Major Themes at the Democratic Convention (So Far)

Day 1 – See, Michelle Obama is not as bad as we all thought…and they have two cute kids…and Obama is a great guy.

 Well, Hillary has just answered the bell for the final round. With the crowd hurling insults and both eyes swollen from the beating, she has popped off her stool, pointed over to Obama and proclaimed, “Now I’m really going to kick your tail.” I have to admit, I’m starting to admire the old girl!

 This is really difficult for me. I have hated Hillary for so long, I can’t remember when it started…somewhere back in the old “Travelgate” or “Hillarycare” days I guess.   Hating Hillary was one of those “givens” in life. I woke up every morning knowing that the sun would rise in the East and I would hate Hillary.  It was soothing.

 Up until a couple of weeks ago, everything was normal. Hillary was cawing out her speeches in “that voice”, making up war stories (ala John Kerry), and breaking out a few tears whenever it was convenient. 

 Then it happened. She was sitting in a working class bar in Western Pennsylvania and decided to have a shot and a beer with “the boys”. The next thing you knew, she was throwing down a shot of Old Guckenheimer and chasing it with an Iron City draft! And she looked like she was enjoying it! The morning after, she showed up for work with a new jaunty hairstyle and a “lets play some tackle football” attitude. Last week she was out on the campaign trail, selling her snake oil from the back of a pickup truck and slugging it out with Bill O’Reilly (the devil himself) on television.

 I don’t know what to make of all this. I just looked out West this morning and the sun was coming up!

No one believed Captain Renault, and no one believed Barack Omama when he claimed that he was shocked to learn that his pastor of the last 20 years was a loon who was spewing racist, anti-American delusions from the pulpit every Sunday.

What America wanted to hear from Obama was why. Why did you sit there for 20 years listening to your “mentor” pass out this garbage, masquerading as Christian teachings.

Two logical reasons come to mind; either he believed what he heard, or he was using his membership in the church to score “credibility” points in his community. 

In his famous speech where he was going to explain all this, he revealed that the reason was…?   Well, what do you know! He never explained all this. Instead, he told us that Reverend Wright was well, you know, sort of a crazy Uncle, who will, you know, say all kinds of nutty things. He’s such as card, that guy! But let me tell you about my white Grandmother! Now she is a racist. She is a typical white person who is afraid of young black men.

O.K. Obama, let me explain this to you. Granny is afraid of young black men who dress and act like thugs. Granny is also afraid of white skinheads, white guys with purple mohawk haircuts and leather jackets, and white guys dressed like Hells Angels bikers. Granny avoids all of these people because there is a good chance they may be dangerous. Granny does not avoid young, black men in business suits.     

You know what? Maybe he really DID tell us why he stayed for 20 years.

Answer: He will be finished, done, deader than Kelsey’s nuts. Punch out and go home!

Barack is staking everything right now on the outlandish claim that he never heard any of the Reverend’s insane rants over the entire twenty-year period that he has attended sermons at the church, and considered Rev. Wright as his “mentor”

How is the Reverend Wright playing in St. Louis right now? Not well!  

If he is playing poorly in St. Louis, he is also playing poorly in a whole bunch of states that Barack needs to win to become President. 

It is time for the Democrat super delegates to look at their hole cards and decide how to bet this hand. If it were me, my money would switch to Hillary. Obama is starting to look like a real sucker bet.

First, his old buddy and real estate partner, Tony Rezko is on trial in Chicago. Barack’s name has already been mentioned a couple of times, and if things get tough for old Tony, he may just throw Obama under the bandwagon to save his own skin. Barack has to know this, and it may just be affecting his sleep pattern.

Second, his minister and mentor of 20 years, Jeremiah Wright seems to have released his entire set of racist and disgusting sermons to the news media. Even the likes of Obama-loving MSNBC seems to be at least mildly offended. Obama’s response to each and every question concerning these sermons is that:

a) Wright is a crazy uncle that says things that he (Obama) doesn’t always agree with.

and...

 b) Wow, he never heard Wright deliver that particular sermon, and had no idea that he ever said such a thing!

 It makes a person wonder. How often did Obama really show up at this church?   And, didn’t any of these crazy things the minister was saying ever come up for discussion among the parishioners? It seems incredible that Barack never knew any of this was going on right under his nose!

No, not a good week at all.

Can We Trust the Dems to Run the Country, when they have so many problems just picking a candidate?

 People who are old (like me) remember Rube Goldberg. For the other 95% of the population, I will explain. Rube Goldberg was a cartoonist who designed very complicated machines to perform relatively simple tacks. He invented the science of over-engineering. Rube Goldberg must have been a Democrat.

Picking a candidate for President seems like a relatively straightforward procedure. You let states run primary elections, add up the delegate counts, and presto…you have a candidate. Not so fast!   If you are a Democrat, it is not quite that easy. Lets look at the Rube Goldberg influence at play with the Democrats.

Super Delegates – Who are these people? Are they Super Heroes? Nobody knows. They are elected delegates who can do whatever they want. Why would I vote for someone who will not necessarily represent my choice at the convention? I would not, but I am not an all-knowing, all-wise Democrat. To me, it smacks of the “smoke-filled-room” politics that the Republicans are always accused of.

The Texas Primary – Let me get this straight. You go vote in the primary election in the morning, then run over to vote again in the afternoon caucus. Whatever happened to one-person-one-vote? If this was Chicago, I might understand, but Texas? The delegates are then parceled out on some formula that is sealed in a secret vault.   A week later, no one has figured this out yet.

Voting Machines vs. Paper Ballots – Back in 2000, the Democrats went crazy because many of their stalwarts in Florida were confused over punching out a hole in an IBM card. To make it simpler for these low-tech Democrats, the party insisted on converting all voting to computerized systems. Many, many millions of dollars later, not only are the computerized systems way too complicated for the average Dem, but it also makes voting two or three times in the same election, much more difficult. Carl Rove is now to blame for all computerized voting machines!

Florida & Michigan Primaries – I’ll bet you think people already voted for their candidates in these states. Wrong! Howard Dean wanted to pick the dates of these elections, but the states picked their own dates. O.K., Howie is not going to let the votes count. Wait! The delegate counts are close, and the Dems need these states’ counts to pick their candidate. What do we do? We need to vote a second time. Who is going to pay for this re-vote? Logically, it would be the Democratic Party. However, on one hand, the Dems claim that they have money pouring in hand-over-fist for their candidates, but on the other hand, they are broke and cannot finance the second elections in these states.   Lets ask the taxpayers from Florida and Michigan to finance the extra elections   Yeah, that’s the ticket!

Whom do you think is to blame for this whole mess? Don’t be silly. It is George Bush’s fault of course! Do you think the Democrats are stupid or something?

Before I even get started, let me get this off my chest.  I am still angry that the Indians traded Rocky Colavito for Harvey Kuenn.  Not, upset, not annoyed, I am still incensed.  You just cannot trade “The Rock” for a lousy singles hitter.  Here was a guy who could hit home runs, throw the ball into the stands on the fly from deep right field, run slower than 40 year old, big, fat Mike Garcia, and do that useless bat-behind-the-back stretching thing every time he came up to hit.  We loved him.  You cannot trade a guy like that. Ever!

O.K. I was about nine months old the last time the Indians won the World Series.  I do not remember a thing.  It might as well have been a hundred years ago (sorry Cub fans) for all I know.  They were in the World Series again in 1954.  I was six years old.  I have seen that stupid Willie Mays catch about one hundred times.  Indians lost in four straight.

I started watching baseball in 1956.  I took me about six months to begin hating the Yankees. At eight years old, I was wise beyond my years.  Hating the Yankees kept me going through the lean years.  All 50 of them!  Don’t get me wrong, the Indians had some good players:  Vic Power, Woodie Held, “The Immortal” Joe Azcue, Willie Kirkland!

O.K. Get me wrong.

I didn’t deserve this!  I was a good kid.  I was in Captain Penny’s Clean Plate Club (except for those green beans), I watched Mr. Jingeling faithfully every Christmas season, I lasted all the way through Ghoulardi into Big Chuck and Houlihan.  We bought our cars at Ed Stinn Chevrolet. 

There were some high points.  O.K. One high point.  Nickel Beer Night.  The single most ridiculous promotion in all promotion history!  You just cannot pass out basically free beer to a bunch of Cleveland sports fans (or any bunch of Clevelanders for that matter) and expect anything short of disaster.  Expectations were exceeded. 

Fast forward to 1995.  The Indians have a team comprised of Omar Vizquel, Jim Tome, Albert Belle, Manny Ramiriz, Kenny Loften, and Eddie Murray.  There is no way this bunch could lose the World Series.  You would think!

1997.  They have to be able to beat the Florida Marlins!  Maybe not.

Look!  I am going to be 60 years old soon.  I NEED THE INDIANS TO WIN NOW!  I just don’t have an unlimited supply of rebuilding seasons left.

I’m not asking for a dynasty.  Just one!

A week ago, Norman Hsu, Hillary’s renegade, Chinese cash bundler, got picked up in Colorado.  He was on the lam from California, where he faces jail time for an old fraud conviction.  Things got worse when rumors of a suicide attempt surfaced.  This all opened old Clinton wounds of Chinese cash scandals.  Remember Charlie Tre?  In the end, Hillary had to return over $800,000.  Ouch!

 Next, Osama Bin Laden popped up with a brand new video (and beard).  This would have been a good opportunity for Hillary to screech (I’m sorry, that’s how she talks) about how poorly George Bush has done capturing the devil himself (Bin Laden) instead of wasting his time killing thousands of other poor innocent terrorists who pose no threat whatever to the rest of us.  Unfortunately for Hillary, Bin Laden had adopted all of the major Democratic talking points into the new video, which made it awkward for her to point out just how evil and depraved the man is.  To make things worse, people began to recall how her husband had let Bin Laden get away when he was offered up to him by the Sudanese years ago  Ouch again!

 Things began to look up for Hillary later in the week.  General Petraeus was coming into town for his report on the Iraq war.  A good Bush-bashing opportunity!  MoveOn.org (an old bunch of loyal Clinton groupies) got the ball rolling with a full page ad in the New York Times, calling Petraeus, in effect, a traitor.  Hillary got so excited over this that she called Petraeus, in effect, a liar.  However, after the public began to admire the showing Petraeus made in front of Congress, they also began to resent the despicable MoveOn.org ad, the New York Times, and anyone who called Petraeus a liar at the hearings.  Rudy Giuliani, smelling blood, pounced on Hillary over the whole affair.  Ouch number three!

 To round out a bad week, conservative talk show host, Laura Ingraham’s new book moved ahead of husband Bill’s latest “tome” on the Amazon.com best-seller list.  That one hurt! 

 Needless to say, Hillary has been listed as missing in action these last couple of days.

O.K. Am I just stupid (a good possibility) or is this Iowa Straw Poll about the most meaningless bunch of foolishness since the last Star Trek convention.

Let me get the facts straight. The presidential candidates all travel to Iowa 15 months before the real election. Everyone sends out busses to bring in voters and then pays them $35 to vote. All-in-all, only about 14,000 people in the whole country participate.

First of all, let me say that bussing people in to vote and then paying them money is something the Democrats are a lot better at. They have been carrying on like this for decades.

Next, with only 14,000 voters at this whole clambake, I could have gotten my Homeowner’s Association together and swung the victory to a different candidate. There were probably more members of the media on hand than voters, which gives a whole new meaning to the term slow news day (or month).

The most amazing result of this whole “event” is that Tommy Thompson did so poorly that he has dropped out of the presidential race. I am sort of embarrassed to admit this, but I was not even aware that he was running for President.  Possibly, another busload or two could have kept him going?

Maybe he drew the short straw? I don't know.  I don't get it.

Now that Barack Obama has unveiled his brilliant foreign policy strategy of cozying up to our enemies and bombing our allies, he has pretty much eliminated any chance of his being elected president. Even the Democrats have seemed to recognize that he should be back in the Illinois legislature, voting on highway bills.

However, he is still very popular among a segment of the population who admire a good speech over experience and sound logic. The consensus still seems to be that a Hillary-Obama ticket would be all but unbeatable, and therefore Hillary is sure to give him the nod to be her V.P.

I say, No Way!

Hillary’s ego could not allow this to happen. She is still trying to figure out how to cash in on Bill’s popularity without him being within three states distance of her. Imagine her standing at the Democratic convention between Bill and Barack. The oxygen would be sucked out of the room by the both of them so quickly, that Hillary would be left in a vacuum. She doesn’t want to spend her presidency, worrying about college girls (and the media) swooning over Barack’s latest speech or ribbon-cutting photo op.

No, Hillary will pick someone solid and dependable. She wants someone with enough experience and knowledge to put up a good front, but not someone who will hog her spotlight. She wants someone bland and boring.

I say she picks Bill Richardson to be her running mate.

The recent CNN/YouTube presidential debate embarrassment had a question on reparations for slavery. Not wanting to end their presidential aspirations immediately, all of the candidates (except Dennis Kucinich, who has absolutely nothing to lose) wimped out by lobbing back a very sympathetic, No.

No one is for slavery reparations because no one can answer the Big Question. The Big Question, of course, is this: Who was guilty enough on the slavery issue to deserve punishment, and rich enough to cough up the big bucks. The guilty party, of course, has to still be around, and still be filthy rich.

The guilty party would be a group of people who were instrumental in the preservation and spread of slavery. People who fought and died to keep slavery. Vengeful people who would hang on after all was lost with petty segregation and “Jim Crow” laws.

The group who should pay reparations for slavery is, of course, the Democratic Party.

They promoted slavery, spread slavery, profited from slavery and fought to the death to keep slavery. After slavery was abolished, they kept on with segregation in the “Solid South” until power was ripped away from them in recent years.

At the moment, they are floating in cash, hundreds of millions of dollars in cash.

Come on Democrats, finally do the right thing! Pay up.

White House Scandals – They set the standard (the low standard).

Scooter Libby Not Going to Jail – Bill was convicted of the same crime and didn’t get squat for punishment. He did lose his license to practice law in Arkansas. (Like he was really going to work again).

Presidential Pardons in General – Bill finished up with a list of pardons about the size of the Cleveland phone book. There were a lot of donors and buddies in that list too.

Bush Not Catching Bin Laden - He was handed to Bill on a platter, and he passed. Next stop, Afghanistan.

Ugly Children – Hey, how did this get in here!

Firing Federal Prosecutors – The Clintons sacked the whole lot of them. Even the one working on their Whitewater case. Throw in a bunch of travel office workers for good measure.

Global Warming – These two jetsetters have enough combined hot air to turn Iceland into Florida.

Raising Taxes on the Rich – There will probably be a tax exemption for “Speech Income”.

Trophy Wives – Bill’s only trophy is a moose head on the rec room wall. (Or is that a bust of Hill?) Sorry, cheap shot.

Marital Fidelity – What is Bill going to do if he has to live with Hillary for four years? Oh my! How many square feet in the White House?

Big Al Gore crusades for energy conservation to fight global warming.

Little Al Gore drives a Toyota Prius

Big Al Gore’s house consumes as much electricity as Yankee Stadium

Little Al Gore drives his Prius at 100 miles per hour while toking on a doobie

A chip off the old blockhead