To an Unknown Iraqi Journalist

I don't know you. We are unlikely to ever cross paths in a Publix, or the Buford Highway Walgreens, and, one surmises, a good Georgia Barbecue Pork sandwich is completely out of the question.

There is no question that there your motives for lofting those loafers were sound. One imagines that if our roles were reversed, the temptation would be difficult to suppress. There are quite a few Americans who would agree with why you hurled the huaraches.

And in that aspect, all persons concerned would be justified in a sneaker slider...but...here's the issue. Whether we like it or not, George W. Bush is the freely elected President of the United States, and will be for another five weeks. Picking a fight with him outside of the United States makes Americans pissy, even Americans who agree with you. It stops being an attack on a man you find despicable, and becomes an assault on the office and the people it serves.

For our friends on the Left, imagine the same thing directed at President-Elect Obama, by a journalist serving at the pleasure of a military dictator anywhere, while overseas, and feel your ire rise. One is free to his dislike for the officeholder, just do not disrespect the office.

Please do not think that we should hoist the presidency up on an ivory tower. It should be down on street level and able to respond swiftly and surely to assaults from all sides.

As for President Bush, what the hell were you thinking? You have five weeks, and a single digit approval rating, best recognized by the single digit raised by most Americans when you pass by or your picture shows up on the news. This is not a time to start gallivanting around the globe showing your ass while asserting your two drops of relevance as a world leader.

This is the time where you would be best advised to sit your fuzzy butt down in Washington or Dallas, stop costing us any more money, and shut the merry heck up. How much does one of these little overseas jaunts cost in the first blamed place? When you're running multi-trillion dollar defecits and got five fricking weeks left in the White House, STAY HOME!

Can you imagine what would have happened had that Iraqi journalist gotten something more serious than a shoe in that room? This is where you and the Left have a great overlap of agreement. Neither one of you wants a President Dick Cheney, which is precisely what could have happened.

The idea of President Dick Cheney, second shortest administration in history (Only William Henry Harrison's being shorter) because you got a wild hair up your torpedo tube to go to Iraq because you could, well, it annoys me. You deserve to be blessed out for it. When we, the people cannot afford Christmas gifts for our children, much less our mortgages, car payments, heating and light bills, or food, your trip is the posturing of an impotent, arrogant, redundant hack.

The really sad part is that there just is not enough time to impeach Bush. But can someone in Congress cut the funding for Air Force One so he has to carry his behind back to the United States and face the disaster he made in person? By the time he hits Washington, there is a good chance that his Cadillac Limo will be an orphan, i.e., a car whose manufacturer no longer exists.

It's easy to be annoyed at the Iraqi journalist. If he had behaved any more obnoxiously, he would now be Fred Goldman. But one at least understands the motivations behind his act.

Bush, on the other hand, should never have been in that situation in the first blessed place. He has enough people around him to know better. And if they are unwilling to say so, we, the American people, are.

One imagines, with great trepidation, approximately 130 million Nikes lining the telephone lines throughout greater Washington.

Blagojevich In The Punchbowl

Lawbreakers can be compelling and personable. Some lawbreakers are people who, given different circumstances, may have been or later became successful in legitimate endeavor. Others are compelling for their commitment to the nonviolent assurance of equitable treatment of all of God's children, surrendering to the authority of an unjust statute as method of revealing its lack of moral integrity.

Most lawbreakers, however, are people who just got greedy and finally got caught.

The former group runs the gamut. Junior Johnson was a moonshiner who found himself paying a debt to society to become one of the most repected figures in American motorsports. Martin Luther King, Junior is now revered for his work bringing equality to a system which held African-Americans accountable without offering access to the systems that could propel a population to great heights. Not all lawbreakers are crooks.

Rod Blagojevich is someone who got greedy and finally got caught.

One does not question Blagojevich's integrity: that would imply that he had some type of integrity.

He started out by calling himself a reformer. Reformer is one of those words which should be included in a future explaination of what things really mean. In Blagojevich's case, Reform meant that the bully pulpit of the Illinois Governor could be leveraged to the highest bidder, as opposed to giving preference to ideology before taking bids.

On at least three occasions the Illinois legislature attempted to rescind a split speed limit of 55 miles per hour for large vehicles on rural expressways. It is a law held in wide disregard by Illinois law enforcement and most of the population outside of Chicago. In Chicago, 55 miles per hour is a fantasy, the two speeds there being damn slow and stop. Robbin' Rod spoke as an "advocate of public safety."

And Hitler wanted to "help the Jewish people." It is appropriate to question how much money from trucking companies, insurance companies, railroads, and authoritarian "safety" groups like RoadSafe America went into Blagojevich's pocket.

If someone were genuinely interested in trucking safety, one may wish to take steps against archaic laws allowing drivers to be paid by the mile as opposed to the hour. One may wish to offer a statewide moratorium on companies not paying truckers overtime. The state could find ways to sanction communities that impede the construction of rest and service facilities dedicated to commercial drivers. Holding companies to a higher standard of accountability beyond that of provable gross negligence could be a good place to start, too.

It could begin with offering something along the lines of the flat-rate book successfully used by people in other trades for at least fifty years.

Blagojevich holds degrees from several prestigious institutions including Northwestern and Pepperdine. The implicit understanding is that the man knows how to read. It is not as if he attended a Community College located in the abandoned Oasis of an unrealized Tollway project. (Turnpike State! On Atlanta's 420 Inner Belt! Go Roadkills Go!)

One is not wholly insensitive to some of the circumstances in the Governor's life which may have altered his outlook. When the Condo board in Oprah Winfrey's Lake Shore Drive building refused his application, it had to hurt. The clause used was the same one they used on Steadman Graham, and rather insulting in its wording.

It is unfair to blame the Governor for the wanton use of force by state law enforcement agencies since the Blues Brothers' era. At that time, Blagojevich was an apprentice crook in college. Questions remain about the uncredited writing of the script for Blues Brothers 2000, a veritable train wreck of a film.

There has been no truth to the rumor that Governor Blagojevich sold his mother to a white slavery ring in Boy's Town, Mexico.

Investigations with regard to several female cousins, however, continue.

While significant mention was made about President-elect Obama's relationship with Tony Rezko, let it be said that the most fastidious cultivator of hogs will get splashed when a boar goes batty in the slop. Blagojevich dived in and joined the party. That relationship was so strong, former New Jersey Governor Jim McGreevy could have been enlisted to perform a civil union.

Political observers throughout the state of Illinois have suggested that Governor Blagojevich's remarkable pompadour is a toupee. That is untrue. There are some things that a wig shop just will not do.

Blagojevich has feuded with over twelve million residents of the state of Illinois, yet was under the illusion that he could win a third term. Talk about living in a river in Egypt. In a poll taken by the Rantoul Morning Spud, of 983 registered voters in Central Illinois, Blagojevich lost to a fictitious Republican candidate, "Ayatollah Fidel Adolf Stalin," an undocumented immigrant and Chicago Cubs fan, 87% to 2%.

95% of the undecided respondents cited the Republican's support for the Cubs as the deal-breaker.

When one speaks of abused political mechanisms, the state of Illinois has been identified regularly as a place of remarkably unethical behavior. The Abraham Lincolns, Adlai Stevensons and even Barack Obama have been overshadowed by Richard Daley, Dan Rostenkowski and George Ryan.

Today we observe the dawn of a new class: a politician has finally been located who is too corrupt even for Illinois. Congratulations, Governor Blagojevich. You will not be forgotten soon.

No matter how much one wants to.

OSAMA BIN LADEN IS DEAD!!!

Osama bin Laden, 51, of Not a Secret Cave Any Damn More, Waziristan, was killed on or about 5 November when a Predator Drone landed in his couscous.

In a moment evocative of the late Jack Anderson, your Wandering Gentile has obtained a transcript of a conversation between two bin Laden henchmen, Farj al-Kufri and Hasan ibn Xanith.

FK: (Intercourse!) They got Osama!

HX: The (intercourse?) When?

FK: The other night.

HX: (Excrement.) Now what are we going to do?

FK: We aren't going to say (male genitalia.) The Yanks are going to have a field day with the death of the Leader.

(Static)

FK, HX: YAAAAAH!!!

HX: How did they find him?

FK: Somebody at the Circuit City in Islamabad spotted him. A dude who stands a meter-ninety two, has a scraggly beard, has not bathed in the last seven years, and speaks poor Urdu sticks out in Pakistan. Believe it or not.

HX: I warned him about his love for technology and gadgets. He spent several weeks last year trying to find a cave with cellular service for his I-Phone. On the bright side, Pakistan Bell Cellular is not going to hold al Qaeda to the leader's contract.

FK: That's mighty Islamic of them. What about Dialysis Time Kidney Machines and Minivans?

HX: Who do you think sent the predator drone?

FK: I thought it could have been the Waziristan Electrical Management Cooperative.

HX: Can we spin this?

FK: Not just no, but (excrement) no. Without Osama, we're like the Stones without Mick Jagger. Wings without Paul McCartney. The (intercourse) you think, dude? We're screwed.

HX: Look, maybe we can pull something out of our ass. We send a video out from al-Zawahiri where he gets racist on Obama, how he's a sellout and a traitor. Maybe that works?

FK: Well, it's probably better than nothing which is all we got right now. You got anything we can hit? Los Angeles? Waco?

HX: You're gonna have to come up with something closer than that. Osama was financing the whole thing with his ATM card, and he never got around to giving me his (almightily condemned) PIN code. We got enough to get maybe to the Khyber Pass, and a phone card to call our cell in Mumbai.

FK: What about our cells in the United States? We had operations in a dozen cities!

HX: "Had" is the operative tense here. Our cells in New York, Chicago, Miami, San Francisco, Cleveland, and Detroit went bust when the economy tanked. Our fronts in L.A., Vegas, and Phoenix were foreclosed. St. Louis and Milwaukee switched their affiliation to Hamas.

FK: That leaves a city! What about Atlanta?

HX: It gets worse. Atlanta got tangled up with Cynthia McKinney when she discovered that we killled Tupac. His future would have been longer in al Aqsa.

FK: Well, we still have the support of our frinds in the Bush family.

HX: Oh, that's just (having intercourse) great. When the economy over there tanked, Bush wound up being three points less popular than Osama. However, that's still within the margin of error. When gas hit four bucks a gallon, Bush may as well have flown the planes instead of listening to a child read My Pet Goat.

FK: (Eeeeeexcrement.) This sucks. Our leader is dead. Our movement is broke. We're (excrement) out of favors with anyone. Can we offer a fitting epitaph to our beloved departed Osama?

HX: It doesn't look like it.

FK: We may as well not give Bush a (condemned) thing, and maybe we slow Obama's (small beast of burden) down just a hair looking for us. In late January we announce that Osama died of natural causes.

HX: Allah be praised! Osama always enjoyed screwing his benefactors.

Conservative Suicide

If Conservatives were less intent upon attending to other people's business and assuring that they legislated effectively, they would not be scrounging around the Beltway for lobbying jobs today. If Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter had been more cognizant of the situation facing the nation; had Lou Dobbs ever bothered to vet a statistic, then Conservative ideas may have earned broader acceptance in the marketplace.

Conservatives got what they asked for.

One does not wish to discredit conservative punditry's knowledge of it's audience. Among them, discussion of alterations to the Tax Code, Abortion, Immigration Reform, or Gay Rights provokes a visceral, immediate and almost uniform reaction. Regrettably (for them), the Far Right Opinion Machine had either no idea or no reverence for the growing chasm between them and the majority.

The Far Right lost on alterations to the Tax Code. Governor Mike Huckabee, and Representative Ron Paul followed behind the "Fair Tax," a consumption tax scheme designed by Atlanta-based radio host Neal Boortz, and Representative John Linder. The basis of its appeal, the decommissioning of the IRS and the sixteenth amendment, is also its downfall.

While one is disinclined to speaking favorably about the IRS, the IRS also has the unenviable task of enforcing the tax codes of the United States. The Internal Revenue Service is overdue for reform in more aspects than can be enumerated here. But doing away with it and moving to a consumption tax lacking regulation or enforcement mechanisms is a vote for the same lack of oversight that put the nation in dutch in the first place.

One also questions a system which allows government to know exactly what and in what quantities an individual purchases. (Hey! Bob just bought fifteen gallons of Blue Bell Homemade Vanilla. Why does he need that?) The current system stinks, but it's better than this alternative.

While questioning President-elect Obama's credentials as a Capitalist, there has been no outcry from Far-Right punditry about the redistribution of wealth from 99% to 1% of the population via current tax policy. One is loath to use a broad term like oligarchist, but what, precisely, is different from the Bolsheviks apart from the transparency of the wealth transfer?

The wealthy have the option of sitting upon their wealth. In the middle classes, a pent up demand exists for liquidity which will purchase cars, homes, durable goods and health care. Call it Trickle Up, a/k/a a rising tide lifts all boats.

The worthy far-right opposition totally lost the abortion debate. The majority is disinclined to reinstating governmental authority over abortion, at times in spite of intense moral opposition to the practice itself. The majority feels that the home is the best place for this discussion, as opposed to public fora. That, and about half of the population is biologically incapable of ever having an abortion in the first place, and would really rather watch football.

In the case of Immigration Reform, four candidates made their opposition a centerpiece of their campaigns. To put it in perspective, in Georgia's Republican primary, the two most vocal opponents to Immigration Reform, Representatives Duncan Hunter and Tom Tancredo, managed to gain 1,076 votes combined.

The author of the Immigration Reform bill despised by Representatives Hunter and Tancredo, Senator John McCain, was a very credible second place with 303,639 votes. Governor Huckabee, who had actually enacted legislation which could be construed as benefitting people who had entered illegally, took first place with 326,069. Call that a 585 to 1 differential against Hunter and Tancredo.

The Far Right Opinion Machine got one small victory in 2008. Proposition 8 failed in California. Judicial resources are going to be tied up for the foreseeable future, and anybody betting on prop 8's survival in the Golden State should be encouraged to send that money via The Wandering Gentile's Commode, P.O. Box Flush-Like-Rush, Atlanta, Georgia, USA.

The Gay activist community may soon discover that they are better served by exacting revenge upon the talismen of conservatism. A few well placed ballot initiatives with regard to additional levies upon SUVs, McMansions, guns, and politically active faith communities in California could be much more effective than protesting in West Hollywood.

There is a country which already has many of the things that the Far Right Opinion Machine embraces already. This crucible should be seen as a oracle for the far right. That country has one of the lowest tax burdens in the world. Nativism has been an obstacle to diversity. The country has a strong relationship with a Conservative Christian community of both clergy and laity. Money is not spent on onerous schools or social programs. The wealthy have authority in all matters, and Mexicans are leaving in droves.

That country is Mexico.

Gentoon Update!

To friends of The Wandering Gentile, and newbies alike. Please let us know what you like. Email is available in my profile. If you have stumbled upon us in the middle of the internet and like what you see, please please please say hello! Your Wandering Gentile promises that he does not in any way, shape or form intend to maim or maul either your psyche or person. (Promise does not necessarily apply to Governor Sarah Palin or Sean Hannity.)

Whither General Motors

It looks like GM may take a dirt nap, whether or not the US Government steps in. It may actually be in GM's better interest to auction off the trademarks of Chevrolet and Cadillac, and use that money to restructure under the GM banner.

There is tragedy, beyond the obvious ones of thousands upon thousands of displaced US manufacturing workers. GM is building some of the best cars they have ever made, some of which are more desirable than their competition.

This was not always the case with GM products, hence GM's dilemma.

Opels were marketed as being backed by the worldwide resources of General Motors. Most of those who owned Opels will recall them as being economical, fun-to-drive, and well made. Unfortunately, things wore out, parts and service were as nonexistent as if Opel were a defunct British manufacturer, and Opels became home automotive mechanics courses, regardless of the owner's aptitude or liking for grease.

Buick was the dealer body accountable for Opel in North America. In a fit of pique which may have been caused by a Buick manager urinating in John DeLorean's Froot Loops, German Opels were whisked out of the country like Bin Laden's relatives. Small car resources were diverted to the execrable Monza, and Buick dealers found themselves selling the substandard Opel/Isuzu.

Not that anything is good at Buick now, nor has there been for the last twenty years. If a line of doddering J. B. Hunt and Swift semi-trucks is doddering down a flat Interstate at a speed under their marginal governed maxima, led by a GM product, it is invariably a Buick. Buicks are capable of top speed, but their owners are convinced that it is 48 miles per hour.

The Saturn Ion is a car that works well on paper, but on the road it sucks. Larger, heavier and more softly suspended than the SL it replaced, it appears to have been engineered by ex-Trabant people heavily dosed with Ambien. Fit and finish, questionable styling, and the plastic body all come from the Trabant tradition. Mercifully, the Ion has been discharged.

GM has had issues with plastic cars in the past. The Pontiac Fiero was plastic. In its favor, the Fiero was handsomely styled and would get out of its own way on the three days per quarter when the V6 models ran. The only major issue was that most major United States insurance carriers had to add the term "spontaneous combustion" to their claims forms. Fiero Flambe ws a big part of the American motoring diet in the late eighties and early nineties.

The General thought so highly of the Fiero experience that they saw fit to recreate it in a Minivan, the Pontiac Trans Sport/Chevrolet Lumina APV. This van, like nothing else, screams of an individual who hangs out in front of a middle school wearing nothing but a raincoat and filling his digital camera with images of 14-year-old boys. That is, of course, providing that a dusty bit of headliner has not dislodged and wrapped itself about the driver's ears.

The headliner bonding process came about concurrently with the Cadillac Cimarron. The recipe was simple: Take one Chevy Cavalier, add Cadillac badges. Advertise as "driver's car," comparing Cimarron to something like a BMW or a Saab that an enthusiast might buy on purpose. Legions of American aficionados laughed themselves incontinent.

This was in an era when the General built all kinds of interesting-life cars designed for fuel economy.

Diesel Chevettes were so slow that the states of Ohio and Pennsylvania required an orange triangle on the back to avert them being rear-ended by the Amish. Larger cars powered by the Olds Diesel 35o were known for having engine failure while leaving the assembly line. And yes, there were Cadillacs with diesel engines. Talk about your "Standard of the World."

At least the Diesel 350 was better that the Cadillac 4100 V8-6-4, which attempted variable displacement before Katy Perry was even born. The only one that passed through my hands worked seamlessly. I was sixteen years old at the time, with a lead prosthetic where my right foot should have been. It never moved off "8" on the cheddary yellow display that told me how many cylinders were operating.

It brings us to the final nail in GM's coffin, the straw that breaks GM's back, the absolute worst car ever sold in North America, the Chevrolet Vega. There was nothing which could fail, fall off, rust, break, or generally act ornery that didn't.

The engines would overheat. Being a linerless, all-aluminum engine, after a catastrophic cooling failure, the head and the block mated like a pair of asymetrical Eggo waffles. If the engine was among the half which did not go Chernobyl in the first two years, it smoked. And it smoked. And it smoked some more.

A comparison with the Marlboro Man is inappropriate. The Marlboro Man had at least one horse.

There was a benefit to the smoke. The oil particles slowed rust on the rear third of the car long enough to get home and hit it with some more Bondo. To express this cars propensity for rusting would be incomplete without stating that it rusted on the showroom floor in Atlanta. Fiats had the good grace to get home before they started rusting.

Should the owner be among those fortunate enough to have his Vega survive long enough to require a clutch replacement, there was another little problem. The bellhousing was made of such soft metal that when the transmission was reinstalled, the bolts would strip the bellhousing.

A hundred miles later, the happy Vega owner would be retrieving his transmission from the middle of the road, where it fell out.

The vinyl in Vega interiors has been rumored to cause birth defects three generations later. The cardboard it was stapled to came from a cereal box. The outside door handles would break at will. Gearshifts and trim came adrift in the driver's hand.

Heck, the glove box latch broke the second time someone ever used it. And that describes a good Vega.

So with cars like this, how did GM manage to survive this long? The answer is easy.

Their domestic competition was worse.

Madam President

The question lingers about the nation's readiness for a female President.

As the United States has answered the question about the role of religion and race bearing upon qualification as commander-in-chief, the largest remaining barrier remains gender.

This is a question which verges upon the asinine. When the candidate offers an appropriate combination of confidence, competence and ideas which appeal to the majority of American voters, a woman will be elected president.

People who break barriers for elective office do not win without having a surfeit of talent. This was the downfall for Senator Clinton and Governor Palin in 2008. Failure had less to do with factors out of their control than it did with a pervasive image of neediness from Senator Clinton, and an overwhelming sense of Governor Palin's lack of preparedness.

Mrs Clinton had every advantage going into the 2008 presidential campaign. She had fifteen years on the national stage, a reputation as an effective lawmaker, and she was married to the last living President whose administration was considered successful. Clinton was holding the standard for a party resurgent owing to the opposition's bad decisionmaking.

The Republican party's bad decisions paled in comparison to Senator Clinton's. It took the Republicans five years to burn through the capital they brought to the table after 9/11. Senator Clinton had the Republican experience on the table and managed to burn through her political capital in five weeks, with people of her own party.

While issues were raised about President-elect Obama leveraging his race, some of it from former President Clinton, the correct assessment gets little play. Mr. Obama was the better candidate. His campaign was better organized. Obama's supporters brought more enthusiasm and generated better results.

However, one suspects that an opinion that no home is large enough for two presidents dwelled quietly in Bill Clinton's subconscious.

Until Republican Partisan Rush Limbaugh intervened and reinvigorated Hillary Clinton's campaign with his own fans and supporters, hoping to face Mrs. Clinton as a General Election candidate, her campaign was moribund. Mr. Limbaugh soon discovered that which did not destroy Obama just made him stronger.

Mrs. Clinton took advantage of arguments raised by Conservative talk to challenge Obama's character, while struggling to reclaim her front-runner status. This was a disaster for Republicans seeking a narrative change in October. This last desperate act of political gamespersonship, mated with a late-primary reference to the Robert Kennedy assassination likely cost Mrs. Clinton the Vice-presidential nomination as well.

Limbaugh's role in the 2008 campaign did not end by attempting to alter the Democratic race. He was also an early advocate of enlisting Sarah Palin as the Republican Vice-presidential nominee.

Note to Republican party: The next time Rush Limbaugh jumps, find out what from before following.

The Palin nomination briefly had the appearance of a good decision. She is a young, telegenic woman with experience as a State Chief Executive. The conservative base of her party was not enchanted with the moderate senior statesman nominated in spite of their best efforts to reclaim the party.

Mrs. Palin appears to have been ordered from ACME by one Mr. Wile E. Coyote, and mistakenly delivered to Senator McCain.

The Palin nomination seems a cynical attempt to reach out to disaffected Clinton supporters. Mrs. Palin, a former beauty pageant contestant and athlete, politically opposite to Senator Clinton, begins as an adversary. One could go as far as saying tormentor. It became a slap in the face, telling women that their looks and youth are more important than their intelligence and competence.

Mrs. Palin exuded poor preparation, arrogance, and defensiveness. There was a streak which voters regarded as blatant self-interest combined with an utter disregard for anyone not willing or able to advance her ambitions. Governor Palin may run again, but she is unlikely to advance in the primaries past Valentine's day.

The woman who wins the Presidency will be very dissimilar to either Senator Clinton or Governor Palin. She will be seen as a sister, a friend, someone who related well to the challenges of everyday americans. Her integrity, intellect, and preparation will be all but impossible to impugn for all but the most commited partisan. Those who dislike her will be forced to challenge her mainly on ideas, or declare that their feelings are personal. Her organizational skills will be stellar.

That person can be described in one word.

Oprah.

Gentoon Classics!

"They sold her brothers as meat. They raped her with a machine for her milk. She won't take it any more. MAD COW BLOODY VENGEANCE OF THE LIVESTOCK. Rated R-beef is very tasty. (Joke works in Spanish, crashes and burns in English.) MAD COW...BLOODY VENGEANCE OF THE LIVESTOCK is a collaborative production of the English Chicken Development Association, The British Fishing Council, and the United Kingdom Pork Products Congress, Ltd."

"Mr. Figueroa, the problem is that we're not looking for a corrupt ex-politician." Note: your Wandering Gentile served as inspiration for the bureaucrat behind the desk.

On dam: "Intervention and certification." On waterfall: "DRUGS" On raft: "Certified" Clinton: "With this dam we can stop the tide of drug traffic flooding the Americas." This is one of my two favorites from this little short thread. It looks the best, and works almost as well.

Fidel Castro: "I don't care how small it is! It must fall! Shoot it!" The kite is made of newspapers reporting about the Cuban military's decision to shoot down two small civil planes searching for rafters departing Cuba. Artistically, not as good as the above Clinton cartoon, emotionally light years ahead.

Pat Buchanan: "We dont want undocumented people taking our jobs nor receiving our benefits."

Unidentified Cholo: "And what about the land that you took from our people?"

Drawing Pat Buchanan as a fat Nazi with a bad comb-over strikes me as bad form now, mainly because it requires absolutely no imagination. The Cholo bothers me because he looks like a Mexican John Redcorn, which was absolutely not what I wanted to do.

All of these cartoons were originally published in a Spanish-language weekly in Atlanta in Spring, 1996.

Signs, Signs, Everywhere A Sign

Are we a nation in search of a label? It seems that half of the pundits are looking for a short definition of the political mood.

Apparently their thesauri are too replete with adjectives.

Democrats won the presidency with 52% of the popular vote, but a spectacular 67.7% of the electoral college. They won at least 57% of the Senate, and at least 58.9% of the House. By every metric, the United States of America has preferred Democratic candidates to the opposition in the Republican party.

One could infer that between fifty and sixty percent of Americans are either Democrats or supported Democratic candidates for major offices. There are people who disagree with interpreting the results in this fashion.

They are called Republicans, and like Democrats in the past, they insist that the tally must be incorrect because they, personally, knew NO ONE who voted for the opponent. In 1972, Republicans mocked those who said this about George McGovern as liberal elitists. Thirty-six years later, one questions the definition of those who knew no one voting for Obama.

Both groups were or are in need of something, and that something is a wider circle of friends.

The wider circle of friends is found closer to the political center. Because Democrats won the electon, the Center Left should be examined first.

The Center Left is much like the plot of Lethal Weapon 3. Everybody thinks they know what it is, but when pressed for the answer, it turns out that the response one gets turns out to be anything but the Center Left or Lethal Weapon 3.

Please bear inmind that this would be an awkward situation if there were a good description of the Center Right as the term is being used. Since November 4th, a flood of commentatators has come out with a statement along the lines of "well, a Democrat may have been elected, but America is still a Center Right country."

One begs pardon. If America is a Center Right country, wouldn't a Center Right candidate like John McCain have won?

Those who speak of the Center Right are like all those who speak of the center on their side: they are those who lost to the other side of the political spectrum in the last election. In other words, they are partisans who are so invested in strict ideological adherence that they are no longer able to functionally acknowledge that someone from their opposition could ever win. Partisans tend to be loud, and extremely paranoid. The ones on the right are also armed.

Partisanship will eventually go too far and cause problems for people with whom they have significant ideological overlap. Ralph Nader had sycophants inside the Carter administration, and a symbiotic relationship with Democrats until he stripped enough votes from Al Gore to make G. W. Bush president.

Those laughing about that on the right should be reminded that the last time a partisan fragged his own side, it was Ross Perot taking G. H. W. Bush down in 1992. Counterproductivity, thy name is partisanship.

The election was not close enough to have been won by trickery. It came down to which candidate ran the best campaign and connected his ideas best to the wants and needs of the American electorate.

Senator McCain's bravery and extraordinary sacrifice are compelling. No question exists that any American would hope to emulate McCain's courage if called. From privilege to prisoner and back, John McCain is synonymous for patriot.

Governor Palin resonated with those who only become empowered when others are excluded. The tolerant Center Right who had welcomed the candidacy of Senator McCain gave the Alaska Governor a chilly reception, and her performance on policy did not acquit her well. Mrs. Palin will long be remembered for talent insufficient for her ambition.

Vice-President-elect Joe Biden will be recognized for his competence, preparation, and perseverance. With regard for his charisma, well, is anyone exactly sure what he looks like?

President-elect Obama is defined as someone who finds triumph in impossible circumstances. No question lingers regarding his profound faith in the promise of the United States for all of its citizens. Barack Obama connected as definitively American with 52% of voters who are also by definition American.

No other adjective is necessary.

How Obama Owns Moderate Mantle

As we approach the little spoiler on the deck lid of the Bush administration, time has come to analyze and (one hopes) suggest how an Obama presidency solves three problems at the same time.

While many are concerned about the environment, few are really committed to the idea of sacrifice in the name of the environment. Hearing terms like Global Warming, Carbon Footprint, and Greenhouse Gas conjures of self-righteous, Prius-driving Lesbian Seagull Liberalism types who feel it is their business to pass judgement on others. Al Gore should be engaged as a surrogate for this group, because he is the President-for-life of this group.

The other 90 percent of us, which includes most of those who own Priuses, are better reached through another approach.

Germany has a functional mechanism for moving toward solar energy. The options are an oligarchical French model using nuclear power, centralizing power generating assets in the hands of established utility providers, and the German model which locates the same power generating assets, through a system of tax credits, closer to the consumer.

While the French system, with appropriate reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel, has a role in the overall picture of the American system, to make it central to our energy needs for the long term as proposed by Senator McCain is myopic. The German system is particularly suitable for the nature and culture of Americans.

Every time those things which were in the hands of a relatively small number of enterprises, transportation in the 1890s and information inthe 1980s being prime examples, and there is a rapid transfer of capacity and technology closer to the consumer, the United States economy booms. That needs to be remembered.

The idea of moving to solar begins with a call to the patriotism of Americans. Our greatest Presidents, FDR, JFK, Reagan, Clinton, leveraged the assets of government and the experience of publicly-funded science in the name of patriotism into enhanced living standards in this country. From the tools that came with the Manhattan Project, to the Internet, and even the greatest powdered orange drink ever, the Space Program's Tang, when Government gets down with science, Government actually gets it right!

The Devil is ice skating. Government gets nothing right which does not have absolutes that cannot be altered by the observers opinion.

The Nation begins by partnering with our experienced German allies. While our abilities will come up to speed rapidly, we can benefit by recognizing the Europeans' place on the learning curve and avoiding the pitfals that we can foresee. Adjustments and advancements suitable for the specifics of this continent can be ad-libbed when there is a plan in place of what needs to be one regardless.

The first step requires restarting idled manufacturing capacity for the production of solar panel generators. The idea which appears to work best is contracting with and established enterprise, such as Siemens or Bosch for the placement of solar generators on every square inch of federal rooftop in the country in two years.

We add a tax credit which offers the greatest rewards to early adopters of solar technology, and the technologies necessary to make a home a net energy producer. A consumer owned, individually managed computerized home energy consumtion/production monitoring system may be one option. The role of utilities would shift from energy generating to grid maintenance and technological research. The role of commercial electricity generation would not be eliminated, indeed much like the railroads, the ability would be to sell more to commercial users.

While the initial investment appears costly, the need for millions of people to manufacture, install, transport, maintain, warehouse, sell, and yes, eventually recycle solar panels will put millions on tax rolls, and move millions more up in tax bracket. The patriotic call to duty, which is already being answered in the heartland by windfarms and ethanol producers, is for Americans to start acting like Americans again, and become self-sufficient.

The victory garden of the challenges to face the Obama administration will be flanked by solar panels and vigiled by a home wind generator, a more productive option in parts of the country not blessed with prodigious, year-round sunlight. (We hear you, up in Vermont.)

In short order comes the bonus.

There will be a tipping point, where one can only guess, when enough Americans become net energy producers, that excess capacity not sold to neighbors in Canada and Mexico could be dedicated to something unfeasible right now like the electrolysis of seawater for hydrogen fuel cell vehicles. The resulting slurry could be mined for precious minerals, and those precious minerals could be used to restore the Dollar to a relationship backed by tangible wealth.

Yes, we're talking about reversing Bretton Woods, and taking a talking point away from Ron Paul voters in 2012. The value of the Dollar would skyrocket.

As we are able to share our technology with other nations, demand for petroleum would plummet. Our industrialized allies, and democratic neighbors would be the first to benefit, with American engineering and ingenuity finally replacing dirty energy production in the emerging nations of China, India, and Brazil.

This builds a situation which does not allow for the survival of despots Ahmadinedjad and Chavez. Russians are less able to take a belligerent stance with Europe and the Caucasus, when the ability to freeze them ceases to exist. This nation returns to a role of world leadership and regard that was all but destroyed by the excesses and incompetence of the Bush administration.

Let's see the results. Environment fixed. Economy booming. Strategic interests protected. Despots ruined. Affluence becoming contagious. It sounds like a winner to me.

President Obama, let's get started

A note to our friends.

A short time ago, your Wandering Gentile suggested that several figures shoud find their destiny as "screw those conservative douchebags." We fear that some of our readers may have found the terms to be inappropriate, or offensive, and may not have appreciated the satirical intent. Our objective was not to insult our fine readers in any way shape or form.

However, the hateful, screeching polemic of many conservative quasi-pundits deserves to be returned in kind, on the same level, in the same style. They are ill-equipped to receive the same taunting that they offer on a daily basis, hence the departure from the usual cheeky, yet erudite style which the Wandering Gentile's admirers have come to know and sort of like.

It is unlikely to happen again.

Gil.

Is Everybody Happy?

Something Good Happened Last Night.

Today this is a better America.

We are better for having elected Mr. Obama president.

We are better in knowing that this great nation belongs to all of its citizens, not just a plurality.

We are better in knowing that a majority of voters were not compelled by fearmongering and divisiveness.

We are better in knowing that in January we face the rebirth of our nation, with tabula rasa.

We are better in seeing that now matter how crazy something sounds, it can be done.

Our hand must be extended to Senator McCain. While there were those around him who did not act in a way which appeals to the better angels of our nature, the Senior Senator from Arizona acted consistently as a Gentleman and truly exemplary of what our nation expects of its finest.

Godspeed, Lieutenant Commander McCain. Your life and service to this nation serve as an outstanding example of devotion and genuine patriotism. We hope that in spite of our disagreements, our lives may serve to reflect our love for this nation as as yours has so eloquently.

And to President-elect Barack Obama, your supporters have seen you as an agent for change. We have thirsted for optimism for many years. And we are grateful for the renewed sense of purpose we have found within ourselves through our involvement with this history-making campaign.

The hard work starts soon. There will be days when we disagree, and there will be days when we flat out wonder what the other is thinking. This is as it must be in all healthy relationships.

But for the moment, the honeymoon shall be sweet and passionate.

Unfair And Imbalanced

Republicans are losing it, and it's a blast to watch.

Very few of us are happy about the way the McCain campaign is being run, but the style book belongs to Karl Rove, and was written by Lee Atwater. However, the Republican party doesn't realize that the magic in that style book was pretty much kaput long about the time the papers covering the 2004 election turned yellow.

Just for those of you who are under the misguided illusion that Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter and Michelle Malkin are actual journalists, here is a little bit of how the propaganda works. (Indeed, your Wandering Gentile has more formal training in journalism than Limbaugh and Hannity, combined.)

Screw those Conservative douchebags. Your Wandering Gentile is PROUDLY PROGRESSIVE!

Socialist- Democrat. Any mechanism which does not enrich the upper one percent of the population is automatically badged with this. Unfortunately, this has been a little bit too successful, and there has been a tremendous transfer of wealth from the lower 99 percent to the upper one percent over the last, say, twenty years or so, removing leverage from those not in the upper percentile.

Socialist- Any form of collective behavior. Not all collective behavior is socialist, nor is all socialist behavior collective. There are points when collective behavior is justified, and protects the interests of its membership. There are practices accepted by capitalists-insurance comes immediately to mind, as does the military, where a broader interest is served by spreading risk and accountability among a larger group.

Amnesty- Any attempt by persons who have been excluded from applying for legal residency by an unjust and overreaching law to legitimize their status, or participate in capitalism. Very popular term for persons with tiny genitals/breasts discomfited by the occasional "Collectible" Ford Pickup playing rancheras by Los Violadores de Chihuahuas.

"The rule of law" - Amazingly unfair when applied to persons who act upon their approval for vigilantism on the U.S.-Mexico border; polygamists who marry middle schoolers in western Texas; commit acts of violence against abortion clinics; display Nazi/Confederate secessionist imagery in inappropriate places; or discriminate against nonwhite job applicants...

Reverse Racist- Any person not of northern European ancestry who dares to assert that the concerns found in his heritage are part of the American experience, and worthy of reflection and contemplation.

Agent of the Homosexual Agenda- Any person who feels that Gay americans are deserving of rights equal to those of straight americans in their private relationships. Automatic suspicion of dressing in a "Babette the leather person" outfit and marching in a Greenwich Village GLBT pride parade.

Anti-Christian- Catholic or non-Evangelical Protestant a/k/a Mainstream Protestant denomination.

Liberal- Has moved far enough to the right to encompass John McCain and George W. Bush.

Conservative- Slightly more tolerant, but as authoritarian as Hitler.

Communist- Just left of center, as compared to an authoritarian economic system characterized by government ownership of all property and management of all production.

(Has heart attack, keels over, dies.)- What happens if a Conservative actually encounters a real Communist, i.e., Hugo Chavez, Cindy Sheehan,

Mmmmmmm. Doughnuts.

What scares Republicans this Halloween?

Not all manifestations of pride in one's identity can be justifiably attributed to bigotry or chauvinism. If one has been marginalized by a population which has at the nature of its commonality a factor beyond the control of the participant, sometimes an identity-based action is part of becoming incorporated into a greater definition.


Of course, one refers to spectacular African-American turnout in favor of Senator Barack Obama. As the Civil Rights movement was predominated by, but not exclusive to African-Americans marginalized under the excesses of Jim Crow, the Obama campaign has managed to include Americans of all ancestries, while effectively addressing egregious, flagrant impositions upon the basic human dignity of African-Americans.


The most egregious of which has been the partitioning of the body of population descended from slaves and sub-Saharan Africa, with hyphens and loaded rhetoric, on all sides of the political spectrum. The accomplishment of an Obama candidacy has been the realization that the American identity is descended from Africa as well as Europe, and the experience of those descended from the more southerly continent is as purely American (and defining of America) as that of those who stepped off the ships arriving from Europe.


The economy has tanked for all Americans. The ideal of home ownership and productive employment have been subverted by corporate bodies unburdened by accountability for their anti-consumer actions. The concentration of Anmerican wealth is falling rapidly into a few sets of hands.


An African-American population with obstacles, be they real or imagined, to the same economic leverage available to Americans of European descent, functions as the early harbinger of financial torment. The chaos seen in African-American areas of Cleveland and Detroit three and four years ago has now metastisized into a national concern.


Ironically, the skill sets required to live in an environment of limited resources, opportunities, and leverage suit those who have these abilities in an atmosphere of financial turmoil. The neighborhood hustler, who always understood the importance of cash is better equipped than the MBA whose day-to-day liquidity was heavily leveraged. By necessity, African-Americans have required broader skill sets to live abundantly than their compatriots of European descent, owing to the relatively large authority accrued to persons overtly or covertly hostile to non-whites.


No African-American has come away from this presidential campaign without an extraordinary appreciation for the talent, sacrifice, and compromise required for Senator Obama to reach nomination. Should Mr. Obama be successful in his quest, while walls may remain, significant barriers to black Americans being realized as just plain Americans will be obliterated.


The purveyors of discrimination who have taken their sanctuary within the body of the Party of Abraham Lincoln will be among the earliest to be discredited. They are under the religion that American voters are likely to remain apathetic, regardless of their ancestry, as opposed to acting upon their own self interest.


The hope is that the American of European descent will become livid about the undocumented person who became productive by living off that refused by others, and disregard the citizen who constructed byzantine contracts and dysfunctional mechanisms which have looted his employment and savings. The proceeds were split between unethical entities in business and government alike.


The faith is that Americans of African ancestry will be too unmotivated to see that realization as Americans in full, and the social leverage commensurate with that status, is in their best interests. The faith exists that the black community is too discouraged to ever struggle again for actualization of the rights articulated and implied by the fourteenth amendment.


And the charity begins at home, making every cent liquid in anticipation of a modest increase in the Capital Gains tax...


Apparently, African-Americans did not get the memo about being apathetic. In states with large African-American populations, from 25 to 35% in some southeastern states, African-Americans have responded overwhelmingly and enthusiastically to the Obama candidacy. In the case of Georgia, once the reddest of the red states, African-Americans account for 35% of early voters, with estimates of support well over 95%.


Putting that another way, should these numbers remain consistent, Senator McCain will require 70% support from voters who are not black to have any chance at winning Georgia. North Carolina is demographically similar to the Peach State, and not safely in McCain's corner. Despite polling which indicates otherwise, no southern state is out of reach for Obama, and there is a very real possibility that Louisiana and Arkansas may go Obama's way as well.


Just when you though it was safe to turn on the news, Black people and liberals are about to take over the country. Somebody needs to get some magnets on Nixon's body, and some copper wire around it, because Tricky is going to spin fast enough in his grave to light up El Lay and Vegas.



THE GOATEE c.1971-2008


The Goatee, a symbol of macho ruggedness for over thirty years, succumbed to injuries sustained by multiple assaults by pretentious dorks.


The death came late Tuesday, when the ten-thousandth photo of Todd Palin's Goatee was published in the North Country Rummage Sale Finder and Penny Hoarder, of Beekmantown, NY.


The Goatee was preceded in death by the Mullet haircut, and Overpriced Sunglasses on a cord worn about the neck. It is survived by single-occupant gas guzzlers and Conservative Talk Radio as stupid fads popular with middle-aged white men.


Services have not been scheduled as of press time.

Wandering Gentoon

Now that your Wandering Gentile has figured out how to place his political cartoons on the post, expect to see a lot more of them.

Longer posts to follow soon.

Gil a/k/a The Wandering Gentile.

Friendly Fire

This just in from Richmond: Sarah "I can see the Milky Way at night so I must be a confectioner" Palin just opened up on HER OWN SUPPORTERS at a rally.

As the great author once said, the difference between fact and fiction is that fiction has to make sense. One is unsure if this is sufficient evidence, but there is a compelling argument to be made about a campaign's defensive posture when the Vice-Presidential candidate mistakes supporters for protesters. Good grief, if Governor Palin is seeing protesters without knowing that they're there, what else is she seeing?

One fact of life: one seldom hears about the image of Jesus appearing on food outside of Latin America, or billboards in Atlanta. This suggests that while He may be showing up in some guy's Moo Goo Gai Pan, the observer is not necessarily so attuned to Christ as to notice His appearance in the observer's dinner.

Relating this to Governor Palin, if she is seeing protesters who are not there, then she is obviously concerned and reactive. This relates directly to the campaign's characterizations of Senator Obama with half-truths and innuendo, and Governor Palin's role. She opened the personal salvo about Obama's relationships without offering anything in the realm of policy.

The Republican Vice-Presidential candidate has made extensive crticism of Senator Obama's relationships and suggested that his discretion in not making his disputes public somehow proves poor judgement. However, Governor Palin's record indicates a pattern of very public and spectacularly petty confrontations which exhibit an imperious character. This character is also consistent with the failures of tact and diplomacy which have become the trademark of the Bush administation.

The imperious nature of Palin's governance, combined with the exposure of scandals which would have been gossip limited to an infinitessimal community in a remote state, plays upon her mindset. Whether or not she believes that she is wrong, she has begun some recognition that her views are less than consistent with the opinion of the mainstream. By moving to a campaign rooted in attempts to defeat Senator Obama by assaults upon the man's private life, Governor Palin must accept that she is now vulnerable to similar affronts.

Senator McCain has chosen to stay out of this fray. In fact, when a supporter expressed several hateful and baseless statements regarding the Democratic candidate, McCain showed a bit of the candidate which moderates and independents found so appealing. Indeed, by refusing to embrace a far-right monologue of paranoia and race-baiting, McCain the man, if not the candidacy, probably charted the best correction of course that his party could wish for.

It may not save Republican chances in 2008, but it may assure that the Republican party still exists in 2012. While one finds a profound question with Senator McCain's decisions in the campaign, one suspects a stewardship which guides his party away from the divisions and ideological exclusion that hallmarks the era of Gingrich and Bush.

The base which had time and inclination to vote based upon an agenda of controlling the behavior of others in times of prosperity now finds itself decimated by the policies of deregulation which have eradicated all of the gains and part of the principal promised by adherence to the tactics and strategies of the Republicans over the last twelve years.

To translate the last few paragraphs for those who are still under the illusion that Republicans are fit to lead: they can dish it out but they can't take it. They want you to worry more about a gay wedding than what's left of your 401(k), and then they want you to think that a candidate who has a plan to change the economy's direction (allowing a middle class voter to prosper) is actually going to be worse for you than the people who wiped out your savings.

With 48 hours until the last debate, this is where Obama is going to stick it in the Republican party, and one suspects that Senator McCain is going to give the opening.

1. The economy looks like what would happen if somebody got drunk and decided to rebuild a transmission on the kitchen table. The drunk individual would be devoid of talent, experience, a service manual or replacement parts. Does the transmission's owner say A.) Screw this, pack up all of the parts on a sheet and carry them over to Aamco, who presumably knows what they're doing, or B.) listen to the drunk who says "Hey, I took it apart. I can put it back together..." while he's opening another beer?

2. If Ayres gets brought up during the debate, look for Obama's vapor trail going after the Keating Five. Although one suspects that the Keating Five is a great name for a retro British Invasion style band, they are an extremely bad memory for Senator McCain. The perfect response would be brief, along the lines of "Senator McCain was involved with Charles Keating, and not only did not renounce his unethical behavior, but was cooperating in an event which cost Americans billions. Now if we are going to talk about our associations, let's get it on and bring up events in which we participated."

3. Obama isn't going to need a game changer. If one likes sports analogies, he just has to keep the ball out of McCain's hands. If one likes Football, as defined by North Americans, what Obama is looking for is a long, clock-eating downfield drive which will put him two scores ahead with no time to play. He's up by seven, 7:30 to go in the 4th quarter, 1st and 10 on his own 20.

In other words, he's winning, and in a good place, but there is time left for things to go very badly. However, McCain is out of time outs, and if the Republicans do not firmly have the ball by the two minute warning, it's going to be all Obama.

4. McCain not only needs a game changer, the more he tries to force a turnover the less prepared his team looks. There was no provision for the possibility of things not going their way. The Republicans did not anticipate the economic downturn (crashing and burning, really). There was no provision for a resurgent Russia on the international stage, nor was there any consideration that countries like Iran and Venezuela may collaborate to drive up crude prices.

Should Obama's team choose to dig in on the McCain team's lack of foresight, scarcity of vision, and frickin' myopia and start hammering, McCain is going to look like he just took on Muhammad Ali in his prime.

In 48 hours, the Obama campaign has a chance to put this away. This looks as if it is going to be very enjoyable for Democrats to watch.

From my lips to God's ear.

Don't Count Georgia Out, Barack.

Just a couple of short words for our friends who suspect that Georgia may be out of reach for the Obama campaign...

Hang on.

A quick perusal of Georgia voter registrations from the Secretary of State's office coughed up some interesting numbers.

Should turnout in the African-American community remain as high as it was during the primary, with similar proportions going for Senator Obama, that would give Obama between 1.5-1.6 million votes.

In 2004 Bush took Georgia with 1.9 million votes. Should turnout remain constant around 77% of all registered voters in the state of Georgia, the threshold for winning the state would be about 2.4-2.5 million votes.

Here is what people refer to as a "holy $#!+!" moment. If historical models are consistent among white voters, and black voters remain consistent with the primary, Obama only needs about a quarter of the white vote to win Georgia.

For our friends away from the deep south, there is a very real possibility that the Peach State, heart of the Confederacy and (occasionally) painted as a hotbed of white supremacy, may actually send fifteen electoral votes for a black man.

In fact, while that possibility may seem remote to some white observers, only a fool would bet on Georgia staying reliably red in this election cycle. It will not take much for people in middle class homes in the Atlanta and Savannah suburbs, enlisted people in Columbus, Augusta, and Hinesville, and a few halfback seniors (halfbacks being Yankees who moved to Florida, missed having seasons, and went halfway back home) to see that the effect that the Republican administration has had on their investments is effectively a tax paid to people who are unaccountable and cannot be voted out of office.

Add on top of that the modest white liberal population around metropolitan Atlanta, and one can see that there is a possibility that Georgia goes blue with North Carolina, Florida, and Virginia.

John McCain, your bus is here. Destination: Phoenix.

And Governor Palin, you are about to improve your foreign policy experience, because it's a loong walk back to Alaska across Canada. Maybe you shouldn't have sold the plane on eBay, huh?

As McCain Fades Away

While not counting chickens before they are hatched, an Obama supporter should be inclined to a bit of optimism after last night's debate. Senator McCain offered yet another spectacular portrayal of the walking undead, as he creaks and groans his way toward the inevitable.

It is not necessary to gild how bad the Republican campaign has become; the Senator from Arizona knows. It would be a challenge for George W. Bush to not know. Rove is apoplectic, and even the Republican party's traditional friends on Wall Street appear to be choosing apathy over action in droves.

The Republicans have had their juju come back on them in the form of outspoken supporters advocating assassination in public fora, while maintaining silence in light of such offensive and gratuitously divisive displays.

Is it possible that after Governor Palin's support of inquiry into Obama's relationship with Wright and Ayres, and suggestions that Senator Obama, Michelle Obama, and progressives in general, hate america, that Palin is throwing stones in her glass house?

If one feels that guilt by association is justification for not voting for Obama, then it should be quite good enough for a ticket which includes Sarah Palin.

While Reverend Wright has been vilified for his inflamatory "God damn America" speech, there has been little accountability for Pastors Paul Riley and Ed Kalnins of the Wasilla Assembly of God, and their sermons suggesting that the salvation of Democrats was in question. The last that I know of, the Bible has not mentioned the Democratic Party specifically, and the Republicans have just as many points of working contrary to scripture (partcularly when it comes to issues of compassion and social justice) as the Democrats.

Too many who have based their social conservatism upon Scripture, just as those who have allied their calls for economic justice with a Christian subtext, suffer from disconnects between scripture and political efficacy. These are questions which need to be answered privately, while reflecting in one's closet, as St. Paul instructs one to pray and worship privately.

Should one look hard enough, Governor Palin has no real room to talk about domestic terrorists, nor Michelle Obama, given her husband's membership in the Alaskan Independence Party. This secessionist group has ties to the KKK, Minutemen, and has endorsed the Constitution party candidate, himself no paragon of tolerance or inclusion.

The advocacy of secession puts the Alaskan Independence Party in direct conflict with article III of the Constitution, by adhering to the idea that the United States should be broken up.

Finally, the Republican campaign has tacitly recognized the support of conservative radio hosts, specifically Sean Hannity. One is justified in questioning the value of his opinion when one considers his relationship with neo-Nazi Hal Turner of North Bergen, NJ.

But one really does not wish to throw these points back in the face of the Republicans. One merely should watch them hew close to their talking points as their policies crumble beneath the clay feet of their moribund governance. And one waits for the questions about the motives of the Alaskan Independence party directed to Governor Palin.

But one will not be holding his breath.

Yipe! It's a Bad Day

Tuesday: Stepdaughter's birthday and field trip. Day 5 of relatively self-inflicted unemployment.

My back feels as if someone is jabbing an ice pick in the bottom of it, provoking your Wandering Gentile to yelp, much like Scooby Doo when frightened. I was sitting in the foyer of Cooter Holler Elementary School, in the Atlanta suburb of Wolfboro, and noticing a tapestry which purported to have all of the Latin American countries celebrating their independence in September.

Mexico. No surprise there, Cooter Holler is predominately populated by children of Mexican ancestry or birth. September 16 was the last time I was in Laredo, and I spent a good amount of time parked on my behind in Laredo.

Guatemala. El Salvador. Honduras. Nicaragua. Chile. All present and acounted for.

No, Got Dang It, that ain't the entire list.

15 de septiembre, Costa Rica. Nope, the tapestry did not even have a provision for Costa Rica. It went straight from Nicaragua to Colombia. One would suspect that the Panamanians might be a little bit miffed, too. On the other hand, well, John McCain's birthplace (the Canal Zone, and the only nominee of a major party not to be born in an actual state! Ever!) is not there, either.

One wonders if Governor Palin had anything to do with this map. It seems unlikely, being that the correct number of countries is on the tapestry, however in the wrong places.

There was a big chunk of the Amazon basin bordered by Brazil, Colombia, and Peru. There was another country between Ecuador and Peru (Ecru? Peor? Pookie? Peekaboo?). And there was a third country somewhere else, sort of like a misplaced Bolivia, hopefully with a history of (comparatively) well-treated indigineous peoples, a middle class, high literacy, high levels of home ownership, and a well checked government.

Oh, wait. Snap! That country already exists, and it's called Costa Rica. No, they couldn't have left off one of the little armpit countries, places so devoid of hope and opportunity that looking to Castro's Cuba for possibilities becomes a very real option. There was no consideration that anyone would ever notice.

And one suspects, no one did until a couple of days ago when someone else noticed Costa Rica's absence. Of course, it would not be the first time. Costa Rica totally dropped off Spain's radar until they declared independence in 1821. The conversation may be imagined as such,

"Your Royal Noisomeness, Costa Rica also delared their independence."

"You mean We still owned it? Why wasn't I told?"

No, I wound up spending 45 minutes waiting to chaperone a field trip, looking at this facockta tapestry that put countries where the maker pleased, and the map of the US had Chicago where Bismarck ought to be, Lake Ontario dipping down to Tioga County, Pennsylvania, and the tip of Texas cut off from Eagle Pass to Corpus Crispy.

So I calmed down, after annoying my wife about what was wrong with the geography on the tapestry for 45 minutes, something for which I may not be forgiven soon. We got on the bus.

For purposes of respecting my stepdaugter's privacy, she will be referred to as Sasha Ortiz. It seems appropriate, as the real hijastra's real big papi is Dominican.

Now, I had never chaperoned a field trip in my life, and keeping up with five energetic eight-and-nine-year-olds had never really been much of a life goal. In fact I wasn't really aware that I would be chaperoning a group of third graders until it was too late to jump back in the Pornstar Minivan, go to QT and buy cheese taquitos. No, I was locked down.

I was the hog committed to crispy bacon. And, to be fair, the kids were totally cool. It doesn't hurt that I don't like most grown-ups much, either.

But we got that perverse sense of presumptuous politeness which is only found in places where people like Mrs. Palin. As the children were being parceled out amongst one little girl's aunt, one father, my wife and me, we were introduced by our presumed surnames.

Teacher got Miss Martinez right, and Mr. Claxton as well. However, when she got to Mrs Wandering Gentile, my wife suddenly became Mrs. Ortiz.

There were two problems with that. First of all, the real Mr. Ortiz had enamored my wife under an assumed name. Second of all, they had never married. Mrs. Wandering Gentile was never at any time in the past Mrs. Ortiz. Nor was Mr. Ortiz an Ortiz at all. Thus, hijastra la menor a/k/a Sasha is listed as Sasha Ortiz, but the name is an illusion of sorts.

That bothers me, because she is a lovely child who deserves an identity that was not speculative. However, I am kind of fond of the idea that she is the first of a real Ortiz line, so one must be somewhat ambivalent.

Of course, what came next tickled me. Because I was introduced as Mr. Ortiz.

And one of the few places where one may find a six-foot-tall, blue-eyed, Mr. Ortiz being completely ordinary does not exist at all on the tapestry in the foyer at Cooter Holler Elementary School in Wolfboro, GA.

And the Hits Just Keep A-Coming

John McCain has had a worse day than last Friday, but it was the beginning of a long presence in Hanoi. If Senator McCain's performance in the debate was not a deal-breaker for undecided voters, then Sarah Palin will be the bullet that ends the pulse of the Republucan campaign in 2008.

It is not appropriate to blame McCain. The handlers from his party have managed to take the likeable, engaging maverick operating on a shoestring, and managed to convert him into a cookie-cutter Republican candidate, scarcely distinguished from former Georgia Representative Pat Swindall, who left office in disgrace in the late eighties.

The Republican handlers are under the illusion that voters actually care about their social conservative wedge issues when the car is out of gas, the pumps are dry (as they are in the southeast), the house is getting foreclosed on, and the 401(k) is more like a 179(B). One suspects that an unemployed individual on the edge of returning to the land of the renter would be happy to host the most flamboyant Gay wedding in history on his lawn, if it means he has a job and gets to keep his lawn.

McCain, the ever-aware pilot, is much too savvy a politician to allow himself to come off as the acrimonious, infirm elderly man we saw on Friday night. The rambling rants were characteristic of the misanthropic message of a party which is willing to sacrifice a war hero who did not always hew closely to a party line which makes no allowances for living up to Christian doctrine which it finds inconvenient.

The Republican party wants to sell the voter upon experience. They want the voter to know that Barack Obama is naive and doesn't get it.

Experienced military leaders lost 4000+ American servicepeople, while the inexperienced Barack Obama was of the opinion that they should not have been committed. The best we can hope for is a draw, and now Saddam isn't there to occupy the Iranians. Oh yeah, by the way, WHERE THE HELL IS BIN LADEN?

McCain, and Republicans "got it," that lax oversight in the housing and financial sectors would be great for the economy because we can trust bankers and lawyers to police themselves. Highly motivated financial people can be counted upon to behave diligently and ethically, right?

And there was nothing AT ALL naive about tax breaks that allowed manufacturing jobs to be shipped overseas at a rate that very nearly replicates the giant sucking sound that H. Ross Perot counseled the American public about in 1992-but he never imagined that the slurping would come from the People's Republic of China instead of Mexico...and the Chinese would be holding a trillion dollars of American debt as a result.

Very well, then, maybe experienced, non-naive people who "get it" aren't all that they are advertised to be. So the Republicans are going to bring out their own inexperienced, naive person who doesn't get it. Governor Sarah Palin makes Dan Quayle look like Shakespeare.

One hopes that the awkward interviews with Charlie Gibson and Katie Couric were a tactic to lower expectations for the debate with Joe Biden. Regrettably, one suspects that Governor Palin is as dumb as a bag of hammers. However, she is much easier on the eyes.

Those who had a complaint about Senator Clinton were less motivated by her genitalia than they were by a perception that the Senator from New York is a bit too tempestuous to be effective in the presidency. Governor Palin does exhibit a level of tempestuousness, but her targets are satirists and those who question her qualifications.

One would guess that "Saturday Night Live" is not shown in Alaska at all, but a quick perusal of the website for Palin's former employer, KTUU in Anchorage, indicated that it is an NBC affiliate. Did she expect her loud arrival on the national stage to pass unnoticed by parodists in New York? Making fun of public figures has been part of the program's description since 1975, and the producers and network know their audience is more likely to give Obama a pass.

A cagey tweener could have seen that coming. Why didn't the 44-year-old? Oh, she talks about having gotten into politics by moving from the PTA, but my math indicates that her oldest child must have started kindergarten at 18 months old.

Getting back to the experience issue, (and away from a rant fueled by lust for Tina Fey), if her experience running a city of any size were characterized by some spectacular accomplishment or demonstration of competence one may be inclined to listen. Giuliani's miracle in New York comes immediately to mind.

However, we are presented with a small town which shares many of the same difficulties of towns its size nationwide. Adding the state into the mix, one wishes for a record which reflects the kind of forward-thinking leadership that puts a state in good stead for future prosperity. Zell Miller's helmsmanship in Georgia is a perfectly fine example of a man who did an outstanding job of running a state that cannot simply dig a hole and have it puke up oil.

Regrets to Governor Palin, but without the North Slope, Alaska would be likened to the Mississippi of the Arctic. That is not entirely fair. Mississippi would be justified in being insulted by the comparison.

So the Republican Party now expects us to put on the Emperor's New Clothes, and accept that this is the best ticket that they can offer. No. Mike Huckabee has spoken eloquently about the Republican lack of political prowess this year.

And he is the next Republican who has a chance of ever being elected president.

How Obama Gets His Groove Back

Apparently, Your Wandering Gentile is a Black, Muslim, Socialist, Anarchist, Miscegenist, Anti-American Pawn of the New World Order, harboring closeted homosexual tendencies, immediately disposed to the murder of infants and the elderly, and perverting kindergarteners with free access to pornography.

Wow, I got all of this for one small donation to the Obama campaign!

To those who share their viewpoint with the lead paragraph, I would also like to say that I dislike puppies, SUVs, and the idea of persons wearing uniforms being granted the authority to review my papers on a whim. While we're at it, the idea of a fence as a barrier between my nation and the rest of the world suggests an infrastructure to convert the nation I love into a prison, an idea which is spectacularly offensive.

Okay, I don't really dislike puppies, but I am allergic to them.

I live in the middle of America, the suburbs of a major city, with an income, age, and educational attainment that sit exactly in the middle. I am John Doe. I am the guy who John McCain got in 2000, and the man he lost in 2008.

That being said, the Obama campaign has a couple of issues that need to be fixed...yesterday.

The campaign must address the fact that issues that face black America are fundamentally the same issues that face white, latino, asian and native Americans. Economic issues in particular have a disproportionately negative effect on black Americans, as do questions of selective enforcement and overt bigotry. To Obama's credit, all of the issues which are not receiving the attention appropriate to their importance were addressed in The Audacity of Hope.

The focus has to be moved on two fronts.

The first front is to demonstrate credibly that the interests of Americans of every identity are more alike than they are different. That in and of itself is a whole hell of a lot easier to say than do. The Republicans have been spectacularly effective in communicating that Obama and his supporters are different and strange, in such a fashion as to make a monolithic body which is questioned for its ability to be considered as a part of America.

This is the overwhelming theme of Conservative opinon, particularly talk radio which has a twenty year head start on Liberal talk radio. The best idea is not by attempting to discredit or disprove allegations, but by moving the conversation to where the audience overlaps in opinion with Obama.

As Chris Rock pointed out in Head of State, the worst thing that Bugs Bunny could do to Elmer Fudd was not blowing him up, but kissing him. An Obama presence with The Portly Pundit and Hannie Pie would be a better opportunity to reach middle America than a billion dollars worth of TV ads. All he would have to do is show up for an hour, take a couple of phone calls which are likely to come from hostile people, and hope the presenter would blow his stack, or in the unlikely event of a civil discussion, he connects with an audience which was not likely to seek his message.

Whether or not Democrats like it, Limbaugh and Hannity are big power brokers in the middle of America. A great big chunk of their audience is rural, white, and blue collar, a few of whom are highly susceptible to rumors and innuendo. The idea is not to mine those who are absolutely opposed to Obama under any circumstances, but appeal to the large component of middle class listeners to these programs who are fair minded and willing to review their decisions based upon a fair hearing of the facts.

There is no question of "legitimizing" Right-wing talk radio. It is not an issue of legitimization or de-legitimization. Right-wing talk radio simply is and no definition of the word is necessary. There is nothing to fear except abandoning an audience which lives in Obama's weakest demographic. One counts upon the junior Senator from Illinois bringing his charisma and charm to the microphone, swinging a few opinions to his side. This idea is a winner.

The other front is deemphasizing the "Change" brand. Senator Obama's resources have him in a position to upgrade his brand from "Change" to "Hope." One supposes that the Gentle Reader is considering that The Wandering Gentile is in deep need of a drug screening after suggesting that Obama show up on Rush Limbaugh and alter his branding.

Change tells the voter that the candidate would do things differently from the current administration, but it does not delineate how or how much. The idea of casting a candidate from the incumbent party as the incumbent is proving to be a non-starter. Hope is what persuaded voters to Clinton in '92, Reagan in '80, Roosevelt in '32. While McCain's policies are deeply similar to Bush's, he remains a different man, thusly falling under a generic idea of change.

It's not persuasive, nor was it ever. The Obama campaign requires the message of Hope to propel the conversation in its direction. Change without hope? Hell, I can get that with McCain. Non-Traditional on the ticket? Sarah Palin is not a traditional person on the ticket. Change is coming regardless.

No, change kind of sucks as a message. Obama would be well served to dance with the one what brung him, and that one is Hope. This is the point where the Clinton assets should come to the table. The Clinton brand was built on hope in the nineties, a particularly potent message in the atmosphere of the Bush 41 recession and the Keating Five. Considering the atmosphere where financial institutions are dropping like cell phone calls in the boonies, and all of the other crud the economy is going through now, hope combined with a clearly articulated agenda has a lot of potential.

The idea is not for either candidate to change their positions, but for both candidates positions to appear clearly and comprehensibly to the electorate. This absurd pattern where both parties' wedge issues are taking center stage needs to end now. While the candidates engage in volleys of juvenile name calling and finger pointing, the issues affecting the quotidian lives of real Americans are not being addressed.

A gifted orator and communicator like Obama can survive the slings and arrows of the partisan opposition if his campaign sticks to the qualities that make him compelling combined with a principled and concrete discussion of his positions. Playing a game invented by his opponents suggests that Obama's presence at the inauguration would be at the discretion of President-elect John McCain, not the American people who have worked so hard to support him.

One asks- does Senator Obama feel that the campaign lives up to the expectations of his supporters?