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Speaking of Jim Hightower's new book Thieves in High Places: They've Stolen our Country and it's Time to Take it Back, I bought Jim Hightower's new book Thieves in High Places: They've Stolen our Country and it's Time to Take it Back. I normally use old baseball or football cards for bookmarks. For this one, I used an old Roosevelt Leaks card. (His name forms a sentence. I like that.) Didn't think much about it until I saw that he played for the Buffalo Bills. Reading about the plight of workers and consumers and the card says Bills. Makes sense because when I see bills (especially for cable, internet connections, phone companies, ect.) I feel buffaloed. Man, this system Leaks. And look, Roosevelts number is 48. Wasn't '48 the year that George Orwell wrote 1984? You know, that book about Big Brother watching us. That's certainly pertinent in a Donald Rumsfeld/John Ashcroft world. I look on the back of the card and see that the player was born, educated, and lives in Texas. I won't go there, both literally and figuratively. Oh wait, it also says he was acquired by the Bills after he was waived by the Colts. That's right, he ended up in this job after he was downsized from his other job. Of course, if I knew my American history, I would make a pun about the player's first name. Like it's been Rough Riding this economy or there are millions of Americans who'd like a New Deal, cause the previous hand just wasn't dealt fairly.
The card is not truly a magical or symbolic bookmark. If it were, I would have chosen Leaks' 1984 card (I chose his 1983 card). Also, if you look at the constant massive job cuts of late, the card number would have been 86. It's number 225. Anyway, there were a lot of fun coindental characteristics of the card.
Oh, yeah. And the book's pretty good, too.
NFL player Jeremy Shockey has made news lately by referring to an opponents head coach using a slur about homosexuals. I've been reading and hearing viewpoints on this event. The main offense many have taken is that the term Shockey used is outdated and not used anymore. Bizarre! When did the national media become a bunch of Joan Rivers' wannabes? The fact that the term is no longer the fashionable slur shouldn't play any role in the discussion.
Of course, I'm not surprised that that was the extent of the discussion. I went to a hockey game once and sat near the players' benches. The dominant words coming from the players were ******-******* and *******. That was the only hockey game I went to. I have no desire to hear that. I assume the same is true at football games, but I'm never close enough to the players to hear it. I doubt I'll ever get any closer until they move my family room television to the sidelines. But even watching the former and current athletes on television sports shows alludes to mutual respect films being totally absent during film study sessions.
In California, they're having a recall election of the governor. Although I'm no fan of sour-grape tactics, there are two major positives to come out of this effort. First, we may get rid of a bad Democrat. I'm all for that. Second, it sets a precedent (my wife is rolling her eyes right now). Whenever Dubya is accused of ruining the economy his apologists (another fashionable term) shoot back with a litany of events that Dubya arguably could not have prevented. Well, these events were even less preventably by Gray Davis. Therefore, if Davis is to take responsibility for the economy of California, then Dubya can be held responsible for the economy of the United States. And the economy of the United States stinks!
There's a commercial out now. It claims something to the effect of "we weren't there at when the Wright brothers took flight, BUT we like to THINK we were there in spirit." Oh, okay. That's how it works now? You can just claim credit for stuff other people did. Not even just stuff other people did, but milestone history book stuff other people did. Well, that's great news for me. I've always felt like, even though I wasn't there, I was there in spirit when Microsoft was being developed. Feel free to send me my royalty billions to my home address.
Then there's another commercial where a soft-drink truck pulls up next to another soft-drink truck and starts dancing and blasting music through large speakers. The commercials pretty blah. I only tell you this as a public service message. When you open your next soda, please be aware that the contents may have been shaken during a routine stop light and said contents may be under greater pressure. Please use caution.
Hope you enjoyed my first attempt at a blog. I like to think I was there in spirit when blogging was created. However, back then it was called a diary or it was called "random thoughts from a cluttered mind" which is both false (the thoughts aren't random) and poor marketing (who wants to know what a person with a cluttered mind has to say). Either way, I like this. I need neither a complete thought nor a clever tag line.
I'd hate to be blogged down by that!
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The opinions expressed here are solely those of the writer and do not neccessarily reflect those of the rest of the family.
© 2003, Mark Wentz