And the birthday presents just keep getting better…….
August 25th, 2008The Man made it to the Convention and gave a rip-roaring speech. There is a word: heroic.
“The danger of civilization, of course, is that you will piss away your life on nonsense.”
I got just what I wanted for my birthday……….
August 25th, 2008
My friend Larry
August 24th, 2008has been taking part in an anti-war vigil in his town for … well, read what he sent me today:
“At our regular Sunday vigil today (plus yearfuckingsix), a friend brought new yard signs. I told him that mine has turned almost pure white from the weather. He said that his too had been bleeding. As have we all.
“Some more than others.”
The unfortunate Laura Bush
August 24th, 2008Has there ever been a First Lady so lacking in style, elegance, flair, originality? She’s chronically frumpy, never seeming at ease in her clothes, and really makes Mamie Eisenhower’s bangs look daring.
But, this comment today by a person who’s absolutely nailed it, still has me laughing:
“Apparently Laura is going to make it through eight years in the White House without figuring out her dressmaker hates her guts.”
Our guys………
August 23rd, 2008
Little Lily Rose lives on……….
August 23rd, 2008I was reading my hometown paper online this morning, and, as usual, checked the obituaries, where I usually recognize more names than I do in the news. It’s been a long time away.
But, this morning, there was one, and it bears notice:
Lily Rose Perlaki, 9 days old, died Aug. 14, at St. Christopher’s Children’s Hospital, Philadelphia.
She was the daughter of Jeffrey A. Perlaki and Heidi L. Hughes Bauder, Reading.
She is also survived by her brother, Laif Alexander Perlaki, at home. Other survivors include maternal grandparents Rosemary V. and Harold E. Schwenk, Ringtown; paternal grandparents William A. and Robin L. Perlaki, Reading; and paternal great-grandmother, June M. Perlaki, Marlett, MI.
A special thank you to the gift of life program. Lily’s heart went to a 2-month-old boy in Michigan; her liver, intestines and pancreas went to a 7-month-old boy in Nebraska; and her lungs went to a 3- month old boy in Missouri.
Jack Cafferty nails it…..
August 19th, 2008I’ve always liked the guy, since he really doesn’t seem to give a rat’s ass what anyone thinks of his opinions. He’s not afraid to call out the fools and jokers and clowns.
But, his comment about Fuck McFuck on cnn.com today was so good, so right, so insighful, and so clear, it bearing (illegally) reproducing here (with no apologies to copyright laws):
Commentary: Is McCain another George W. Bush?
By Jack Cafferty
CNN
Editor’s Note: Jack Cafferty is the author of the best-seller “It’s Getting Ugly Out There: The Frauds, Bunglers, Liars, and Losers Who Are Hurting America.” He provides commentary on CNN’s “The Situation Room” daily from 4 p.m.-7 p.m. You can also visit Jack’s Cafferty File blog.
NEW YORK (CNN) — Russia invades Georgia and President Bush goes on vacation. Our president has spent one-third of his entire two terms in office either at Camp David, Maryland, or at Crawford, Texas, on vacation.
His time away from the Oval Office included the month leading up to 9/11, when there were signs Osama bin Laden was planning to attack America, and the time Hurricane Katrina destroyed the city of New Orleans.
Sen. John McCain takes weekends off and limits his campaign events to one a day. He made an exception for the religious forum on Saturday at Saddleback Church in Southern California.
I think he made a big mistake. When he was invited last spring to attend a discussion of the role of faith in his life with Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, at Messiah College in Pennsylvania, McCain didn’t bother to show up. Now I know why.
It occurs to me that John McCain is as intellectually shallow as our current president. When asked what his Christian faith means to him, his answer was a one-liner. “It means I’m saved and forgiven.” Great scholars have wrestled with the meaning of faith for centuries. McCain then retold a story we’ve all heard a hundred times about a guard in Vietnam drawing a cross in the sand.
Asked about his greatest moral failure, he cited his first marriage, which ended in divorce. While saying it was his greatest moral failing, he offered nothing in the way of explanation. Why not?
Throughout the evening, McCain chose to recite portions of his stump speech as answers to the questions he was being asked. Why? He has lived 71 years. Surely he has some thoughts on what it all means that go beyond canned answers culled from the same speech he delivers every day.
He was asked “if evil exists.” His response was to repeat for the umpteenth time that Osama bin Laden is a bad man and he will pursue him to “the gates of hell.” That was it.
He was asked to define rich. After trying to dodge the question — his wife is worth a reported $100 million — he finally said he thought an income of $5 million was rich.
One after another, McCain’s answers were shallow, simplistic, and trite. He showed the same intellectual curiosity that George Bush has — virtually none.
Where are John McCain’s writings exploring the vexing moral issues of our time? Where are his position papers setting forth his careful consideration of foreign policy, the welfare state, education, America’s moral responsibility in the world, etc., etc., etc.?
John McCain graduated 894th in a class of 899 at the Naval Academy at Annapolis. His father and grandfather were four star admirals in the Navy. Some have suggested that might have played a role in McCain being admitted. His academic record was awful. And it shows over and over again whenever McCain is called upon to think on his feet.
He no longer allows reporters unfettered access to him aboard the “Straight Talk Express” for a reason. He simply makes too many mistakes. Unless he’s reciting talking points or reading from notes or a TelePrompTer, John McCain is lost. He can drop bon mots at a bowling alley or diner — short glib responses that get a chuckle, but beyond that McCain gets in over his head very quickly.
I am sick and tired of the president of the United States embarrassing me. The world we live in is too complex to entrust it to someone else whose idea of intellectual curiosity and grasp of foreign policy issues is to tell us he can look into Vladimir Putin’s eyes and see into his soul.
George Bush’s record as a student, military man, businessman and leader of the free world is one of constant failure. And the part that troubles me most is he seems content with himself.
He will leave office with the country $10 trillion in debt, fighting two wars, our international reputation in shambles, our government cloaked in secrecy and suspicion that his entire presidency has been a litany of broken laws and promises, our citizens’ faith in our own country ripped to shreds. Yet Bush goes bumbling along, grinning and spewing moronic one-liners, as though nobody understands what a colossal failure he has been.
I fear to the depth of my being that John McCain is just like him.
So do I, Jack. So do I.
Our secret language
August 16th, 2008When you are old, old friends, when you’ve known each other for almost half a century, when you have been in each other’s hearts for that long, even if there were decades when you were all out of touch, busily building individual lives, there is a language that began when you met and nothing - not time, not distance - ever diminishes the power of that language. And it never speaks louder or with more force than when things are difficult or complicated for one or the other of these old friends.
I am blessed with these people in my life, and they feel the same about me. One tells me a story about something he did a few days ago, at an event thousands of miles away, surrounded by people I’ll never know, and when he did it, he said he couldn’t wait to tell me what he’d done - knowing I’d be absolutely, blindingly, lovingly proud of him - but also that he could hear me laughing when he did it. And, of course, he was right.
He shows me a picture of him and his niece, the beautiful little one who looks so much like him, and I melt.
Another tells me of an accident, other things, and he says that he is sad, but I know that he’s angry, too, and I pick up the phone and get his wife, a woman I’ve not yet met, but she knows all about me, who I am, what I am in her husband’s life long before they met, and she and I talk like old friends, not even a second’s hesitation before the intimacy is solid and we are friends, we shall always be friends. When he walks in, she hands him the phone, as pleased as he is to know I’m on the other end of the line.
And he and I talk. About everything. About things that don’t even apply to either of our lives right now. About things I’ve never told him, and things I didn’t know about him. We go over all of it and how we - because we’re all in this together - are going to navigate these suddenly tricky and treacherous waters on which we find ourselves. What we do know, though, is that we will navigate them successfully and that one day we’ll look back at this time in wonder, how did we get through all that, why did it happen, isn’t it great that we’re still here, still together?
Someone we both love is having trouble, too. After a lifetime of good works, he suddenly finds himself in a vacuum of sorts, without many places to turn, and his wife is disappointed and hurt, he is confused and angry, but he’s not one for phone calls or consoling. He comes around at his own good time, that’s what we know about him, and I say that I wrote to him, but I won’t hear back for a while, and our other friend says Yes, that’s right. But we all know we’re here, we’re always here.
The one we’ve not heard from is the one who moved heaven and earth to make sure he got to me before anyone else when one of our small group died last September. He did not want me to hear it in abrupt terms or shocking blurts. He wanted to talk with me, to cajole me, to make me laugh when I didn’t much feel like laughing, and then he told me that Arthur was gone, so gently I almost didn’t understand what he’d said.
When he surfaces, we’ll be here, and we’ll talk about whatever we need to talk about. Maybe we’ll tell stories, maybe we’ll ask questions, maybe we’ll just remember and be silent and be glad to be with each other.
This is the secret language of loving old friends. This is what doesn’t need to be said. This is the comfort in which we can all wrap ourselves, and this is what we all found in that grand hotel on the beach just one month - today - short of forty-two years ago. A lifetime plus, and we are still here, and no one has to say a word.
A rare sighting……
August 14th, 2008It’s not often that someone gets to photograph the two most vicious war criminals of the recent past together.
Unfortunately, Kissinger is only sleeping, not dead. The other one is also alive. Sort of.
Mark David Chapman
August 12th, 2008I am certain there is no single individual as universally loathed by my generation as Mark David Chapman. He killed John Lennon. Yeah, Sirhan Sirhan is up there, as was James Earl Ray, but when I think of who was lost to us, I think first of Lennon.
Today, I read of his most recent parole hearing. Laughable, really, to think that anyone would ever consider releasing this fucker into society. He’ll die behind bars, which is as it should be.
And, while reading this article, I saw the Chapman is married, and, once a year, enjoys a 42-hour conjugal visit with his wife. Having recently lost myself in a viewing on VH-1 of a show about women who get involved with and sometimes marry men on Death Row - I had a supply of Doritos, freshly-made salsa, icy Diet Coke With Lime, and my sweet “princess” to keep me company while we both agreed that we might have met one of these women, maybe, a long time ago (he - “princess” - says he finds them in chatrooms all the time, and I believe him) - I know those women are out there, but my education doesn’t make them any less insane or unappetizing.
Who the fuck would marry Mark David Chapman? Well, her name is Gloria Hiroko Chapman; she was married to him when he murdered Lennon, and she visits him more than once a year. What kind of woman stays married to this guy? Does she take her marriage vows so seriously that she gives up her life to remain faithful? I read, too, that Chapman has become an “evangelical Christian” - doesn’t that just figure? - so maybe they’re both ensnared in that “’til death do us part” stuff.
Pity that their honoring of their vows didn’t extend to respecting whatever vows John Lennon had taken with his wife, Yoko Ono. Pity that he still gets to enjoy the pleasures of the flesh, at least once a year. I suspect others at Attica enjoy the pleasures of Chapman’s flesh, without his consent or cooperation, more than once a year.
Every time this happens - the parole hearing - I cringe. Not because I’m afraid he’ll get parole, because the likelihood of Chapman getting out is as good as the idea of Charlie Manson getting out. But, I’m reminded that he’s still alive, and John Lennon is still dead.
And we’ll never know what was lost. That’s what nags at me, so much that I hate to be reminded of it.
Some things are just too sad and irretrievable to contemplate, and this is one of them.
Our President
August 12th, 2008 
John Edwards is no Wilt Chamberlain……..
August 8th, 2008So he boinked a chickie beyond the boundaries of his marriage. That makes him an adulterous pig, assuming, arguendo, that he and his wife, Elizabeth, don’t have what used to be referred to rather euphemistically as an “open marriage.”
Unless his grand total eclipses the claim of Wilt Chamberlain that he slept with more than 20,000 women, he’s just another guy who couldn’t keep it in his pants, got caught, and his political career is over.
It’s a shame about the last, because he’s a very talented man, but, in this bluenose America in which we live, we’re more able to tolerate a lying, murderous pig in the White House than a man who cheated on his wife. Truth to tell, we’ve got some problems with our priorities here in the land of the free and the home of the brave.
John McCain - not quite the bottom of the bucket, but close ….
August 6th, 2008There are things about the two candidates that the American public needs to know, and one of them – the one I find most compelling for a variety of reasons – is that John McCain got into Annapolis as a legacy, the same way Fuckface got into Yale, because he was the son and grandson of Navy men. When he graduated, he ranked 894th out of 899 graduates. That’s fifth from the bottom of a class of almost 900 midshipmen.
That’s so low as almost to negate his degree. It’s more of a certificate of attendance than a degree, really.
If my physician or my lawyer or even the woman who cuts my hair ranked in the bottom of his or her graduating class, I would not let them take care of me or anyone I cared about.
The idea that someone with that abysmal sort of ranking tells everything we need to know about what sort of jazzman McCain is. He’s never held a job on his own; he went to work for his brand-new father-in-law after he quickly married the much-younger beer heiress as soon as he was able to ditch the crippled wife, the mother of his kids, who’d waited for him while he was a POW. His father-in-law employed him for a short time, and then bought him a seat in Congress in his own Arizona district, where McCain was nothing short of a carpetbagger who had made a very smart, very profitable marriage.
Today, reading Maureen Dowd’s column in the New York Times, this paragraph jumped out at me:
“McCain could dismiss W. as a lightweight, but he knows Obama’s smart. Obama wrote his own books, while McCain’s were written by Salter. McCain knows he’s the affirmative action scion of admirals who might not have gotten through Annapolis without being a legacy. Obama didn’t even tell Harvard Law School that he was black on his application.”
Obama was so confident of his abilities and his credentials, he didn’t feel the need to list himself as half-black on his application, something that certainly would have helped his cause. He was not about to capitalize on something that he hadn’t earned; he just went ahead with what he’d done on his own.
Unlike John McCain, who’s made a career, from the start of his life, of riding on the coattails of others.
594 out of 599.
I wonder where 595, 596, 597, 598, and 599 are, and what their lives have been like. I daresay none of them has ever entertained the notion of running for President. Even they have shame, something sorely lacking in McCain.
For all my Fuckface-loving friends out there…..
August 5th, 2008………… oh, wait.
I don’t have any friends who love Fuckface. In fact, everyone I know hates him. Which makes sense.
Little Boy read this, and thought of me…..
July 29th, 2008It’s just about the most wonderful thing anyone could say about me. That Little Boy, he really has my heart - and my number ………….
“Live your life in such a way that when your feet hit the floor in the morning, Satan shudders and says, ‘Oh, shit, she’s awake!’”
Everyone needs a nigger ……..
July 26th, 2008I thought of what it used to be like, getting ready for Saturday nights when I was a teenager, back a million years ago, in my home town. Since I had a job that kept me occupied almost every Saturday, all day and well into the evening, a Saturday night off was a rare and wonderful occurrence.
Most often, it meant going to Schiavone’s to hang out with everyone else there. Sooner or later, a bunch of us would wander down East Lloyd Street, cut across the railroad tracks across from Sorin’s rag factory, and walk that block along - what was it, Emerick Street? - to Sands’ Restaurant, where we’d order our usual hamburgers with hot sauce and fries and Cokes and now, after all these years, I can see us there, I can still hear the music from the jukebox in Schiavone’s, but I no longer remember what we were saying, what it was we talked about, what it was about, all that time we spent growing up.
I just remember how it felt. I watched the sun going down tonight, and I remembered how it felt. It felt like everything was possible, that it was all good, that there was excitement around every corner because everything was new, and it all belonged to us because we were young and beautiful and strong and because we would be like that forever.
Well, that’s what keeps kids from killing themselves, that kind of hope and belief and uninformed strength that helps us to grow up and learn that none of it is true. That it’s all hard work and failure and the occasional victory, but mostly it’s going to be fear and sadness and betrayal and lust and joy and misplaced certainty and the ultimate decision to live or die, made every day by the sentient ones.
Tonight, I felt it all again, and it was wonderful. I was glad to be able to recapture that feeling, if only for a moment. You see, I’d been thinking of my home town today, after I learned that three young men - teenagers - had been arrested and charged in the beating death of that Mexican man who lived in my home town. I recognized two of the family names, and I used to know one family fairly well. The idea that their spawn murdered someone, that they’ve been charged with homicide, the horror of all that has transpired, is just hard for me to grasp.
I’ve known people who were murdered. Some were close to me, others were acquaintances, but they were all shocking. I’ve known murderers, but always in a professional capacity, and it was always difficult for me, but I did it, because I took an oath and that’s what mattered. I wept when a murderer, in fact, was executed, tears that still confuse me.
But, to see those boys - and they are boys - who spent that day getting drunk and then kicking and stomping another young man to death is to see something gone so terribly wrong, so terrifically off the grid, that I realize those boys never knew what I knew on those Saturday nights. Those boys were filled with rage and hate and - is there any place in this scenario for the inevitable question about steroids, since two were football players? - acted those emotions out with absolutely no impulse control. Teenagers are notoriously short on such an adult concept as holding oneself in check, but these boys had the fuel of alcohol to render them even less capable.
And so they beat a man to death for no other reason than he hadn’t been born in the United States and he didn’t look like them. It’s called a “hate crime” these days, a designation I find absurd, since I’ve yet to encounter a murder that was a “love crime,” no matter how anyone tries to romanticize crimes of passion. They’re all hate crimes, and what those boys did in Shenandoah, PA almost two weeks ago is simply a crime of hate.
The posts at the newspaper’s website contained more of the “He was here illegally so he had it coming” variety than I’d have wished. There were others, more compassionate, more intelligent, more understanding, but the ugly ones caught my attention. They were the posts of people who so desperately need niggers they willingly sacrifice whatever humanity they might once have had.
See, I had a theory about my home town, which was populated by immigrants beginning at the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth century. The Irish showed up first, so they were the owners. Then, the Italians showed up, and because they got there after the Irish, the Irish made the Italians their niggers. Fortunately for the Italians, the Poles and the Lithuanians arrived later, and then the Italians had their very own niggers. Other Eastern European types came, and some Greeks, some Lebanese, some from Western Europe, and they were everyone’s niggers.
By the time I left that town, all we had left was Dick the Nigger, who worked on the garbage truck, but he was Syrian, not black. He was the best we could do, though.
Now, I am told, the population has changed. Lots of Hispanics, most from Mexico, I think. African-Americans. Puerto Ricans. All sorts of Latinos, Hispanics. The white old-timers are probably close to being in the minority, although I have no way of validating such an assumption.
My old home town has changed forever, but the concept of everyone having a nigger still remains. The boys who beat that man to death - and, yes, I’m well aware of the concept of innocent until proven guilty, but let’s be real here - needed a nigger, so they found a Mexican. The people who left those hateful posts at the newspaper’s website need niggers, too, so that they can pretend to justify their inferiority.
Some things never change, they say, but my experience is that everything changes all the time. You go back to see the old school - it’s a falling-down mess. You go to meet the old boyfriend for a drink - he’s an anger-filled dry drunk with a foul mouth and a tragic history. You look at work you did a long time ago and you wonder how you got away with something so shoddy. You see your first home and you can’t believe you lived in a place so small.
You read about your home town and you are saddened in a way you never were before because something in your history died when that Mexican man succumbed to his injuries. The memories I carried were cloaked in a kind of innocence that no longer exists, and no matter how I try to turn away, to hold onto the stories that were mine and mine alone, I can’t help but hear the sound of kicks hitting a fallen man, the crack of a skull slammed into the ground, the calls of young bigots telling an already-mortally wounded man that his friends should “go back to Mexico and get out of our town.”
It’s like a song playing on a radio in the next room. I can’t hear the tune, I can’t make out the words, but it’s there, running right underneath my consciousness, and no matter how I try to pretend that I can’t hear it, I can hear it. I’ll always hear it. And its awful, constant, deadly transmission has become the background music for the feeling I had tonight when I thought of what Saturday nights were like in my home town.
They killed more than a man that night, those stupid, brutal young thugs.
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