June 11, 2018--Ladies of Forest Trace: President Grump

The phone rang as we were in the midst of preparing dinner. 

"Who would call us at this time?" I asked. "Anyone who knows us knows we have dinner about this time."

"Maybe it's a robocall," Rona said. "Check the caller ID."

I did and said, "It's from an unfamiliar area code--123."

"Pick it up. Maybe an actual person is placing the call. Not a computer. We've had an increase in the number we've been receiving. Maybe you can get them to take us off their caller list."

"Forget that," I mumbled. I was just about ready to add the spice mix to the vegetarian chili that was simmering on the stove. 

Rona said, "I thought no area codes are allowed to start with a 1."

"With telemarketing and hacking," I said, "I assume anything goes. So maybe I shouldn't answer it. We don't want to get drawn into anything that will take over our computer or phone."

"Now you have me curious," Rona said, "I wouldn't worry too much about that. I'll add the spices. You answer the phone. Let's see what this is."

"You would think I have all day." On the phone it was a woman's voice that sounded vaguely familiar."

"Who is this?" I asked tentatively.

"Have I changed that much in three years?"

"Who is it?" Rona mouthed.

Shrugging, I shook my head.

"Well, in fact I do have all day," the caller chuckled.

"Tell me what this is about. We're in the middle of preparing dinner. Chili." I was poised to hit the phone's Off button.

"How can I be at rest while that Grump is making himself a king?"

"Is this . . . ?" I began to tremble.

"Who else calls you when you're hiding in Maine?"

"We're not hiding . . . " I couldn't catch my breath but finally said, "Mom?"

"This is not the time to be hiding away. It wasn't easy, but if I could get permission to call you between now and November the least you can do is put down your potholder."

"Is it really . . .?"

"The girls and the people who run this place are very concerned with what is happening."

"In Maine?" I didn't know what to say. My heart was thumping and I thought I was about to pass out or have a stroke. 

I collapsed in a chair and Rona rushed over to see if I needed help. I signaled that I was OK. Just overwhelmed with emotion.

I mouthed, "I think it's my mother."

"How can that be?" Rona said so loud that my mother or whoever was on the phone could hear her.

"Tell my darling I love her and not to worry about me. They take very good care of us here. Even better than Forest Trace. Especially the food. Last night we had flanken with horseradish. It was delicious, I could chew it, and best of all it didn't give me gas."

Rona reached for the phone but I pulled it away. So she ran into the living room and snatched the other one from its cradle.

"Mom?"

"It's so good to hear your voice. I miss you every day."

"I think about you all the time. What an inspiration you have been and continue to be. So now you're here to . . . ?"

"Help with the election. We don't have newspapers or cable so I can't listen to Wolf or read Maureen Shroud. It's been difficult to keep up with the news. But we do know who was elected and can't believe what his people are doing to our  country. The same country that rescued so many of my family who fled the pogroms before the Nazis took over. Today, Grump would want to arrest us and send us back to Auschwitz."

"It isn't that bad," I said, and then after a pause added, "Yet."

"That's what they said in Germany. Things are bad but we will be safe. All we have to do is not make trouble. We're Germans, yes Jews, but we have always lived side-by-side with gentiles and they won't allow the worst to happen." She took a deep breath and said, "And then the worst happened. More than the worst."

"And so?"

"So, we have to make trouble. That's why I got permission to call. To make sure you and your friends--not just your Jewish friends--make trouble."

"Which means?"

"Working every day to make sure good people get elected. If he wins in November I fear for the future. It will say the American people agree with what he has been doing. What a message that will be to the world. And how it would encourage him to continue doing all the things he is doing. What will this mean to young people? I was a teacher and a mother all my life. My heart breaks when I think about what the future will be like for young people. They will lose hope. For the young, that would be the worst thing. Not to look forward to the future."

"That would be a tragedy," I agreed, "But young people are activated and it seems are eager to vote in November."

"They didn't vote two years ago. Not enough of them. They wanted Burning Sanders and when they couldn't have him they didn't vote. And what about women? I remember when we couldn't vote. I was 12 years old when they passed the Amendment. My sisters were suffragettes. They marched and marched and marched. In the heat and the rain and the snow. But now too many women didn't vote for the first woman running for president. Hillary. Not my favorite but better than him, no?"

"Much better," Rona said, "Especially as we see what he is doing. At least with her things wouldn't be this bad. But more than 50 percent of white women voted for Trump. So it was white women and young people more than anyone else who helped elect him. But we are organizing and demonstrating. Just last week we did well in primary voting in California."

"I hadn't heard about that," my mother said, "That is good news but unless Democrats won by big numbers it may not be good enough. And when I think about the demonstrations I am not impressed. How long has he been in office?"

"About a year and a half."

"And what did you have? Two marches? One right after he was sworn in, the Pussy Cat march (I'm old fashioned and hated the name), but it still was good and then there was the one organized by the Florida children after 17 of their friends were killed. Also very good. But I didn't make all this effort to be able to talk with you to pretend to feel good about two marches."

"What would have made you feel good?" I asked.

"A march every week or at least every month. That would be at least 18 marches already. I know the news people would stop talking about it but if it went on and on they would have to pay attention and it could make a difference. It would keep the drum drumming  It would also show that people, including young people, care about the future of America and the world. Their country, their world. Not mine and too soon not yours.

"What do you mean 'too soon'"? I asked, fearing she knew something I didn't.

"Time. Time is marching even if Americans aren't. Time doesn't need to do much or really anything to keep moving along. Time and tide. Look out your window up there and pay attention to the tide."

I glanced at Johns Bay and was about to ask about the tide since it ebbs and flows, first north and then it swings around to the south. I wasn't sure why this was significant to her. But before I could enquire, she told us she needed to pass the phone to one of the Forest Trace ladies who was waiting in line. She promised, until November, to try to call every few weeks. Maybe, she said, on her birthday, June 28th, when if she were still here she would be 110. Not, she said, that they make a big fuss there about birthdays. Or that 110, considering where she is now, is a big deal.

But before yielding the phone, she asked "Doesn't chili give you gas?"

The Ladies of Forest Trace (Mom Standing)

February 14, 2018--Hence, Donald Trump

In case anyone is still wondering why Donald Trump was elected, in a few words, in her Sunday New York Times column, Maureen Dowd, who has recently turned more attention to interviewing celebrities (Uma Thurman last week) than writing about our depressing politics, returned to biting form and supplied as good an answer as I have seen. 

Here are the first few paragraphs--

Donald Trump slipped into the Oval Office through a wormhole of confusion about American identity.  

We weren’t winning wars anymore. They just went on and on and on, with inexplicable and deceptive aims and so many lives and limbs and trillions lost.  

We couldn’t believe in our institutions, with breaches of trust and displays of ineptitude.  

We were moving from a white-majority, male-dominated country and manufacturing base to a multicultural, multilateral, globalized, P.C., new energy, new technology world, without taking account of the confusion and anger of older Americans who felt like strangers in a strange land.  

Among many, the allure of Barack Obama’s brainy nuance had given way to a longing for a more muscular certainty.  

With the Russians sowing confusion, Trump surfed those free-floating anxieties, that fear of not knowing who we are, straight to Pennsylvania Avenue.

July 3, 2017--Jack: Political Bull Fight

"I know you love Joe and Mika."

"Not really," I said to Jack who has taken up residence in the Bristol Diner.

"Don't you watch Morning Joe all the time?"

"Not so much in Maine where we limit our TV watching. Especially cable news."

"But I assume you're aware of the flap between them and Trump?"

"How could I not be, though I already disagree with you."

"I'm all ears."

"It's not between them. It's a situation that Trump created by his venomous tweets. And I mean them since the tweets were almost as nasty about Joe Scarborough as they were about Mika Brzezinski. I think the president called him a psycho, among other things. And of course got into all that blood business again, this time about Mika bleeding from the chin."

"And you think Mika and Joe are wholly innocent?"

"Whatever they might have said about Trump is not in any way equivalent. He's the president of the most powerful country in the history of the world and they are talkshow hosts."

"Let me quote a few things to you that on the air they said about Trump. Let's see if you feel they crossed the line."

"Before you begin let me agree in advance to one thing."

"I can't wait to hear this."

"During the campaign for the Republican nomination Joe and Mika, like a lot of other TV and print people, cozied up to Trump because he was a good story, quotable, and whenever he was on the air they would see their ratings skyrocket. And of course it was good for Trump as well as it gave him many millions of dollars worth of free air time. It was win-win for them while for the country it was lose-lose."

"And then," Jack said, "after he was elected they thought he would continue to be their pal and remain available to them. But once he was in the Oval Office he was no longer so eager to be on their show. He had other ways to communicate with his base. Mainly via Fox News. And tweeting of course. Joe and Mike admitted at the end of last week that he cut them off when they began to criticize him after they tried to influence his appointments and policies. He ignored them and they felt used, left out, conned. All of which they were."

"So far there's nothing new about this," I said, "Talkshow people like Sean Hannity, Mika and Joe, and real journalists are all about their contacts and sources. They live off access and leaks."

"That's why they snuck off to Mar-a-Lago New Years. To hobnob with Trump."

"It's an ugly business all a round. But remember, Trump's the president and what he said about the two of them went way over the line. Though as Maureen Dowd said yesterday, he's not a sexist pig but a pig."

"I'll get to her in a minute," Jack said, "but before I do, do you disagree that over the past few months Mika and Joe have questioned his stability, mental health, and ability to serve as president? This is different than criticizing his policies and the activities of his cabinet and White House staff. This is to call him crazy."

"But again," I said, "he's the PRESIDENT (all caps) of the United States. They are, what, by comparison small time operators. If he could manage to keep his mouth shut or stop tweeting, basically ignore them, that would be the best way to retaliate. Ignoring them is the best way to deal with people with big personalities and egos."

"But again, I mentioned Mika and Joe not to talk that much about them but about something that should be of greater concern to you."

"I'm happy to move on. Do you want to talk now about Maureen Dowd's column where she did in fact call him a pig?"

"Not about that," Jack said, "but about something else she wrote. More in line with what Brzezinski and Scarborough and the people appearing on their show have bene staying about him. Let me read you something she wrote this weekend--

"He is not built for this hostile environment [Washington, DC] and it shows in his deteriorating psychological state."

"What's wrong with that?"

"First of all, Joe and Mika and Maureen are not psychiatrists. Calling him reprehensible is one thing, but attacking his mental health is another matter. Are they beginning to make the case that he's psychologically impaired and so it's time to roll out the 25th Amendment and declare him incompetent to continue as president? If so, expect people in the streets with torches and pitchforks."

"I could see that happening," I said, "His people are pretty riled up. Many, worse than that."

"One more thing--there was that New York Times' lead editorial on Saturday--'Mr. Trump, Melting Under Criticism.'"

"I saw that."

"And what did you think?"

"I basically agreed with it."

"I have to agree with some of it as well--particularly the part that criticizes him for all his disgusting references to bleeding, really women's bleeding. It's obviously some sort of reference to menstrual blood. He must have male menophobia--an actual condition. But now here I go playing psychiatrist! What concerns me is the title of the piece. How it too suggests Trump's unfit, maybe psychologically unfit to be president. The Times even praises Nixon, if you can believe it, for the 'grace,' that's the word they used, with which he handled the press during the height of Watergate. That's as low a blow as anyone could deliver to a president--comparing him unfavorably to Nixon."

I said, "I too thought that was way below the belt. Nixon was disgraceful when it came to the press. He illegally wiretapped dozens of them and got the IRS to audit many of their taxes. That doesn't qualify as grace."

"But here's my real concern--do you and your friends really want to see Trump meting down, cornered? I mean, he appears to be very thin skinned and if he feels trapped who knows how he might act or, worse, retaliate. And I'm not talking tweets and stupid videos of Trump body slamming a fake CNN reporter at a WrestleMania  match. I'm talking Syria, North Korea, Putin, China, and a few other little things like that."

"Say more," I said, "And by the way, you're being very reasonable this morning."

He ignored that and said, "From your perspective would you want an out-of-control Trump or Mike Pense in charge? Pence who could probably work more effectively with Congress?"

"I'll have to think about it. I did write a few months ago that from a progressive perspective a weak Trump for three-and-a-half more years may be the best thing to hope for."

"You told me once that when you spent a half year in Mexico and during your times in Spain you enjoyed bull fights."

"I admit that I did. I know it's not politically correct, but I went to a lot of corrida de toros."

"And as part of every fight in an attempt to weaken the bull the banderillas planted barbed sticks in its shoulders. This did weaken him, lowered his head, but also enraged him and, my point, made him more dangerous."

"I am getting your analogy."

"I know you and your friends are enjoying Trump's fall, but maybe you're also making him more dangerous. If I were you, I'd think about this."

June 27, 2017--Jack Again: Trump's Intelligence

OK. One more from Jack and then tomorrow, I promise, back to Midcoast stories--

Trump's Intelligence

Never previously, but this time, two days in a row, Jack showed up at the Bristol Diner.

I said, "Long time, no see." I admit that though he almost always manages to get under my skin, I was happy to see him. Maybe I was in a masochistic mood. Or confused about the state of our politics. Closer to the truth, how Democrats are faring these days. Not good.

"Did you see that piece in Friday's Washington Post, 'How Can You Still Doubt Trump's Intelligence?'"

"I did in fact see it. By one of their conservative opinion writers, Kathleen Parker, and so . . ."

"'And so' nothing. Just being a conservative doesn't mean you're always wrong. Even to people like you who claim to be interested in honest dialogue between those who disagree with each other. You always talk about the need to be open minded and civil."

"The Post piece was civil, I'll grant you that, but it dealt only with Trump allegedly outsmarting former FBI director, Jim Comey. Trump may or may not have won the day with him but that doesn't speak to his larger state of mind or ability to be an effective president. In fact, though he may be good at putting people down--ask Little Marco and Low-Energy Jeb about that--but about the things that presidents need to know, I see very few signs of intelligence."

Ignoring me, Jack said, "The title of the Post piece says it all. My boy may be getting battered and even at times shows signs of unravelling, but there's no denying he's sly as a fox. Call it political intelligence if you will. My favorite current example is not how he helped four Republicans win four special congressional elections, but, as Parker said, how he managed to snooker Comey with that talk about how he had their conversations on tape. That dominated the headlines at the same time Comey was testifying to Congress and became as much the story as what Comey had to say. If nothing else, Trump knows how to change the subject and dominate what you guys call the 'narrative.'"

I repeated, "That doesn't prove he's particularly intelligent. Let's agree to disagree about that. I think Comey did pretty well, but for me that's not the meaning of life. What special counsel Robert Mueller eventually comes up with is much more important than how Comey did the other day."

"OK, let's disagree about that but how about what your Maureen Dowd wrote last Sunday in the New York Times, 'Trump Skunks the Democrats'? Let me read some of it to you--

The Democrats just got skunked four to nothing in races they excitedly thought they could win because everyone they hang with hates Trump. 

If Trump is the antichrist, as they believe, then Georgia was going to be a cakewalk, and Nancy Pelosi was going to be installed as speaker before the midterms by acclamation. But it turned into another soul-sucking disappointment. . . . 

Democrats cling to an idyllic version of a new, progressive America where everyone tools around in electric cars, serenely uses gender-neutral bathrooms and happily searches the web for the best Obamacare options. In the Democrats' vision, people are doing great and getting along. It is the opposite of Trump's dark diorama of carnage and dystopia--but just as false a picture of America.

"I saw that," I said, "and agree with most of it. Liberals, most Democrats have been out of touch with voters who should be, who have been their constituents. We have become isolated and smug. People feel this and hate it. And us. Of course not all of us," I added, "But enough to win national and local elections. Especially local elections. I've been writing about this for years."

"Which brings us back to Trump," Jack said.

"Yes and no," I said, "He won, that's true, and it showed a certain kind of intelligence. But he's done nothing but stumble when it comes to the being-president part of the equation. For politics I give him an A-, for the rest of it, straight Ds."

"And," Jack said, winking, "I thought the old professor in you would give him Fs."

"OK," I agreed, "All Fs." This time I did the winking.

August 10, 2015--On the Rag

When I saw yesterday that Maureen Dowd's column in the New York Times was about Donald TRUMP, half to myself, I moaned, "Here we go again. Yes, he deserves to be eviscerated yet more for his misogynist comments. Not for what he said at the debate about Megyn Kelly (in effect that she was unfair to him because she was--as he and I would say where we both grew up in Brooklyn--"on the rag") but for all the despicable things he has had to say about, as he would put it, "the women" throughout his life in public."

I promised myself I would get to it after reading through less-predictable stories.

When I did, as she less and less has done in recent years, Dowd this time surprised me with her fresh and tell-it-like-it-is insights about TRUMP, the media, and the state of our political culture.

Read it all if you haven't, but here's a flavor from the very end. About TRUMP talking about how he contributes money to politicians so he can have access to them and get them to do favors for him--

His policy ideas are ripped from the gut instead of the head. Still, he can be a catalyst, challenging his rivals where they need to be challenged and smoking them out, ripping off the facades they're constructed with their larcenous image makers. Trump can pierce the tromp l'oeil illusions, starting with Jeb's defense of his brother's smashing the family station wagon into the globe. 

Consider how Trump yanked back the curtain Thursday night explaining how financial quid pro quos warp the political system. 

"Well, I'll tell you what, with Hillary Clinton, I said be at my wedding and she came to my wedding," he said. "You know why? She had no choice because I gave. I gave to a foundation that, frankly, that foundation is supposed to do good. I didn't know her money would be used on private jets going all over the world. 

Sometimes you need a showman in the show.

Go Maureen!

In the aftermath of the debate, the media was obsessed about one thing, the wrong thing--themselves.

Much of the commentary, on full display on Sunday's TV talk shows and on the Internet's political websites, was about TRUMP's on-going trashing of Fox News' Megyn Kelly. Did The Donald really say she was unfair to him with her tough questions because--did he imply--because she was menstruating?

With the exception of Maureen Dowd there was hardly a post-debate word about the most important issues. For example how the four governors among the GOP "Top-10" (is this about the presidency or American Idol?) exaggerated--OK, lied--about their records in Florida (Jeb Bush), Wisconsin (Scott Walker), Chis Christie (New Jersey), and John Kasich (Ohio). How they didn't tell the truth about jobs created during their terms in office, their states' budget deficits, and about how public education fared as a result of their leadership.

Here's a flavor--

Jeb Bush claimed that high school graduation rates increased dramatically during his eight years as Florida governor. They "improved by 50 percent," he boasted. In fact, most of the gains occurred after he left office. During his two terms graduation rates grew by 14 percent.

He also claimed that he cut taxes by $19 billion but failed to mention that most of those cuts were because of federally-mandated decreases in the estate tax.

John Kasich lied when he said that the state's Medicaid program "is growing at one of the lowest rates in the country." In fact, Ohio ranks 16th in enrollment growth among the 30 states that opted out of Obamacare.

Scott Walker claimed that because of his leadership, Wisconsin "more than made up" for the job losses that were the result of the recession. In truth Wisconsin gained 4,000 jobs since that time.

How did Maureen Dowd put it? This posturing and dissembling is the work of "larcenous image makers" and of course embraced by the candidates.

But enough about this. What did TRUMP really mean when he said Megyn Kelly was "bleeding from wherever"?

Megyn Kelly and her Fox News colleagues

June 17, 2015--Schmoozing With Congress

Again on Sunday, Maureen Dowd (who my 107-year-old mother calls Maureen Shroud) in the New York Times castigated Barack Obama for his unwillingness to deal directly with Congress. To work them, schmooze with them. How he has disdain for them, remains aloof, and thus is unable to get even widely-supported legislation passed, including last week to give him and future presidents more flexibility in Asian trade policy.

She wrote--

The president descended from the mountain for half an hour on Thursday evening, materializing at Nationals Park to schmooze with Democrats and Republicans at the annual congressional baseball game.

It was the first time he had deigned to drop by, and the murmur went up, "Jeez. Now? Really?" 

Obama has always resented the idea that it mattered for him to charm and knead and whip and hug and horse-trade his way to legislative victories, to lubricate the levers of government with personal loyalty. But, once more, he learned the hard way, it matters.

I am reading James Patterson's Restless Giant: The United States from Watergate to Bush v. Gore, and a large section of it is devoted to Ronald Reagan and his presidency.

Reagan may not have been the sharpest tack but he was among the most effective presidents in getting his agenda enacted by Congress, even though during his eight years in office, for the most part, both houses were controlled by Democrats. Fiercely partisan ones at that. Tip O'Neill, for example, was Speaker of the House during Reagan's tenure and there was no stronger partisan than old Tip.

He disagreed with almost everything the president stood for, but made many deals with him when they met regularly at the White House after office hours, trading stories and sharing a bottle of fine Scotch.

No fan of Reagan, Patterson reports that during his first 100 days in office, even while recovering from a very serious assassination attempt, Reagan amazingly met 69 times with 467 members of Congress, in addition to lobbying many more on the phone.

No one yet has added up Obama's meetings with members of Congress, but I wouldn't be surprised to learn that during his first six-and-a-half years as president he has had fewer than 69 meetings and met with and spoken personally with fewer than 100 members.

Patterson writes that--

Though Reagan rejected major changes in his [legislative] plans, his actions indicated . . .  that he was far from the inflexible ideologue that critics had described.

Yes, the tax cuts he enacted with bipartisan support added exponentially to the national debt, tripling between 1980 and 1989 from $914 billion to $2.7 trillion, in many ways he was a successful president--the economy improved and he proved adept at foreign policy, very much including getting along famously and doing serious business with Soviet General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev.

Clearly schmoozing works.

August 28, 2013--Ladies of Forest Trace: Maureen Shroud

“I’m fed up with her, all the time calling him ‘The One.’”

“I think I know who you mean.”

As usual on Sunday, at the stroke of noon, my more-than-105-year-old mother was calling from Florida. She takes special pride in doing so each week at precisely that time, seeing it as evidence that she, as she puts it, still has her “marbles.” Or, as she has recently come to modify it, in acknowledgement of her very-advanced age, and reality, “at least some marbles.”

“Doesn’t she know what he’s facing? She should know better, that Maureen Shroud.”

“Maureen Dowd,” I corrected her.

“Dowd, Shroud, what difference does it make as long as you know what I am saying.”

“I know who you’re talking about but not what you’re saying.”

“If you would stop interrupting and let me catch my breath you’ll know soon enough.”

I could hear the hiss of her oxygen accumulator, which she has taken to using more than usual, and also in the background the voice of Candy Crowley.

“You shouldn’t be reading the paper and watching CNN at the same time. It’s too much for you.”

“There’s so much happening.”

“I know that but you remember what your doctors say.”

“How many of them are 100? When they get there, I’ll pay attention to what they tell me.” She enjoyed that and I could sense her chuckling to herself.

“But as I was trying to tell you about Obama--half of them hate him for we know why.”

“The public? Republicans in Congress?”

“Them.”

“Again, who?”

“Republicans.”

“Do you think it’s about him or would they hate him even if it was someone else?”

“Him. But now you sound confused.” She was right about that.

“And don’t you think,” I pressed, “the Democrats would do the same thing if there was a Republican president?”

“Some.” I could hear her breathing thickly.

“Do you think,” she continued, “the Democrats would be talking already about infringement?”

“If you’re referring to Maureen Dowd’s column, you mean impeachment.”

“That too.”

“I think Maureen got it right. There are these new Republican members of the House and . . .”

“The Senate too. That one from Oklahoma who is supposed to be his friend. The one with the beard. I forget his name. Heartburn?”

“Close, but no—Tom Coburn. And he is as you said from Oklahoma.”

“Is Maureen right that one of the leaders is Santa Claus?”

“Not actually Santa Claus, but he’s in some sort of Christmas business—Kerry Bentivolio, a freshman congressman from someplace in Michigan. He has a sled with his own reindeer. He apparently spends so much time dressed up as Santa Claus that he talks about himself as ‘we’—him and Santa.”

“I was trying to make a joke about him being Santa Claus. Mainly I wanted to tell you about those crazy people in Congress who hate Obama so much they can’t wait to infringe him.”

Not correcting her again, I said, “I thought Maureen Dowd did a good job of . . .”

“That’s why I called--to tell you that because of this morning’s column I forgive her for what she said about the Clintons. (Though Bill was very bad with that woman). And about Obama and ‘he’s The One’ business. She should know what he has to deal with every day. Worse than Clinton. Who at least deserved much of what she said about him.”

“I agree that often she goes too far, looking to be so clever that she comes off as smug. Though as you said, Clinton deserved to be held accountable.”

“But today, she redeemed herself.”

“You mean with how she concluded her column?”

Over the sound of the oxygen machine I could hear her wrestling with the newspaper. “Let me read to you. The last sentence—‘For some of the rodeo clowns,’” she paused, I thought to catch her breath, “That is going too far, isn’t it? I don’t like name-calling even when it’s deserved, but that’s how they talk these days. Even the best of them.” She sighed.

“’For some of the rodeo clowns,’’” she resumed, “’clamoring for infringement,’ I mean, ‘impeachment around the country’—they’re on vacation again and back in their districts. ‘For some of the rodeo clowns clamoring for impeachment around the country, Barack Obama’s real crime is presiding while black.’”

“I couldn’t agree more.”

“And so do the girls who I have dinner with. They may not be such big fans of his, but they can spot prejudice from a mile away. I’ve told you about some of the things they had to experience in their lives.”

“You surely did.”

“So they know. They know it when they smell it.” 

“For certain.”

Her breathing had become more labored and I suggested she lie down and increase the flow from her oxygen accumulator.

“I’m fine,” she said, gasping, trying to reassure me, “but have to . . . lie down . . . This is what it’s like . . . when you’re my age. Hooked up. Sleeping all the time . . . Like being a baby . . . again.”

“Everyone should be like you.”

With that she hung up. And I hoped turned off CNN.

July 31, 2013--The Weiners and the Clintons

In her Sunday New York Times column, Maureen Dowd was half right--Anthony Weiner is a "punk"; and she was also right to say that the Clintons want him out of the way since there is a connection between Weiner and them that is reminding voters about Bill's hanky-panky from 1995-97 with Monica Lewinski.

But she goes way too far when making an invidious comparison between Weiner's and Clinton's transgressions.

Somehow, Dowd feels that since Weiner is essentially a nobody (while in Congress for 12 years he managed to get just one piece of insignificant legislation passed) and Bill, to quote one of her sources, was and is "the greatest political and policy mind of a generation"; and thus what they did in private (and then was exposed publicly), to Dowd should be judged differently. "Bill," she writes, "was a roguish genus and Weiner's a creepy loser," and for these reasons we should not hold them to the same standard.

This is as if Dowd is saying that ubermensch Bill Clinton should be allowed to live and thrive in a Nietzschean world beyond good and evil, while Weiner should be required to crawl back into his hole and see if he can find a job selling life insurance.

But before we accept this analysis, let's take a moment to see what the two bad boys were up to--

On the Internet Wiener send out some creepy pictures of his appropriately-described "junk" and drew a few unsuspecting women into sex talk; whereas Bill Clinton, President William Jefferson Clinton got a 22 year-old intern to give him frequent BJs in the Oval Office and then lied about it to his family, the American public, and under oath to federal prosecutors.

There's not much equivalency there--Weiner by comparison is a small-time perv--and thus it is no wonder that the Clintons want Weiner to simply disappear and his wife, Huma Abedin, Hillary's former devoted assistant and body person, to dump Anthony so they can return to enhancing their brand and Hillary can focus on making millions while getting ready to run for president without everyone thinking about Bill and Monica and why the "feminist" Hillary stood by her man.