The Funny Issue Of Political Identification

I’m an Independent. At times in my life I’ve voted for and/or registered Democratic, Republican, Independent, Libertarian, Progressive Party of Vermont, and Green. I’m not politically schizophrenic, I just happen to agree with some portions of some parties and some positions of some candidates. The notion of being a Yellow Dog Democrat or a similarly dedicated Republican[1] is an illogical and (in light of the NY-23 race and the growing liberal discontent with the Democrats) possibly fading mentality, but one that I can understand. I am, after all, a Red Sox fan, and while I have loved and lost[2] (and twice won) I’ll be a fan until I die.

However, there’s a huge difference between a baseball team and the team of people in charge of our government. Wakefield may stress me out with his lack of performance, but if he gives up six runs before being pulled in the second inning that doesn’t result in thousands of people being imprisoned. Transversely, when Democrats say again and again that they’ll reform our idiotic drug laws and then fail to perform, people who shouldn’t be arrested are sent to sit in jail on your dime and mine. When Papi is hitting sub-.200, no one dies for oil. When Manny flaked out before he was traded, I didn’t have my credit card interest rate skyrocket as a result.

Currently I’m a registered Republican. This is a hangover from 2007, when I registered that way so I could vote for Ron Paul[3] in the primary. I liked his stance on the wars (get out) and taxes (cut ‘em), but was I a dyed-in-the-wool R3VOLutionary? No. I’m not a dyed-in-the-any-sort-of-fabric anything. I’m an independent, and sometimes it frustrates me as much as it would frustrate a political candidate seeking my vote.

Here’s a nifty list with what I’d consider some of the major issues America is dealing with on the left, and my no-bullshit opinion on the right. Feel free to ignore this if you think it’s too long, but my position is extremely nuanced.

Abortion: Avoid getting pregnant with sex education, personal responsibility, and contraception, but ultimately it’s not my body so it’s not my decision.

Budgetary Issues: If we really, REALLY don’t need something, like $200 million in design changes and furnishings for the Department of Homeland Security headquarters, $6 million for snowmaking at Spirit Mountain in Minnesota, (…one thousand pages of bullshit pork…) then maybe we shouldn’t put it in the budget. We can’t buy everybody a present for Christmas.

Church & State: Notice how they’re two words, not one. They want a political voice, they can start paying taxes. If they don’t pay taxes, like they don’t now, they can stay the fuck out of the arena and, ultimately, my life.

Death Penalty: The older I’ve gotten, the more I oppose it (racial disparity, questions of innocence, et cetera). Let the guilty rot, not necessarily fry.

Defense: I’m all for defending our country. I’m not all for running around the world thinking we can solve every conflict. Let’s get the eff outta Iraq and Afghanistan.

Drugs: Legalize and tax marijuana. The other stuff, I don’t know. I do know that thousands of people are harmed or die every year because of perfectly legal medicines, which are perfectly legal because they’ve been lobbied into legality by the multi-billion-buck companies that hawk them. Ultimately it should be a health issue, not a criminal one.

Education: Needs to be a high priority if not the highest, and I don’t mean just buying the kids laptops, demonizing teachers, and shuffling money around, which seemed to be the 2000-2008 mentality.

Energy: If we’ve got the genius and energy to put a man on the moon and convince people to buy tickets to crappy Transformer movies, we’ve got the genius to ditch oil for something that isn’t going to kill the world and fund people who want to kill us.

Environment: The world ain’t ending in 2012, Jesus ain’t showing, so let’s cut the shit and start listening to what Al Gore and, yes, Van Jones (who, incidentally, shouldn’t have been thrown under the bus by the Democrats) have to say.

Financial Regulation: When you’ve gotten insanely rich off of screwing middle and poor America, you have no reason to stop unless the government gets involved. Transversely, Barney Frank and Chris Dodd share the blame and should get the eff outta the way.

Gay Rights: Incorrect term. Should be called Gay Equality. Their marriage doesn’t affect me one bit, their having kids doesn’t affect me one bit, but having a second class of citizenry does make me want to vomit.

Health Care: If we have trillions to piss away for wars in the Middle East, then we have the resources available to help people, and if we don’t, perhaps we should reassess our priorities. But please, don't make me wait 6 months for surgery if I need it.

Media, The: I like newspapers and magazines. I tolerate some TV news. The internet can be a good way to get news out. But when you spend twice the time on a celebrity’s sex life that you do on the two wars we’re in, I want to walk into your newsroom and slap the shit out of you. Amen Mika.

Race Relations: All men are created equal. I judge Obama not by the color of his skin, but by the ever increasing list of promises that he hasn’t fulfilled. I judge Glenn Beck not by the color of his skin, but by his batshit crazy blubbering.

Social Security: I’m not expecting anything when I turn 65. That boat just may be sunk.

Taxes: Just like de limbo, as low as you can go.

Term Limits: Two terms, that’s it, across the board, end of discussion.

I’ve missed a lot of issues, but as this is my first blog post in a long, long time, I figured I shouldn’t shoot my whole load in one hit. I’ll have plenty of time when the twins come to sit on my butt with one hand on the keyboard and the other holding a bottle (of milk, for one of the kids, come on), but right now I’ve been concentrating on the dag-gum novel.

So remember, in 2010, vote for the person whose positions you agree with the most, and they don’t HAVE to have a (D) or an (R) after their name, and if it’s a choice between Tweedledee and Tweedledum, don’t be afraid to write in another someone…

---

[1] I did some research to try to find the appropriate Republican equivalent and failed to do so, but there are several interesting terms that refer to people of a certain political persuasion, being the Gypsy Moth Republican, the Boll Weevil, and the one I actually did know, the Rockefeller Republican (itself an endangered, if not extinct, species).

[2] In my pre-pubescent days I had Mike Greenwell and Roger Clemens up on my walls. Clemens was torn up due to his changing into a Yankee uniform, Greenwell (who I still respect) had his poster retired to make room for Kathy Ireland in a green bikini.

[3] Not Popeil.

Back, Forth, Back, Forth

I'm a purchasing manager at an aerospace company. That’s how I pay all the bills. My job is to keep everyone supplied, happy, and ultimately, try to save money. I’d like to think that I’m pretty good at my job. I’ve saved my company hundreds of thousands of dollars, and order times have gone down dramatically under me. It’s an easy job, but there’s one tiny aspect of it that drives me insane: copying and pasting lines from an online order to a purchase order.

Here’s an online order:

I have to highlight each bit of info, copy it, ALT-TAB over to Quickbooks, copy it over, then ALT-TAB back, then do it again, over and over.

It’s one of those stupid things you just have to do, but it drives me nuts, to the point that my leg starts to jiggle like I’m a puppy that needs to go. Back, forth, back, forth. I can sit and read a book for hours, I can type and think and type some more at my typewriter for just as long or longer, I can walk through the woods for miles and never be bored, but the stupid copying and pasting, it’s like the hourglass turns from a steady downward stream to a sandstorm in my eyes.

Back, forth, back, forth.

I was sent to Catholic school in the tenth grade because I was failing every one of my classes. I got into a few fights and mouthed off, and weekend suspensions were common. It was a boarding school, so a weekend suspension meant I didn’t get to go back to Vermont. I would wake up, go to mass in the morning, do various assigned cleaning jobs, and then there would be a long punishment "study hall". It wasn't for actual study, but for doing whatever they told you to do. One time we watched the movie A Man For All Seasons with the volume turned off. Another time we wrote the alphabet over and over for two hours. And one time we had to take a novel, turn to the last page, and copy the book, word for word, backwards, for two hours. I remember doing A Tale Of Two Cities:

“Known ever have I than to go I that rest better far, far a is it; done ever have I than, do I that thing better far, far a is it."

Perhaps that’s why I have such a low tolerance for the frustrating and seemingly meaningless tasks that come up sometimes…

Our glorious leader, President Barack HUSSEIN OBAMA WILL KILL US ALL!!@$!!~! Or maybe not.

There’s been a lot of screaming and yelling and fighting and mass emailing and pontificating about health care lately. On one side of the argument is the belief that the gentle, loving, generous Democrats will bestow upon all of us health care for all, which will make us all live healthy lives to a good age, at which point we will quickly die without pain. It will cost less than health care costs now, it won’t interfere with current coverage if you have it, and if you don’t have coverage then you’ll finally be covered, like under a freshly laundered comfy-dumfy blanket. On the other side of the argument is the belief that the Communist Crusaders are going to turn hospitals into gulags, where decent, hard-working white folk will be lined up and euthanized by gangs of dark goons straight out of Birth Of A Nation. And speaking of births and our nation, have you heard the one about where Obama was born?

I’m a Libertarian, but a moderate one. Like, I enjoy driving on a road that I haven’t had to build myself. And I like libraries. But I’d prefer if we didn’t get into wars like in Vietnam and Iraq and the one on Drugs. And while I wear a seatbelt religiously and keep my daughter snug and safe in her car seat, I think the Click It Or Ticket program is a ridiculous waste of government money and police resources. Because I'm a Libertarian, I'm supposed to immediately reject any government involvement in health care. But I'd also like my taxes (too many as they are) to do some good, for once, so I have chosen to listen and research and think longer than five seconds on the issue.

Every week I pay $85.99 out of my paycheck for pretty wonderful health insurance. The total cost of my wife giving birth was almost $10,000, but all I had to pay was a $500 co-pay and that was that. My only other real medical issue is that I have a thickened mitral valve in my heart, which sometimes gives me chest pains, dizziness/faintness, and all that good stuff. I met with a cardiologist, got an ultrasound before and after running on a treadmill, and was told that it’s actually pretty common but that I should keep an eye on it, as it can eventually lead to blood going the wrong way in my heart and, uh, you know, death. All my visits and tests dealing with my heart put me back a total of $20. So in summation, and in conclusion, I’d like to keep my health insurance the way it is, because it’s worth the $4471.48 a year.

Now, I don’t know how much of this or this is true or sensationalist misinterpretation, but the consistency in some of the criticism of the bill has given me the motivation to actually download the text and start reading (warning: it's a big PDF), which I think should be required for any politician who is going to be voting for it OR against it. It’s one thing to read the headlines and cherry pick and bitch and accuse and namecall, and it’s another thing to actually wade through the 1,017 pages and see just how it’ll affect me, my wife, and my kids. I should be done by September.

Jesus, I sound old. And now, to cleanse the palate:

A Little Bit On Size

I’m concerned with size. No, not that kind. Eyes above the shoulders, please. Size of me writings, that is. Among all the other things I’m working on, I’m reading through a book of Aesop’s Fables I had as a kid, with an introduction by Isaac Bashevis Singer. It’s a printing from the late sixties, with wonderful little drawings every page or so. In reading these little paragraphs that hold so much, I’m reminded of Hemingway in a way (ho-ho), mostly the way he wrote when he was at his best: paring down his words to just the bare necessities, and sometimes even less. The iceberg method of writing, where only a fraction of the story is exposed, fascinates me and frustrates me, as I’m always tempted to wax on and off about some little detail in a Dickensian manner (“the Sofa…”). I’ve recently written a short story that came out around 4,000 words. I think it’d be a damn good piece if I could get it down another five hundred or thousand words. Like Wash says in Knocked Up, TIGHTEN.

A bit breezy in here, ain’t it?

And now, the first fable from the book. I’d like to dedicate this to politicians, past, present, and probably future:

THE WOLF AND THE LAMB
A wolf, meeting with a lamb astray from the fold, resolved not to lay violent hands on him, but to find some plea to justify to the lamb the wolf’s right to eat him. He thus addressed him” “Sirrah, last year you grossly insulted me.” “Indeed,” bleated the lamb in a mournful tone of voice, “I was not then born.” Then said the wolf, “You feed in my pasture.” “No, good sir,” replied the lamb, “I have not yet tasted grass.” Again said the wolf, “You drink of my well.” “No,” exclaimed the lamb, “I never yet drank water, for as yet my mother’s milk is both food and drink to me.” Upon which the wolf seized him and ate him up, saying, “Well! I won’t remain supperless, even though you refute every one of my imputations.” The tyrant will always find a pretext for his tyranny.

Short, simple, to the point. Well played, Aesop.

Hurry Up!

Often I stumble upon some book that was written by someone younger than me, and I find myself feeling depressed at the state of my writing. It’s in those times that I find myself drifting around the internet, looking up hopeful information like this:

William Faulkner: first novel published at age 29

Anthony Burgess: first novel published at age 39

It’s an obsessive compulsion, like some of the other things I find myself doing. But it has a sort of calming effect on me. While I wouldn’t dream of comparing myself to Faulkner or Burgess (or Cormac McCarthy, first novel published at 32, or Don DeLillo, first novel published at 35), it helps me put things in perspective. Lately I have written a few short stories and several poems. I’m into the thirdish draft of my second novel (well, second novel where I actually got to the end – I’ve got a stack of fizzled fireworks tucked away somewhere), and the last thing I need to do is stress myself out over such a stupid thing as being an unpublished writer at the age of 27.

Reading Status: I finished reading “The House With A Clock In Its Walls” again. Just so damn good, and worth paying the library fines for. Tried to find a copy of the second book in the series at the library but it’s missing, so I got Anthony Burgess’s “Any Old Iron”. Looks interesting, and I’ve been meaning to read his stuff for years (aside from the impossible-to-avoid “A Clockwork Orange”).

Sorry for the boring state of this post, but it's been one of those weeks...

Why am I not surprised?

I’d like this to be a more personal blog than political or anything of that sort, but sometimes a story I read on one of the many news sites I check at work brings back memories. This is a weird one, complete with a shocking headline: Bomb Parts Smuggled Into 10 Federal Buildings During Test.

You see, in 2004, I was a mailman. Officially my title was casual carrier, as I wasn’t part of the union, and thereby only allowed to serve for 6 months before taking time off to apply for full-time letter carrier status or doing whatever until my next 6 month tour came up. I was actually surprised at how much military-official lingo was used, especially when I had to take an oath to protect and defend the constitution of the United States of America. I had the average American perspective of mailmen, which was that they fill up their bags and trucks and go around all day and at the end they go home and play with guns and drink their brains out. Not entirely untrue in some cases, but not entirely accurate. Some of the nicest people I’ve known are from my days at the USPS: hard working, honest, nice people, real sweethearts. Some total assholes, but mostly really nice people. They’re government agents, albeit without any real authority, other than the authority to take your personal letters and packages and open your mailboxes and apartment buildings.

A casual carrier, in my time (it’s been five years, so I don’t know what’s changed), is paid less than a regular carrier (who can earn up to $75,000 if they’re there long enough), doesn’t have a set route, and doesn’t wear a uniform. The regulars have to pay for their uniforms, true, but they actually look like mailmen. I was shown a room with discarded uniform parts (hats, shirts, capes for when it rains and snows but you’ve got to get the mail through) and I took a few items, but for the most part I wore khakis and tee shirts and sweatshirts of my own. This may not seem to be important, but it is.

Depending on the route, I’d either leave the station walking, in an LLV (long-life vehicle, your typical mailman truck), a larger truck for pickups and deliveries (like when I’d go to Phish Dry Goods, if I may casually drop a name), or in a plain white van, where the only identifying marks were the US GOVERNMENT license plates. I had a funny incident once where I delivered a package to a house that housed some college students, and they thought I was the DEA or some other agency. I got out, heard toilets flushing, and when one of the guys came out and saw me handing over an Express Mail parcel he yelled “it’s the fucking mailman!” to his friends, who I’m sure wished they had waited just a bit longer before sending whatever wherever.

How does this relate to the story? Well, I once had to deliver to a government building in South Burlington that housed a division of Homeland Security. I rolled up to the guard gate with my white van and tee shirt and khakis, and there was no one there. I pressed a talk button, and a stammering voice asked “uh, can I help you?” It was Saturday, so it seemed no one official or important was there. I said I was going to drop off the mail and pick any up, and I hadn’t been there before, could I be directed to where I need to go? The voice told me where to go, the gate was raised so I drove into the parking lot, the side door was buzzed open, and before I knew it I was wandering around the offices. I found the mail dropoff point, left the white tub of mail, and as there was nothing to pick up, I simply left.

In summation: I showed up to a government office in an unmarked (except for the license plates) van, showed no identification, interacted with no one other than over an intercom, and was able to walk around their offices. I could have swiped a hard drive. I could have brought a bomb in under the pile of mail. I could have poisoned their coffee. I’m not a terrorist, so I didn’t, but still, I’d like to think that, after five years and billions of dollars, shit like that wasn’t still going on. But as the GAO showed, it does.

Something The Day.

Instead of seizing the day, lately I seem to be just salvaging the day. I’ve been making little headway in my novel lately, but I’ve pecked at and finished two short stories recently, written some poems that I’m not ashamed of, and almost finished planting my garden. That’s the kind of thing that keeps me going, that and my wife and kid(s).

Today I intended on going to the library and cranking on my novel, but stress from work took its toll and by the time I was on my way to the library my brain felt worn and I couldn’t shake the sense of anger and sadness. However, I saw something on my way to the library that I hadn’t noticed before, and I pulled into a random parking lot to write down what I later at the library formed into a pretty damn good poem if I say so myself. After working two drafts of it, I sat in one of their firm, purple chairs and read some Robert Frost with some humble satisfaction before heading back to my place behind the desk and monitor and stacks of papers.

I didn’t accomplish what I had intended to, but I suppose I salvaged the day, and even if that’s all I get, I can’t complain all that much in the end.