With Gusto

Few people get through life without saying something embarrassing. I've done my share but the most embarrassing thing I’ve ever done did not involve saying a word. Although I did, in a manner of speaking, make myself heard.

For a few years, I taught at a middle school conveniently across the street from a very busy McDonald’s. Most mornings I stopped in, ordered coffee and an Egg McMuffin, and settled down with the sports page of the Washington Post. It became routine and like most routines it became comfortable. Sometimes, that’s not a good thing.

Hot coffee, an Egg McMuffin, and the early morning light of a beautiful October day throwing leaf patterns across the room distorted my sense of place. I forgot where I was and being male ... think active gastrointestinal system ... and being ... I believed alone in the world … well, who would have thought a run of the mill McDonald’s would have acoustics rivaling Carnegie Hall?

The tone of the room altered and like Dorothy I realized I was no longer in Kansas. I slowly lowered my paper and was greeted by at least a hundred people ... frozen in mid bite ... staring in my direction. There was nothing to do but raise the newspaper, wait as long as I could, and slip out the side door.

The next morning I skipped breakfast and went straight to school. On my desk ... just the way I like it ... was a cup of McDonald’s coffee with two creamers and two packs of sugar. No one ever claimed responsibility.

High Places ...

"For behold, He who forms mountains and creates the wind And declares to man what are His thoughts, He who makes dawn into darkness and treads on the high places of the earth ..." Amos 4:13

I grew up in the Appalachian region of Kentucky and my friends and I spent a lot of time in the mountains. As children, we tore up cardboard boxes and slid down the sedge grass on the lower slopes. We drank from cold, mountain springs and swam and fished in the rushing waters of silver quick streams.

As teenagers, we spent a lot of nights parked on wide spaces along the roads that crossed the mountains. We drank beer and sat on car hoods and tried to grow up. We struggled with doubts, argued, and debated philosophy in accordance with beer consumed. There was never a better place to be young.

It was Huckleberry Finn in the Appalachians. It was James Still’s River of Earth. In the shadow of Still's sun-ball, we were “a borning, a begetting, and a dying.”

Sadly, it seems the love of money always trumps plain good sense and in recent years Old King Coal has rearranged the Appalachian landscape. There's money to be made and the most cost effective way to make it is to blow the mountains apart and scrape up the coal.

Streams that have nourished the rivers of Kentucky for eons are choked off now. Trees that have stood watch since Daniel Boone walked through the Cumberland Gap lie broken and rotting on the ground ... the destruction of entire ecosystems ... the death rattle of a dying industry ... 

Genesis says we have been given dominion over the earth and over the plants and animals of the earth, If that's the case, I'm pretty sure God envisioned careful stewardship not carte blanche issuance of mountain top removal permits.

The Appalachians are among the oldest mountains on earth and they are sacred ... the province of the pilgrim ... and when coal is mined it should be mined in the least intrusive way possible. When we destroy places of the spirit, we erase our collective memory ... and we lose our ability to appreciate our smallness.

Here's Terry Muncy ... 

It Was You Ronnie

Ronnie, when you announced your candidacy for president in 1979, you gave us these inspiring words. "A troubled and afflicted mankind looks to us, pleading for us to keep our rendezvous with destiny; that we will uphold the principles of self-reliance, self-discipline, morality, and, above all, responsible liberty for every individual that we will become that shining city on a hill."

That's good stuff, Ronnie. So, what happened to the "morality and responsible liberty?" How about the slaughter of our marines in Beirut? Did their lives matter? Were the lies later told by your party to invade Iraq an example of the morality you reference? How did your vision of a "shining city on a hill" lead us to this place of despair for so many? What part did you play, Ronnie?

Wasn't it you who allowed Poindexter and North to set aside our Constitution and operate a shadow government while you napped? Of course it was. It was also you who fired the air traffic controllers and encouraged the ongoing assault on unions that has destroyed America's middle class. You are the person most responsible for creating a corporate aristocracy in America and a wealth disparity unseen since the Gilded Age.

You spoke of Morning in America but brought forth only darkness and despair. You're the one who begat George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Karl Rove, Grover Norquist and the countless legions who have diminished our Republic. You are the true patriarch of the Tea Party and current Republican wannabes like Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, and Rick Perry are your idiot progeny.

Good job, Gipper. Good fucking job.

Rewind the Insanity

"Pick Sarah Palin," they said. She'll bring in the women's vote. Sure

she's dumb but she looks good and we can control her." 

"Get her on the phone ... bring her on board," I said. 
"Oh yeah. I said it. God forgive me I did."

"Then, I said I cheated on my wife because I had worked so hard for the good of the country I needed to calm down some. I swear to God, Rick, the Teabaggers lapped it up."

"Ron, I swear .... make one more negative remark about me and I'm telling everybody you're Secret Service code name is Depends."

"Well, I don't care what the others say, Lindsey. You look fabulous."

"Damn! I make it to the top and America finally gets around to judging a man by the content of  his character. Thanks a fucking lot, Martin ..."

Sing Along With Cletis

Randy Randy

Give us your answer do

Are you crazy

Thinking we’d vote for you

I shouldn't deign to disparage

But it won't be a miscarriage

Cause your deceit

You lying cheat

Means America would get screwed

Christie Christie

Wassa matta witchu

Are you bonkers

Thinking we'd vote for you

What a terrible miscarriage

Is yours and Jersey's marriage

And we'd rather be switched

Than see you hitched

To the rest of America too

Newtie Newtie

Give us your answer do

Are you loony 

Thinking we'd vote for you

Your poor wife's embarrassment

Due to your serial harassment

Means we'd rather be switched

Than see you hitched

To the rest of America too

Voices From The Clown Car

" .... War? Oh, hell yeah! Thumbs up ..." 

 "... sure I got free eye glasses through a government program and mamma was getting food stamps but just think what I could have been without Big Brother interfering in my life ..."

" ... George W Bush? The name sounds a little familiar but I can't place him. Is he in the movies or something ..."

" ... I swear ... that bitch is wearing my pumps ..." 

"... really? ... so if evolution is survival of the fittest how do you explain idiots like me ..."

GOP Hopefuls ..... God Save Us

".... that's right ... the first thing I do each morning is wake up and smell the coffers .... er coffee ... smell the coffee ..."

"Oh myyyyyyyyyy ... look at the size of the wallet on that man ..."

"How do we best help working people? How the hell should I know? Do these look like the hands of a man who has ever done a lick of physical labor in his life ..."

"Hmmmm ... immigration reform? .... Give me a minute ... don't rush me ... trying to remember what I said yesterday ..."

"And my head I'd be scratchin' ... While my thoughts were busy hatchin' ... If I only had a brain ..."