Take Me Home Country Roads

…West Virginia, Mountain Mama…

Even John Denver couldn’t take Hillary home now. She’s expected to win WV’s primary this coming Tuesday, May 13, and although some Talking Pin Heads estimate her margin of victory at around 30%, she’s already a day late and a dollar short.

In my judgement, she’s in her current state of rapid decline because she is affiliated with Bill Clinton. He was popular and well liked once but he’s old stuff now, a part of the Establishment ever since the Republicans began their own run of sex scandals and had to admit that, yes, Republicans actually engage in sex, a revolutionary development.

Now, a humongous slice of the American population today is looking for a degree of political enlightenment that isn’t likely to occur with her and Bill in the Oval Office. Change is in the air, but the Clintons haven’t yet inhaled deeply enough to clear their political lungs.

It’s quite accurate and fair to argue that I once presented a different analysis. I said that Barack was an unknown element and Americans are afraid of real change when you get right down to it. But that was before John Boy became the so-called presumptive Republican nominee and began to talk about colonizing the Middle East.

With John as Commander in chief, the Sun Will Never Set on the Rovian Empire. Americans don’t like change, true, but they want a return to the 19th Century even less. Suddenly, Americans figure, maybe Barack isn’t so scary after all.

Put that together with the lovey dovey platitudes exchanged between the John and Billery camps and many people have come to believe that she is auditioning for the role of the Oldest Living Confederate Widow.

So, given Barack’s lead in just about any marker you care to name, why is Hillary bothering with West Virginia? Even if she wins handily, as the Talking Pinheads predict, her standing in the primary will remain largely unchanged from a practical standpoint.

But we all know that emotion not logic is the name of the psychological game of politics. Tiny and seemingly insignificant matters can make or break kings and presidents. Hope springs eternal.

I hope I haven’t insulted the state of West Virginia and its citizens by counting the state itself as politically insignificant in terms of Hillary’s race for the Democratic presidential nominee. Far from it.

But most Americans rarely read or hear about WV in the corporate media unless a story appears on the sports page. The WV Mountaineers are a perennial football powerhouse. I happen to know a lot about the Mountaineers and West Virginia through the simple process of osmosis. I was once within the borders of the state for about an hour. It happened this way.

As our soon-to-be son in law drove us into the town of Cumberland, Maryland to meet his parents, I looked up and spotted a World War II B-17 coming in for a landing somewhere.

Later we learned that a traveling exhibition of old aircraft was at the Cumberland Airport, which happened to be located across the state line in West Virginia. We spent a couple of hours wandering among the planes, and that’s the sum total of my on-the-ground experience in West Virginia.

But there’s more osmosis. When our son-in-law was a student at WVU, he was a member of the Drum Line and is still an avid Mountaineer. His father also graduated from WVU, and his grandfather lived in Morgantown most of his life.

Put all of this together and I feel like an honorary Mountaineer. I want a Mountaineer cap or tee shirt or some scrap to show my allegiance. Our daughter, however, refuses to send me anything.

In the manner of daughters everywhere, she looks out for our well-being.

“Yellow is too bright for you, Dad. It isn’t your color.”

Mountaineer colors are actually Blue and Gold, but I’ve learned one thing about daughters. When they are looking out for our well being, they can be rather intractable.

Now, if Chelsea would just tell Hillary she doesn’t look good in ruddy red embarrassment. Tell her, Chelsea, so we can get on with returning John Boy to Spencer’s Mountain.

Did You Know?
The first known Mother’s Day celebration in America occurred in May of 1907 or 1908 in Grafton, West Virginia. President Woodrow Wilson made Mother’s Day a national holiday in 1914.

Technorati Tags: West Virginia,Mountaineers,Hillary Clinton,Barack Obama

May is Mental Health Month

…and it’s time for a Jiffy Brain Lube…

I’m okay on the physical side. On a scale of 1 to 10, I’d probably come in with an 8. I’m 167 fully clothed, don’t drink or smoke, and I watch my calories.

On the downside, every calorie in my mouth is a fat calorie times 2 because I sit around all day thinking up justifications for sitting around. My killer abs are losing definition and that is depressing, man.

The old golf game is showing signs of wear as well. I’m on the brink of miscounting my strokes but I’ll hold off and see what happens. As long as the suckers I play with are worse than me, happy talk reigns.

Upstairs, I’m not so certain. I’d probably come in at a 5 on the old 10 point scale. My brain has definitely shriveled, with the invertible results, forgetfulness, lying to cover the forgetfulness, and excuses for calling my wife Hillary.

But these are minor inconveniences. Many people suffer from deep-seated mental health problems, depression, manic-depressive episodes, panic attacks, anxieties, and stress. Many are on medications which alleviate the symptoms but leave them lethargic.

Mental health professionals know that depression and many other ailments are easily treatable, and the best approach is often a combination of medication, therapy, and a strong circle of family and friends. In fact, some professionals believe that the single most effective treatment component is the latter.

That’s why Mental Health America (MHA), previously the National Mental Health Association, is emphasizing a program it calls Get Connected. The three elements of the program are:

• Get Connected to Family and Friends
• Get Connected to Your Community, and
• Get Connected to Professional Help

Humans are imperfect at best, but my experience tells me all of us know our internal mechanisms, mental and physical. We feel that pain in the back, that little muscle twinge. We also feel that fleeting moment of sadness and we know well the prolonged effects of our sadness.

On the other hand, we are quite imperfect when it comes to admitting our feelings even when we know admission is critical to recovery.

Sometimes a simple phone call or a mouse click can get the process started. Here are a few sources of help, for yourself, a friend, or a family member. Just do it.

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

National Mental Health Information Hotline

San Francisco Mental Health Services

Bay Area Mental Health Advocates

 

Technorati Tags: Self Help,Mental Health,Suicide Prevention,National Mental Health Month

 

Did You Know…?

Well, no. And I’m not sure I want to know now.

It’s another one of those irrelevant stories that seem to grab the attention of the corporate media. The story has no substance and no legs. But…and this is all important…it’s salacious.

I’m talking about Barbara Walters, host of The View on ABC, and her affair 35 or so years ago with then-Senator Edward Brooke of Massachusetts.

She’s written a book titled Audition: A Memoir that includes the revelation and perhaps others. I haven’t read the book and don’t plan on it. But lots of people will. She’s been hawking it on various television shows, and is scheduled to appear in San Francisco Thursday, May 15th at the Nob Hill Masonic Center, 1111 California, at 8 p.m. 

The only real nugget of relevant (if you can call it that) information is Brooke’s ethnic identity. He’s Black, no big deal in most of the U.S. today, but around 1973, the story would have been dynamite. Had an affair between a White woman and a Black man become known, their careers would have faded faster than a speeding bullet.

Perhaps, if nothing else, the affair and its revelation may cast some light on race relations 30 years ago and illustrate only a slight degree of social progress in the intervening years, Barak’s popularity not withstanding.

So far, Brooke, who is 88 now and reportedly living in Florida, hasn’t officially affirmed or denied the story. We have nothing but Barbara’s words to rely on. Still, we can be fairly certain of their  authenticity. She has a great deal to lose should the story turn out to be a figment of her imagination.

In the long run, Barbara’s book and her affair with Brooke will become a footnote to a footnote. For awhile, though, we will be properly titillated in the manner of Americans while we settle back and wait for the next scandal.

 

Technorati Tags: Barbara Walters,ex-Senator Edward Brooke

Can We Obliterate Politicians?

Hillary Clinton said she would “obliterate” Iran if Iran attacked Israel with a nuclear bomb, or words along those lines.

According to Dictionary.com, obliterate means “to remove or destroy all traces of; do away with; destroy completely.”

Let’s look at some of the real-world effects of Iran’s obliteration.

70,000,000 people dead
Let’s see, that includes men, women, children, fetuses in the womb, mentally and physically deficient individuals, and a host of Iranians who admire the U.S., not to mention visitors who happened to be in Iran when shock and awe occurs, along with anyone in Turkey standing too near its border with Iran. Now wouldn’t that be a kick in the head?

2.5 million barrels of oil a day removed from world markets
Officially, the U.S. doesn’t purchase oil from Iran, but the rest of the world certainly does. If that supply disappeared, the price of gasoline at the pump would soar, reaching stratospheric heights. Only the top millionaires will be able to afford a tank of gas. Or food. Remember Soylent Green?

Destruction, among others, of the economy of Japan
A strong ally of the U.S., Japan relies on Iran for a substantial portion of its oil purchases. You don’t imagine that it’s primary imports are Persian rugs, do you? Unless, of course, they’ve figured out a way to convert them to energy. Those Japanese are wily folk. They’re capable of anything. They destroyed the American automobile market by producing cars that actually didn’t collapse within the first month or so of purchase. Who woulda thunk of a crackpot idea like that?

Collapse of the world food market
Crops are fertilized with oil-based products. Without those aids to growth, crop yields per acre will fall dramatically, as crops require longer growing seasons to produce stunted versions of today’s robust varieties. Hark back to Soylent Green. Your next meal could be a Hillary Burger. Or, hopefully, a Bush Steak.

Collapse of the American economy
Suffice to say, when the leading economic powers of the world lose purchasing power, American exports will shrink with disastrous effects on American jobs, already decimated by the influx of foreign labor and the movement of American industries to cheap-labor countries. Oh, I forgot, America is a cheap-labor country, isn’t it?

Nuclear Retaliation
Iran’s location in the Middle East puts it in proximity to nuclear powers such as Pakistan, India, China, and Russia. Those countries may feel threatened by the U.S. and decide on their own version of preemption. Moreover, Iran is a Muslim country. The obliteration of 70,000,000 Muslims would certainly ignite a tinderbox of resentment with disastrous consequences for the U.S.

Hillary’s Rationale
Was Hillary serious when she uttered her rash statement on national television? Or was she merely resorting to the est school of political campaigning, the greatest, the biggest, the most superlative, the mother of all whatevahs, kick ass, obliterate?  Or was her intent to demonstrate that she can play with the best of the big boys and even beat them at their own testicular-engorged game? My missile is longer than yours, pal. Here, I’ll show you.

Naturally, she’ll garner a goodly number of votes in upcoming caucuses and primaries because of her statement. The United States is populated by a surplus of the “kill ‘em all” school of foreign policy. From the standpoint of sheer effective political tactics, she did good.

But…?

After thinking about this for awhile, I’m still trying to understand her rationale. Why would she claim that she will go to such extreme lengths? To the best of my knowledge, no other high-level politician of either party would publicly subscribe to a view of the world so outside the pale as to border on lunacy. Surely, it’s just a jest.

Apocalypse Now?
In the long run, cooler heads will prevail. My guess is that Hil’s strategists are searching for a spin to minimize any damages. More than likely, the parsers will appear in the light of day and say something like, “What she really meant was…”

All will be well, despite my dire predictions. Relax. It’s only politics, folks.

 

Technorati Tags: Iran,Obliterate,Hillary Clinton

The Past Becomes the Future

This is the center of three piers at Fort Mason in San Francisco. Here is where I was introduced to the pleasures of troopship travel.

Prior to arriving, we had spent four hours on a ferry from Camp Stoneman in Pittsburg. When the ferry reached Mason, the tugs parked it on one side of the pier, and we debarked (a new term learned then) and assembled in the shed where we waited until the ferry had been emptied.

Then we were lined up by number and marched aboard a troopship parked on the other side of the pier. The entire process from Stoneman to our bunks in Compartment C and then a walk up a couple of gangways (’nother new term) for an idle stroll around the main deck took about seven hours.

In mid-afternoon, I felt the ship move almost imperceptibly, and then I noticed the gap of water between the side of the ship and the pier widen. Shortly, the tugs began to slide the ship backwards until it cleared the end of the pier. Then just as slowly, the tugs swung the bow of the ship around until it pointed at the Golden Gate Bridge. Soon, the tugs dropped away and the ship was on its own, heading toward the open sea beyond the orange span.

As the ship moved toward the Bridge, I walked along the deck so that I could look up at it as we slid below. And then I walked aft and leaned on the rail, watching the Bridge grow smaller and smaller until at least it disappeared.

I remember clearly at that moment the tears in my eyes and the terrible thought that I would never again see my family. The brains of 18-year old males are at one and the same time adventurous, amorous, and loaded with trepidation and high emotion.

Call it luck or the hand of God as you choose, but two years later I sailed under the bridge, into the bay, and joked over the rail with the tug sailors who shouted up at us that San Francisco women would take our money. “Stay out of the bars,” they said.

Fortunately, I was on my way to a discharge at Parks in Pleasanton and freedom at last. I had no time for an interlude with the San Francisco ladies. The feeling of euphoria is difficult to resurrect now, but suffice to say, I could have walked on water at the thought of relaxing for a few months before deciding on my future.

Mason is still there, much in its original form. It’s been turned over to the city and serves some interesting purposes such as an arena for fashion shows, which are nice if you are into that sort of thing but which serve no useful purpose unless you consider skeletal women in grotesque clothes disjointedly walking to the end of a runway, whirling around, and returning, a valuable purpose.

When I think about inane activities like this, which aren’t restricted to San Francisco, by the way, I am often confounded by the utter self-absorption that has given rise to a culture and an entire economic industry based on a transitory act of physical indulgence. Foreplay by any other name is still foreplay.

But I have more unsettling thoughts. I wonder if my brief time in uniform contributed in any way to the vital national defense of the United States. Don’t get me wrong. I don’t regret my service.

But the nearest I ever came to combat and either heroism or cowardice was sitting in the passenger seat of a car across the street from a bus station in Oakland watching two United States Marines do their level best to beat the living hell out of a single sailor who more than held his own.

Despite my constant calls then for fairness and equity, I Cheneyed out. I deferred to the sailor. I remained in the safety of the car. I rationalized my failure by convincing myself that the sailor could more than take care of himself, and then suddenly, before I could think further, the fight ended and the combatants faded into the darkness.

Someone had called the police, and the fighters hadn’t yet sunk into a state of absolute, unmerciful degradation. They heard the siren. They were after all United States servicemen. They didn’t want to kill each other. Did they?

Today, I still hide the cowardice of that time and place by blathering about fairness and equity. Two on one is patently unfair, I proudly proclaim, as if I would never be a disinterested bystander when someone is in need. Deep inside, though, I know my own reluctance.

I am your classic, patriotic All American, a man without an American flag lapel pin, a condition I justify neatly with a classic degree of political cowardice by pointing out that I do not wear shirts or coats with lapels, and I have no intention of having an American flag tattooed on my forehead.

Besides–and we all know this, right?–a symbol isn’t a gauge of reality. Or, as someone wrote once upon a time, “The map is not the territory.” For those who say they will not vote for Barack because he doesn’t wear an American flag lapel pin, I say fine and dandy. Don’t vote for him. I would hazard a guess that he prefers only intelligent people in the booths on election day anyway.

I wonder if the 4,000 plus American men and women who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan would be wearing lapel pins if they were alive. My guess is that some would and some would not.

I also wonder if those men and women once believed in fairness and equity. Did they think it unfair for two to pick on one? Did they believe they had an obligation to help those in need?

Would they come to the aid of an abused child or an abused spouse? Or would they, in their sheer elation and euphoria at the joy of life, choose to look another way? To create justifications? To attend fashion shows at Fort Mason where men once sailed off to give their lives so that those very inanities could thrive?

Barack Obama is at this moment like the sailor I witnessed withstanding an almost overwhelming attack by two United States Marines. I have no doubt that he will not fade into the night. He will remain in the arena. He doesn’t need a lapel pin.

Life is a Circus

I read lots and lots of on-line newspapers, and one of my favorites is Hometown Annapolis.

Annapolis is a sort of fifth-level hometown, meaning it would be about Number Five on my list of the best places to live. It’s really an All-American town, very historic, very East Coasty, and very scenic, although in a rather subtle way.

It isn’t too far from Washington, D.C. if you like to browse historical and genealogical records at the National Archives, a real treasure trove for historians and family researchers. I’ve been to Annapolis with side trips to D.C. several times, so I’m somewhat familiar with the landscape.

When I scanned the Annapolis paper this morning, my eye fell on a story in the Children’s section that reminded me of my own hometown, which shall remain unnamed here because I don’t want anyone there to know my whereabouts in case there’s a warrant out with my name on it.

The story that popped out was about the Cole Bros. Circus.

I did a little breath intake when I saw the headline. This was a real coincidence, not because I like circuses. I hate them. And not because I had been dragged to circuses against my wishes and now suffer irreparable psychological damage. No. None of these.

I actually was dragged off to the Cole Bros. Circus as a kid, more than once, in fact, because adults justify hauling defenseless kids around as excuses for satisfying their own fantasies.

That’s not the big deal here, though. A few years later, in high school, I worked for a circus in a manner of speaking, and I am firmly convinced that it was Cole Bros. That’s the only circus name I know and the only one ever to visit my hometown.

Well, to make a short story interminably longer, someone from the circus showed up at school one day recruiting temporary labor to help erect the bleachers. They offered no money, just a free meal and a ticket to the show that night.

Of course, they selected our high school because the only suckers who would work for nothing were high school boys who could not have cared less about attending the circus. We just wanted to get out of school for a day. We figured the work couldn’t be that hard.

Wrong. This was slave labor pure and simple, and about two hours after our labor started, three quarters of us had bailed out. I stuck around, and I swear, single-handedly erected almost the entire set of bleachers.

In the process, I talked to some very nice circus people, laborers mostly but a gang boss or two as well. Some told me practically their life stories, which weren’t quite as romantic as the lives depicted in the movie The Greatest Show on Earth starring the recently demised Charlton Heston.

At the end of the day, I was too tired to think about attending the circus. Circuses are for kids, anyway. But I learned a couple of lessons from my brief stint as a circus laborer.

The circus food served to me, and I presume others, was lousier than anything I’ve run across since, except possibly the green eggs served on a rolling and tossing troop ship.

And I learned that most people have interesting stories they are willing to share, even with a kid like me in a hick town down South.

The arts of observation and listening have served me well over the years.

 

Technorati Tags: Cole Bros. Circus,The Greatest Show on Earth,Charlton Heston,Annapolis Maryland,Washington D.C.,Hometowns

Wanna buy a house—cheap?

The small community of Manteca about 60 miles East of San Francisco is witnessing an economic disaster-in-the making, as the housing market is on the edge of collapse. Foreclosures have skyrocketed recently and hundreds of homes on the market have remained unsold and vacant for extended periods of time. Some homes are in a state of complete disrepair, and abandoned swimming pools have become breeding grounds for mosquitoes.

We lived in Manteca a few years ago. It was a beautiful small town, hardly touched by urban blight. The streets were lined with stately trees, its library was staffed with friendly employees, and its schools were neat and clean. It could have been described then as a classic small town community, a wonderful place to raise kids.

Now, an over-extended mortgage market has reached this ideal Northern California haven from the traffic and congestion of the Bay Area. As buyers default on excessive payments, mortgage holders are left holding the bag. Even public auctions are poorly attended, meaning the holders will either have to lower the minimum bid floor or let the properties fall into further disrepair, stretching civic resources such as police who must now increasingly patrol deteriorating neighborhoods.

Manteca’s population was around 63,000 in 2006. That’s up from 49,000 in 2000. The current population may sound substantial, but in context, it’s about within the population range of other Valley communities. Nearby Tracy, for example, is 57,000. The most populous nearby city is Modesto at 189,000.

Contrast those figures with some popular Bay Area communities: Napa 73,000; Santa Rosa 148,000; and San Mateo 92,000. A number of smaller towns ring the Bay Area, but many in the East Bay are packed together so tightly that a newcomer might believe all are one city.

Along with Manteca’s population increase came rising home values. In 2005 the median household/condo value was $416, 000 compared to $156, 000 in 2000. Now the air seems to be escaping from the balloon.

Still, if you are tired of an urban environment and can tolerate a 60-mile commute twice a day, you might like to check out Manteca. Two things to watch out for. It’s deathly hot in the summer and plagued on some days in the winter with a fog as thick, damp, and cold as an icy cloud from outer space.

On balance, though, it’s a pleasant location for a growing young family with kids. For a good deal more information, click here.

p.s. I wrote this at the beginning of the mortgage collapse but never got around to posting it. Now seems like a good time.