Published in Trop Magazine (tropmag.com)
A is for ambush. America’s corporate-industrial-military-political-financial complex is a fairly large animal. Its trillion-ton head is Manhattan, its girth the million-square-miles of the Great Plains and the Rocky Mountains; its claws extend through the Bering Strait. It plods at the pace of glaciers, swallows whole cultures in single gulps. In 2008, brazen and unregulated thieves detonated atomic bombs at its base and shocked and knocked the colossus to its side. Now, in horrible theater, the wizards of Washington proclaim villainy upon one another and peddle snake oils that promise to right the capsized beast.
B is for Bert and Ernie. Well, more Ernie than Bert. Remember Ernie in his shower cap as he sang among the bubbles: “Rubber duckie, you’re the one. You make bathtime lots of fun. Rubber duckie, I’m awfully fond of you… woh, woh, bee doh!” Or Kermit in the sweet ballad, “It’s Not Easy Being Green.” Outrageous! Pull the plug on the little shits!
C is for chameleon. These are lizards that are uniquely adapted to their environments; they can change their colors to match those that populate their surroundings, whether pink, blue, red, orange, turquoise, yellow, or green. Their stereoscopic eyes can focus on separate objects at the same time, making it impossible to know where they stand. Chameleons are native to tropical Asian locales, but have been introduced to the Republican Party, where one in particular has become their nominee.
D is for discombobulation. Barack Obama during the first debate seemed to stand there in utter discombobulation. Some of us would have preferred if he had exuded some combobulation, or, at minimum, an aura of bobulation. Al Gore famously suggested that the Prez might have been afflicted with altitude discombobulation. I can vouch for that. One time I climbed Mount Cartier in eastern Quebec. When I got to the top, I lapsed into uncontrollable giddiness and started bobulating my butt off. Believe me: At that altitude, I would have been in no shape to debate even the meekest Republican.
E is for Eleanor Roosevelt. She asked, “When will our consciences grow so tender that we will act to prevent human misery rather than avenge it?”
F is for frijoles. I have discovered that my debate-watching enjoyment is greatly enhanced by eating Mexican food a few hours before the opening handshake. And the meal should include a double portion of frijoles. Once intestinally primed in this manner, the viewer should be able to release their consequent emissions at key moments in speeches to make clear the viewer’s editorial positions. Of course, the sound effects become more meaningful and memorable the larger the living room audience present. A TV viewing area with ceiling fan, needless to say, is recommended.
G is for getting a buzz. When I was in high school, a bunch of us wrote an "underground newspaper" which we dubbed, RIPT. The name was a nod to our underground readers that we were in solidarity with them: that we writers, too, loved to get high, to get "ript", as it were. Back in his days of rebellion, Barry Obama also sat around with his boys, smoking joints, getting hungry, and getting ironic. Anymore, this is standard initiation for American youth, although there is peril in not breaking from those seductive clutches (he said, speaking from personal experience).
H is for haiku. These dizzying times beckon for a moment of poetic contemplation:
red states and blue states
our country is dipped in mud
we wear galoshes
I is for Icabod Ickwith. Mr. Ickwith was an aspiring political candidate who was tarred and feathered and run out of his Rhode Island town in 1821 for making scurrilous stump speeches. Ickwith claimed, "Forty seven percent of the American populace are a bunch of lazy, freeloading, drunken turnip-eaters." Ickwith was never heard from again, but many believed he wound up a beggar in Utah.
J is for jumpshot. I've never seen Mitt Romney play basketball, but Obama sure has a smooth jumper. I'm sure Barack would take the Mittster going one-on-one or in a friendly game of horse. In a recent Sports Illustrated poll, 98 percent of unlikely voters would like to see the candidates go head to head in a variety of games. A depressing 20 percent would like to see a "face-off" in "guillotine testing." Another 20 percent would like to attend a match of medieval jousting, the best two of three. Given Romney's exposure to the cavalry, swords, and dressage, he clearly would be the jousting favorite. Romney would win on a horse, while Obama would win at a game of horse.
K is for Kenya. That country, as we all know, is where Obama's father came from. My roots go back to a German draft dodger who sailed for America to stay out of the army. Our last name means "storage house for beans." Maybe our ancestors were German bean farmers. Or perhaps our last name was a euphemism, born in medieval times, for folks who were famous for their volumes of gas, or for the distinctive ways they cut the proverbial cheese. "Oh that Gunter, he is such a storage house of beans." There is no shame in this. I have been known to "carry the family torch." Just ask my wife. If I had a choice, however, I think I would rather claim lineage from Kenya, the land of long distance runners, than from the land of bloated bean eaters.
L is for limerick.
There was a young fellow named Ryan
Who came to our town a-cryin',
"When it comes to the budget
I can magically fudge it,"
And was tomatered in the face for lyin'.
M is for mouthpiece. While we know that ventriloquists can't really throw their voices, some possess skills so uncanny as to appear almost alien. I mean, when Mitt Romney stands before a microphone, you would swear that the sound masquerading as his own voice was emanating from his own lips. Many people are deceived by this. But if we follow the money before carefully pulling back the curtain, why, right there in their board rooms, in their leather-back chairs, we see the alien ventriloquists themselves. There they are, counting their millions, creating political dummies, stuffing their shirts, and inserting mouthpieces! Peek-a-boo, we see you.
N is for nitpicking. I know a thing or two about head lice. Back in my earlier social worker days, I spearheaded a project aimed at helping parents eradicate head lice from their children's heads. (At the time, this seemed a just reward for going to graduate school.) I am here to report that a louse has a spouse who out of love produce numerous nits that very quickly grow into more adult lovers of each other. The only hope for lice-freedom, among other things, is to employ a zealous nitpicker. Comb, comb, comb, pick. Comb, comb, comb, pick. But still, the little bastards almost always return. Head lice, by extension, are the despicable lies spoken by politicians. You shine a light on them, you comb, comb, comb, and pick, pick, pick them clean. But in the end, they return to suck blood from the head, and contaminate the public's thoughts and beliefs. (If you scratched your scalp while reading this, I totally understand.)
O is for Ohio. Nothing like a little pressure, eh, our buckeyed brethren? What's it like to become everybody's best friend for a few weeks every four years, only to be forgotten on a November Wedneday like the previous day's garbage? We look to you Ohio, ol' buddy, ol' chum. But hey, no pressure.
P is for protest. In the spring of 1972, when I was a long-haired, anti-war student at Michigan State, I grabbed a bullhorn on the steps of the Administration Building and made an impassioned speech in front of 2,000 fellow students. Richard Nixon a few days earlier had bombed Cambodia which spawned enraged turbulences across a hundred campuses. After we shut down traffic on East Grand River Boulevard, we stormed the center of campus to shut down the university's brain center. Vietnam was genocide. America was burning children by the thousands. And now, Cambodia! Mitt Romney, meanwhile, had attended Stanford and also protested there. He also heard a call to action. Romney carried signs that supported the Vietnam War, and did all he could to renounce the anti-war movement.
Q is for quahog. It is important to give credit where credit is due, and I hereby praise Governor Romney of Massachusetts for presiding over a state that produces such spectacular clams. The quahog clam is of the hard-shell variety, stouter and chewier than its soft-shell cousins. When I vacationed in Wellfleet, Cape Cod, in 1981, I frequently ate raw oysters and little-neck clams ("steamers") while overlooking a salt marsh and guzzling beer at Captain Jack's Tavern. "Quahog" also can come in handy for players of Scrabble. If the Governor had aggressively touted his clam connection, the seafood kind, who knows?
R is for really, really, really rich people. Rich as a hot vat of triple chocolate fudge. Rich as owning a private jet, and a yacht, and big-ass bling, and seven bedrooms. Ritzy rich, rich with blue blood, and rich with justifications for greed. The finest leather, the oldest wine, that rich American shine. Gated communities and feel-good fundraisers and looking down the nose. Way more than rich enough to fill a refrigerator for every hungry child on the face of the earth. Rich enough to fill those refrigerators a thousand times over.
S is for stuck-out ears. Barack Obama and Paul Ryan both have ears that stick out, all four of them. And I'd wager that Obama's flaps, if tested, would displace more air and create more lift for flight than Ryan's. Not that there's anything noteworthy about that. Most voters would probably call an ear contest a draw if the media were to draw attention to it. For the record, I feel that Ryan's ears are the cuter pair.
T is for tourniquet. One day a week I work at the courthouse in Bellaire, Michigan. Last winter, a woman slipped on the icy cement steps outside and fell on her forehead. She was assisted into the lobby area as blood streamed down her face from a nasty gash. A group of people came to her aid and, given her critical condition, they were about to call an ambulance. The woman in anguish cried out, "Please! Don't call an ambulance! I can't go to the hospital. I don't have any insurance! I can't pay for it! I'm begging you! Please! Don't call an ambulance!" But her wound was deep and wide, and because a medic couldn't stop the bleeding, an ambulance was called. She sobbed the whole while as the EMTs prepared her to go, but not from the physical pain.
U is for undecided. Three weeks before the election, it was announced that 12 percent of likely voters still remained undecided. Twelve percent! How could that be? Are 12 percent of voters locked in their closets? Is there a third set of wildly different values that neither man represents? It's not like deciding between shades of beige paint for the family room. It's not like deciding between french fries or curly fries. The differences are stark.
V is for a very, very, very good used car salesman. Mitt missed his calling. Oh sure, he made a billion dollars by flipping vulnerable companies, but consider what he could have pocketed at Bubba's Used Car Acres. Mitt could persuade people to buy the fuzz scraped from spoiled cottage cheese. He could sell out tickets for a cruise ship bound for Des Moines. And if it ever came to used cars, Mitt could sell out Bubba's inventory on a single Saturday morning in a blizzard. That man coulda moved some cars!
W is for wedgies and swirlies. That's right, members of the Congress, we're looking at you. Until you start acting like grownups, and actually GET ALONG, you can expect your underpants straps up to your necks and your heads plunging the porcelain!
X is for x-rays. You have to admire the dental health of modern candidates. Those perfectly crafted pearly whites must come from many weeks in the dentist's chair. Ever notice in the portraits of presidents and famous people long-gone that you never see their teeth? George Washington with his wooden dentures probably had the breath of a turkey vulture. In the 1800s, even if your mouth was reduced to rotten nubs, your oratory could save the day. Lincoln's nubs were right down to his gums. Nowadays you're doomed if you can't flash a Pepsodent smile at every unsuspecting, undecided voter. Mark these words: If Obama wins this election by a hair, it will be because his toothy appeal pushed him ahead. If Romney wins, give credit to his dentist.
Y is for "Yer Darn Tootin'." The brilliant "Yes We Can!" unified and brought energy in 2008. But Obama has desperately needed a replacement, and if the campaign had taken my advice, a new slogan would have given him momentum and a margin. Imagine Obama in an arena packed with 10,000 frenzied fans. He stands before them with loosened tie and rolled up sleeves:
Obama: This is our moment, America! Are you with me, America? Is it time to move forward?
Throng: Yer Darn Tootin'!
Obama: Yer Darn Tootin'! This is not a country of the few, but a country of the many! Where we ask the most fortunate to do their fair share."
Throng: Yer Darn Tootin'!
Obama: And where every American deserves state-of-the art, affordable health care!
Throng: Yer Darn Tootin'!
Obama: Yer Darn Tootin'!
Z is for zombies. It's exhausting to feel polarized. It's exhausting to resent. I drive down my street every day and pass a yard sign that reads, "Take our country back!" It has become exhausting to consider and then reconsider the posters of such signs, to take such umbrage against such a sea of flawed assumptions. Wrong, wrong, wrong! Bad, bad, bad! Anymore, I feel like the walking dead. It's exhausting to walk while you're dead. Let's get a break. Let's take five. Even zombies need their rest.
Comments are welcome at tombohn2@yahoo.com
.
A is for ambush. America’s corporate-industrial-military-political-financial complex is a fairly large animal. Its trillion-ton head is Manhattan, its girth the million-square-miles of the Great Plains and the Rocky Mountains; its claws extend through the Bering Strait. It plods at the pace of glaciers, swallows whole cultures in single gulps. In 2008, brazen and unregulated thieves detonated atomic bombs at its base and shocked and knocked the colossus to its side. Now, in horrible theater, the wizards of Washington proclaim villainy upon one another and peddle snake oils that promise to right the capsized beast.
B is for Bert and Ernie. Well, more Ernie than Bert. Remember Ernie in his shower cap as he sang among the bubbles: “Rubber duckie, you’re the one. You make bathtime lots of fun. Rubber duckie, I’m awfully fond of you… woh, woh, bee doh!” Or Kermit in the sweet ballad, “It’s Not Easy Being Green.” Outrageous! Pull the plug on the little shits!
C is for chameleon. These are lizards that are uniquely adapted to their environments; they can change their colors to match those that populate their surroundings, whether pink, blue, red, orange, turquoise, yellow, or green. Their stereoscopic eyes can focus on separate objects at the same time, making it impossible to know where they stand. Chameleons are native to tropical Asian locales, but have been introduced to the Republican Party, where one in particular has become their nominee.
D is for discombobulation. Barack Obama during the first debate seemed to stand there in utter discombobulation. Some of us would have preferred if he had exuded some combobulation, or, at minimum, an aura of bobulation. Al Gore famously suggested that the Prez might have been afflicted with altitude discombobulation. I can vouch for that. One time I climbed Mount Cartier in eastern Quebec. When I got to the top, I lapsed into uncontrollable giddiness and started bobulating my butt off. Believe me: At that altitude, I would have been in no shape to debate even the meekest Republican.
E is for Eleanor Roosevelt. She asked, “When will our consciences grow so tender that we will act to prevent human misery rather than avenge it?”
F is for frijoles. I have discovered that my debate-watching enjoyment is greatly enhanced by eating Mexican food a few hours before the opening handshake. And the meal should include a double portion of frijoles. Once intestinally primed in this manner, the viewer should be able to release their consequent emissions at key moments in speeches to make clear the viewer’s editorial positions. Of course, the sound effects become more meaningful and memorable the larger the living room audience present. A TV viewing area with ceiling fan, needless to say, is recommended.
G is for getting a buzz. When I was in high school, a bunch of us wrote an "underground newspaper" which we dubbed, RIPT. The name was a nod to our underground readers that we were in solidarity with them: that we writers, too, loved to get high, to get "ript", as it were. Back in his days of rebellion, Barry Obama also sat around with his boys, smoking joints, getting hungry, and getting ironic. Anymore, this is standard initiation for American youth, although there is peril in not breaking from those seductive clutches (he said, speaking from personal experience).
H is for haiku. These dizzying times beckon for a moment of poetic contemplation:
red states and blue states
our country is dipped in mud
we wear galoshes
I is for Icabod Ickwith. Mr. Ickwith was an aspiring political candidate who was tarred and feathered and run out of his Rhode Island town in 1821 for making scurrilous stump speeches. Ickwith claimed, "Forty seven percent of the American populace are a bunch of lazy, freeloading, drunken turnip-eaters." Ickwith was never heard from again, but many believed he wound up a beggar in Utah.
J is for jumpshot. I've never seen Mitt Romney play basketball, but Obama sure has a smooth jumper. I'm sure Barack would take the Mittster going one-on-one or in a friendly game of horse. In a recent Sports Illustrated poll, 98 percent of unlikely voters would like to see the candidates go head to head in a variety of games. A depressing 20 percent would like to see a "face-off" in "guillotine testing." Another 20 percent would like to attend a match of medieval jousting, the best two of three. Given Romney's exposure to the cavalry, swords, and dressage, he clearly would be the jousting favorite. Romney would win on a horse, while Obama would win at a game of horse.
K is for Kenya. That country, as we all know, is where Obama's father came from. My roots go back to a German draft dodger who sailed for America to stay out of the army. Our last name means "storage house for beans." Maybe our ancestors were German bean farmers. Or perhaps our last name was a euphemism, born in medieval times, for folks who were famous for their volumes of gas, or for the distinctive ways they cut the proverbial cheese. "Oh that Gunter, he is such a storage house of beans." There is no shame in this. I have been known to "carry the family torch." Just ask my wife. If I had a choice, however, I think I would rather claim lineage from Kenya, the land of long distance runners, than from the land of bloated bean eaters.
L is for limerick.
There was a young fellow named Ryan
Who came to our town a-cryin',
"When it comes to the budget
I can magically fudge it,"
And was tomatered in the face for lyin'.
M is for mouthpiece. While we know that ventriloquists can't really throw their voices, some possess skills so uncanny as to appear almost alien. I mean, when Mitt Romney stands before a microphone, you would swear that the sound masquerading as his own voice was emanating from his own lips. Many people are deceived by this. But if we follow the money before carefully pulling back the curtain, why, right there in their board rooms, in their leather-back chairs, we see the alien ventriloquists themselves. There they are, counting their millions, creating political dummies, stuffing their shirts, and inserting mouthpieces! Peek-a-boo, we see you.
N is for nitpicking. I know a thing or two about head lice. Back in my earlier social worker days, I spearheaded a project aimed at helping parents eradicate head lice from their children's heads. (At the time, this seemed a just reward for going to graduate school.) I am here to report that a louse has a spouse who out of love produce numerous nits that very quickly grow into more adult lovers of each other. The only hope for lice-freedom, among other things, is to employ a zealous nitpicker. Comb, comb, comb, pick. Comb, comb, comb, pick. But still, the little bastards almost always return. Head lice, by extension, are the despicable lies spoken by politicians. You shine a light on them, you comb, comb, comb, and pick, pick, pick them clean. But in the end, they return to suck blood from the head, and contaminate the public's thoughts and beliefs. (If you scratched your scalp while reading this, I totally understand.)
O is for Ohio. Nothing like a little pressure, eh, our buckeyed brethren? What's it like to become everybody's best friend for a few weeks every four years, only to be forgotten on a November Wedneday like the previous day's garbage? We look to you Ohio, ol' buddy, ol' chum. But hey, no pressure.
P is for protest. In the spring of 1972, when I was a long-haired, anti-war student at Michigan State, I grabbed a bullhorn on the steps of the Administration Building and made an impassioned speech in front of 2,000 fellow students. Richard Nixon a few days earlier had bombed Cambodia which spawned enraged turbulences across a hundred campuses. After we shut down traffic on East Grand River Boulevard, we stormed the center of campus to shut down the university's brain center. Vietnam was genocide. America was burning children by the thousands. And now, Cambodia! Mitt Romney, meanwhile, had attended Stanford and also protested there. He also heard a call to action. Romney carried signs that supported the Vietnam War, and did all he could to renounce the anti-war movement.
Q is for quahog. It is important to give credit where credit is due, and I hereby praise Governor Romney of Massachusetts for presiding over a state that produces such spectacular clams. The quahog clam is of the hard-shell variety, stouter and chewier than its soft-shell cousins. When I vacationed in Wellfleet, Cape Cod, in 1981, I frequently ate raw oysters and little-neck clams ("steamers") while overlooking a salt marsh and guzzling beer at Captain Jack's Tavern. "Quahog" also can come in handy for players of Scrabble. If the Governor had aggressively touted his clam connection, the seafood kind, who knows?
R is for really, really, really rich people. Rich as a hot vat of triple chocolate fudge. Rich as owning a private jet, and a yacht, and big-ass bling, and seven bedrooms. Ritzy rich, rich with blue blood, and rich with justifications for greed. The finest leather, the oldest wine, that rich American shine. Gated communities and feel-good fundraisers and looking down the nose. Way more than rich enough to fill a refrigerator for every hungry child on the face of the earth. Rich enough to fill those refrigerators a thousand times over.
S is for stuck-out ears. Barack Obama and Paul Ryan both have ears that stick out, all four of them. And I'd wager that Obama's flaps, if tested, would displace more air and create more lift for flight than Ryan's. Not that there's anything noteworthy about that. Most voters would probably call an ear contest a draw if the media were to draw attention to it. For the record, I feel that Ryan's ears are the cuter pair.
T is for tourniquet. One day a week I work at the courthouse in Bellaire, Michigan. Last winter, a woman slipped on the icy cement steps outside and fell on her forehead. She was assisted into the lobby area as blood streamed down her face from a nasty gash. A group of people came to her aid and, given her critical condition, they were about to call an ambulance. The woman in anguish cried out, "Please! Don't call an ambulance! I can't go to the hospital. I don't have any insurance! I can't pay for it! I'm begging you! Please! Don't call an ambulance!" But her wound was deep and wide, and because a medic couldn't stop the bleeding, an ambulance was called. She sobbed the whole while as the EMTs prepared her to go, but not from the physical pain.
U is for undecided. Three weeks before the election, it was announced that 12 percent of likely voters still remained undecided. Twelve percent! How could that be? Are 12 percent of voters locked in their closets? Is there a third set of wildly different values that neither man represents? It's not like deciding between shades of beige paint for the family room. It's not like deciding between french fries or curly fries. The differences are stark.
V is for a very, very, very good used car salesman. Mitt missed his calling. Oh sure, he made a billion dollars by flipping vulnerable companies, but consider what he could have pocketed at Bubba's Used Car Acres. Mitt could persuade people to buy the fuzz scraped from spoiled cottage cheese. He could sell out tickets for a cruise ship bound for Des Moines. And if it ever came to used cars, Mitt could sell out Bubba's inventory on a single Saturday morning in a blizzard. That man coulda moved some cars!
W is for wedgies and swirlies. That's right, members of the Congress, we're looking at you. Until you start acting like grownups, and actually GET ALONG, you can expect your underpants straps up to your necks and your heads plunging the porcelain!
X is for x-rays. You have to admire the dental health of modern candidates. Those perfectly crafted pearly whites must come from many weeks in the dentist's chair. Ever notice in the portraits of presidents and famous people long-gone that you never see their teeth? George Washington with his wooden dentures probably had the breath of a turkey vulture. In the 1800s, even if your mouth was reduced to rotten nubs, your oratory could save the day. Lincoln's nubs were right down to his gums. Nowadays you're doomed if you can't flash a Pepsodent smile at every unsuspecting, undecided voter. Mark these words: If Obama wins this election by a hair, it will be because his toothy appeal pushed him ahead. If Romney wins, give credit to his dentist.
Y is for "Yer Darn Tootin'." The brilliant "Yes We Can!" unified and brought energy in 2008. But Obama has desperately needed a replacement, and if the campaign had taken my advice, a new slogan would have given him momentum and a margin. Imagine Obama in an arena packed with 10,000 frenzied fans. He stands before them with loosened tie and rolled up sleeves:
Obama: This is our moment, America! Are you with me, America? Is it time to move forward?
Throng: Yer Darn Tootin'!
Obama: Yer Darn Tootin'! This is not a country of the few, but a country of the many! Where we ask the most fortunate to do their fair share."
Throng: Yer Darn Tootin'!
Obama: And where every American deserves state-of-the art, affordable health care!
Throng: Yer Darn Tootin'!
Obama: Yer Darn Tootin'!
Z is for zombies. It's exhausting to feel polarized. It's exhausting to resent. I drive down my street every day and pass a yard sign that reads, "Take our country back!" It has become exhausting to consider and then reconsider the posters of such signs, to take such umbrage against such a sea of flawed assumptions. Wrong, wrong, wrong! Bad, bad, bad! Anymore, I feel like the walking dead. It's exhausting to walk while you're dead. Let's get a break. Let's take five. Even zombies need their rest.
Comments are welcome at tombohn2@yahoo.com
.
