With all the real issues at issue these days, we clearly need more non-issue issues to leaven the load, issue wise.
Lapel flags are not the burning issue they once were. Immediately after 9/11, they constituted an important public signifier, indicating: “I am Ready to Lose My Mind for My Country.”
Many patriotic Americans not ready to drink the Bush/Cheney Kool-Aid were unwillingly trapped by default into making a non-lapel-flag-wearing statement that was easily misconstrued by lapel-flag-wearing-patriots as actually siding with the enemy. If you left your lapel unadorned while all around you real Americans were giving their lapels over to support The War on Terror, were you not in fact handing your lapel over to Osama. And if you gave your lapel to Osama what else might you be willing to surrender to him: your first born, the keys to your SUV, a balloon mortgage on your God given right to your personal portion the American dream.
As The Iraq War slid into a boondoggle the lapel flags quietly became scarcer. The statement made by any given a lapel flag became more ambiguous. Lapel flags were worn even by scathing critics of Bush and the war. They wore flags as if to say: “Don’t tell me I can’t love my country and hate this idiot at the same time.” A lapel flag became an unreliable indicator of the wearer’s position on the war and feeling toward the administration.
People who had worn lapel flags aggressively in the early days, and continued to support the war, started to be less consistent in there wearing of the lapel flag, as if to acknowledge sheepishly: “OK I love my country, and I happen to support the war, but I’m not a lockstep moron.”
After the election of 2004, lapel flag wearing or non-wearing became completely chaotic, almost meaningless. Dennis Kucinich could wear one and Dick Cheney might actually be caught out without one. Unless you knew the wearer well, you might never be able to figure out what they meant by it, if they meant anything at all. Lapel flags became a take it or leave it sort of accessory.
Then Obama made that perfectly reasonable statement a few months before the election about not needing to wear a lapel flag to show his patriotism.
Some squawkers squawked and it became clear that there actually were voters so dumb that they actually would withhold their votes from Obama unless he put on a lapel flag. So Obama started wearing a lapel flag. Obama wore the flag without irony. Obama favored a very small, flat, minimalist lapel flag. It seemed to whisper: “I am wearing this subtle and not at all in your face lapel flag pin because even though I don’t need to wear this pin to show my love of country, I would not want anyone to misunderstand my lack of a lapel flag for even a fleeting moment of embarrassment about openly expressing my patriotism or being too proud to capitulate to the feelings of those who need me to wear a lapel flag pin to reassure them that I am not part of an Islamic plot to take over the country. If there is one vote to gain by wearing this damn pin then I will wear it and love it.”
Since Obama has taken to wearing the lapel flag, his political opponents have redoubled their efforts in lapel flag wearing. Now Republicans are uniformly sporting a slightly larger and wavier style flag. These new Republican lapel flags seem to shout: “President Obama may be the sort of patriot who grudgingly wears a tiny flaccid sort of lapel flag, but I’m the sort of patriot who wears a lapel flag that flaps proudly in the inextinguishable breeze of freedom emanating perpetually from somewhere near my right clavicle.”
Rahm Emmanuel or someone equally high up must be onto this developing lapel flag dialectic, because just a few days ago Vice President Joe Biden was seen with one of the new Republican style lapel flags. This is clearly a trial balloon sort of move.
Clearly Biden was selected by the Obama team because he is perfect for the job of going out there, in a seemingly out of control way, to say something about something that the Obama wants to try out on the country without actually having to own up to it. Then if the whatever falls flat the administration can always say, “Oh that’s just Biden being Biden. Don’t mind him.” This is very similar to the way Dick Cheney used George Bush during the last administration.
A subtle strategy may be at work here. Is the administration using Biden as a stalking horse to draw the Republicans into a sort of lapel flag race. If the Republican lapel flags keep getting larger and wavier to out-do Biden’s lapel flag, will Obama give up lapel flags altogether, thereby appearing to be the only sane politician in a capital city in the throes of a crazy lapel flag obsession? Or will Obama’s own lapel flag suddenly explode like a Japanese robot toy into a huge mega kick ass lapel flag after Biden has tested the concept?
Friday, March 6, 2009
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
One Behind the Other
In response to yesterdays "Something to Chew On", one reader “Godfather” invited me to chew on the prospect of Obama replacing Timothy Geithner and Larry Summers with more realistic and less Rubin-esque economic advisers like Paul Krugman and Nouriel Roubini. Sounds like a good idea but timing is everything, and you have to set it up correctly.
Grandma Grumpy had a piece of wisdom that bares consideration in this context. "One behind the other", she used to say whenever some kitchen staple ran out and she pulled out a fresh box, can or bottle of whatever foodstuff had just been finished off. It was point of pride with her. A careful homemaker always thought ahead and made sure she was covered for all contingencies.
Likewise an effective president will always keep in mind the right time and method to “finish off” one of his aides and he will have number of carefully vetted replacements lined up.
When the time is ripe he will be ruthless in his dispatch without looking cruel or vindictive. Already Obama has shown himself to have the right stuff when executing his minions. Bill Richardson: Whack. Tom Daschle: Thwap. Judd Gregg: Boing. Obama could so easily have looked feckless and disoriented as a result of these departures. Instead he looked cool, calculatingly and in control.
Geithner and Summers will almost certainly get the ax at some point, not because they will have failed at the job but because the job is impossible. The public trust will at some point require a placebo of fresh blood. Fresh blood is rarely better than the old blood but it is always fresher.
Regarding the lining up of suitable replacements, Obama needs to get much better. It has taken him too long to stand up his second and third choices as his first and second picks have fallen. He needs to develop deep benches in every area.
Krugman and Roubini are both hot prospects in the financial area. They both have the unfashionable advantage of having been prematurely correct in their analyses of our economy. Everyone hates hearing, “I told you so.” In picking Geithner and Summers, Obama was no doubt trying to reassure Wall Street that he was not going to saddle them with anyone too zealous in punishing their mistakes and misdeeds. So he picked a few advisers who though chastened by recent circumstances had also largely shared in Wall Street’s wrong headedness.
Obama may share or come to share the economic worldview of Krugman and Roubini but if he ever resorts to them he will make it look as if he has been forced to it because more conventional economic thinkers have been found wanting. A great politician never gets too far out in front of the herd.
It must be pointed out that Krugman and Roubini do not come without liabilities in the not unimportant PR department. This is a serious consideration. Obama almost certainly wishes they had screen tested Timothy Geithner before handing him the Treasury. Geithner’s big speech on the economy a couple of weeks ago reminded some viewers of Eddie Haskell. Others were reminded of that annoying kid from summer camp whom everyone used to torment with wedgies.
Krugman, as much as we love him, is also impossible on television. With that furry professorial visage and his eyes darting back and forth furtively from side to side he looks like a wicked smart beaver. Whenever he says something I agree with, my next thought is that I also should be vigilant for large predators with pointy teeth.
If Krugman cut his hair closer, shaved his beard and grew a big walrus mustache he would look a lot like the millionaire from the old Monopoly game. That would reassure the majority of Americans who learned everything they know about economics from playing Monopoly.
Roubini is a special problem. The last high government official with a heavy foreign accent was Jimmy Carter’s national security adviser, Zbigniew Brezinski. Brezinski proved that you could be right about almost everything and still not have what it takes to sell it to the peanut gallery.
There is nothing you can do with Roubini’s accent so I would double down on it and have him go everywhere with Arnold Schwarzenegger. This would remind everyone in a heartwarming way of that great film “Twins” in which Arnold played opposite Danny Devito. Arnold and Nouriel would get a lot of laughs “translating” for each other. Roubini could play the egghead and Schwarzenegger could follow-up with an explanation for the six-pack crowd. Arnold is a great political communicator because whenever he says something at all intelligent, there is a powerfully disarming subliminal message conveyed: “Even a bonehead like me can understand this.”
Grandma Grumpy had a piece of wisdom that bares consideration in this context. "One behind the other", she used to say whenever some kitchen staple ran out and she pulled out a fresh box, can or bottle of whatever foodstuff had just been finished off. It was point of pride with her. A careful homemaker always thought ahead and made sure she was covered for all contingencies.
Likewise an effective president will always keep in mind the right time and method to “finish off” one of his aides and he will have number of carefully vetted replacements lined up.
When the time is ripe he will be ruthless in his dispatch without looking cruel or vindictive. Already Obama has shown himself to have the right stuff when executing his minions. Bill Richardson: Whack. Tom Daschle: Thwap. Judd Gregg: Boing. Obama could so easily have looked feckless and disoriented as a result of these departures. Instead he looked cool, calculatingly and in control.
Geithner and Summers will almost certainly get the ax at some point, not because they will have failed at the job but because the job is impossible. The public trust will at some point require a placebo of fresh blood. Fresh blood is rarely better than the old blood but it is always fresher.
Regarding the lining up of suitable replacements, Obama needs to get much better. It has taken him too long to stand up his second and third choices as his first and second picks have fallen. He needs to develop deep benches in every area.
Krugman and Roubini are both hot prospects in the financial area. They both have the unfashionable advantage of having been prematurely correct in their analyses of our economy. Everyone hates hearing, “I told you so.” In picking Geithner and Summers, Obama was no doubt trying to reassure Wall Street that he was not going to saddle them with anyone too zealous in punishing their mistakes and misdeeds. So he picked a few advisers who though chastened by recent circumstances had also largely shared in Wall Street’s wrong headedness.
Obama may share or come to share the economic worldview of Krugman and Roubini but if he ever resorts to them he will make it look as if he has been forced to it because more conventional economic thinkers have been found wanting. A great politician never gets too far out in front of the herd.
It must be pointed out that Krugman and Roubini do not come without liabilities in the not unimportant PR department. This is a serious consideration. Obama almost certainly wishes they had screen tested Timothy Geithner before handing him the Treasury. Geithner’s big speech on the economy a couple of weeks ago reminded some viewers of Eddie Haskell. Others were reminded of that annoying kid from summer camp whom everyone used to torment with wedgies.
Krugman, as much as we love him, is also impossible on television. With that furry professorial visage and his eyes darting back and forth furtively from side to side he looks like a wicked smart beaver. Whenever he says something I agree with, my next thought is that I also should be vigilant for large predators with pointy teeth.
If Krugman cut his hair closer, shaved his beard and grew a big walrus mustache he would look a lot like the millionaire from the old Monopoly game. That would reassure the majority of Americans who learned everything they know about economics from playing Monopoly.
Roubini is a special problem. The last high government official with a heavy foreign accent was Jimmy Carter’s national security adviser, Zbigniew Brezinski. Brezinski proved that you could be right about almost everything and still not have what it takes to sell it to the peanut gallery.
There is nothing you can do with Roubini’s accent so I would double down on it and have him go everywhere with Arnold Schwarzenegger. This would remind everyone in a heartwarming way of that great film “Twins” in which Arnold played opposite Danny Devito. Arnold and Nouriel would get a lot of laughs “translating” for each other. Roubini could play the egghead and Schwarzenegger could follow-up with an explanation for the six-pack crowd. Arnold is a great political communicator because whenever he says something at all intelligent, there is a powerfully disarming subliminal message conveyed: “Even a bonehead like me can understand this.”
Monday, March 2, 2009
Something to Chew On
The pundicratic question of the week: “Has Obama bitten off more than he can chew?”
A more pertinent if rather unsanitary rephrasing comes to mind. Can We chew, what Obama has bitten off?
Clearly there’s going to be a lot of jaw numbing chewing going on. Someone has to do it but it’s not going to be That One. Look at the guy. He’s skinnier than Don Knotts. Not much chewing going on there. That’s not the way he rolls.
Anyway, Obama’s too smart to ever get stuck with the mundane policy chewing. He’s a biter. A big vision, go for broke, world-class, chomp monster. Health Care. Chomp. Global Warming. Chomp. Education. Chomp. Economic Reconstruction. Chomp, chomp, chomp. As Biter-Off-in-Chief, Obama may have no rivals.
It’s not that Obama eschews the chewing process itself. He’ll show up for a photo op and perform a little small bore governmental mastication, the same way he visits a homeless shelter and pretends to do a little painting or visits a factory and walks around wearing a hard hat and goggles, pointing at machinery.
The real problem is the sheer volume of chewing his agenda requires. We’re all going to have to belly up to the board and do our share. The whole Obama Nation is going to have to help choke down this hog.
So we need some catchy motivational slogans, like:
“Chaw We Can Believe In!”
“Yes We Chew!”
“Obama Bites so We Chew!”
“Ask Not What Your Country Can Chew for You. Ask What You Can Chew for Your Country.”
Please send your suggestions and they will be forwarded to The Chompster.
A more pertinent if rather unsanitary rephrasing comes to mind. Can We chew, what Obama has bitten off?
Clearly there’s going to be a lot of jaw numbing chewing going on. Someone has to do it but it’s not going to be That One. Look at the guy. He’s skinnier than Don Knotts. Not much chewing going on there. That’s not the way he rolls.
Anyway, Obama’s too smart to ever get stuck with the mundane policy chewing. He’s a biter. A big vision, go for broke, world-class, chomp monster. Health Care. Chomp. Global Warming. Chomp. Education. Chomp. Economic Reconstruction. Chomp, chomp, chomp. As Biter-Off-in-Chief, Obama may have no rivals.
It’s not that Obama eschews the chewing process itself. He’ll show up for a photo op and perform a little small bore governmental mastication, the same way he visits a homeless shelter and pretends to do a little painting or visits a factory and walks around wearing a hard hat and goggles, pointing at machinery.
The real problem is the sheer volume of chewing his agenda requires. We’re all going to have to belly up to the board and do our share. The whole Obama Nation is going to have to help choke down this hog.
So we need some catchy motivational slogans, like:
“Chaw We Can Believe In!”
“Yes We Chew!”
“Obama Bites so We Chew!”
“Ask Not What Your Country Can Chew for You. Ask What You Can Chew for Your Country.”
Please send your suggestions and they will be forwarded to The Chompster.
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Super Bowling
Is Super Bowl Sunday getting too wholesome? It used to be the one day on which we celebrated everything gaudy, overblown and steroidal in the American way of life. Real football fans aren’t supposed to pay much attention to the halftime show but that’s where in years past the zeitgeist was most overtly on display.
This year, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street band cut off a few slices of their healthy earnest rock-n-roll. The Boss is of course a national treasure. He connects the whole cultural gamut like almost no one else - from down and out America, through the blue-collar heartland, to the new Obama left and the NPR crowd. He is a wholesome cohesive influence with a sense of humor about himself. On the Super Bowl Sunday, he brought out the raucous party Boss. His energy was a little forced and self-consciously youthful. The way he threw himself around one hoped he had a chiropractor and a team of masseuses waiting in the wings. The performance was uniformly great and there where even a few moments of welcome goofiness, as when the Boss belly flopped onto the stage side camera. But who wants a piece of high quality authentic American pop culture, just when you’re hungering for a big slab of bogus American kitsch?
A few of the recent halftime shows have been almost satisfying. That freakishly talented newt man, formerly known and now know again as “Prince”, added a wonderfully lubricious taint to Super Bowl XLI.
Super Bowl XXXVIII gave us the hilarious Nipplegate. Justin Timberlake pretended to assault Janet Jackson, igniting an amusingly harmless scandal.
But generally, the halftime shows have been getting better and slicker in a professional Las Vegas sort of way, leaving us nostalgic for the truly great dumb spectacles of the past.
Does anyone remember the halftime show in 1988? That was the year some genius realized that there were 88 keys on the piano keyboard and by an amazing coincidence the year was 1988. The show included 88 fake grand pianos, rolled out on to the field. 44 of them were white and 44 of them were black. Dancers in white tuxedos pretended to play the white ones. Dancers in black tuxedos pretended to play the black ones. There was a thrilling moment when the dancers in white pretended to play the black pianos and the dancers in black went at the white pianos.
At the climax of the extravaganza 44 Rockettes high kicked out on to the field with their 88 legs colored black and white to represent a piano keyboard. In case anyone missed it, an announcer announced that the 44 Rockettes and their 88 legs were impersonating a piano keyboard.
1988 was absolutely the best Super Bowl half time show ever. It was so fantastic that in 1989 some suggested that they customize 89 fake grand pianos with an additional key, and then recruit a Rockette with only one leg.
Sadly, American bad taste has become an endangered species. It used to be as common as the housefly and now you have to hunt for it like a very rare bird. Perhaps we should start cultivating opportunities to display great schlock the way we support classical ballet and symphony orchestras.
A huge opportunity was lost the year Levitra hit the market to compete with Viagra. There were Levitra ads all over the stadium, and Levitra and Viagra spots dominated the TV commercial breaks. But what the occasion called for was a Levitra vs. Viagra halftime smack-down, with pole-vaulting, drag racing, gladiators parachuting into stadium and fighting with swords (Insert your favorite phallic potency symbol here.) all accompanied by ZZ Top surrounded by hundreds of nubile dancing girls in bikinis, just to remind folks that really ancient guys can still get really young girls if they can just score the right pills.
Today, so many erectile dysfunction drugs crowd the market. Could we pull off a Viagra vs. Levitra vs. Cialis vs. whatever elimination match in the ten minutes allotted to the halftime show? This is America people. Let’s do it!
This year’s halftime could have been so much better, even with the available ingredients. They already had Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger and the Hero Crew of US Air flight #1549 on hand to take a bow before the Star Spangled Banner. They already had General David Petraeus officiating at the coin toss. With a little imagination they could have done so much more.
Imagine this: There’s a huge explosion over the stadium. You hear an announcement: “LaGuardia we have a bird strike. Make that two.” A full size model of the airliner with engines blazing and trailing smoke crash lands on the 50-yard line - fire, explosions and geysers of water. A moment of silence and then the doors fly open. Inflatable red white and blue escape slides unfurl. A choir of “passengers” climbs out onto the wings singing, “This Land is Your Land, This land is My Land.” Pete Seeger sails up “The Hudson” in his schooner Clearwater, to accompany. Then the real Sully and crew come out onto the wings waving surrounded by a few “passengers” who happen to be incredible break-dancers, spinning on their heads. Then, and only then, The Boss and the E Street band steam over from the “New Jersey” side in a ferryboat singing “Baby We Were Born to Run.” They start rescuing the passengers as they segue into “The Rising.” The Statute of Liberty walks over from the end zone with Aretha Franklin up in the statue’s crown. Aretha and Liberty are wearing matching crowns. Aretha sings “Respect” in a duet with Bruce. The song doesn’t really fit but you don’t have time to think about it because General Petraeus starts walking around on the “water” with an honor guard handing out huge medals that look like New York City manhole covers covered in gold. Everybody gets a medal. This makes sense when Bruce dives into his finale song, written just for the occasion: “He’s a Hero, She’s a Hero, You’re a Hero too. In America, We’re all Heroes, We’re all Heroes, Woo!”
Now that’s a halftime show.
This year, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street band cut off a few slices of their healthy earnest rock-n-roll. The Boss is of course a national treasure. He connects the whole cultural gamut like almost no one else - from down and out America, through the blue-collar heartland, to the new Obama left and the NPR crowd. He is a wholesome cohesive influence with a sense of humor about himself. On the Super Bowl Sunday, he brought out the raucous party Boss. His energy was a little forced and self-consciously youthful. The way he threw himself around one hoped he had a chiropractor and a team of masseuses waiting in the wings. The performance was uniformly great and there where even a few moments of welcome goofiness, as when the Boss belly flopped onto the stage side camera. But who wants a piece of high quality authentic American pop culture, just when you’re hungering for a big slab of bogus American kitsch?
A few of the recent halftime shows have been almost satisfying. That freakishly talented newt man, formerly known and now know again as “Prince”, added a wonderfully lubricious taint to Super Bowl XLI.
Super Bowl XXXVIII gave us the hilarious Nipplegate. Justin Timberlake pretended to assault Janet Jackson, igniting an amusingly harmless scandal.
But generally, the halftime shows have been getting better and slicker in a professional Las Vegas sort of way, leaving us nostalgic for the truly great dumb spectacles of the past.
Does anyone remember the halftime show in 1988? That was the year some genius realized that there were 88 keys on the piano keyboard and by an amazing coincidence the year was 1988. The show included 88 fake grand pianos, rolled out on to the field. 44 of them were white and 44 of them were black. Dancers in white tuxedos pretended to play the white ones. Dancers in black tuxedos pretended to play the black ones. There was a thrilling moment when the dancers in white pretended to play the black pianos and the dancers in black went at the white pianos.
At the climax of the extravaganza 44 Rockettes high kicked out on to the field with their 88 legs colored black and white to represent a piano keyboard. In case anyone missed it, an announcer announced that the 44 Rockettes and their 88 legs were impersonating a piano keyboard.
1988 was absolutely the best Super Bowl half time show ever. It was so fantastic that in 1989 some suggested that they customize 89 fake grand pianos with an additional key, and then recruit a Rockette with only one leg.
Sadly, American bad taste has become an endangered species. It used to be as common as the housefly and now you have to hunt for it like a very rare bird. Perhaps we should start cultivating opportunities to display great schlock the way we support classical ballet and symphony orchestras.
A huge opportunity was lost the year Levitra hit the market to compete with Viagra. There were Levitra ads all over the stadium, and Levitra and Viagra spots dominated the TV commercial breaks. But what the occasion called for was a Levitra vs. Viagra halftime smack-down, with pole-vaulting, drag racing, gladiators parachuting into stadium and fighting with swords (Insert your favorite phallic potency symbol here.) all accompanied by ZZ Top surrounded by hundreds of nubile dancing girls in bikinis, just to remind folks that really ancient guys can still get really young girls if they can just score the right pills.
Today, so many erectile dysfunction drugs crowd the market. Could we pull off a Viagra vs. Levitra vs. Cialis vs. whatever elimination match in the ten minutes allotted to the halftime show? This is America people. Let’s do it!
This year’s halftime could have been so much better, even with the available ingredients. They already had Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger and the Hero Crew of US Air flight #1549 on hand to take a bow before the Star Spangled Banner. They already had General David Petraeus officiating at the coin toss. With a little imagination they could have done so much more.
Imagine this: There’s a huge explosion over the stadium. You hear an announcement: “LaGuardia we have a bird strike. Make that two.” A full size model of the airliner with engines blazing and trailing smoke crash lands on the 50-yard line - fire, explosions and geysers of water. A moment of silence and then the doors fly open. Inflatable red white and blue escape slides unfurl. A choir of “passengers” climbs out onto the wings singing, “This Land is Your Land, This land is My Land.” Pete Seeger sails up “The Hudson” in his schooner Clearwater, to accompany. Then the real Sully and crew come out onto the wings waving surrounded by a few “passengers” who happen to be incredible break-dancers, spinning on their heads. Then, and only then, The Boss and the E Street band steam over from the “New Jersey” side in a ferryboat singing “Baby We Were Born to Run.” They start rescuing the passengers as they segue into “The Rising.” The Statute of Liberty walks over from the end zone with Aretha Franklin up in the statue’s crown. Aretha and Liberty are wearing matching crowns. Aretha sings “Respect” in a duet with Bruce. The song doesn’t really fit but you don’t have time to think about it because General Petraeus starts walking around on the “water” with an honor guard handing out huge medals that look like New York City manhole covers covered in gold. Everybody gets a medal. This makes sense when Bruce dives into his finale song, written just for the occasion: “He’s a Hero, She’s a Hero, You’re a Hero too. In America, We’re all Heroes, We’re all Heroes, Woo!”
Now that’s a halftime show.
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