American Idolatry - Barbs and Stingers

"Someday she'll make someone a good husband," my neighbor commented to my dad as I stacked haybales on the back of our pickup. I was within earshot, so I guess he meant it as a compliment. It stung, but I kept stacking.

I used to have a t-shirt that said, A woman's place is in the House....and the Senate. I'd wear it to school and get nasty comments. They stung but I kept wearing it.

Up until recently, well-meaning people sent me Hillary jokes. Daily. They thought I'd enjoy them, laugh along at the silliness. But they stung.

I'm not a fan of being politically correct. I've seen many good jokes die, choked to death by over-the-top niceness. I don't wanna be PC. I don’t want my sense of humor to die.

But this Hillary thing was different. Why?

I play sports. I can handle losing. I can handle having my team dissed for all sorts of nonsensical things. But this is bigger than a game.

This reeks of a smackdown. Of put-her-in-her-place, on-your-knees sexism. A t-shirt depicting Obama as a monkey was vehemently yelled-down as crude and racist, yet the "Iron my shirt" sign held up at Clinton's rally was merely giggled at. So KKK is taboo, but 'get-back-to-the-kitchen' is amusing?

Hillary the dominatrix. Hillary the nutcracker. Behind many of these jokes, there’s a deep-seated fear. Fear of loss of control. Sending Hillary back to the kitchen would mean back to good-ol-boy business as usual. The easiest way to put her there was to sugar-coat anger and pass it off as humor. Hillary in an S&M outfit sent the not-so-subtle message that if we elect her, men will lose control.

Things that sting:

• being expected to laugh at jokes designed to remind me where I belong


• getting paid 67% of a man's wage


• getting labeled a liberal


• getting labeled a feminist


• getting labeled as having my period


• getting labeled, period
  

No matter what you think of Hillary, she’s a great role model for a group that desperately needs one – young girls. Hannah Montana’s lovely fluff, but Hillary brings home the beacon and lights it up with a plan. She was within a stone’s throw of the Presidency. And she has quite an arm.

Is there a chip on my shoulder? Yes. It’s handy though, because it keeps my purse in place. You know, the pretty bag where I keep all my money.

Election Results

Today, in our living room, my two boys held an election. About twenty stuffed animals ran for mayor. They were quickly whittled down to four finalists, mostly by our terrier running off with some of the losers. (Isn't that always the way?)

The final four consisted of a chicken, a fish, a dog, and a gorilla. Each gave a speech. The fish, being out of water, had a bit of trouble and died of asphyxiation at the podium.

The gorilla started out smoothly but lost his composure when he had an inconvenient itch that just couldn't wait. It was a bit of a turn-off and, if it isn't already, is sure to be a hit on Youtube.

The chicken clucked something unintelligible, flapping her wings like the sky was falling. Most of the audience didn't speak chicken so they didn't understand. Too bad, since she might have made sense if she could reach them somehow.

The dog napped through the other speeches, spoke last and promised everyone cake. Sadly, that was all it took.

My question to Scruff, the worn, old dog who won, was this - how could you promise everyone cake when food isn't allowed in the living room? How could you make such a promise when you knew from the start that you couldn't deliver?

As a stuffed animal, Scruff wasn't talking. He appeared angry and a bit creepy. Maybe he was missing his nap. I'm guessing he hadn't thought his actions through this far. Just get through the campaign, promise what you need to, and fix it all once you're in control. Arf.

I'm sure we'd never let that sort of thing happen, right?

The Candidate Who Came to Dinner

The same blizzard that welcomed John F. Kennedy to our highest office welcomed me to this world. At the time, people worried that putting a Catholic in the White House was a huge mistake. Washington would be controlled by Rome, and Kennedy would be nothing more than the Pope’s pawn. Pretty soon we’d all be packing Rosaries and banned from eating meat on Fridays. This silliness amazed me.

I don’t want to be amazed like that anymore. Now we have a woman and an African American running for office, and some people running to cover their ugly, deep-set fears with flimsy excuses. Look deep - if you’re voting against (or for) someone simply because of gender or race, you need therapy, not a voting booth.

Honestly, I don’t want to know what a candidate does at home, how bad a bowler he is, or whether she can kick back shots with the guys. At what point do we finally say, “I don’t care if the next President of the United States is a transgender mandrill – somebody give me a shot at a decent life?”

The candidates confuse the issue more by pandering to our base commonality. “I’m one of you,” they purr. No, you’re not, and we’re happy about that. We could never survive the rat race that is Washington. We’re hoping one of you can.

Sometimes private choices give you a peek at what a candidate's future intentions might be. For instance, did they marry for money? If that’s the case, maybe that candidate will marry big oil. Gas is quickly approaching $4 a gallon – at what price ignorance? But at least he’s white, you may think, if not say. If we decide one of the most critical elections using racist or sexist bias, we deserve what we get. If we can’t look beyond looks, we are most certainly doomed.

Has it really come down to which is less worse – a woman in the White House, or a black man in the White House? Are we really that shallow? This is the part where you yell, ‘No!’ Unless, of course, you're uncomfortable with a woman telling you what to do. If that's the case, I hope you enjoy cereal for dinner, because after paying for gas, that's about all you'll be able to afford.

False issues cloud the real deal like so many messy snowflakes. But I will tell you one thing -this candidate WILL be coming to dinner. The next President will decide how often you have a nice steak, or have to settle for a cheaper cut of meat. Picking the President based on primordial fears may be the cut that gives you indigestion.

Choose wisely– you may have to eat your vote. And that's no bologna.

Live, From Texas and Ohio, it's Democrat D-Day!

Step right up and dangle your chad - we have all the makings of an exciting political showdown. The Democratic Sweeps Week is giving "Lost" a run for its money as top topic at the water cooler. If a similar thing was happening in, for instance, baseball, I'd be excited. But this is our country's future, my healthcare, my war, my gas tank, so I'm more nervous than excited. Next to this, sports and entertainment trophies pale in comparison.

For the Democrats, it's anybody's horse race. Hillary has gone to the whip, scoring key tv appearances on Saturday Night Live and The Daily Show. Barack is spending like there's no tomorrow (there isn't). American Idol has nothing on how these two perform.

Obama certainly sings a lovely song. "I'm asking you to believe," croons his website. "Not just in my ability to bring about real change in Washington...I'm asking you to believe in yours." The problem is, we don't need another song. We need a solution. We need to quit dreaming and get doing. His bedside manner is quite charming, but anyone who marries for charm finds out what happens when the honeymoon is over. The dream can become a nightmare. A weak dollar, an ugly war, it's time to wake up. No more snooze alarm.

Sadly, the best soundbite often supercedes the best intentions. Is Clinton getting choked up during her campaign really more of a story that than Bush not getting choked up about invading Iraq? A little emotion once in a while usually illustrates a heartfelt decision. (For the record, I've shown more emotion at a shoe sale at Nordstrom than Hillary ever displayed in her emo non-event.)

Hillary contends that Barack's dream is a projection of what people want to see. What dream isn't? Everyone likes to dream. Dreaming is fun. That's a big part of the Obama allure. Clinton, on the other hand, is Monday morning reality. Not our favorite time of the week, but if you're gonna get something done, that's the time to do it. Not in your dreams.

Let's leave the excitement and dreaming for the reality TV stars. When G.W. Bush was running against Al Gore, a friend commented that Gore was "boring." I replied, "I'll take boring over stupid any day." That time around, not quite enough people did. And here we are.

I'm done sleeping. I'm picking the doer over the dreamer.

Hilla-Bama Ding-dong

Recently CNN correspondent Randi Kaye asked African American women in a beauty salon if they were voting for Clinton or Obama. In other words, are you siding with your race or gender? Ouch. Talk about a classless question. It was, however, invigorating to see many intelligent responses, such as 'keep it real - vote for the best candidate,' and numerous attempts to bring the subject back where it should be - to the issues. (I kept hoping someone would give the correspondent the stink-eye and reel off a list of eloquent reasons why they were voting for McCain, but no such luck.) The media’s assumption of simplistic bias, not the people’s voice, quickly became the focal point.

Now we see comments that Clinton is running into problems with Latino voters. They aren’t voting for her en masse as they supposedly were before. This prompts the vision of a large crowd stirring about, murmuring disgruntled grumblings, whispered protestations, and low growls. I'm not Hispanic, but just being lumped together like that would make me growl. I, for one, don’t lump well. I have a tendency to smash stereotypes whenever possible, just for entertainment's sake. It's safer than skeet shooting, and slightly cheaper.

But we all get lumped, don't we? Assumption of voting trends along racial and gender lines seems to be a foregone conclusion. People are lumped, stirred, and scrambled into convenient political groups. I can hear you lumping me right now.

Yes, we do our own lumping. We’re naturally visual. To get by, we simplify and classify. I admit to being thrilled to see a woman as well as an African American in the race. So lump me in with the ‘change is exciting and interesting’ group. Just don’t put me in the ‘must-be-voting-for-Hillary-because-she’s-a-feminista’ group. Unless you have already. Then I’m putting you in the ‘knucklehead-ruining-my-life’ group.

Maybe that’s what the growling is all about. As the CNN correspondent found out, assume that someone is voting their gender or race and they may get a tad ornery with you. Life is shades of grey, yet we continually strive to boil it down to black and white. Like a photo in newsprint, the simpler we make it, the less we see. We need hours to do the topic justice, yet it’s given only a snippet of face time.

Can we drive the media? Can we steer the pundits? Can we step out of our own stereotypes and choose wisely? Seems like a huge ship to turn this late in the voyage. The best way to avoid 'issues' with large chunks of aggregated voters is to not aggregate them in the first place. So who's doing the lumping- the candidates or the media? It appears to be a little of both. And look at that - I just lumped the candidates AND the media. Shame on me.


Just say 'no' to lumping!

References:
CNN transcript - Anderson Cooper 360 Degrees - aired 1/25/2008 http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0801/25/acd.02.html

"Hillary running into problems with Latino voters" - Ruben Navarrette, Jr for the SD Union Tribune on the VC Star Opinion page 2/21/2008.

Primary Callers

Something tells me there's an election coming up. Not sure what tipped me off - maybe the multitude of hyper-friendly strangers calling me at dinnertime to urge me to vote for their candidate. Or the ALL CAPS flyers filling my mailbox advising me that certain candidates hate, hate, HATE puppies and rainbows. Or perhaps it's the full-frontal assault of television ads confiding in me that if so-and-so wins, the global-warming terrorists will control the casinos. At this point, all it would take to secure my vote is a commercial quietly stating, "I'm running for President, and I promise to never, ever call you at dinnertime."

In a oddly disturbing way, it's comforting to have our politicos out there bouncing around, making noise. Like kids, if they're too quiet, they're up to something. This is our chance to influence them, before they close the door to the Oval office and take crayons to the walls.

Many people seem to pick candidates like they'd pick a baseball team or a hairstyle- a gut, emotional call made early in their formative years. Their choice is based on a revelation, a feeling, or an aversion to certain vegetables. I'm not talking about you specifically of course. I know for a fact you would never do such a thing. It's all those other knuckleheads out there. I'm sure you know who I'm talking about - all those wingnuts who don't agree with us and will somehow find their way to the voting booths, wiping out the votes of good, upstanding citizens such as ourselves. There out to be a law against letting them do things like that.

For once I'd like to see us vote for process, not person. No faces, no voices - just answers to essay questions:
Question) Describe in detail how would you fix healthcare.

Candidate A) raise taxes

Candidate B) lower taxes

Candidate C) tax taxes

On second thought, maybe the vegetable-aversion issue is the way to go.

Putting skepticism aside for a moment, however, there is at least one website, http://www.dehp.net/candidate/, that offers a 'candidate calculator.' You're given a list of issues, you pick your stance and how strongly you feel about each issue, and it tells you the candidate who best aligns with your views. Whether you like it or not. Interesting idea, although it fails to factor in fibber-potential, experience, hairstyle, and those crucial sports & vegetable affiliations.

California's time in the national sun is coming. On January 30th we'll have a Republican candidate debate at the Reagan Library. The candidates will argue their points while suspended in the air in front of Air Force One. Really. This sounded like a network ploy for ratings until I found out they'll actually have a floor built under them. Initially I had visions of Huckabee puppets suspended from strings. When McCain gets going, he resembles something out of a Punch and Judy show, so it could work. Besides, many of the candidates have made it this far without a real, functioning platform beneath them. Why change now?

We are a big state. We aren't New Hampshire or Nevada, media trinkets that blink and fade. We're a big deal and we demand respect. We take flak over our 'Governator.' Our writers' strike is crippling water-cooler talk nationwide. The entire state could use a big, long drink. The last thing we need is a faux pas involving a candidate falling from the Air Force One stage, or tripping over a dangling participle, or suffering from a fractured 'misstatement.' Let's keep it safe and sane, and get through this political fracas together.

One more thing, dear candidates - we would like some substance. We may be known for our Hollywood fluff, but that means we can spot it a backlot away. So pass the meat and go easy on the gravy. Yes, it's dinnertime, so please - don't call.