and Sarah Palin calling for a “re-load,” threats of personal harm were unleashed on ten Democratic legislators, and that’s just for starters. Should any of this come to pass, file it under Domestic Terrorism.

So we’ve hit rock bottom and it’s time to twelve-step (or however many it takes) to sober up our drunken politics. We’ve sown the wind and reaped the whirlwind.

It’s judgment time. The judge has come. And may we come to our senses.

Categorized in Politics
Tags: , , , , , ,

Mar
23

See, I Told You So

2 Comments

Busting Scott Brown’s Chops

Forgive me for borrowing the title of a Rush Limbaugh book (“See, I Told You So,” but for years he’s been snitching pages from the life and career of Father James Coughlin, who savaged FDR while people cheered, so let’s call it even. Note however that FDR is now a giant in the American pantheon and Coughlin virtually forgotten.

What I’m recalling is my comment a while ago, after the Tea Party came to my small New England town and, to show how mature they are, held an abusive shout-out at Democrats arriving at a rally. I always thought that peaceful assembly was an American right, but not anymore. I suggested that, in victory, Scott Brown would have to find a way to deal with the Baggers because they are, in the first place, politically ugly and, secondly, will turn on him as quickly as they turned out for him.

So here’s the I-told-you-so: the trash-talking Tea crowd is already busting Brown’s chops for doing what he said he would do–try to break the logjam in Congress.

And that’s what’s so telling about these miscreants. I don’t know where Brown will end up politically but clearly he has a tiger by the tail: the Tea-and-No Sympathy folks had claimed that all they wanted was someone who would forswear politics as usual and just Do the Right Thing. Well, did and did. And what is their reaction?–as if a sewer had backed up.

To wit, it’s not a good idea to read his mail if you have a weak stomach. These people who imagine themselves as do-gooders and super- patriots are not just calling Brown every name in the book, they’re issuing a second edition: how dare he vote to prevent filibuster against a jobs bill! How dast he, in any way, shape or form, vote now and then with Democrats! Don’t look now, but he’s getting both personal and political threats–and not of the mild variety.

Some very offended local Tea-tasters objected to my remarks and insinuated by letters to the editor that the movement was merely the voice of the people having become the voice of God. I knew that wasn’t the case but imagine my surprise when it took only one of Scotty’s first votes to morph his supercilious supporters into Former Followers. This is where anger gets you, especially when there are no rational thoughts to go with it.

America is a constant lesson in civics. Dictatorship, without a doubt, is the most efficient form of government; thankfully we are heir to all the risks and hazards of democracy. But both sides must be aired, and patience is a virtue. The tea that our current Citizens-Behaving-Badly are drinking is of a cheap kind: hanging it on one’s fishing cap is just another lure with a hook in it. All we need do is to refrain from biting.

So another told-you-so is next to come: my warning that Brown’s electrifying first appearance in the Senate would soon become low-watt. The radical right, you recall, nearly puked up their socks when Al Franken finally got the nod in Minnesota after Norm Coleman petulantly held out at great expense to the people there. Everyone thought that the 60 Majority he supposedly carried in with him would turn us all into–gasp! a Soviet state. And look what happened: who thinks of Al Franken anymore, and where’s the feared Commie Country West?

Things are never as they seem, and in no time Scott Brown will still be all the talk in Massachusetts, as he should be–after all, he’s their Senator–but not much of anywhere else. Besides, he has a spanking yet to come, this time from his new Senate cohorts who don’t cotton (sorry, one of my Southern-isms), uh, “clam” to young upstarts in their bailiwick.

For one thing, he will soon have Mitch McConnell, he of the inimitable verbal slurp, dish out words of reproach and our Centerfold find himself bumped into line real quickly. At such point, I’d advise him not to attempt an impression by shedding his clothes in those hallowed halls: that would be, well, just another freaky day in Congress, and his little truck would be needed for a fast getaway, schtick shift and all.

As for the Bag ladies and gents, they’re already stepping on their own tongues. Their nasty notes and discourtesies will be around a bit longer, but there’s many a slip twixt the cup and the lip–and god forbid the hot tea spills in their laps.

Then when you see them jump up wildly, it won’t be because they’re cheering.


Categorized in Politics
Tags: , ,

Mar
19

Return of the Tiger

3 Comments

The meaning of celebrity, and who ought to be whose heroes.

The world is at odds with itself over the imminent return of Tiger Woods. Golfers are united in the conviction that it’s the best of all worst worlds–else, no one will care, let alone watch the PGA. All others are split over the morality of the occasion, not to mention events surrounding last Thanksgiving.

There’s not a little posturing over all of this; in extreme cases it’s known as self-righteousness. When it was rumored that Elin had banged his noggin with a golden nine-iron, after what surely was an opulent feast of turkey followed by her becoming privy to his flagrant texting to various and sundry little tarts scattered about lush resorts left in his wake, it was deemed to be a matter of justice rendered in good measure. Of course, had she been the betrayer, and Tiger had busted her chops with as little as a stalk of cooked asparagus, the PC Police would have said that no sin on the part of a woman deserved violence on behalf of the man.

As said in an earlier Post, tell the public to do something, and they won’t; tell them not to, and they will, especially when it comes to beloved celebrities, except when given an excuse to stop loving them–to which was added the postscript: Ain’t love grand?

Another ongoing hypocrisy has to do with the “obligation” Tiger has–besides to his adoring, free moral agents over twenty-one–to the children of this world who ostensibly have no real heroes save a singular golfer amid the mass of those on pro tour. Few if any such moralists suggest that kids strive to be their own heroes, let alone have parents to take up the cause. Parents, feeling already overwhelmed with issues of child-raising, prefer that this duty fall to others outside their families.

I risk repeating that Tiger’s gift is both blessing and curse, with the added burden of being everybody’s hero, in the absence of others who have abdicated the role.

Along with Tiger’s being also a “brand” that is ogled and bought, when something goes wrong at his house, as it does in yours and mine, we believe that such investment makes us the Morality Police for incidents in his abode, but not in our own.

I have lost no sleep over his loss of endorsement income and care not a fig that various vast corporations that happily embraced Tiger as a Cash Cow have since abandoned ship. Stay tuned, because once he wins another tournament, they will be back with hats in hand.

As for our beloved children, whom we deem eminently resilient regarding our shortcomings but not those of others, I repeat: how about the idea that their lives aren’t dependent on any celebrity, but on themselves; or that if we insist they have heroes, to be such for them. And if we can’t, why not?

They’re our kids, so it’s our job, not Tiger’s.

Categorized in Sports
Tags: ,

Mar
08

Once More for the Oscars

1 Comment

The Oscars 2010

You could swear that watching one night of the Oscars is to see a lifetime of them. Celebrity, we know, is America’s way of re-creating royalty: somewhere in our DNA we miss what we had when we were unborn and British, but they don’t run it all up the flagpole as often as we do–the Brits have to have a Royal wedding, funeral or a new monarch to match what we do every year.

A good way to vastly improve the Oscars is to get rid of the overdone Red Carpet walk–a parade of senselessness and trite conversation–unoriginal interviewers repeatedly fawning, “Can I say first that you’re just beautiful… stunning…gorgeous…” Oh, gag us with a spoon. As if Hollywood’s not the first place where those blessed with fairy-tale looks don’t go when they take the first stagecoach out of Dodge. Walk around Tinseltown for a day and even beauty begins to lose its value. With apologies to Mae West, too much of a good thing is not always wonderful, but don’t tell that to those for whom celebrity rescues from what Thoreau called “lives of quiet desperation.”

Given all the money thrown at this sextravaganza, you’d think they’d get everything absolutely right. So the real fun is knowing that heads will roll for screw-ups like this year’s failure to mention Farrah Fawcett among the Dearly Departed. And there were lines that cried out to be said but weren’t–like neglecting to add that Michael Jackson didn’t die–he melted.

And why does anyone want to Host these vile annual proceedings, but apparently the world holds its breath to see what the next comic will do with the task. Of course, we know Steve Martin will deliver–as will Robin Williams as long as he’s on something.

But I’m more amazed at the staying power of Alec Baldwin, who can do no wrong regardless that women will put a fork in most guys who are found to have an ugly side, and if ever an actor has anger issues, it’s Alec. Despite the phone rant to his daughter, heard universally, and given that his ex, Kim Basinger, is absolutely terrified of him, he remains the centerfold of Distaff Nation–right down to the body fat that’s starting to pop his shirt and collar buttons: at the Oscars his invisible girdle was evident in that his arms stuck out like a body builder’s, which he definitely is not. Anyway, Martin got the great lines, e.g., “Damn Helen Mirren” and calling Meryl Streep a “loser;” in Alec’s mouth such would have been reminders of his temper-temper with womenfolk.

And there’s the curious and perpetual love affair with dissipated, chauvinistic male character roles who’ve ruined their and the lives of everyone who’ve loved them–Jeff Bridges being the latest (Mickey Rourke having preceded him); please notice that it’s only among older-men roles that these traits are tolerated: younger studs are less forgiven. Why is that?

There is proof positive that the show isn’t about the statuette and what it means. The old Hollywood joke is that two actors met and one said, “Let’s talk about you: how did you like my last movie?” Hence we are not surprised that instead of cradling Oscar like a baby, it is wielded like a knife or spear, or used during wild gestures. I still wait for someone to drop it or, faux pas of all, walk off and leave it on the stage.

The sleepers in all of this are animations, the sad truth being that such are better actors than real stars. Which is to say even Hollywood won’t last forever, but someday succumb to technology that can produce box office hits in basements of pimply-faced adolescents who skip school; and cartoon characters will people all our movies, not to mention Shakespeare.

Equally intrusive around the Oscars are certain critics, one saying Mariah Carey should have been nominated; oh, please, while doing a creditable job in “Precious” she lacked both face- and script-time to challenge those with major roles. Worst of all was Barbara Wa-Wa, whose last (thank god) pre-Oscar special showed that she’s lost none of the banality for which we’ve come to know and love her. Her exit line, if you can believe it, is that after all these years of making tons of dough for asking stupid questions, she’s “kind of sick of it.”

Gee, wish we had known that long ago and been spared her annual tedium, but I do hold in fond memory her attempt to get Richard Pryor to admit free-basing, only to have him look her straight in the eye, totally poker-faced, and say that one late-night, sleepless, he went to the kitchen for a bite and dunked a cookie–only to have the milk explode. Scientists, he added, are still trying to explain the occurrence.

Barbara was not amused. But then she was never amusing, either.

Categorized in Pop Culture
Tags: , , ,

Mar
05

CNN Is Drinking the Tea

2 Comments

Pygmies casting such long shadows is a sign of how late in the day it has become.

CNN is drinking the “Tea,” a libation as lethal as Jim Jones’ cool-aid in Jonestown, and, in its infinite tolerance, purveying this deadly potion to the public.

As U.S. politics boil to extreme temperatures, CNN’s apparent pull-back from a liberal slant (not liberal bias, regardless of right-wing noise to the contrary) would be laudable if it meant letting facts speak for themselves so that We The People, with time to cool off and reflect, can sort out things and come to our senses.

But we found that vox populi is anything but vox dei. To now, the  American public has had an innate grasp of ultimate good sense, returning always to moderation after petty flirtations with extremism. Such was largely due to the contest of ideas, what Milton of old described as “winds of doctrine let loose to play upon the earth,” for so would “truth be in the field (and) we do injuriously to misdoubt her strength.” God, I love dead poets.

But CNN of late has taken a lesser path, deeming it unfair to the political right wing not to let them harp on at length on CNN’s portion of the airwaves in addition to its free-range rants on Fox News. Blitzer, Cafferty & Co are giving insanity a boost by over-airing fools like Glenn Beck and their own drum-beat of vitriol on the head of Obama.

Fox has no wish to temper its plague of poison news, a drip-drip of steady lies and innuendo on anything deemed outside their circle of No. Since the disaster in Haiti, CNN spent countless hours covering related stories. Not FauX News: flipping channels to see what was up on that Evil Empire found them ever in mid-rant on Reid, Pelosi, and Obama–and that’s just for starters. To say they have a “news gathering” team is to mis-name revisionism and rumor-mongering.

Thus America is now caught between non-stop mud-slinging from Fox and a CNN fearful of the Right’s empty accusation that liberals never give them an even shake–a misreading of the necessary give-and-take that informs our democracy so that reasoned judgments may be made. Otherwise, even democratic societies become no better than Pavlov’s Dog, slobbering assent at every ding-dong of idle comment.

CNN‘s Jack Cafferty is a crank or like a drunk on a barstool, leaving bystanders to wonder which way he’s going to fall. And it hurts to see the usually even-minded David Gergen, advisor to both sides of the aisle for decades, become Chicken Little over a sky that isn’t falling–though if all news sources get on the same page, we may well see a full-fledged run on government institutions that will make bank panics seem like, well, a tea party.

When America listens to the likes of Glenn Beck, it is time to say that pygmies casting such long shadows is a sign of how late in the day it has become–though not too late for real and balanced journalism and to derive the benefits therefrom. But this will not happen if CNN merely joins in the panic.

The radical right doesn’t know that to start a war is one thing, and ending it is another. Portland’s Museum has a portrait of a very tired Washington after Valley Forge, where he lost 3000 men in a costly victory and making the early patriots wonder if theirs was a worthwhile cause. Not far from him is Ulysses Grant in marble but with flagging sword, and the artist had to fashion a more heroic Grant suitable for placement in the nation’s capital.  Such is war, and none is more ruinous and despicable than that of countrymen fighting each other.

Thus we are in what Lincoln would call another great civil war. Obama cannot undo in one year what was eight in the making, but the Grand Old Party would rather have us all fail than to forge workable compromises.

This no time for CNN to turn into wusses. They should know that things can turn around in a heartbeat, the way Bush’s limping presidency found resuscitation in 9/11. Heaven forfend similar disaster should recur, but the White House, and this one in particular, being the nerve center of the world and ever the Home of Bad Luck, surely will have its own opportunity to pull us back together as friends, not foes.

Obama is neither lame nor dying. We’ve a lot to learn about this man, but don’t look for it in the current GOP Book of the Dead. This is only Chapter One of Obama’s tenure and things are daunting, but America’s been here before.

In the meantime, CNN, stop drinking the Tea.

Categorized in Politics
Tags: , , , , ,

Feb
26

Looking Presidential

Leave a Comment

Somebody please tell me which was the real “Presidents Day”? There’s Washington’s and Lincoln’s to whom we used to give a nod teach Feb. 12 and 22. Maybe no others were born in this month of the most “r’s” and the most oysters. Truth be told, some years we’re big on those two guys, some years not. These days the GOP give not an ounce of respect to Obama, as if the office itself doesn’t deserve it. So much for presidents.
Will Rogers said that all he knew was what he read in the newspaper. Now our info is anecdotal, aggravated by the new technology–we learn by bits and pieces while lack of serious, sustained reading handicaps our brains.
Take the apotheosis of Reagan, for example. People think he brought down Communism, gave us balanced budgets and that his “toughness” restored morale in America. But if ever there were a Cardboard Messiah, he was it. As for the fall of the commies, you’d think the pope and the Solidarity movement never existed, to hear his revisionists tell it. And during his first term the scariest financial meltdown to that time occurred while he went and hid, bringing about the increased power of the Federal Reserve that we know and love today.
And he was no tough guy–till he had a military behind him. He and John Wayne never went near the fighting in World War II. In his autobio, Reagan admitted he was just a “reserve officer…for ‘limited service’” due to his “poor eyesight.” I never saw him wear glasses, did you? As the war generation began dying I officiated many funerals for men whose early-life photos showed them wearing lenses as thick as the bottoms of Coke bottles– but who served their country in war. Ronnie only narrated “training films.” And though he spent those years stateside, he made sure he always wore his little uniform from home to work, since men who donned civilian clothes while on furlough were mistaken for draft dodgers and cursed and spat on.
Reagan and Wayne were just big, good-natured guys who had other things to do than fight wars. Their agents convinced them and the military that doing films were good for U.S. “morale”–while Clark Gable, Jimmy Stewart and others gave up valuable career time (and money) risking life and limb for America. Wayne’s conscience finally got to him and he regretted being a noncombatant. Not Ronnie; he wanted to be President.
Conservatives laugh at the very mention of Jimmy Carter but during his four short years in office (after being an officer on Navy subs in war time) he negotiated the Camp David Accords, the SALT II and Panama Canal treaties, normalized relations with China, got the USSR to demilitarize the Indian Ocean, a SALT III agreement for 50% reduction of nuclear arsenal by the Soviets, an on-site inspection of their facilities, and a comprehensive test ban.
Yet Reagan, to the end of his presidency, referred to Carter’s time as “failed policies of the past,” a chestnut he recurringly threw into speeches right up to his very last month in office. His big talent, more than acting, was blaming someone else for his own ineptitude, and Carter was it. Yet during his first six years, Ronnie concluded no international treaties with foreign governments and failed to free American hostages in Lebanon; two were executed and Terry Anderson by that time had been held over 650 days and counting.
Allow me to humor you with some more facts, this time from the Congressional Quarterly: Reagan’s budget overestimated revenues by 5 billion in ‘83, 13 bill in ‘84 and 16 in ‘85. By ‘84 he was back to the blame-game, and this time his target was Congress, but the Economic Advisers warned of a coming rise in deficit, and when that hit, it hit hard. And we all know about his gaffe at Bitburg cemetery where Hitler’s elite guard were interred.
Domestically, he was good at talking tough then pulling in his claws. For all his right-wing rhetoric, he never made abortion a priority, let alone deliver on it. When Right-to-Lifers mass-marched in DC he spoke to them only by loudspeaker from the White House, pledging a human life amendment to the Constitution with “no compromises,” and later, through a spokesman, said he’d support legislation “except to save the life of the mother.”
Allow me now to mention Lincoln, who came to the job with a terrible civil war on his hands that went very badly at first, while he was called every name in the book, mostly simian terms like, “monkey,” “ape,” “baboon,” and “orangutan,” though he was a true rough-and-tumble frontiersman who self-educated and became the right man for the right time in America. When he died, people who didn’t think they liked him realized they loved him, but politics had got in their way.
If you wanna be prez, just know it’s no piece of cake. And even when you do the best that is humanly possible, some people will hate you anyway.

Categorized in Politics
Tags: , , , , ,

« Previous Entries
Next Entries »