Monthly Archives: October 2006

Pissed off

I think we vote for people who are pissed off.

I think we admire that passion and don’t give a shit what it’s being passionate about.

I mean, us Americans, not you few elite that read this.

Democrats routed the Republicans in 1974 because they were pissed off.  Reagan routed the Democrats because fiscal conservatives finally got pissed off and Newt Gingrich was the most pissed off of all. 

I think that’s what Republicans don’t get this time.

We’re pissed about $3/gal gas and we’re pissed because we expect a Congressperson to know that chasing a teenager sexually is just indecent and outrageous, no matter what laws are involved.  We’re pissed that the poor don’t pay tax and now the rich don’t pay tax and i pay a shot in the jaw and then the state grabs theirs and then the school district and the banks get all the rest in interest because I have to borrow against my equity in my house to get braces for the youngest and put the oldest in college.  And where the hell are my health and retirement benefits?  The Dow is up to 12,000 and I’m up to my chin.  Something’s wrong and I’m pissed.  And if my situation is bad and they are so damn smart, why isn’t the budget balanced?  We know it can be done.  Clinton did it with a GOP Congress and Bush can’t?  Bullshit.  I’m pissed. 

We’re pissed about Iraq.  We were thinking something more along the lines of a class act that made us look good and what we got was excrement thrown in our faces while we slog through an endless quagmire.  Not what we had in mind at all.

I’m personally pissed about Katrina and my son’s eviction as a refugee from this government’s incompetence.

We’re pissed that you, Mr. President, keep asking for more power to fight terrorists and you don’t seem to know what to do with the power you already have.  Neither does your Secretary of Defense.  We’re spending billions in no bid contracts in Iraq and nobody asks but one question:  what’s my end?  Duke Cunningham goes to jail, but he’s not even a very big crook at a mere $2.4 million in bribes (a record, so they say). 

I think we’re pissed because they’re so fucking smug.

What would Jesus Do?  He’d throw the bums out of the Temple, and he’d use a thong of leather to whip their ass out the door.

 

My wise grandmother

My grandmother, Elsie, who lived with us when we were growing up, was a wise woman.

I loved her with all my heart and still do.

Anyway, one of the wise things she told is that stupid people talk about people, mediocre people talk about things and smart people talk about ideas.

Tonight, reading the blogs of my friends and family, I am surrounded by a lot of smart people.

I’m happy for blogging.

It keeps me up with what folks are thinking in a way that casual conversation rarely goes these days.

Despite the alienation of the computer and the internet, I feel closer to my sister in South Carolina because I get to read her blog.  I really haven’t known MCARP very long or well, but I feel very close to him, knowing what he thinks and goes through.  It’s an intimacy really only possible through his blog.  I would never get to see John X enough to find out the details of his mind turds, but I’m jolly glad I do via his blog.  Erika West, the same.

Haven’t been able to read my daughter’s blog lately because she has it set to private, friends only and I’m off MySpace.  I’m a recovering spacer.

In fact, I wish more of my friends blogged.  I know people all over the state and most areas of the country and if they would all blog and read my blog, we’d all be in better touch.

Of course, I’d be so busy reading blogs, I’d starve.  Maybe I’d better think this through a little.

Anyway, I’ve enjoyed y’all’s blogging.  Keep it up.  Good Job.  Pat on the Back official.

 

It's the TIMING, stupid …

By Kevin Johnson, USA TODAY
WASHINGTON — FBI agents raided the homes of a Pennsylvania congressman’s daughter and her business partner Monday as part of an investigation into whether Rep. Curt Weldon, R-Pa., helped them secure lucrative lobbying contracts.

Federal investigators targeted four locations near Philadelphia, including the home of Karen Weldon, and two properties in Jacksonville, FBI spokesman Debbie Weierman said.

Weierman declined to elaborate. But another federal law enforcement official said the probe focused on whether the congressman used improper influence to steer business to his daughter and her partner, Charles Sexton.

The official, who has been briefed on aspects of the investigation, was not authorized to comment publicly on the inquiry. The congressman’s properties were not among the locations searched, the official said.

At a campaign stop near Philadelphia where Weldon is in a tight re-election race against Democrat Joe Sestak, the congressman denied any wrongdoing and questioned the timing of the investigation.

“What I find ironic, if there is an investigation, is that no one would tell me until three weeks before the election. This incident was 2½ years ago,” he told the Associated Press. “I’ve never helped my daughter get anything. My kids are qualified on their own.”

In 2004, a liberal watchdog group, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, called on the Justice Department to examine whether Weldon violated federal law by assisting companies that hired his daughter as a lobbyist.

Laocoon’s note:  Yeah, everything is timing and everything is political at this time, Rep. Weldon.  The problem is that it’s hard to imagine some FBI supervisor timing this out because it’s so well known how much Bush’s Bureau loves to make official moves to favor some Democrat against a senior GOP House committee chairman.  Those FBI agents and supervisors, wacky guys that they are, can’t wait to give a hand to a looney, left-wing … er, ah … turns out the Democrat, Joe Sestak, is a retired Admiral.  Well, you get my drift, anyway.

 

The Foley Effect

New polling came in over the weekend that reflects the Foley scandal in various races and it’s astounding.  Many more races became competitive for the Democrats and the GOP is being walloped in formerly tossup races.

It’s hard to tell whether this effect will stay in place over the next three weeks until election day, absent another news story to drive the election returns, because the GOP will be spending tens of millions on negative ads and have their other institutional advantages (gerrymandering, incumbency, vote fraud, e.g.) and their legendary advantage in getting voters to actually vote.

News stories say Rove and Bush are still confident of retaining control over Congress and have no plans in place for any other outcome.

Meanwhile, the national GOP election committees have begun to re-allocate funds.  Mike DeWine in Ohio, for example, with a $4.5 million warchest for the last three weeks will have to go without national backing because national money is going to go to shore up George Allen in Virginia.  Allen had enjoyed a 7 percent lead in the polls in his race against former Reagan Navy Secretary turned antiwar activist Democrat Webb, but is now locked in a statistical tie.  The GOP is also going to focus on Missouri and Tennessee, where Dems hold very slim leads, within the margin of error of the polls.  Bush himself will be making at least two trips to Nashville and Chattanooga in the final days of this election cycle.  The GOP has to win one of the two in Mo. and TN and hold onto Va. to keep hold of the Senate but the Dems must sweep to take the Senate.

On the House side, it’s even more problematic.  I’m just guessing, but it looks like Foley didn’t make anyone change their mind, but it crystallized a lot of thinking for independents and undecideds and moved them solidly into the Dem category.  Dozens of races show movement toward the Democratic candidates and wholesale categories of races have moved from “tossups” to “lean Dem” and from “lean Rep.” into tossups.  Late last week, I doubted if the Dems could take the 12 or 13 necessary races out of 18 tossups to take over the House.  The polls over the weekend show the Dems getting 15 of those 18 and moving another 9 races  into the tossup category that had been safely GOP seats.  Local reporting in New York state, for example, three races I was watching closely in upstate New York included, look like a Dem sweep beneath the coattails of the very popular Hillary and governor candidate Eliot Spitzer.  Pennsylvania and Ohio Republican parties seem to be imploding and bleeding red votes into blue Democrats.  Even such safe Republican seats as Chris Shays in Conn. and Clay Shaw in Florida are no longer good bets.  Two of the three tossup Indiana races I’ve been watching turned into seats the Democrats can consider theirs to lose and the one that was marginally GOP is now marginally Dem. 

It won’t stay like this.  All elections tighten up as it gets closer to election day.  The GOP onslaught of negative ads starts today and will have its effect.  The GOP will still outperform the polls.  The ability to manipulate successfully a small turnout election is still within the grasp of the GOP.

Nevertheless, the gap has now narrowed and I’m changing my prediction slightly.  In the Senate, it will be 51-49 GOP, a net gain of another Dem seat from my earlier thinking.  In the House, it finally looks like the much ballyhooed Dem takeover, but not the sea change i’ve seen written about:  Dems 220, GOP 215. 

A little more politics

I’ve written some about the House races, predicting the Dems will fall short a very few seats of the 218 they need to flip from the GOP hold.

Just briefly on the Senate…

The GOP needs just one of the following six races to go their way:  Rhode Island, New Jersey, Ohio, Montana, Missouri and Tennessee.

If you look at where the GOP is spending their money, they seem to have given up on saving Sen. Burns in Montana, Lincoln Chaffee in Rhode Island and upsetting Menendez in New Jersey, although those races are all within striking distance for Republicans.

That leaves three critical races: Ford (D) vs. Corker in Tenn.; McCaskill (D) vs. Talent in Missouri; and, Sen. Mike DeWine vs. Bob Casey (D) in Ohio.  Polling shows all three of those races within the margin of error of the polls, but Casey has been consistently leading in Ohio by a margin of 3 percent.  The Missouri and Tenn. races have flipped and flopped in the polls, but in this post Mark Foley atmosphere, the Dems have begun to show consistent, if thin leads.  It’s the “firewall” strategy, the press is calling it:  all they have to win is one of these three and it’s game over, so let’s pour money into the races.

If the GOP only wins one of these three races, it’ll be 50-50 in the Senate with V.P. Dick Cheney casting the deciding vote.  Wouldn’t that be interesting?

Anyway, election night Nov. 7, watch for U.S. Senate returns from these three states and you’ll likely know early how things will go.

In the House, I’ll be watching three upstate N.Y. races and three Indiana races in the early returns.  If those six appear to all go to the Dems, it’s game over; four or five of the six and it’s still a tossup; a three and three split or worse and the Dems will fall short in the House.

Yeah, I know.  I’m the only one who gives a shit at this point.  I don’t care.  It’s something that I like to keep up with.

 

some this 'n that

Congressional Quarterly, compiling all polls and other information, says that Dems are pretty sure winners of 208 House seats and the GOP 213.  This is a net gain for Dems and loss for the GOP over the past 60 days.  Two months ago, CQ had the GOP at 219 and Dems at 203.  There are, in addition, 14 seats “too close to call”.  If CQ is to be believed, that means that the Dems must take 10 of those 14 close races while the GOP can keep its majority only winning 5.  In Oklahoma City’s 5th District, the only poll I’ve seen, SurveyUSA, shows Mary Fallin at 62% and Dr. Hunter at 33%, which was about the split 2 years ago when it was Istook vs. Bert Smith.  The most recent polls also show Brad Henry beating Istook 60-30 with the rest undecided.

Today, as has been the case for a couple of weeks, I’m obsessed with a case where I’m behind the 8 ball personally.  I have personal and professional culpability for letting this case get way behind on my side.  Today I have to go before a judge and pronounce “mea culpa, mea maxima culpa” (“my fault, my most grievous fault” for those of you who aren’t current on their Latin Mass from the old Catholic church.)  In 20 years of practicing law, I’ve never been in this position before and it’s been making me lose sleep (and, I’m told, grind my teeth so loudly that others lose their sleep as well).  I guess I’m only human and can be allowed a mistake or two in 20 years, but it is killing me and I don’t like it and I’m upset beyond words.  This has definitely affected other parts of my life and that’s also unlike me.

Had some nice IM contact with my son, Jack, yesterday.  He makes me laugh.  He says he’s writing a play called “The Titanic Adventures of the Love Boat Poseiden”.  We bantered about possible dialogue:  “Bottoms up, girls!” and “You’ve already gone down on the entire ship, you slut.”  He’s the most funny guy I know.  Can you tell I love my child?

I overate at the India food buffet last night with 13 people at the table (unlucky?).  As a result, even though the Ed Norton performance was good, I dozed off during the movie “Down in the Valley”.  Luckily, only George Oz and The Gary were subjected to my poor hosting and they didn’t seem to mind all that much.  I missed the Debster, who is in Albuquerque, NM, according to her hubby.

Despite the above, I’ve been working steady and as hard as I know how and it exhausts me.  What is up with this get to work in the morning and stay all day stuff?  Don’t people know that I have a convertible to ride in and late night music to hear?

I’m looking forward to seeing my sister in S.C. the first of December, despite her blogged problems with my neice.  Hang in there, M.E.

You, too, MCARP, hang in there.  Glad to get a chance to see you doing better last night.

SuzArt, faced also with the prospect of an actual full time job, is shopping the sales, I’m told.  Be careful, girls, Suz has sharp elbows and she’s playing bigger at the post position than her actual height/weight because she can be SO ruthless.

I’ve got to go obsess some more, but remind me to tell you guys how much I enjoy Dayna D, the suicide queen.

 

 

art scene

First, I’ll admit to a slight bias:  I’ve been an unabashed fan of the work of J. Don Cook for three decades, first as a news photographer, then as an art photographer and more recently as a writer, sculptor, painter.  I even like the guy himself, despite the fact that he cut my favorite tie off me at the Red Cup one fine day.

That aside, his new work he debuted at Nova Friday knocked me out.  I really loved it.  Such happy, vibrant colors and a mysterious technique.  In the black and silver techno look of Nova, it just was brilliantly displayed and I could just gush with admiration.

As an art weekend, it was the first I saw and the most vivid, but it only set the stage for a wonderful weekend of artistic pursuits.

That same night was Paseo Gallery Walk with a wonderful retrospective at JRB and — believe it or not — an even stronger show at PAA gallery on the other end of the street.  Suzart oversaw a show of several artists and for there only being about 20 pieces showing, I saw at least 5 that I lusted after.  I want to mention my friend Lynn Barnett Sparks especially since I just adored a small piece she did of a woman’s tatooed bum topped by a masked head.

From there, it would have been easy to feel a letdown, but the furniture and design show at IAO held up well against such good competition.  Loved loved loved several of the pieces, including Kyle Golding’s and someone I don’t think I know named Fitzsimmons (?).  The Bewleys had wonderful glass and she had a black and red legged accent piece that made my mouth water with avarice.

That should have been enough for one weekend, but never sated, I also did the studio tour in the area just west of Classen above 39th.  Martha Green never disappoints with her predominately red and silk fabric pieces and she snuck me into a back room to see a George Oswalt I’d never before seen that she owns. 

One might have been forgiven for not noticing art at Ernesto and Lynne’s gorgeous house and garden, but there was plenty of Sanchez “cellular”/organic/bubbles work to catch your eye and some environmental art under a tent by another artist and did you know that Ron Ferrell the sculptor knows the best places to sit and enjoy a beverage at every studio in town?

Susan Mears house and studio was a cornicopia of bright colored glass and piece after piece of yes-I-want-that-in-my-house work.

We finished up Saturday’s art tour at Paul Medina’s studio, where he was showing some work from the 1990s that had not been seen for all those years, but shared the vivid colors I’d started with on Friday afternoon at J.Don’s show.  The lovely Emily as bartender was just one more piece of art since she’s featured in several of the works more recent by Paul.  Paul’s multimedia work of the past couple of years never fails to engage me on all levels, they are all altars to art and his power and authority as an artist.

sunday, I hid from the world and my cell phone in a dark theatre and watched Departed.  Go.  I’m not even going to say anymore than just go and see it.  It’s worth it and you’ll like it.  It’s a work of art, too, and everyone will be talking about it, so go and form your own commentary.

A final thank you to all of you who went to Dallas and let me into the best bars and restaurants and helped me find the good parking places in your absence.  I enjoyed the better service.

Which brings me to bad service.  Twice now, the service at Bossa Nova Bar above Cafe do Brazil on a Friday night has been absolutely horrid.  If it weren’t for the full moon and skyline available from their rooftop deck, I would have been lividly denouncing the joint to Anna’s face and be grateful to be 86’d. Between the bad service upstairs and the bad music set too loud downstairs …  grrrrrrrrr!!!  I like the place, the food and Anna.  I really really WANT that place to succeed.  I gotta think twice about whether I’ll go again on Friday night.

In the same way other guys pour over baseball statistics or football scores, I’ve been obsessed with polling and other political insider crap and I’ve spent a hell of a lot of time pouring over minutia.  The problem of predicting political outcomes is the same as with a college football game or a baseball World Series.  This political year is especially frustrating because it’s a low turnout cycle since the presidency isn’t on the line.  This means a very small change among those who actually go and vote (as opposed the everyone who has a political opinion and may sometimes vote) can make a big difference in the outcomes.  This year’s primaries had record low turnouts.  Randy Graf in Arizona is the GOP nominee and a Republican nomineewould ordinarily be a good bet in the Tucson area that has been represented for several terms by a retiring well-liked incumbent.  But, a small number of very conservatives voters beat the national GOP choice of a more moderate and less strident conservative.  Now, Graf is getting pummelled by a Democrat in the polls, but he was also being pummelled in the polls when he won his primary.  Same for the Democrats in Conn., where a minority position held fervently by those who actually voted ousted Sen. Lieberman, a former party vice presidential nominee and, for all appearances earlier this year, a shoo-in.  There’s also the consideration of the institutional advantages the Republicans have built into the system.  From language and framing the issues to gerrymandering and maybe even vote fraud where absolutely necessary, and certainly their get-out-the-vote superiority, the GOP outperforms the polls and can really make polls look foolish in low turnout cases.  The media I’m reading — even the insider commentary — has its own biases to weigh and the polls themselves are not equal — some are more persuasive (like Gallup) to me than others (like Zogby) and that’s a REAL insider thing about methodology, statistics and interpretation. Anyway, it comes down to reading tea leaves and chicken entrails. 

Bedtime.  Big week.  Things to do, people to sue, lives to ruin. 

 

 

Bite thy tongue, John

My interpersonal skills dropped off the low end of the scale yesterday.

Not once, but twice yesterday someone was a good enough friend to call me on my bullshit and say that a remark of mine was out of line.

Guilty as charged, your honor.

If you only knew how much I’d like to avoid personal responsibility and blame this on last night’s full moon.  Alas, no can do.

From my personal and interior point of view, the matter is made worse by the fact that my mouth and brain were disconnected by my worry over a case in which I bear personal responsibility for bad lawyering.  That’s actually pretty rare for me over the past 20 years and I’m not happy with myself or the situation.

I let my personal disappointment with my professional performance spread bad juju to my personal relationships.

And, it wasn’t even merely the two friends who confronted the situation.  The lovely Juliet took some poor behavior in stride, forgiving me without ever saying a word, but clearly disappointed in my behavior.

I’m sure there are others who had the misfortune to encounter me — store clerks and other anonymous souls — who put up with my moodiness.

So, this OU-TX weekend, I’m thinking about this out loud on this blog.

As many of you know, I’ve made some changes in my life lately.  Principally, I’ve put a much higher priority on my work and devote much much more time to my law practice.

I haven’t done so quite as thoughtfully as I might, it occurs to me.

When working expanded in my schedule, other things took a back seat or disappeared from my day altogether.  I haven’t given any thought until today what was left in and what was left out.

One of the things, I now realize, that has been absent from my life that once was a focus of my life is “getting centered”.  Formerly, there was a time every day (or nearly so) that I read, prayed, got perspective, meditated, or just was quiet and undisturbed.

I knew that I had lost my daily blogging and journaling and thought little about it, but it’s now more clear that those things helped me keep my perspective and articulate what was going on with me internally.  Those things were in my life for a reason: they help me understand what my place is within the universe and what my own role is in life, especially my own life (whether I shall be the hero or the villain in my own life, Charles Dickens).

When I’m thinking about how I messed up my case and what I can do to escape the consequences, I’m not in the now, I’m in the past and the future.  When I’m thinking about how I can cover my own ass, I’m not considering how I affect others, what they will feel if I unleash my cynicism and bile.

One of the things I said yesterday for which I was called down directly implicated my sobriety.  One of the many reasons I quit drinking was that alcohol destroyed my filters and I very often awoke with a sense of dread and remorse about something I’d said the night before.  Over the years, I’ve destroyed many relationships by the simple expedient of being an asshole with a penchant for vivid language and hyperbole.

I’ve also today had occasion to remember that my estrangement with one of my sisters is about how much like me she is and how much I hate to see my own character flaws reflected in her (“you spot it, you got it” is the AA aphorism).  She does not seem to be able to be happy and feel good about herself unless she’s tearing me down and it wears on me.  Now, I must confront the idea again that I sometimes leverage myself up by pushing others down.

This redeployment of my time and energy seems to have exacerbated this problem.

Another way of looking at the problem is that I’ve been so concerned with my own stuff that I’m inconsiderate of others’ feelings.  This is particularly piquant personally because I’ve gone so far as to break off romantic relationships because I was so important that some woman’s inability to pay 100 percent of her attention to me 100 percent of the time offended me — how could they be so inconsiderate? 

What is most distressing for me about this is the sense of hopelessness and despair that I will ever be free of these character flaws.  I have the sense that I can be made aware of the problem and that I can analyze the problem and can even mitigate the behaviors, but that it’s such an integral part of my character that I’ll never be rid of it.  It’s a neverending fight for truth justice and the american way, Superman.

I’d like to just stop here and say, OK I have a problem with my mouth and I’ll try to be better and I’ll make sure I have a time every day to reflect and that will help with the problem.

I can’t do that.

The reason I can’t just stop at that point is that the problem is metastic. 

I’ve not written, composed a poem, painted, done sumii for a very long time.  I know that I do those things not just to express my creativity, but also because it feeds and nurtures my soul and enhances my life.  I’ve let my time budget get out of control and I’ve been thoughtless about my priorities.

Playing off a theme near and dear to a lawyer’s heart, that time IS money, it’s like I’ve needed clothes and bought an Armani suit and needed to eat, so I went to Coach House for steak au poive, but meanwhile, I can’t pay my electric bill and the lights are off at the house.

Lately, work has overwhelmed all other time priorities.  Lately, my relationship with the lovely Juliet (whatever the hell that relationship is) has been a high priority.  Lately, politics has consumed my interest and I spend an inordinate amount of time on the internet pouring over polls and commentary.  Then there is the immediate shiney object on the ground that distracts me like the cat barf I just found on the carpet that caused me to stop this blogging and reach for the cleaning materials and the mental note to talk to MCARP about same.

I have not been very good in my life with monetary budgeting and now I find myself forced to confront the consequences of that and pay attention to financial priorities and I am very much struggling to do at 57 what others learn much earlier.

I am not very good at keeping to a schedule and a schedule is very much like a budget, except for time rather than money.  Now, I find myself forced to confront the consequences of that and pay attention to my priorities and I am very much struggling to do at 57 what others learn much earlier.

I know I’m not the first one to struggle with a budget or a schedule and that there’s wisdom out there so that I don’t have to invent the wheel all over again.

However, after one says “here’s how to make a budget” or “here’s how to make a schedule”, there’s still a problem:  what, after all, ARE my priorities, either financial or timely?

I would like to have some balance because it seems that having balance would ameliorate other problems, like running off my mouth because I’m so feckless and inconsiderate when I don’t pay attention to getting centered or running up credit card debt because I’m so hedonistic I go to coffee and ride around with the top down instead of billing files.

Once one is budgeted, scheduled and prioritized, where is the spontaneity and surprise?

I bet I’ve seen, scanned and dismissed a thousand stories about women trying to balance work and home.  That’s their problem, I thought.  How is that problem different from my problem?

My reality is that I can budget, schedule and prioritize, but eventually will simply tear all that down because I so hate being regimented that I despise even my own authority to do so and blame the world for that regimentation rather than myself.

All at once, it seems, a minor problem of a social slip — a gaffe directed at a friend — becomes a psychological crisis of conscience.  All at once, it seems, a simple task of making a budget and a personal schedule becomes an existential crisis and a philosophical question of what is important in life.

Hell, I’m not sure I have the time and money to budget, schedule and prioritize because I’m on my way to a sports bar to watch OU play Texas and then to an art studio tour and I’ll hook up with Juliet for a party after that and …