Newt Gingrich in Davenport (IA) on Dec. 19, 2011.

Newt Gingrich spoke at Global Security Services in Davenport, Iowa at 2:30 p.m. on Monday, Dec. 19, to a small crowd of approximately 100 people. There was no press check-in, which was odd, but there was food, which was also unusual. Only 10 chairs were set up in what appeared to be a garage. And a garage across from the Col Ballroom—not the best part of town— an area which the national media following the campaign were photographing in all its paint-peeling glory.

Face the Nation Appearance

The day prior, Newt  appeared on the Sunday, Dec. 18 “Face the Nation” program with Bob Schieffer, where he discounted the Des Moines Register’s endorsement of opponent Mitt Romney saying it was from a liberal paper. He touted his own endorsement by the Manchester Union Leader. [Iowans would not  categorize the Register as liberal.] At that time, he dodged Schieffer’s charges (from Romney) that he was “an unreliable leader in the Conservative movement.” Newt laughed when asked if he had asked for Christine O”Donnell’s (“I am not a witch”) endorsement, which Romney also got. Newt also seemed proud when he said, “I’m not a lawyer. I call that an advantage.”

Newt Gingrich.

From that point on,  Newt rambled about the 1958 Warren Court, the Federalist papers (and the abolishing of over 1/2 of the judges that had just been placed in their posts, by Thomas Jefferson) and called the Dred Scott decision, extending a ban on slavery to the entire nation, bad. (So did Bachmann in the last Republican debate). Newt most famously and repetitively  attacked the 9th Circuit Court because of its stance on “one nation, under God” and repeated that assertion on Monday in Davenport.

Newt: “Everything you’ve heard is true.”

For a guy who’s been married 3 times (cheated on his first 2 wives and asked for a divorce when the first was in the hospital recovering from cancer surgery), who has now announced that he is Catholic (in deference to wife #3), he sure has a “holier-than-thou” attitude. [I'm Catholic, and I'm even wondering how a man who has already been married two times can BE married, as a Catholic. Plus, he's only BEEN a Catholic for 2 years.] And I’m not even going to get into his censuring by Congress or the lobbying charges hurled by Bachmann in the last debate.

Evangelical Voters in Iowa

Newt points the finger.

I don’t think Newt is fooling the Evangelicals in Iowa (or anywhere else.) In a piece entitled “Pastors: Newt Gingrich Is Empty Suit With Broken Zipper” by Tony Leys on 12/13, the Reverend Albert Calaway of Indianola wrote, “Mr. Gingrich is the Don Draper of 2012.  When it comes to his character record, he’s a very fine, empty suit with a broken zipper. Christians in Iowa—and I understand many of his old U.S. House colleagues as well—desperately want to see a changed man, yet we keep on seeing a glib, wordy cheater. On all fronts, Newt should just be faithful.” The Reverend went on, “When you endorse a check, you sign it.  When you get married, you sign the license. When you sign a contract or covenant, that means you are all in. But, Mr. Gingrich has yet to sign for many things which Christian Iowa cares about very deeply.”

Ouch!

The Courts

Larry Riney, author of the book on the "Effie Afton" and the Lincoln/Douglas debates, is this you in the crowd?

Newt also took some flak from Schieffer (on “Face the Nation”)  over Newt’s avowed intention to reform the courts. Schieffer wanted to know: “Wouldn’t your policies throw the courts into chaos?” Newt pointed out that there were 80 judgeships vacant out of 800 and continued his attack on judges, in general. “There is a fundamental conflict underway about what kind of country we’re going to be,” said the Now Holy candidate. This quote (from Dec. 5, 2011 “Newsweek”) is also telling: “A country which has been, since 1963, relentlessly in the courts driving God out of public life shouldn’t be surprised at all the problems we have because we’ve in fact attempted to create a secular country, which I think is frankly a nightmare.” Oh, Puh-leese. This from the same man who was having an affair while prosecuting Bill Clinton during the Lewinsky mess.

That statement was made at the FAMiLY Leader debate, where Vander Plaats, who ran unsuccessfully for Governor against Terry Branstadt said, “Though they don’t embrace or endorse or condone his (newt’s) personal past,. they might be more willing to get over that if he’s the best one to lead to preserve the America they want for their children.” Well, Bob, he’s not. Get over it. Newt is Newt, and, as he said on Monday—the day after his “Face the Nation” appearance—”I’m really different than what they’re (Washington, D.C.) used to.” I would say that this comment, as well, is quite disingenuous, since Newt has spent more time in Washington than any of the other potential candidates, with the possible exception of Libertarian Texas Senator Ron Paul, who’s got to be the oldest guy running for anything (born Aug. 20, 1935).

An unidentified audience member catches the mood of the crowd.

The Dec. 5 “Newsweek” article stated —erroneously, I feel—”The Bible makes room for complicated, morally compromised heroes. Now Christian conservatives, desperate for an alternative to Mitt Romney, are learning to do so as well.” That was Michelle Goldberg’s view in an article entitled “Let There Be Newt.” No, Michelle, Iowans are not learning any such thing, and if you were from these parts, you’d have picked up on that, but, apparently, you’re not and you haven’t.  Today’s Huffington Post polls show Ron Paul surging at 24%, Romney at 20% and Newt sliding into oblivion at 14%. The article was written by someone named Michelle Goldberg and accompanied by a picture of Newt with a halo light effect. I have a feeling that Ms. Goldberg is not from around here, she said wryly.

The Mainstream Media’s Take
The national media I spoke with today characterized Newt’s appearance this day as “Newt’s book tour” (he’s written 24) and a pushy woman in a red dress seemed to be barking orders about “the books” and getting the books out for purchase. There were precious few other workers apparent. Newt, himself, said in closing, “We need folks in every precincts.

Apparently Newt needs more workers to contact potential caucus-goers, since 60% had been contacted by Romney’s people, according to a poll by the “New York Times,” 47% by Ron Paul’s, and only 30%—-1/2 of what Romney has scored—by Gingrich’s workers. The comment made to me by the other press was that, “He’s disorganized.”

Newt quotes from his Davenport Dec. 19, 2011 appearance :

Zepelin, a guide dog for the blind, toughs out the speech with trainer Julie Hogenson of Princeton, Iowa.

On negative ads:  “The only person who profits from negative ads is Barack Obama, and I think that’s pretty reprehensible behavior.” (Meanwhile, outside in the parking lot, ironically enough, opponents were placing negative flyers under our car door handles.) Most of the carping was about Newt’s taking money from Freddie Mac as a “lobbyist” by some other name.

On Israel:  “I’m not prepared to see Israel annihilated. …We need to give a sense that we are a leading country and willing to defend ourselves.”  In watching GPS (Global Public Square) with Fahreed Zakaria on Sunday, December 18th,  all of the panelists. which included the Jewish editor of the “New Yorker” magazine and well-known Republican speechwriter Peggy Noonan, decried the constant harping by the Republican candidates on Israel as the sum and substance of U.S. foreign policy. All saw it as pandering to the United States  Jewish vote. All noted that foreign policy is notoriously complex and simply declaring one’s support for Israel ignores the complexity of modern foreign policy. Most of the panelists, in fact, were complimentary of Obama’s handling of the Libyan situation. Newt then added that he had “taught 1 and 2 star generals” and you just got the feeling that his giant ego could barely be contained. The man has a HUGE head and  a HUGE ego to go with it.

On North Korea (whose leader, Kim Jong II died recently): “We have no idea whether the new regime will be more open or worse.” [Well, gee, Newt. I'll alert the media to that insightful bit of hot air.]

This man spoke up about having to work into his 60s and 70s, not being able to count on Social Security, which Newt did not seem particularly keen on preserving.

On the economy:  “I believe it is possible to turn around the economy with amazing speed…That’s why we need a program for very dramatic job creation.” (No specifics offered.) Newt cited Ronald Reagan creating one million jobs in August of 1993 and unemployment dropping from 10.8 to 5.6% during Reagan’s years. Those were very different years, and I don’t see Ronnie (Trickle Down) Reagan anywhere around at this time. Nor do I see ANY president capable of turning around the economy “with amazing speed.” That includes Romney .

On Social Security:  “People should not have to depend on politicians, nor be threatened by the loss of their Social Security check.” Newt seemed to be in favor of letting people not pay in to Social Security and save the money themselves….which, of course, is problematic if they do not.

On college students and student loans:  “They (students at the College of the Ozarks, Newt’s model college for financial assistance) all do real work. I’m an advocate of real work.” Newt held up some College in the Ozarks to a student from Iowa State University in Ames who asked him a question about public education. The student noted that the average student debt for  Ames graduates is $48,000. She wanted to know if that was “public education.” Ames is a fine school. To tell Iowa State University that they should start taking cues from a college in the Ozarks that nobody has ever heard of sounded lame.

On gun ownership:  “Our rights will not be taken away from us by a dictatorial government.” Nice rhetoric. Again, no substantive policy discussion.

The sparse crowd. Only 10 chairs, and 2 of them are empty.

On  Freddie Mac and charges that he received over a million ($1.2 million? $1.6 million?) in payment for lobbying efforts for them:  “I should have had a much more coherent answer. The Gingrich Group was hired. I only made about $35,000 a year.  I make more than that for speeches.” Again, your ego is showing, Newt. Take it down a notch.

On his run for the White House:  “I am really different than what they’re used to.” About that time, as a joke, he said, “It’s tricky for me to turn to the left, but I’m trying.” Whatever Newt does seems “tricky,” to me, and I am not surprised that Donald Trump seemed to be his biggest supporter, while none of the 12 people he served with in Congress has come out and endorsed him, nor did John Boehner during his appearance on “Meet the Press” on Sunday, December 18th.

Would he propose a new Contract with America?  “Yes. I’d use executive orders to do away with 100 to 200 White House czars on my first day in office.” I wonder if he would bring up some of his less feasible ideas about Mars, et. al.? About this time, Newt began comparing Obama to Saul Alinsky. I doubt if many in the room knew much about Saul Alinsky. I did not, so I looked him up when I got home. Here are the results:

Saul Alinsky Reference

Newt signing books, which went on for quite some time.

Saul Alinsky was born in Chicago in 1909 and became a cracker-jack community organizer.  Adlai Stevenson said of Alinsky:  “Alinsky’s aims most faithfully reflect our ideals of brotherhood, tolerance, charity and dignity of the individual.” If you don’t like Adlai Stevenson, consider that William F. Buckley, that Conservative icon said of him that he was a near-genius at organizing.

Alinsky wrote, “What follows is for those who want to change the world from what it is to what they believe it should be. ‘The Prince’ was written by Machiavelli for the Haves on how to hold power. My book was written for the Have-Nots on how to take it away.”

Wikipedia goes on to say that Alinsky would not join political organizations of any kind, including those he formed. He said, when asked about Communist and Socialist parties, “I prize my independence too much. And, philosophically, I could never accept any rigid dogma or ideology, whether it’s Christianity or Marxism.  One of the most important things in life is what Judge Learned Hand described as ‘that ever-gnawing inner doubt as to whether you’re right.’ If you don’t have that, if you think you’ve got an inside track to absolute truth, you become doctrinaire, humorless and intellectually constipated. The greatest crimes in history have been perpetrated by such religious and political and racial fanatics, from the persecutions of the Inquisition on down to Communist purges and Nazi genocide.” When I heard the term(s) “intellectually constipated” and “doctrinaire” and read Alinsky’s description of someone who thinks they know everything, Newt’s name was used to illustrate this personality trait.

So, here’s my question: Why would it be a “bad” thing to be compared to a man who tried to help the poor and disenfranchised to organize and get their fair share? Newt’s comparison of Obama to Alinsky seems to be the fear of the rich white man who sees his grip on power threatened by the likes of the Occupy movement.

Debates Ad Nauseum

Newt Gingrich.

Last,  but not least, Gingrich told the audience (citing the Lincoln/Douglas debates) that, if he is the candidate, he wants to debate Obama constantly and that, if Obama will not agree, he would let the White House be his scheduler and arrive in the towns where Obama was to speak 4 hours behind him.  “Unlike the president, I studied American history,” crowed Gingrich. Right. And Obama studied law at Harvard and life in the streets of both Chicago, the Philippines and Hawaii.  Gingrich went on to say, “How can he say he is afraid to debate some guy who taught at West Georgia College?” (He hasn’t said it, that I have heard.) And Newt added, “I will concede in advance that he can use a teleprompter.” Wow! That old Speaker of the House arrogance just rolled off Newt’s back like water off a duck’s.

Woman Hurt at Rally

I hope this woman had an X-ray. Check out the bump on her forehead.

Gingrich then signed a book for a very nice elderly lady from Florida who fell down on her way into the garage (missed the step) and took a very nasty fall onto hard concrete, giving herself a huge goose egg on her forehead. I urged Lou Phillips to get an X-ray after she said, “Oh, the EMTs looked at it.” All I could think of was Liam Neeson’s loss of his wife, Vanessa Redgrave’s daughter, the actress Natasha Richardson, who fell while skiing and hit her head, but said she was “fine” for several hours afterward, ultimately dying from the fall.

After the rally was over, we were not allowed to leave until Elvis had left the building and we were sternly warned not to take any pictures or video. [Like anyone wanted to.] All the national press referenced this appearance as “Newt’s book tour.”

Polls Show Gingrich Falling; Paul Rising

Gingrich, put a brave face in the wake of the release of a new (Dec. 19) Huffington Post survey of 597 caucus-goers that shows Ron Paul at 23%, Mitt Romney at 20% and Newt sinking to 14% saying, “President Ronald Reagan was 30 points behind in the polls at this same time in his presidential run.”

That sounds about right, and it is what I predicted days ago: a Ron Paul surge. Let’s face it: Bachmann and Santorum are toast. Perry has done himself in with his “oops” moments. Cain was not able.  Romney may take the nomination, nationally, but Iowans are peeved that he didn’t come here and court them, as he did in 2008.

Romney in 2008

That year, Romney started with his $10 million of ads in March (of 2007) and visited all 99 counties (either himself or via his family members). This year, he spent only about a week in Iowa and had spent $3.1 million on TV and radio spots, but had only used about $868,000 of it, to date.

The Col Ballroom on W. 4th St., across from the rally, in a decidedly seedy part of Daveport, Iowa.

I did hear some rumblings about Perry’s ads from the locals, also. They don’t like them.

If Iowa could give their seal of approval to Huckabee in 2008, despite the fact that he didn’t win the party’s nomination, there is nothing to stop them from anointing Ron Paul this time. Yes, he’s ancient. Yes, he’s flakey. But he’s likeable and the young support him. He won’t win the national nomination, but anybody but Newt!

Writer Christopher Hitchens, who died of esophageal cancer on Dec. 15, 2011.

Christopher Hitchins’ death on December 15 makes it time to share this story of a Celebrity Encounter at the June, 2011 BEA (Book Expo America). Maybe encounter is too strong a word. More like two ships passing in the night.

I had bought a ticket for the breakfast, which begins early in the morning, but I did not purchase the food, but only a seat on the perimeter, as per usual. You still get the free books…if they are giving them out. (Last year, only chapters of books, not entire books). Other years, free copies of “The Kite Runner,” etc.

Because all the seats on the perimeter appeared to be occupied, I saw a group of people who were going up some stairs through a door near the back of the hall. They began climbing upwards. In my mind, I envisioned a balcony or loggia, like a church choir loft, if you will, and one of the men in the party was carrying a glass which was obviously booze, as it had a little parasol in it. This was approximately 9 a.m. and I remember thinking that that individual must really like to party hearty! I decided to follow the group and went through the same door and began climbing.

At about the second landing, I caught a glimpse of the group ahead of me and recognized Christopher Hitchens as the man carrying the drink. I also realized that I was, inadvertently, crashing the group of would-be speakers, who were apparently climbing to a behind-the-stage area where they would be introduced and seated.

Whoops!

I quietly tip-toed downstairs and took a seat on chairs at the back of the hall, the perimeter .
When Hitchens was introduced (by Patton Oswalt, the stand-up comedian who is now co-starring opposite Charlize Theron in “Young Adult”) he strode to the microphone and recited several dirty limericks, most of them by heart. As I recall, he also said something about homosexual hi-jinks in an English boarding school, but his entire demeanor was very preoccupied and grim. He then left, with Patton Oswalt explaining that he “had to catch a plane” or some such. Keep in mind, this was about 7 months before he would die of esophageal cancer, and he had known he was probably terminally ill for a year and a half before he died quite recently, of pneumonia from complications of the disease.

In the January issue of “Vanity Fair” Hitchens’ final essay appears, entitled “Trial of the Will.” He debunks the saying, “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger” and even speculated that Nietzsche, to whom the quote is attributed, might have stolen it from Goethe. Hitchens gives a brief thumbnail capsule of Nietzsche’s life. To wit:  “In the remainder of his life, however, .Nietzsche seems to have caught an early dose of syphilis, very probably during his first-ever sexual encounter, which gave him crushing migraine headaches and attacks of blindness and metastasized into dementia and paralysis. This, while it did not kill him right away, certainly contributed to his death and cannot possibly, in the meanwhile, be said to have made him stronger.”  More details of Nietzche’s life are provided by the terminally ill writer and, of his own condition he said, “And then I had an unprompted rogue thought: if I had been told about all this in advance, would I have opted for the treatment?  There were several moments as I bucked and writhed and gasped and cursed when I seriously doubted it.”

Hitchens, who was an avowed atheist and told Anderson Cooper that, if he heard stories that, on his deathbed he had recanted and “gotten religion,” he should not believe such reports. He recounted a poem by John Betjeman called “Five O’Clock Shadow:”

This is the time of day when we in the Men’s Ward

Think:  “One more surge of the pain and I give up the fight.”

When he who struggles for breath can struggle less strongly.

This is the time of day that is worse than night.”

Added Hitchens, “I have come to know that feeling all right: the sensation and conviction that the pain will never go away and that the wait for the next fix is unjustly long.  Then a sudden fit of breathlessness, followed by some pointless coughing and then—if it’s a lousy day—by more expectoration than I can handle. Pints of old saliva, occasional mucus, and what the hell do I need heartburn for at this exact moment?  It’s not as if I have eaten anything:  a tube delivers all my nourishment. All of this, and the childish resentment that goes with it, constitutes a weakening.  So does the amazing weight loss that the tube seems unable to combat.  I have now lost almost a third of my body mass since the cancer was diagnosed: it may not kill me, but the atrophy of muscle makes it harder to take even the simple exercises without which I’ll become more enfeebled still.”

And Hitchens added, “I am typing this having just had an injection to try to reduce the pain in my arms, hand, and fingers.  The chief side effect of this pain is numbness in the extremities, filling me with the not irrational fear that I shall lose the ability to write.  Without that ability, I feel sure in advance, my ‘will to live’ would be hugely attenuated.  I often grandly say that writing is not just my living and my livelihood, but my very life, and it’s true.  Almost like the threatened loss of my voice, which is currently being alleviated by some temporary injections into my vocal folds, I feel my personality and identity dissolving as I contemplate dead hands and the loss of the transmission belts that connect me to writing and thinking.”

“These are progressive weaknesses that in a more normal life might have taken decades to catch up with me.  But, as with the normal life, one finds that every passing day represents more and more relentlessly subtracted from less and less.  In other words, the process both etiolates you and moves you nearer toward death.  How could it be otherwise?”

And how could the end have been other than it was. Christopher Hitchens, dead at 62.

Speaker of the House John Boehner (R, Ohio).

As the debt ceiling talks stall, I am reminded of the “Rolling Stone” article I wrote on Speaker John Boehner back in January. If you haven’t read what is essentially a synopsis of an extremely informative article in “Rolling Stone” by Matt Taibbi, there’s a link above. It would be a good idea to read it, in light of the unprecedented crisis he and his party have thrust upon our country with the failure to pass an extension of the debt ceiling, something done 18 times for Reagan and 7 times for Clinton. Bush the Younger, who got us into this mess by blowing through the surplus that President Clinton left and getting us into multiple conflicts worldwide also had the debt ceiling raised several times, whether the leadership was Republican or Democratic.
But our first black president cannot catch a break from the Tea Party tribe recently installed in the hallowed halls of Congress.  I saw the potential for impasse up close and personal in 2008 at the Ron Paul Rally for America in Minneapolis’ Target Center. I remember saying then, “If the Republicans can harness all this energy and enthusiasm and youth, they have a shot at revitalizing their party,” which, let’s face it, was looking pretty old and white and homogeneous across town in St. Paul at the RNC. That harnessing, unfortunately, has led us to the brink of financial ruin, as the group that emerged became known as the Tea Party.

Here’s a quote from today’s (July 28^th) Chicago “Tribune” regarding Speaker Boehner and the current impasse:  “He is the party,” said Rep. Steven C. LaTourette (R, Ohio), a longtime ally.   “If he’s diminished, the party is diminished.” Given the way they’ve been acting, all I can say to that is a resounding, “Good!”

A few more quotes from a different Chicago “Tribune” article by Lisa Mascaro and Kathleen Hennessey of the “Tribune’s” Washington bureau. (And make no mistake about it: the “Tribune” is pro-Republican most of the time and praised Boehner’s bone-headed 2-step tax proposal, which would put “we, the people” through this mess all over again in 6 months’ time…a bad idea in and of itself.)

Page12, July 28, “Nation & World” section, “Boehner Steers A Rocky Path:”  “Earlier this week, the plan was relegated to life support when an analysis showed it would not cut as much as advertised, threatening to take Boehner down with it amid warnings of dire economic consequences for failing to act.  In a quickly changing atmosphere, though, little is certain.”

The “Tribune also said, on the same page, “If the GOP majority ends up falling in line, Boehner will emerge as a cool political operative who found a way to steer his caucus and its unruly freshman class to momentary unity.  If the bill fails, Boehner will have proved the conventional wisdom:  Neither he, nor possibly anyone else on his team can control the rambunctious tea party-aligned GOP ranks that are redefining what it means to be a conservative in this country.”

Later in the article (and at great length in the original January piece. link above), the comment was made:  “Boehner’s hold over these newcomers is fragile.”

Let’s face it: NOBODY has control over the Tea Party loose cannon element in Congress. The nation is pretty sick of it.  Quoting folks who live near the Beltway, Faye Fiore of the “Tribune” papers quoted 66-year-old Warren Cohen of Fairfax as saying, “Lunacy” and announcing his willingness to pay more taxes on his $250,000 in income.  That comment was made “as the country barreled toward a financial cliff.” Noted Fiore, “They’ve (citizens interviewed) had it up to here with politicians who listen to the fringes of their parties, then expound about what ‘Americans want.’”

I just signed a petition authorizing President Obama to invoke the 14^th Amendment and, if necessary, raise this debt ceiling on his own recognizance. He has tried to “lead from behind,” as the pundits put it, being reasonable with a group of intractable Congressmen who act like two-year-olds and putting up with a lot more ridiculous behavior from the Tea Party crowd than any informed, intelligent, dedicated public servant should have to put up with. It seems like most of them deserve a “time out.” This former Senator and Harvard grad , who is now the President of the United States,  is at the mercy in the case of my own district (17^th Congressional, Illinois) of a guy with a 2-year degree from Black Hawk Junior College and not much else on his resume, other than owning a pizza parlor, being firmly in the pocket of big contributors in this area such as John Deere, and having once served his union. He and the man he defeated (Phil Hare) were both staunch Catholic graduates of Alleman High School in Rock Island, but only Bobby Schilling has 10 kids. (Hare had only 2). Only Hare had 27 years’ experience as Lane Evans’ right-hand man until he had to retire with Parkinson’s disease, also, and that, too, shows in this most recent idiocy. Schilling is among 5 first-term GOP House members from Illinois. He was endorsed by the Tea Party when he ran and you can bet your endangered Social Security dollars that he is going to have a real fight on his hands during the next run for office, given his performance to date.

Here is how Faye Fiore in McLean, Virginia put it:  “They (the citizens) want this debt game over.  It’s getting old: rich lawmakers playing chicken with the lives of people who can’t afford it.” Senator Harry Reid has already announced that the plan, even if it were to pass, is DOA in the Senate, and there is also the matter of a presidential veto that would be likely. But getting this group of Republicans to agree on anything is like herding cats, and not particularly bright cats, at that.  Does the old cliche “Lead, follow or get out of the way” carry any meaning any more? The Republican “followers” seem unwilling to “follow” their own leader and the ostensible leader has never been noted for leading much of anything but the group leaving the 18th hole for the country club bar. Ergo, get out of the way seems apropos.

True story, however: as I exited the Women’s Rest Room just opposite the downstairs hall in which the program was to take place, I saw some people entering a stairwell. One of those people, a rather tall gentleman, was holding what appeared to be a REAL drink (and it wasn’t even noon yet) so this caught my eye, and I decided, “Well, that person definitely is in to the sauce already today, and I’ll just follow that group in to find our seats.” I was halfway up the stairwell stairs when we hit the landing and I realized that the rather tall gentleman holding the drink (it was in a wine glass, anyway, and it certainly did not look like iced tea) I belatedly recognized as Christopher Hitchens, the keynote speaker. I remember thinking that it was too bad I didn’t have my camera with me, but my next thought was to exit as gracelessly as I had entered (i.e., stumbling into the wrong stairwell and almost ending up onstage, it would seem).

This sort of thing seems to happen to me a lot. I ended up in an elevator with Mickey Rooney and his 9th? 10th? wife in Washington, D.C. once at a poetry thing where he was to speak. (Actually, he spoke just a little, sat down, and his wife sang. She sings well.) His wife was quite angry with little Mickey (who came up to about boob-level) that he had “gotten on the wrong elevator.” Apparently, there was a “special” elevator for the star speaker, but Mickey—who was then nearing 80 if not already in his eighth decade—had picked the wrong elevator and therein lies my “brush with greatness.”

With Christopher Hitchens, I didn’t really stay in the stairwell long enough to be identified as an interloper and, therefore, was merely an audience member wondering why he just kept repeating limericks, some of them fairly outrageous, and then shared memories of deflowering various male members of Parliament or some such. I grew up in Iowa. I now live in Illinois. I am obviously out of the NYC loop and most of the audience that day, when Patton Oswalt (a comedian) hosted, seemed to be out of the NYC loop, also. I think there were several deep breaths taken by the audience (and deep drinks taken by Mr. Hitchens) before he abruptly exited, stage left (the very same stairwell he came in) to “catch a plane to London.” Ah, the lifestyle of the rich and famous!

In keeping with that lifestyle, I’d like to share with you, with appropriate attribution, Christopher Hitchen’s remarks, as quoted in something entitled “Diary” on page 82 of the July, 2010 “Vanity Fair.” It is just a small part of a longer piece, but, in light of my remarks above, I think you’ll get the general idea, and I won’t even tell you about the time I ended up in the elevator with Jesse Jackson’s entourage inside the Pepsi Center in Denver during the DNC, BEFORE he was accused of trying to purchase Barack Obama’s soon-to-be-empty Senate seat (which he vociferously denied).

Here is the excerpt from Christopher Hitchens’ diary, the very same C.H. with shom I had a “brush with greatness” in the stairwell of the Jacob Javits Center on May 27th,…although I’m sure he never knew I was there:

“There was a time when I could outperform all but the most hardened imbibers, a generous slug or 10 of Mr. Walker’s amber restorative being my tipple of preference.  It was between the Tel Aviv massacre and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.  I now restrict myself to no more than a couple of bottles of halfway decent wine for elevenses, and then a couple more as an accompaniment to luncheon, with Mr. Gordon’s gin firmly ensconced in the driving seat for the remainder of the day.  As an enthuisastic participant in the delights of Mr. Dionysus, I offer no apology for passing down these simple pieces of advice for the young.

Never drink before breakfast, unless the day of the week has a “u” in it.  Martinis go surprisingly well with Corn Flakes, while a medium dry sherry remains the perfect accompaniment to Mr. Kellogg’s admirable Rice Krispies.

It’s much worse to see a woman drunk than a man.  I don’t know why this is ture, but it is, it just is, I don’t care what you say, it just is and you can take that from me and anyway that’s not what I said. (*Author’s note: it is what you said, and it’s sexist as hell!)

And finally, if, like me, you are, like me, a professional scrivener, like me, never ever ever drunk while written an article column piece ever.  It is, perforce, something I never don’t.” (As told to Craig Brown and previously printed in “Private Eye”)

Among the cuts being contemplated, according to Enrique’s Community Update and the Chicago Sun Times article of 3/16/2010 by Rosalind Rossi (www.suntimes.com/news/education), anticipated cutbacks include most assistant Principal positions, a number of clerks, and a moratorium on non-varsity sports. There would also be no full-day kindergarten, no early childhood classes and no mandated transportation to magnet schools or charter schools.

The proposed cuts include $398 million in central office and citywide cuts and 3,200 teaching positions, with 600 non-teaching positions also scheduled to be cut. Another 1,900 jobs would open up due to resignations and retirements. Most central office employees would also take 15 furlough days (as they did this year) and there would be a pay freeze.

There would be $27 million cut in non-mandatory transportation to magnet or charter schools and $17 million in cuts to enrichment and after-school programs.  The system would attempt to cover the deficit by drawing down $240 million from the system’s reserve fund and there would be a –18% reduction to charter and contract schools in per student spending.

The Chicago Teachers’ Union is due a projected 4% raise next year, which would amount to +$169 million in additional spending.  Teachers’ Union spokesperson Rosemarie Genova of the CTU (Chicago Teachers’ Union) said, “If this is a negotiating ploy, there will be no negotiation in the press.”

Next year, pension demands on the TRS (Teachers’ Retirement System) are slated to jump from $308 million to $587 million as a result of the aging of the teaching force and retirements of veteran teaching staff. The TRS system in Illinois is generally considered the third-best teachers’ pension system in the nation.

After the normal “welcomes” and reference to how “prayer can bring sustenance to our lives” Obama said, “But there is a sense that something is different now; that something is broken; that those of us in Washington are not serving the people as well as we should. At times, it seems like we’re unable to listen to one another, to have at once a serious and civil debate.  And this erosion of civility in the public square sows division and distrust among our citizens.  It poisons the well of public opinion.  It leaves each side little room to negotiate with the other.  It makes politics an all-or-nothing sport, where one side is either always right or always wrong when, in reality, neither side has a monopoly on truth…Empowered by faith, consistently, prayerfully, we need to find our way back to civility.”

Obama went on, “Civility also requires relearning how to disagree without being disagreeable…We forget that we share at some deep level the same dreams—even when we don’t share the same plans on how to fulfill them.”  The president urged a way “to make an impact in a way that’s civil and respectful of difference and focused on what matters most.

Obama quoted three great leaders in making his point(s) on civility:

1)      Abraham Lincoln, who said, on the eve of the Civil War, “We are not enemies, but friends.  Though passions may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection.”

2)      Martin Luther King:  “Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend.”

3)      President John F. Kennedy: “Civility is not a sign of weakness.”

Obama said, “But progress doesn’t come when we demonize opponents.  It’s not born in righteous spite.” He added, “It seems like the very idea (of civility) is a relic of some bygone era.  The word itself seems quaint—civility.”

All of the above excerpts from our president’s February 4^th speech are so true and so sad. I have bold-faced the last line, because I think that President Obama may not realize how true it is: civility and politeness are, indeed, values no longer abroad in the land. Civility is a quaint word and a quaint concept in 2010.

It seems that only the older generation—those who grew up in the age of Truman and Eisenhower or before— have even a dim memory of how it used to be in society.  Children were taught to be polite; rudeness towards one’s parents, peers or teachers was not tolerated. The longshoreman language we hear spouted by even first-grade students in schools was non-existent in those “happy days.”

In today’s schools at every level, teachers are lucky if they are merely called profane names. Educators are fortunate if they are only assaulted with idle threats and profane insults when things don’t go the students’ way.  The teacher is no longer always right. Mom and Dad—if there is one— (and, often, the administration of the school) will very often side with Junior and undercut attempts at enforcing standards of civility and polite discourse. In some noteworthy cases, Junior may become violent, a threat to himself, his teachers, and his classmates. These outbursts, this impolite, dangerous behavior did not happen in the days of civility and polite discourse.

Not just schools and government, but all of our institutions are under attack; none of our institutions are totally trusted any longer. It doesn’t matter if you’re a fireman, a policeman, a teacher or a politician. Whatever form of authority you represent, even if it is simply the owner of a store, handling customer complaints is a nightmare in this age of out-of-control anger and uncivil behavior.

What was most telling, for me, about President Obama’s eloquent words, were the three quotes he selected to illustrate his very valid points about civility in 2010. Obama quoted John Fitzgerald Kennedy, the martyred president of Camelot lost; Martin Luther King, Jr., the murdered Civil Rights leader who preached nonviolence to his followers; and Abraham Lincoln, whose enemies chose to still that Illinois president’s voice of reason with a bullet to the brain

I found the words of President Obama’s speech true and moving.

However, I fear that he is pleading for something that is perhaps gone forever, like the dinosaur, or, if not gone, in very short supply.  Quoting three murdered leaders only makes me fear more for our president and for our country, which so badly needs polite and civil discourse and both sides working together in civil harmony, rather than radical rants and unreasonable stone-walling.

Something is broken, Mr. President, not just in Washington, D.C., but also in the United States of America. Can chaos give way to order? Can the bell of rude behavior be unrung when it’s been pealing for decades?

Many things are definitely broken in America. I wonder if they can be fixed?

Although Nashville’s sit-in protesting racial discrimination at the city’s lunch counters like Woolworth’s (then a staple) was upstaged by an impromptu sit-in the day before, [on February 1, 1960], at North Carolina A&T College, by four black students (all freshman African American students at AT&T College)—Joseph McNeil, Ezell Blair, Jr., David Richmond and Franklin McCain—the Nashville protest movement involved many more students, both local residents and many who were urged, as I was, to get on buses and travel South to be part of the protests. Many of these Freedom Riders, as they were known (or trouble-makers, if you were a local in the Southern community being visited), were organized by SNCC (the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee).

SNCC was organized in Raleigh, North Carolina in 1960 to help coordinate sit-ins and freedom rides and marches. Most were unpaid volunteers, but some were paid $10 a week to help the organization. Initially, the organization was meant to be non-violent. In its later incarnations under Stokely Carmichael, when the Black Power salute came into being, etc., the organization’s leaders said, “I don’t know how much longer we can remain non-violent,” and, indeed, it did not stand fast to Martin Luther King’s original nonviolent protest principles and passed out of existence in the seventies. However, during the hey-day of the sixties, SNCC was instrumental in helping organize protest movements in the United States, both by raising funds and by recruiting sympathetic students from across the northern part of the United States, who traveled South to help win civil rights for the black residents.

One of the most influential, in fact, would be an English major from Chicago, Diane Nash, who emerged as a key spokeswoman and ultimately confronted Nashville’s Mayor, Ben West at the height of the city’s sit-ins of 1960 (.

Nashville, Tennessee in 1960 was still a segregated city in the South, although it prided itself on being “the Athens of the South,” with its model Parthenon in the park and what officials felt was an enlightened attitude. But the black students who could not be served at Woolworth’s, S.H. Kress, McClellan’s, Grant’s, Walgreen’s and Cain-Sloan along Fifth Street didn’t quite see it that way.

Today, with the benefit of looking back from the vantage-point of 50 years in the future, it is apparent that the Nashville protest for civil rights was far better organized than many of those being staged in 112 Southern cities by October of 1960 (as documented in Juan Williams’ book Eyes on the Prize: America’s Civil rights Years, 1954-1965).  Of the 112 sit-ins and other demonstrations staged, many were ineffectual. It is a tribute to the preparation and planning of leaders like Chicago’s Diane Nash that Nashville’s sit-ins and protest movement yielded fruit that today’s college students benefit from, even if they cannot remember and, sometimes, cannot believe that this sort of unrest occurred in their fair city.

While Joseph McNeil, one of the original sit-in demonstrators at the lunch counter at Woolworth’s in Greensboro, North Carolina, had simply “had enough” and did what he did with little preparation or forethought, simply because, “I didn’t want to see my children have to face the same problems.  We just felt that this certainly was a time to act. If not now, when? If not my generation, what generation?” others spent more time preparing and planning. McNeil is now 67 and a retired Air Force Reserve major general who lives in Hempstead, New York. He adds, “My parents grew up and carried the scars of racial segregation.”

Lest readers think that Nashville, with its reputation as the Athens of the South, was so much better than Greensboro, North Carolina, let me quote 82-year-old John Seigenthaler in the USA Today front page article (Feb. 1, 2010) who was then the weekend city editor of The Tennessean, Nashville’s leading newspaper. Said Seigenthaler, “It (Nashville) was as segregated by race as any city in South Africa during apartheid.” Seigenthaler went on to become the first editorial director of USA Today, after serving as editor and publisher of The Tennessean.

When 124 students who had been coached in non-violent reaction by groups such as SNCC, dressed in their Sunday best, marched quietly, 2 abreast, from a nearby church to Fifth Avenue in Nashville and entered Woolworth’s, S.H. Kress, and McClellan’s, stores that, today, we would describe as “dime stores,” they were told by a waitress, “We don’t serve niggers here.”

The students waited quietly while other shoppers stared.  The protesters sat for a few hours and then left. However, the students returned over and over again during the next 2 weeks and added a fourth store, Grant’s, and a fifth, Walgreen’s.  (None of these stores remain on Nashville’s Fifth Avenue, today, except Walgreen’s, which hasn’t had a lunch counter in decades, as that particular American cultural phenomenon has been supplanted by fast food places like McDonald’s and Burger King.)

Each subsequent sit-in grew larger, attracting more students to the cause, but each subsequent sit-in also attracted supportive, idealistic white youths of the era. Protesters were heckled, beat, and spat upon the protesters and all this has been documented on film. By February 27, 1960, Nashville had decided to crack down on the disruption(s) to the local businesses and 81 students had been arrested.

Seigenthaler remembers, “For the white community, there was shock, anger, overwhelmingly negative feelings. The business community adopted a very steel-backed approach, rigid and very negative.”

I remember that, in my own case, I only took part in demonstrations that were held on the campuses of the universities I was actually attending. My parents decreed that there would be no bus trips to Southern cities for this college co-ed. But the colleges I was attending during the years outlined in Juan Williams’ book (see above) were the University of California at Berkeley and the University of Iowa in Iowa City, Iowa. (If you think things were “all quiet on the western front at Berkeley,” you have not read many history books about “Berzerkley” in the sixties.)

I remember that all the bookstore windows were broken out during demonstrations, to the point that the bookstores on both campuses replaced their previously glass windows with a bricked-up substitute. I remember the (repeated) occupation of Sproul Hall (the administration building) on campus at Berkeley and many protest rallies and concerts by such luminaries as Pete Seeger and Bob Dylan and, in one memorable poetry reading, Alan Ginsberg.

Ginsberg, the much-acclaimed author of “Howl” and one of the Beat Poets (like Jack Kerouac of “On the Road”) was so high on something that the janitor had to be summoned to actually physically lift the man, (squatting cross-legged in yoga lotus position onstage with finger cymbals), and remove him from the stage (stage left, as they say). I remember Mario Savio, now deceased, who was constantly rallying the student demonstrators, and just as constantly being hauled off to jail. [Imagine my surprise on a return trip to Berkeley recently to discover a life-sized statue of this leader of the Free Speech movement and civil rights activist right on campus. (“The times, they are a’changin’,” for sure.)]

But back to Nashville, so that my daughter, born in 1987, may read some reminiscences of others more central to integrating the city she now calls home.

Sit-ins had been tried in more than 12 cities, beginning in Wichita, Kansas in 1958, but the one in Greensboro, North Carolina described above ignited the most passion and reignited Dr. Martin Luther King’s movement, which had flagged after the Rosa Parks bus incident in Birmingham, Alabama, faded from memory. Without the students leading the way, Dr. King’s movement might well have faltered, but the unbridled enthusiasm of youth—harnessed again in Barack Obama’s campaign in 2008—rescued a flagging Civil Rights movement back in the sixties.

By February, 1960, sit-ins had taken place in 31 cities. By March, 1960, sit-ins had taken place in 71 cities (USA Today article of Feb. 1, 2010, by Larry Copeland, p.2A). By October, 1960, sit-ins had occurred in 112 Southern cities. The movement was growing and, in Nashville, at least, students from all over the country and all over the world were feeding it.  Said Representative John Lewis, (D, Ga.) who was then 19 and among those in the Civil Rights movement in 1960, “Students would come to Fisk to watch films and plays, or come to the Fisk Chapel to listen to unbelievable music, but they could not eat together downtown in racially mixed groups.”

For 2 years prior to the Nashville movement of 1960, Lewis was among a group of students learning non-violent tactics from James Lawson, a graduate student at Vanderbilt University. (Again, at Iowa, the group was SNCC, Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee). This is where Diane Nash from Chicago, mentioned earlier, studied the movement and where Bernard LaFayette, who later became a college president, would take part. C.T. Vivian, who later became an Atlanta city councilman was there and Marion Barry, later the Mayor of Washington, D.C. whose antics in office earned him a less-than-stellar reputation for drug use and womanizing, decades afterwards.

All these disparate people came together and planned, for 2 years, to hold mock sit-ins and studied how NOT to respond if attacked or arrested. Test sit-ins were held in late 1959 at 2 Nashville department stores, Harvey’s and Cain-Sloan. All this was in preparation for “the real deal,” which rolled out on February 13, 1960.

Says LaFayette, today, “There was an ongoing debate between the students and their parents.  They (the parents) feared for our safety, because we were going up against a system that was not known to be very sympathetic or humane, particularly law enforcement in the South.”

I had grown up in the lily-white town of Independence, Iowa. I did not have…then or now…. one shred of prejudice towards any other ethnic group. It isn’t that I can claim any moral high ground. I just had had no bad experiences of any kind (nor good, for that matter) with the students referenced as “colored.” Basic human decency and logic would dictate that people are people, no matter what color or religion they are, and should be treated equally well. Isn’t it the Bible that says, “Do unto others as ye would have them do unto you?”

It didn’t take me long to decide where I would stand on this issue, but how active I could/would be in the movement was dictated by my conservative Midwestern parents who controlled the purse strings. However, when I was on campus where it was all happening (as at Berkeley and Iowa)…(finish that thought). My parents were completely clear that I was NOT to sign anything, NOT to get arrested, and NOT to get on a bus heading south.

However, as long as I didn’t sign anything (“Do NOT sign anything,” said my stern father.) nor get on a bus for parts unknown, like the hapless college students whose short lives and brutish murders are so compellingly portrayed in the 1988 Alan Parker film “Mississippi Burning” (Gene Hackman, Willem Dafoe), I could take part in protests on the campuses I was actually attending without repercussions that would cause trouble with the authorities (and, in that group, I include my conservative parents). I remember particularly vividly giving blood to be thrown on the steps of Old Capitol in protest, but the protest was an anti Vietnam War protest, not a Civil Rights protest.

 This period of time stretched from 1963 to 1968, later than the period (1960) being discussed in the USA Today story. Still, I remember that the beacon burned bright in those years of the sixties, especially as anti-war protests against the Vietnam War, fueled by our nation’s draft system, began to become part of the mix.

As for sit-ins, perhaps 100,000 participated in them, according to historian Clayborne Carson, and 3,000 were arrested in 1960, alone, so demands that you “not get arrested” were reality-based when delivered by a worried parent to an idealistic would-be participant.

The sit-ins in Nashville carried on in to April of 1960, costing local merchants money. Easter was approaching and the large black middle class in Nashville organized a “No New Clothes Easter.” “Jim Crow” laws in at least 11 Southern states prohibited inter-racial mingling between blacks and whites, but, in 1954, the Supreme Court had ordered the schools desegregated. Ordering it didn’t make it happen, however, and there have been books written about the integration of the South’s most revered black institutions (colleges, universities, public schools), including a famous Norman Rockwell painting depicting a small black girl walking into a previously all-white school.

Said a Nashville student who was part of the protest movement of 1960 (Mitchell) of the “No New Clothes Easter:” “People were very serious about this.  They didn’t shop.  Anyone who had new clothes that Easter stood out.” Naturally, this hurt local merchants and Mayor Ben West proposed a compromise whereby a 3-month trial period would allow blacks to be served in a separate area of the local restaurants (Remember “separate but equal?”). This angered the black students and it was rejected. The sit-ins continued.

On April 19^th, the home of the students’ attorney, Z. Alexander Lobby, was bombed. Thousands of people, both black and white, marched in silence to City Hall later that day, where spokeswoman Diane Nash (the Chicago convert) addressed Mayor Ben West, saying, “Mayor, do you recommend that the lunch counters be desegregated?”

The Mayor—who had always been viewed as a moderate and who was a white man presiding over an integrated city council—hesitated briefly and then said, “Yes.” (This version comes from Seigenthaler, who was present.) Says historian Clayborne Carson, “The sit-ins were the real starting point of the protests of the 1960s.”

By May 10, 1960, six Fifth Avenue stores (Kress’, Woolworth’s, McClellan’s, Grant’s, Walgreen’s and Cain-Sloan’s) seated black customers at lunch counters for the first time. When Reverend Martin Luther-King came to Nashville mere days after the confrontation between Chicago’s Diane Nash and Mayor Ben West, he told a capacity crowd in the Fisk auditorium, “The Nashville sit-ins were the best organized and the most disciplined in the Southland.” (Parting the Waters by Pulitzer-prize winner Taylor Branch).

As a sometimes Chicagoan who participated in protests during the troubled decade of the sixties, it is difficult for me to explain to my 22-year-old daughter, who lives in the very city where much of this occurred, how it is conceivable that a white minority would or could attempt to keep down a black majority. One has only to look to apartheid in South Africa with the Dutch colonial settlers (and this year’s “Invictus” film by Clint Eastwood) to realize that the history I lived through and participated in (to a lesser extent than these pioneers, but to the extent that I was able to do so) really did occur.

As Seigenthaler put it, “It’s really tough to understand how a city could be so insensitive, and, in some ways, so dumb, but Nashville’s ability to resolve it within a relatively short period of time and put it behind them is worth considering.” Says Mitchell, “Nashville, today, is a city that’s very respected in race relations. It’s a diverse, international community.  The present generation is often shocked when we refer to the sit-ins. They see a very open and urban community, and they don’t believe that that happened here.”

As you drive down Fifth Avenue in Nashville, today, little remains to remind of the history that took place in these streets. There are no signs or memorials and, although the sign is still up at the old Kress store, it’s been converted into loft apartments.  Walgreen’s, the only store of those mentioned that remains, has no lunch counter, and has had no such amenity in decades.

Nashville residents, like my daughter, can sit together and eat lunch wherever they want with whomever they choose, today. But they owe that freedom to Freedom Riders (as they were known), youths like me, who often boarded buses and traveled South (at considerable risk) to join their oppressed fellowman, in the hope of assuring “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,” just as our Constitution has assured our citizens since the 1700s. It was justice and equality for all under the law, regardless of race, color or creed that the children of the sixties stood up for.  I hope today’s youth and tomorrow’s youth-yet-to-be-born remember this history 50 years from now.

Dr. Paul doesn’t make sense all of the time, but he certainly got my attention with his comments about spending more than you take in being a bad thing.  He could was eloquent when talking about the crime that he thinks was committed when America left the gold standard (for backing our currency) and began printing money up like worthless scrip. I even remember my banker father taking a few gold dollars (uncirculated) and putting them away in a safety deposit box, telling me that these would, some day, become collectors’ items. (And, boy, was he ever right!)

When I entered the Target Center in Minneapolis (St. Paul’s twin city), which most people had paid $17 a head to enter (press got in free), I was amazed at the fact that the place was full and, also, at the diversity of the audience members. There were many spectators walking around wearing delegate badges to the “real” Republican convention across town in St. Paul. When I asked one of the delegates to the RNC why he was here (Minneapolis) rather than there (St. Paul) he said, “This is where the real action is.” And I felt he was  right. I got a sense of enthusiasm, of supporters who were not just rich fat cats or old white men, but a diverse group cutting across all segments of the nation. Why, I hadn’t had a feeling like that since I was present in Denver at the DNC at the Pepsi Center!
Now, the Ron Paul Rally for America action was odd action. I was sandwiched between 2 economists from Germany who tried to give me a crash course on Libertarianism and seemed to think that Ron Paul represented the second coming. (I was afraid one of them might accidentally give an unfortunate salute at any moment, such was his unbridled enthusiasm.)  I felt I was having an out-of-body experience when, onstage, appeared (at one time) Barry Goldwater, Jr. (looking just like dear old Dad), Tucker Carlson, Jesse Ventura (former professional wrestler, actor and Governator of Minnesota), and Ron Paul. When the conversation took off on legalizing hemp, I began to really feel I had wandered into an alternate universe. It was surreal.

But the one thing that you could say for and about the St. Paul “Ron Paul Rally for America” is that it had youth. It had vigor. It had action. It had a feeling of some life and some commitment to the cause. I had some hope that the elephant might survive, IF it could find a way to get these radical rascals back into the herd.  And I don’t mean the herd of old white fat cats with no visible diversity at all. This year, in Bush Jr.’s absence the party had even given up the display of token inclusion they attempted during the second of “W’s” conventions.

Imagine my surprise to pick up the December 14 (2009) issue of Newsweek magazine and belatedly read Howard Fineman’s article “Is There a Doctor in the House?” in which he says (among other things), in a discussion of Ron Paul, “No one thinks Ron Paul is going to lead the G.O.P, let alone be president.  He’s 74 years old and just too…out there.  He is an obscure guy who waited patiently (if not quietly) for the cycle of history to come back around his way, and finally it did. We have been arguing about money, credit, and banks since the first days of the republic. Paul is a bargain basement Jefferson for our time.”

Wow! My ears perked up at these words of praise for the old warrior.  I read on, because what Howard Fineman said next is what I have been telling everyone everywhere since the Republican National Convention in Minnesota and I want to thank Phil (my blog guy) for making me go hear Ron Paul and the Libertarians, who seem(ed) to much more fully capture the zeitgeist and spirit of America than the Gestapo-like horde of old white guys downtown in St. Paul.

Said Fineman in his article: “Still, the GOP needs to study Ron Paul and learn.  No one has better captured the sense of Main Street outrage over secret insider deals and Wall Street bonuses.  No one has been more consistent about sticking to core conservative values—including the one that says the government shouldn’t spend more money than it takes in.” [At this point, I’m sure, were my own dear father alive, he’d be chiming in, shaking his head in assent and saying, “That’s right!”]

Fineman went on to say, “If the GOP is going to appeal to independent voters, it has to confront its own corporate allies…The good doctor, of all people, is showing Republicans the way.  What they need is a candidate who embodies the spirit of Ron Paul. Just so long as it isn’t Ron Paul.”

Hear, hear! I’m beginning to think that I do make some sense once in a while, because Howard Fineman has come around to my way of thinking roughly a year after my Eureka moment in Minneapolis.                                        

Ray LaHood was my neighbor for many years in East Moline, Illinois on our 3rd St. B court street. At that time, he worked for the Bi-state Metropolitan Planning Commission, and his son, Darren, was an 8th grade classmate of my son, Scott.

One summer day, Scott came running into the house, breathlessly exclaiming that Darren had built a ramp for his skateboard and, sans helmet, had driven over it at warp speed, fallen and apparently knocked himself out. I was a schoolteacher at the time and home on summer vacation, but Darren’s dad was at work and his mom was not at home at the time. Darren was groggy, but semi-conscious, and it appeared safe to move him by car to the emergency room in Silvis, Illinois (Illini Hospital), which I did. I called Ray, who immediately came to the hospital, and Darren was none the worse for wear.

As for Senator Dodd, when he was campaigning in Iowa during the winter  caucus season, he actually moved to a house in Des Moines. He appeared as one of the speakers at the Scott County Red-White-and-Blue Banquet in Davenport, Iowa, along with Joe Biden and Walter Mondale. I also covered him at a downtown Irish pub very near the end of his campaign. The crowd was so small that I got quite a bit of face-time with the then-candidate.

On the night of the Iowa caucuses, I drove to Des Moines, Iowa, as I had done during the year that Howard Dean campaigned for president. My friend’s daughter, Emily, wanted a ride downtown and my Prius in the driveway was blocking their family cars. Emily was in the market for an auto, so I told her to drive my hybrid and we struck off for the downtown, where I would drop her off. With Emily at the wheel, I spied a white-haired man I would have sworn was Chris Dodd. I told Emily, “Stop!” and leaped from the car to chase Chris Dodd for fully 3 blocks through the streets of downtown Des Moines. He was surrounded by a small entourage, but I drew near his left elbow, looked him in the eye, and realized that this man wasn’t Senator Christopher Dodd.

“Hi,” the stranger said, somewhat startled.

“Hi,” I said, sheepishly. I immediately retreated to the car, where Emily was convulsed with laughter.

Emily and I then went to the downtown hotel where John Edwards’ campaign group was staying. we saw Madeline Stowe, Jean Smart and James Denton (the plumber on “Desperate Housewives”) in the lobby. We also ended up in the elevator with Mr. and Mrs. Edwards, John’s parents, and chatted with them about their impending move to New Hampshire on the morrow. [All of this was pre-Reilly Hunter Affair/Scandal days.]

Since the party seemed to be over, Emily and I retreated and I dropped her off at her destination and I returned to my friend’s Des Moines home. But as I drove, I was thinking of the foot race I had run to chase down the bogus Christopher Dodd and how I’d be fending off jokes about that for years to come!