Democratic... Debates?

May You Live in Interesting Times

Image by florentiabuckingham from Pixabay

This is a weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny. I write letters to my grandchildren (who exist), and my great-grandchildren (who don't) — the Stickies — to haunt them after they become grups or I'm deleted.

                  
This column is rated SSC — Sexy Seasoned Citizens Perusal by kids, callowyutes, and approximately 39.9% of all grups may result in a debilitating intersectional triggering. 

                                                  Glossary  

                                                    About

Erratically Appearing Hallucinatory Guest Star: Dana — A Gentlerreader

"It's not easy to be engaged in political debate when it is reduced to performers trying to outdo each other." -Alexandra Adornetto 


Dear Grandstickies & Great-Grandstickies (& Gentlereaders),

I am, at this point in my present sojourn on this low-level planet, a somewhat jaded and cynical Citizen of the Republic.

[What the hell are you on about now, old man?]

Older than many, younger than many, Dana. Old enough to appreciate the significance and importance of Benjamin Franklin's reply to Mrs. Powell's question.

[Who's Mrs. Powell and what was her question?]

Allegedly, Mrs. Powell was the woman who asked Franklin what the Constitutional Convention had cooked up. "Well, doctor, what have we got, a republic or a monarchy?"

To which he (allegedly) replied, "A republic, if you can keep it."

I use the word allegedly since the evidence of exactly what happened is thin and contradictory. However, it's what I was taught, and given the fact it should be true, as far as I'm concerned it's written in stone.

[With minimal respect, your garrulousness, what's this got to do with the Democratic debates?]

Twelve carefully coiffed and professionally made-up people standing on a stage and just itching for a chance to deploy one of their pocketful of carefully crafted, focus group tested sound bytes created by professional political guns for hire is not a debate...

It's just another (un)reality show.

[I see you're in search of setup, Sparky. I'll bite, what should we do?]

We don't. There's nothing to be done but enjoy the show and pray for divine intervention or whatever it is, that somehow, so far, has enabled the Republic to always come out smelling like a rose. Eventually. Once the smoke clears.

[Why are you so...]

The Founding Oppressive Patriarchs, not wanting a king, set up a system that included a relatively weak chief executive with a narrowly defined job description. Power is supposed to be wielded by the people's representatives, Congress.

Nowadays, as George Will has noted, Congress is more theatrical than actual.

Congress has an approval rating, as this is being written, of 18%. Historically speaking, they have a reelection rate of about 97%. If that doesn't call for a big fat WTF! (wow, that's freaky!) I don't know what does.


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The presidency has degenerated into a cult of personality contest. All tribes and sub-tribes fixate on a messiah while demonizing all the other would-be messiahs secure in the knowledge that if they can get their guy canonized, heaven on Earth will commence directly.

[Well, maybe, but...]

The frontrunner of the week, Fauxcahontas (lawyer, 70, net worth $12,000,000) is formerly (that's so, like, last week) famous for claiming to have a significant amount of Cherokee blood in her veins so as to benefit from a homemade affirmative action program.

She's now becoming famous for spouting fountains of bafflegab when asked how she plans on funding her well-planned utopia without heavily taxing the middle class. It's a numbers thing, there aren't nearly enough evil rich folks to pay the tab.

There's still no such thing as a free lunch. A well functioning social democracy requires heavy taxes on as many people as possible to pay for all the free programs. If my fellow Americans want to go down this path, let 'em knock themselves out. 

However, tell us how much the easy monthly payment's going to be before we sign here and initial there, before we wind up with a political version of Bernie Madoff in the Whitehouse.

As for my favorite socialist, the other Bernie (78, net worth $2,500,000), given that he recently had a heart attack and has been a professional politician of minimal accomplishment for 99% of his adult life, Why hasn't he been voted off the island?

And leave us not forget Joe Biden friend of the working man born in hardscrabble Scranton, Pa (left when he was ten, lawyer, 76, net worth $9,000,000). Mr. Biden went to Washington. Mr. Biden should've had a more father-son conversations with his boy Hunter, who may have ruined dad's latest and likely last shot at the monarchy.

And how about...

It was at this point in my ruminations that I was struck stupid by a vision. 

I saw an, angel? An avatar of some sort materializing at the first debate between the Donald and... I couldn't make her out.

A drop-dead gorgeous, Bisexual Woman Of Color (she experimented in college but now is a faithfull mom of three married to a plumber of pallor), a BWOC, who appeared standing behind a podium of solid gold.

This persona had been tested and been rated Inevitably Electable (IE) by Frank Luntz, Swampmeister. Wikipedia: "Luntz's current company, Luntz Global, LLC, specializes in message creation and image management for commercial and political clients." 

The deliberately vaguely defined higher power (DVDHP) ain't dumb. It knows the current zeitgeist is one of all Showbiz all the time and is aware of the current importance of acronyms.

When the Secret Service rushed the stage they were repelled by an invisible barrier. A reporter (a plant hired by Luntz Global) shouted out, "Who are you, and where did you come from?!? She calmly replied that she's the embodiment of multiple statesmen that have appeared throughout history whenever America needed one.

"You can call me, Marie-Louise."

She said that she had been sent by the DVDHP to save us from ourselves since given the current state of the media, and the audience they pander to, a homegrown statesman is currently impossible.

Unable to control himself—having been temporarily taken possession of by the anti-DVDHP—an apparently biologically male member of the Righteous Resistance famous for his obnoxious personality leapt to his feet and demanded to know why she had used the words statesmen and statesman instead of statespersons and statesperson.

The IE-BWOC then pointed at the male member and a lightning bolt struck him in the chest. Fortunately, it was just a special effects lightning bolt, no more powerful than a Taser with depleted batteries. Just powerful enough to get everyone's attention.

The BWOC then said, "This is the sort of trivial, politically correct B.S. I'm here to put a stop to, honey. Anyone here have a real question?"

The Donald said, "Hey, Marie-Louise, sweetheart, how much for the podium, and what are you doing after the debate?"

Pandemonium ensued; I snapped out of it.

Poppa loves you,
Have an OK day

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Your friendly neighborhood crank is not crazy about social media (I am a crank after all) but if you must, you can like me/follow me on Facebook. I post an announcement when I have a new column available as well as news articles/opinion pieces that reflect where I'm coming from or that I wish to call attention to. Cranky don't tweet. 

Two Reasons I'm Glad I'm Getting Old

Image by annayozman from Pixabay

This is a weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny. I write letters to my grandchildren (who exist), and my great-grandchildren (who don't) — the Stickies — to haunt them after they become grups or I'm deleated.

                  
This column is rated SSC — Sexy Seasoned Citizens Perusal by kids, callowyutes, and approximately 39.9% of all grups may result in a debilitating intersectional triggering. 

                                                  Glossary  

                                                    About

Erratically Appearing Hallucinatory Guest Star: Dana — A Gentlerreader

"To me, growing old is great. It's the very best thing—considering the alternatives." -Michael Caine


Dear Grandstickies & Great-Grandstickies (& Gentlereaders),

All of my life I've been hearing the cliche, you're only as young as you feel. This is utter nonsense. Nobody feels old.

You may feel older than a chronologically younger person than yourself.

Or, you may even feel older than a person that's older than you are (who, of course, should be old enough to know better).

As I've written elsewhere, but I'm too old to remember exactly where, that feeling of superiority, perhaps even contempt, that third graders feel for first graders, never goes away. The age gaps just widen, 8 is to 6 as 30 is to 20.

While you may be feeling your body's age—particularly once the inevitable long, slow decline sets in, or you're the victim of a string of serious medical problems and it feels like your body has turned on you—in your heart of hearts, you never get old.

You're still, fundamentally, you. You're still pretending to be the grownup they told you would be someday. They didn't tell you that you will always feel more grown-up than some, less than others, and that the game never ends... well, till ya meet your end.

[Um... while I agree that the above is probably true, your garrulousness, I fail to see what it has to do with why you're glad you're old.]

Well Dana, while it's one of those many life lessons that you might grasp intellectually as you begin racking up the decades, but odds are you're not going to really know the truth of it in your very bones if, and until, you become a sexy seasoned citizen.
 
[Uh huh... but I still don't see why...]

It makes me happy? It's very liberating. You're not seeing the big picture, the concept applies to everything. You're never going to be done. You're never going to be secure. You're never going to wake up one day and finally know what, it, is. No matter what you've got, even if it's more than you need, you're never going to stop wondering what's missing.

And you're never going to be old.

Once you truly know and accept this, it might change everything or it might change nothing (externally speaking), but it will change you.

[Okaaay... what's the other reason?]

                                                   
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America's having an existential crisis, a cold civil war has broken out, cold enough to freeze The Gummit in place till at least November the third, 2020.

[This makes you glad?]

Look, While I'm concerned with what the future holds for my grandstickies, because who knows how the war will end, there's not that much I can do about it beyond cranking out these columns. 

The Millennials are slowly coming into their own, as far as who runs things, and the Boomers have slowly begun to fade away. There's about as many of them as there are Boomers and coming up behind them are the 91,000,000 members of Generation Z, the largest generation in American history.

Having recently turned 39 for the 27th time my use-by date is only about 13 years away. I may have a fixed income but I'm reasonably confident that the two subsequent generations I share a home with will make sure I'm not rendered homeless unless we're all rendered homeless.

So, here I sit in a comfortable office chair in front of a computer monitor, that in effect, is a magic window that looks out on to, well, everfugginthing there is or ever was.

But, not having been raised surrounded by screens, even if the entire nation experiences a version of the electrical insanity going on in the People's Republic of California, I will not be traumatized.

To my right is a bookshelf stocked with several key texts in the dead trees format to keep me amused. There's a library within walking distance stocked with same. There are 6.5 people outside my bedroom door who like me (most of the time) to talk to.

I wish I had a money bin, or more generous readers, or that someone would syndicate me but you can file that under woulda, coulda, shoulda. I'm a lucky sumbitch.

                                                  *     *     *

[Okay, but...]

Okay but nothin', let me finish, please. I'm slightly smarter than the a-ver-age bear, I was born only eight years after the last world war ended. I received twelve years of what used to be foundational American education just before Western Civilization started taking random potshots at its feet.

Nine of my 39 certified college credits were also accumulated before the Boomers took over and set the culture on fire.

I mention this because if you combine the above with the fact that I've been a voracious reader and a current events junkie since I was about ten years old you get an old dude with a halfway decent reality-based historical perspective, a currently unfashionable notion. 

Also, I've had, and understand the importance of, a grounding in the traditional liberal arts which are currently under attack by the armies of the woke.

                                               *     *     *

So here I sit, a well-informed spectator, watching the game. I'm hoping my team (The Fighting Enlighteneers) beats the other guys (The Squabbling Postmodernists), but as I've mentioned above there's not much I can do. I write, try to influence my dear grandstickies, hope to live long enough to meet my great-grandstickies, and enjoy the game.

And hope and pray Social Security and Medicare don't crash and burn.

Poppa loves you,
Have an OK day

Please scroll down to react, comment, or share. If my work pleases you I wouldn't be offended if you offered to buy me a coffee.  

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Your friendly neighborhood crank is not crazy about social media (I am a crank after all) but if you must, you can like me/follow me on Facebook. I post an announcement when I have a new column available as well as news articles/opinion pieces that reflect where I'm coming from or that I wish to call attention to. Cranky don't tweet. 





















                                             

Do You Love Your Work?

Don't confuse your work with your job

Image by Alexas_Fotos from Pixabay

This is a weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny. I write letters to my grandchildren (who exist), and my great-grandchildren (who don't) — the Stickies — to haunt them after they become grups or I'm dead.

                  
This column is rated SSC — Sexy Seasoned Citizens Perusal by kids, callowyutes, and approximately 39.9% of all grups may result in a debilitating intersectional triggering. 

                                                  Glossary  

                                                    About

Erratically Appearing Hallucinatory Guest Star: Dana — A Gentlerreader

"I am a friend of the working man, and I would rather be his friend, than be one.                                                                                        -Clarence Darrow


Dear Grandstickies & Great-Grandstickies (& Gentlereaders),

When I began this particular missive I had no idea what I wanted to write about but this is not particularly unusual. Just because I've made a personal commitment to writing a weekly letter doesn't mean I'm necessarily brimming with ideas and can't wait to start writing on any given day.

Regardless, I write nearly every day, even if it's only a few sentences. I do this for myriad reasons but I'll refrain from pouring out my psyche all over the page. Bottom line? It provides all sorts of mental/emotional/spiritual/etceteral health benefits at no charge.

Also, it somehow enables me to tap into something that I can't possibly explain with mere words. Ain't that ironical. 

I've recently made the mistake of re-researching how to make money from wordsmithing, looking into the subject more deeply than I ever have before.

Suffice it to say I've once again abandoned my novel. All the life lessons I would have you learn, carefully disguised in a (hopefully) entertaining bit of fiction, have been put back on a virtual shelf.

Sorry, it looks like you'll have to mine my weekly missives if you're interested in unearthing a nugget or two of useful information.

This is not as mercenary as it sounds. I've made, literally, less than a hundred bucks for my work since I began writing this weekly whatever it is four years ago but it's never occurred to me that I should give it up.

Trust me, I'd absolutely love to make a pile of dough for my efforts. I've tried various methods to turn my words into cash. The campaign continues apace.

But I'm sure you (possibly from me), and my gentlereaders, have heard the cliche that if you love what you do you'll never work a day in your life.

It's true.

The bad news is there's a very good chance you won't get paid for your work. But even knowing what your work is, and having the opportunity to do it, is a blessing.

[Could you be a little more vague? What does any of this blather have to do with the title Your Garrulousness?]  

Dana emerges! In fact, I wrote a column (a hobby that turned into my work, these letters) on this very subject quite some time ago.

What would I have you learn, Dorothie's?

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Strive to become skilled at something the world is willing to pay you for and is likely to keep paying you for down the road, that you don't hate, and your life will be a lot more pleasant than otherwise. But there's a good chance it won't be your work.

Your work is something you'll keep doing anyway because you almost have to and it will keep your soul from slowly evaporating as you age. Your work can be almost anything—you'll know it if you're lucky enough to find it.

[Wait-wait-wait, what's this got to do with you dropping the ball, or should I say the keyboard, as far as your novel is concerned?]

The novel's not my work, I thought I had found a job that might possibly lead to me and mine making some cold hard cash. Every time I start working on it again it quickly becomes a job that I don't much care for.

And that would be fine—I've had more than one of those, but I knew what the payoff was and I did what I had to do to take care of business. At this point, the reader might go back to the part about learning a skill the world's willing to pay for.

BIG BUT... even getting signed by a well-known publisher doesn't ensure that two, three, or more years of intellectual bloodletting will result in more than chump change.

I've read articles by compulsive novel writers that have a published novel out there, and two or three more in a drawer, that haven't made enough money to fund a vacation from their day job.

But they continue writing novels, or _______, for the same reason I continue writing my column. There are other forms of compensation besides money.

                                                   *     *     *

I'm doubly blessed.

We share, my Dear Stickies, and have for quite some time, a home. I know that's unlikely to last as you're all headed towards gruphood at the speed of life. But hopefully, one or two of my less annoying attributes are/will be of some assistance to you now and in the future.

And while I've yet to make more than a few bucks for my efforts, I, like serial novel writers who have also have been denied both fame and fortune, love my work.

And just like them, and lottery players everywhere, in my heart of hearts I know that I'm going to wake up one day and discover I have the golden ticket.

You gotta play to win, right?

Poppa loves you,
Have an OK day

Please scroll down to react, comment, or share. If my work pleases you I wouldn't be offended if you offered to buy me a coffee.  

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Your friendly neighborhood crank is not crazy about social media (I am a crank after all) but if you must, you can like me/follow me on Facebook. I post an announcement when I have a new column available as well as news articles/opinion pieces that reflect where I'm coming from or that I wish to call attention to. Cranky don't tweet.