The Emerald Rose

     As we get closer to the end of all of this “horse manure” we call the election process, and the candidates become clearer, nastier, and scarier this thought crossed my mind (what’s left of it!).

     Would I consider running for an elected office? No particular one, just any elected office. The answer was a resounding NO WAY. I was embarrassed that it took me about a half a nano second to make that decision, and it has nothing to do with being “un-patriotic” or not “giving back to the community” or the like.

       I would have to say it’s more like that dreaded part of every physical when the Doctor says, “Ok, turn around and bend over.” Only instead of one doctor you have thousands of them! UPI, Reuters, The NY Times, The Washinton Post, CNN, Turner Broadcasting, NBC, ABC, CBS, Wolf Blitzer, James Carville, and every other two bit yahoo walking the earth with a press pass! No thanks not for me.

     I tend to not have a ton of patience, understanding, how you say “suave and debonairre”, controlled, and otherwise tactful genes in my makeup. One of the reasons is because stupidity has reached HUGE epidemic proportions all over this country. (If you offend easily, and don’t want to read a political rant, or otherwise non “soft and fluffy” blog, stop here. “Click” on the big red “X” in the top right corner of your screen and go do something useful! You have been warned.

      I think elections take too long, don’t really make a damn bit of difference. They just give one person a term to spend saying “It wasn’t my fault, my predessessor was responsible for this mess”, and inventing a proven political hypothesis that you “can” please all of the people some of the time, at least enough to get your paycheck and tap into the “perc pool”, and the “favor pool”, you know the ,…ahem, “you take care of me,….I’ll take care of you” gig.

       Someone sent me a “joke” recently the headline was “Is this the NBA (National Basketball Association) or the NFL (National Football League), both renown for their players, aaah …indiscretions and lack of integrity. It went on, and if I can find it I will cut and paste it at the end of this rant, to outline the number of arrests for spousal abuse, drunk driving charges, cashing of fraudulent checks, plain theft, and even the fact that out of some 450 people in the group, 71 of them could not even get a credit card in their name!  The “punch line” after this litany said “…guess which one yet? The answer is neither, it is the United States House of Representatives”

    “Well drop kick me Jesus, through the goal posts of life!” Who would have ever thought that? Oh yeah, there was a thing earlier this week about a U.S. senior Senator  who was just indicted for taking bribes. It is “alleged” that others paid for huge renovations (over $200,000) on one of his “summer homes”. Now this clown goes on TV and says that’s a lie, he says “We paid every bill that came in for that construction ourselves” Please allow me to translate into American politicianeese. Sure he paid every bill that came in during that construction, but what about the bills that never came in, and were paid by somebody else?

       How stupid does he think we are? Or take the case of the kid down the block who is not working, never seems to do anything, and drives the brand freakin’ new, fully tricked out 2008 Mercedes Benz! Duh, maybe he hit the Lotto and just likes doing nothing and hanging out unemployed in the shitty neighborhood. Does this ring true to you.

       Or several years ago, here where I live, when a County Commissioner does all this research on an old abandoned piece of land that no way can even come close to the requirements to even build a dog house on, and in a very “clandestine” manner tracks it down to the owners heirs and buys it for a real song (like maybe $10,000). Sounds ok thus far, but now as Paul Harvey says, “The rest of the story.”

      Seems like the road off the highway that the school buses have to go over cuts across that piece of land, and it’s the ONLY way for them to go to drop the kids off and pick them up at school. (Is a glimmer of light now coming on in your mind?)

      A few weeks later in some little page 64, below the fold, in the obituary section, there is a “blurb” that the school committee rejected an option to acquire and buy  a piece of land near the ABC School. You guessed it,…so that is still not the end of the story. Several days later a roadblock is put up on that little piece of land with private property, no trespassing signs, and the school busses can’t get through! Gee! What a novel idea. Maybe I did fall off the old “turnip truck”, and bash the crap out of my head, but I still smell a skunk, and a schemer, and a real “dirtbag” around here.

     Lo and behold the flap goes on for a week , ten days, and the school committee finally caves in and buys the damn land,with MY freakin’ money as a taxpayer! Me, I’d a been willing to spring for the rope to lynch the bastard up on the school flag pole, but when he was  “interviewed” by the local newspaper, he simply says there’s nothing wrong with a businessman trying to make a fair profit in his business, and that this is not going to effect his decision to run for another term in office, nor his percieved outcome of that election because of all he has done for his constituents!

       Outcome, he lost the election, kept the money, and hasn’t been seen or heard from in the public circles of the area since election night. But the unmitigated gall of the man is unbelievable.

     Remember to take your “stupid” pills or you will catch it, get up early and vote on election day in November, go to bed early so you don’t have to listen to all the crap on the TV about the “exit polls”, and the inevitable “projected winners” and pray that there is at least enough folks left with a half a brain or more who actually do care about our country, and maybe,…just maybe, we might survive to the next election. At this point the operative word is “survive”, tough to do without a job, without money, without food, without adequate health care, and oh yeah with severely tarnished hope!

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