Differences

According to my statement of the intent of this blog (check the header), I don't have an agenda. This remains true, although I've recently got all approvally about recent political events. Well, why not? Everybody likes an occasional feel-good. What's bothering me is that not everyone got a goody this time, and that's a shame, because if things work out this could be win-win for all of us.

Maybe it would be productive to define the terms "Liberal" and "Conservative".

Let's take Conservative first (ABC order). The term basically means "cautious". Politically it used to mean, "Be careful that in your zeal to improve things you don't accidentally throw out the baby with the bath water". It's chief value is as a mature check on the exuberance of well meant liberalism. In this sense "conservative" means "thoughtful". Lately, it appears that a number of those who support conservative principals are acting more as if they are cornered than thoughtful. These people could be more useful directing and refining "change" which is after all inevitable. Next.

Liberals are the weather changers of the human race. They are enthusiastic, and we find them in the leading edge of the storm front of political change. Good for them; they just can't seem to understand why everybody else doesn't get it. This kind of mind lock, as in the case of conservatives, leads to hard-headed foolishness. What would be useful, would be for those of both mind-sets to get their butts off their shoulders and sit them down around some hot caffeine drinks. And, of course, talk about it.

I find that I am conservative in that I want things to be as nice as I can remember them as being.

I'm also liberal enough to want things to be better.

Regards,
Daddy

A (conditional) Sigh Of Relief

Well, here we go again! I really love the way my country reinvents itself. There's no way I'm gonna get depressed (at least long term) by the "same-old same-old". Just when it looks like the future's in the Crapper, we manage to re-inspire ourselves, and when we do that have you noticed how it lights up the rest of the world? Apparently all it takes for them to believe in us is for us to believe in ourselves. The responsibility implied by that thought ought to scare every one of us shitless. I'm either going to have to stop drinking.......or really tie one on.

Anyway, here it is, the day after a major game changing election. My friends at the bar always want to know for whom I voted, and I always reply: "Truman". The truth is I've been voting for Harry Truman since I began voting no matter that he hasn't been running. He was the first president I can actually remember, and he was my Daddy's favorite. That's important to me. I keep on voting for Democrats in the hope that if one of them wins he'll turn into Harry Truman. I admit that's not much to hang your hat on, but it's what I've got. I also believe I'm going to win the lottery. And the check pool. Every week the world's made new, so I'm a winner 'till I lose.

This time in a sort of weird backhanded way I may have gotten my wish. It's true there is no superficial resemblance between "Black Obama" and "Harry the Hatman"*, but hang in here with me. Just for a minute.

Only time will tell (that's a pesimistic way of saying "I can't believe my good fortune"), but Barack H. Obama appears to have a fair dose of the go-it-alone courage and stubborness and the essential fair-mindedness of my old hero. If I'm right, then I win, and if I win, maybe I win for long enough that my optimistic spirit can get a well deserved rest. That'd be nice.

Regards,
Daddy

*A month before his marriage in 1919 Truman started a "haberdashery". The quotation marks are because hardly anyone remembers that the word means a mens clothing store that sold your basic suits and hats. During his later political campaigns his oponents put him down as a mere seller of hats. He won anyway.