The Grouch's Election Report

Shiftless Blacks, Lazy Hispanics, and Slutty Women Put Obama Over The Top           

Now there’s a sub-title that probably caught your eye.  I wasn’t aware that these sorts of people had propelled Obama to an Electoral College landslide in the recent election, but apparently that is the case.  I know that because Ann Coulter, Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity pointed it out in the first days after the election.

It appears the country has reached the tipping point with more than 50% of the population being  “takers” and something less than 50% are “doers.”  Apparently, these more than 50% of “takers” voted for Obama because they want free stuff from the government.  In other words they are looking for handouts.  So who are these “takers?”  I guess you would have to include the 90% plus of African-Americans, 75% of Hispanic, and the 55% of woman voters who supported Obama.

Up until Rush, Ann and Sean, along with a host of other right wing politicians and commentators, explained what was motivating these demographics to support Obama, the Grouch thought he had a pretty good handle on why they might have voted the way they did.

It seemed logical that African-Americans would have a hard time supporting the people who used a deceptively edited video to destroy Acorn, an organization that provided services to poor African-American communities.  I thought there was a chance that when they tried to destroy the career of Labor Department employee Shirley Sherrod with another video hack job, black people might have taken notice.  It seemed logical that they might not have liked Paul Ryan’s budget that would have entailed deep cuts to social programs in favor of more tax cuts for the rich and powerful.  The thinly disguised voter suppression laws, pushed by Republicans across the country, might have upset people whose grandparents could tell them about their first hand experience with Jim Crow.

But most of all, I suspected they didn’t like the barely veiled racist campaign the right pursued from the first day of the first black president’s administration.  Fox News and its allies tried to paint the President as an angry black man, who hates white people.  They questioned his legitimacy through birther nonsense and made up a fantasy Obama, who was a communist, socialist, Muslim, atheist coming for your guns.   Some Republican clown even heckled the President during his State of the Union Address and Arizona’s demented governor wagged her withered claw in the President’s face because he had refused to waste his time providing her with a publicity opportunity.  Mitt smiled and stayed silent while his surrogates lectured the President on how to be an American.  He even tried his hand at a birther joke at a campaign stop in Michigan.  Mitt made a special trip to accept the endorsement of Donald Trump, who had made a complete fool of himself concerning the President’s birth place and then decided to double down on the lunacy by ginning up some demented theory concerning the President’s college transcripts.

I have to admit, the Grouch was wrong about all of the above, and the reason African-Americans voted for Obama was because they wanted free stuff from the government.

I apparently was wrong about the Hispanic vote too.  After years of close observation, I have concluded that most Hispanic people are various shades of brown.  After a little reading about their history, I concluded, they too, have been the victims of racism.  So I thought they might have noticed the same things black people were witnessing.

Additionally, Republican opposition to the Dream Act, talk about building that big electric fence on the border, and laws designed to make them prove their citizenship to any cop or authority who wanted to harass them might not have left them with kind thoughts for the Republican party.  The last Republican President’s immigration reform legislation was scuttled by the Republican House. Mitt suggested “self deportation” (make life so miserable here they go home) as a solution.  The right’s way of always talking about “illegals” without ever acknowledging the contributions made by Hispanics to our country’s well being might have rankled a few Hispanic.

Of course, I have come to learn that none of this mattered because Hispanics voted for Obama to get free stuff.

And that brings us to our last free stuff voters.  Once again, I mistakenly thought that Republican attacks and Mitt’s pledge to close Planned Parenthood on his first day in office might have upset woman voters.  The millions of woman who depend on Planned Parenthood for essential medical care might have found the Republican dedication to getting rid of Planned Parenthood troubling.

When the Republican controlled House, which had campaigned in 2010 on jobs, jobs, jobs, introduced more than 1100 new bills affecting woman’s reproductive rights in their first year of control, woman took notice.  These small government advocates wanted the government to impose medical procedures on women exercising their constitutional right to make medical decisions about their own bodies, that include forcing doctors to shove instruments into them for no medical reason.

I had thought woman may have been offended when Rush called a student, who had the audacity, to testify before congress in favor of insurance coverage for birth control, a slut and suggested she film her sexual encounters so that tax payers could watch.  Other leading lights, like Republican presidential wannabe, Rick Santorum, suggested states should be able to outlaw birth control all together.  The right appeared to want to reopen the debate on many issues woman had fought for over the last 40 years.

And then there was rape.  Republicans running for both statewide and federal elective office took to the airwaves to express their views that a child conceived by rape was God’s will and suggested that women’s bodies had a secret anti-sperm shield that prevented pregnancy in the case of “legitimate” rape.  Another idiot expressed his view that pregnancy as a result of rape almost never happens.  And finally, we had a whole host of Republican candidates who were against any exceptions in an abortion ban including cases of rape, incest, and even to save the life of the mother.

Then of course, Mitt refused to say whether he would seek to repeal the Lilly Ledbetter Equal Pay Law, which makes it easier for women who experience wage discrimination to seek redress in the courts.

So please forgive the Grouch for again misreading this group’s motivation for voting the way they did.

While the “takers” have been ruining the country, the “doers” have not been twiddling their thumbs these past 30 years or so.  After all, they have been spending millions (to make hundreds of millions) lobbying congress to pass the carried interest tax exemption and reduce the capital gains tax to a top bracket of 15%, both of which have contributed to the largest income disparity since the Guilded Age. They have manipulated the tax system so that they could stash millions in places like the Cayman Islands, Switzerland and The Isle of Man. They also worked very hard to retain the oil depletion allowance, even in the face of record profits.  They lead a years long assault on the Glass Steagall Act, which helped lead directly to the 2008 melt down.  They grew to be too big to fail and crashed the economy through their mismanagement and criminal activity and then looked to the government for hundreds of billions of dollars to bail them out.  They worked tirelessly to do away with the Inheritance Tax so they could pass their obscene wealth on to their offspring. And finally, they have fought furiously to either repeal or prevent meaningful regulation to curb their excesses.  The one thing they haven’t been doing is creating jobs, unless you count the jobs they have sent overseas to countries that pay low wages and have weak environmental protection laws.  So it seems there has been a wee bit of taking going on from our patriotic “doers.”

Now the Grouch is the last person to offer advice to conservatives, but for God’s sake, Wake Up!  The population of the U.S. is changing.  A political party that insults women, blacks, Hispanics, young people, gays and thinking people everywhere can not succeed in a national election anymore.  Your party’s craziness has handed the Democrats a ready-made coalition that could propel them to victory for the foreseeable future.  Unless you change, your only hope is that the Democrats well-known propensity for snatching defeat from the jaws of victory will save you.  There are a lot of good people who believe in conservatism and there is a place for you in the national dialogue.  In fact, the country needs your ideas.  But those ideas need to be based in reality and not be in the service of a racist, anti-science, fantasy that will only succeed in further degrading our democracy and handing our destiny to plutocrats beholding only to themselves.  Conservatives need a new William F Buckley, who helped drive the crazies in the John Birch Society out of the Republican Party back in the 50’s and 60’s.

A first step might be to stop listening to the likes of Rush, Ann, Sean, Bill O’Reilly and Glenn Beck.  Don’t expect them to change their acts because they have made millions off of your support and will need to double down on the dog whistle racism, deception, conspiracy theories and fear mongering to continue on that gravy train.  Stop listening, stop buying their books, let their sponsors know you have jumped ship, and most important, let your elected officials know they no longer need to fear these prophets of doom.  On election night Republicans were stunned by the results because they had been told for weeks before the election, by Fox News, that Romney was going to win and not just win a close race but would most likely win by a landslide.  Even if you give no credence to the studies that show Fox News viewers are less informed about current affairs than people who watch nothing at all, you have to wonder how they could have gotten this so wrong. Roger Ailes, who runs Fox News, is reportedly a pragmatist.  Let him know you want more news, albeit from a conservative viewpoint, and less propaganda and distortion.  He will listen to you, so make a call, sign a petition and make your leaders more responsible to your needs.

The country is changing.  Look out Texas – another Hispanic baby was born just a minute ago.  Look at the bright side.  Your growing Hispanic population may yet, some day, save you from your bat shit, crazy selves.

The Grouch wants to help.  So here is an exercise you can do to help you regain credibility with the various segments of our society that have abandoned your politicians.  It can work with any group but let’s use Hispanic people for this first exercise.

Ok, the first part of the exercise is the purge.  Close your eyes and think of Hispanics as hordes of brown people coming to take our jobs and bankrupt us by using our schools, hospitals and social services.  Think of the gun toting cartel members trying to hook our kids on narcotics.  Now let those images fade, let them slip away, they’re almost gone, they’re gone!

Now think of people who come to your community with a wonderful entrepreneurial spirit and open grocery stores, restaurants, auto repair shops, barbershops, bakeries, legal offices, and roofing and remodeling businesses.  Think of the revitalization of the part of your town that just a few years ago was boarded up and was producing little or no tax revenue for your city.  Think of these people as loving parents who are raising well-behaved and happy children.  Think of them as extremely hard working people who send a little money to their parents in the old country and strive to ensure their kids will have a better life than theirs.  Finally, think of them as your friends and neighbors who are adding to the mosaic that is America.  Once you have internalized this vision, you will be able to craft policies that will encourage Hispanic Americans to consider conservative ideas.

No need to thank the Grouch.  He is happy to help.

Standing at the Threshold

When you reach the age of 60 it becomes harder and harder to kid yourself into thinking you are still young.  By any reasonable calculation, you have more than likely burned through over two thirds of your life and no amount of telling your self that 60 is the new 40 is going to change that.

The signs of aging are just too great to ignore anymore.  The physical signs become more apparent.  Hair grows in spots that best be left hairless.  The hair on your head becomes thinner.  A bladder that has become a night owl interrupts sleep and “sleeping in” means you made it to 7:00am.  Your balance becomes a little wobblier and you discover aches and pains you have never had before.  Your skin sags and your face and hands wrinkle.  Eleven o’clock becomes a late night and you need three days to recover from a moderate night of drinking.

Along with these physical changes come a whole variety of other signs that become increasingly hard to ignore or discount.  When you go to the next family reunion you notice that you are now a member of the oldest generation present.  Everyone you know has a preexisting condition and you find yourself talking more about various ailments.  You get in the mail, unsolicited, an offer for 50% off your first spider vein treatment from the Vein Clinic PA.  When you go to the class reunion the “In Memoriam” page lists more and more names.  When they list the birthdays of celebrities and notable people you find yourself wondering, “who the hell are these people.”  You also find that when you are talking to younger people and make, what you believe to be a common knowledge type cultural or historical reference, you get a blank unknowing stare and have to explain what you are talking about.  And finally, when you are watching a TV commercial where an attractive young woman takes notice of a young man in a certain brand of jeans, resulting in their sharing a glass of wine later in the day, you can’t help but think that if she noticed you, she would be thinking, “I wonder how that guy with the beer gut and the slack ass keeps those jeans from falling down around his ankles.”

So this aging thing is no small matter.  In the mid 70’s, I was lucky to work for a non-profit that provided transportation services to Madison, Wisconsin’s elderly.  Working with the elderly is a valuable experience for anyone, but especially so for the young.  If you keep your eyes and ears open you will learn quite a bit about life.  Not all of it will be pleasant and rosy, but that should come as no surprise if you have been living on this planet for any period of time.  All of it can be helpful, during your lifetime and especially as you get ready to experience the last decades of your time here.

My first assignment for Independent Living was to pick up various old folks, who were still living with a spouse or family member and take them to an adult day care center and then return them home at the end of the day.  These were the people who were incapacitated, mentally or physically, or both.  The idea for the adult center was relatively new at the time and its purpose was as much to give the families a break from the full time care these individuals required as it was to provide an opportunity for the old folks to break the monotony of their routines.

Say what you want about picking up and delivering these people, it was never boring.  On my only day of training, I was shown the ropes by my predecessor.  When we went to pick up one client, I was told I needed to always be alert so as not to get punched in the face.   I’ve had a lot of jobs through the years but that was the first and only one where I received that warning.

I remember one guy named Jimmy who always had a smile on his face and was extremely cooperative.  He was about 5 feet 5, and had a big round jug-eared, bald head.  He always seemed to be in a good mood and reminded me of a happy elf.

One night, I was driving Jimmy home when he began to shriek at the top of his lungs that I needed to watch out for the herd of pigs that were crossing the Beltway in Madison.  When my heart stopped pounding and I felt assured the pigs were in Jimmy’s head, I tried to calm him down and he went back to his smiling self.

When I got Jimmy home, I walked him up to the front door of his daughter’s home, climbed the steps of the porch and rang the bell.  As we waited for someone to come to the door, I looked through the glass window in the door and saw Jimmy’s daughter walking down a hallway, coming to answer the door.  In the time it took for me to look in and watch the daughter approach, Jimmy unzipped and began to water the front of the house just to the right of the door jam.  His daughter opened the door and we both looked at Jimmy happily whizzing away.  I recoiled but the daughter, with a smile on her face said, “Oh, dad”, and gently assisted him into the house. The look she gave me said, “don’t worry, I’ve seen much worse.”

I always wondered what went on in Jimmy’s head.  From all outward appearances he seemed happy.  I wondered if he had created a wonderful world in his head where everything was worry free and good.  Maybe everything he experienced was new to him and immediately erased the moment after it happened.   Little was known about dementia at that time and I don’t think anyone other than researchers knew what Alzheimer’s was.  We were entering into a generation that was living longer and these diseases were becoming more common.

While Jimmy appeared to be happy, another of my clients was definitely living on the other side of the spectrum.  Doc was a rail thin, six foot two, retired dentist in his early eighties.  He lived with his son’s family in an affluent section of Madison.  It was my first day picking up Doc, when I was told to stay alert to avoid being punched.  His daughter in law led him out to the car when we arrived.  He was completely rigid and took tiny shuffling steps like one might take when walking around the rim of a volcano.  You had to be careful not to let Doc get a hold of your hand because he would squeeze it to the point of breaking bones.  My first day I tried to coax him into the back seat of the car by gently asking him to bend his knees and duck his head.  My trainer watched for about a minute, and then showed me his technique for getting Doc in the car, which consisted of applying force to certain joints, and pushing at the same time.  It seemed a little cruel at the time but I came to learn there was no other way to do it.

The most striking thing about Doc was his eyes.  They were the most intense mirrors of fear and rage I have ever seen.  His disease had definitely taken him to a different place than Jimmy’s.  It made me think about what life was like for him and despite the many rotten things he did (including punching the day care lady in the nose) you couldn’t help but wonder what horrors were running through his head every day.  The wear and tear was evident on the faces of his family and he was the single saddest case I encountered while working for Independent Living.

As a young man I learned that life could be cruel and isn’t necessarily fair.  The folks who spent their days at the day care had been dealt a bad hand and each of them tried to cope with it as best they could.  I also learned that nothing is guaranteed in this life and but for the grace of god, or if you prefer, dumb luck, there go I.

After a few months my job changed and I was put in charge of coordinating a network of volunteers to provide transportation for medical and other business related trips for Madison’s elderly.  Every day I would call volunteers and try to arrange rides to fill in the schedule.  I was also given the use of a car so when I couldn’t find enough volunteers I would drive clients to their appointments.

The people I was dealing with were in much better shape than my previous clients.  They were living on their own and needed transportation to make sure they could continue to live in their homes and apartments.

I remember a woman, named Mary, who was a role model for how to age gracefully.  She was around 85 when I met her.  She was never ready when I pulled up to her house.  I would knock on the door and eventually go around back and find her, in a pair of bib overalls, weeding her garden or caning a chair.  She was a tall woman with very good posture.  She would see me and remember why I was there and would spring up the steps of her back porch and in five minutes would come out her front door all put together and ready to go to whatever appointment she had.

When you talked to Mary, it became apparent you were talking to a highly educated and intelligent woman.  It always struck me that my best move with Mary was to shut up and listen.  Once when I was giving her a ride she asked me what I planned to do with my life.  I told her I didn’t know, but I was saving money to go to South America.  She looked at me and then began to tell me about the time she had accompanied her father, who was a mining engineer, to South America for a year.  It was sometime between 1905 and 1910 and her memory was sharp and her stories vivid and fascinating.   I could tell that she enjoyed the opportunity to remember and tell her stories to someone who was interested and might benefit from hearing them. She highly endorsed my plan to travel south and said that her year in Colombia and Peru had been one of the most interesting of her life.

Mary was one of the first people I met through Independent Living that gave me the idea there might be some connection between an active, lively mind and an active, healthy body.  At 85, she was so very much alive.  She was curious and one got the sense that she never had quit learning throughout her long and interesting life.

And that brings us to Antoine Pliska.  I met Antoine when he was in his nineties living in a five-story walk up room near downtown Madison.  He was about 5 foot 8 and possessed a slight but sturdy body.  He sported a long gray ponytail and a gleam in his eye.

Antoine was an associate of Madison icon and political gadfly Eddie Ben Elson, who once kicked off his campaign for a Dane County judgeship by dancing nude at the appropriately named Dangle Lounge in downtown Madison.  One of Eddie Ben’s greatest hits was his 1973 scheme to sell tickets, at $10 a pop, to individuals who wanted to ride the Comet Kohoutek, which Eddie contended was really a spaceship he would captain.  The tail of the comet/spaceship was going to brush the earth leaving it covered in oil and sludge.  Those who wanted to survive could buy a ticket and an invention of the eminent Dr. Antoine Pliska would miniaturize the ticket holders so they could ride the comet to safety.  Eddie was once asked by a reporter to be shown the miniaturized people he had stashed in his basement.  Eddie told the reporter he would call him back later that day and he did call him back and told the reporter that his greedy wife sold the little people to a Belleville Cadillac dealer to be used as hood ornaments.  So Antoine wasn’t your ordinary, run of the mill, old coot.

One night Pat and I were watching TV on our 9-inch black and white set.  There was nothing of interest on so we, out of desperation, tried the public access channel, which was showing a City Council meeting relating to a proposed ordinance put forward by the Madison Tenant’s Union and opposed by the Madison Landlords Association.

While we watched, one after another proponent of the ordinance came to the podium and testified to the various crimes and misdemeanors committed by the slumlords of Madison.  Every now and then, a landlord would point out that renting to five 19-year-old boys was equivalent to renting to a herd of wildebeests.  The testimony went on like this for a while, until the mayor announced there was time for one more citizen to speak.   As the last speaker approached the podium, I sat up, and said to Pat, “That’s Antoine!”

Antoine took the podium and began by holding up his hand, with the back of his hand facing the audience, and his index and middle fingers raised in a V and said, “During World War ll this signal meant victory.”  He then held up the same two fingers, with the palm facing out, and said, “During the sixties this symbol meant peace.”  He then looked directly into the camera and with a wicked smile on his face said, “And now I have a symbol for the landlords of Madison.”  Waiting a beat for dramatic effect, he raised his middle finger and gave the landlords the bird.  The audience exploded with laughter and the Mayor gaveled the meeting to a close.  It was theatre of the highest order.

There was no question that Antoine was bright, alert, involved and immensely enjoying his “Golden Years.”

So what did I learn about aging from these experiences?  First, there are no guarantees.  There are things that can happen that no amount of preventative action can avoid.  When you think about it, that rule applies to your entire life.  The proverbial bus can hit us all at any time in our lives.  I do think we can take a lesson from aging athletes, who have to prepare harder in the off-season, to continue to perform at high levels.  But, no matter how much you exercise, watch your diet and drink quality beer, bad things can and do happen.  Who knows what caused Jimmy and Doc to lose their grip on reality?  Life isn’t fair and we really shouldn’t carry around that expectation.

I like to think of my life in thirds.  The first third was childhood through the end of my formal education.  The second phase was building a career, raising a family, eventually culminating with retirement.  The last third is the one I am standing on the threshold of right now.  Each of these phases has their anxiety and terrors, whether it is fear of dodging a bully looking to rearrange your face, getting laid off from your job in the middle of a recession, or becoming physically or mentally dependent on others.  So, it looks like the “Golden Years” won’t wipe away those types of concerns. 

The big difference between the thirds is how they end.  Two end with graduation and retirement and the last with the big dirt nap.   That is something everyone has to come to grips with on their own terms.

I’m hoping my last third is closer to Mary and Antoine’s experience.  They were blessed with relatively good health and I plan to take care of myself and hope to be lucky.  I think one of the keys is to stay interested.  Never stop learning.  Never let our youth obsessed society convince you that you are irrelevant.  Enjoy and exercise the freedom this phase affords you. Find what turns you on and keep doing those things that you find valuable or interesting.  Continue to think about the big picture and remember those 60, 70, 80 years of life you have experienced are valuable and the lessons learned are best shared with those smart enough to understand you have something to teach them.  

While I was in the process of writing this post, I’ve decided that it would be great if I make it to my 90’s, and have the opportunity to give the finger to some individual or entity that richly deserves it. Then I will know that I was still kicking to the end.

PS.  One night, Pat and I were sitting in the bar at the Black Forest in south Minneapolis, when I told her a little bit about what this post was going to cover.  Hearing I was going to talk about my days with Independent Living, she suggested and I whole-heartedly agreed  (I‘m not stupid), to include the story of her heroism (my term, not hers) while she worked for the same agency.  Below is the article that appeared in a Madison newspaper proving her fifteen minutes of fame.  I must admit I never did anything remotely heroic during my time working with the elderly.

Part 1 - Click on image to enlarge

Part 2 - Click on image to enlarge

PPS.  I believe that we need to remember that our heroes are very much human.  I think it holds out the possibility that anyone of us may some day, if the circumstances are right, become a hero.  In keeping with this philosophy, I need to point out that Pat slammed Antoine Pliska’s arm in a car door.  No permanent damage resulted, although I imagine Antoine had better afternoons. Pat has felt bad about this for 35 years and counting.  I never slammed anyone’s body parts in car doors during my employment with Independent Living, which in and of itself, is sort of heroic, isn’t it?                  

 

 

Gunsmoke: Then and Now

          

I have to confess, I’ve always had a weakness for a good horse opera.  There was something about the wide-open range, good versus evil, horses as transportation and a cowboy’s best friend that appealed to me as a small boy.

I was lucky to have grown up during TV’s golden age of Westerns.  Every week, I could watch Gunsmoke, Bonanza, Rawhide, The Rifleman, Have Gun: Will Travel, The Rebel, Wagon Train, The Big Valley, The Wild, Wild West, and I’m sure a couple others I have forgotten.  My grandfather’s favorite was Gunsmoke and most weeks we would all watch it together and let our imaginations roam with Matt, Doc Adams, Kitty and Festus.

Matt, Festus, Doc and Kitty

Now, thanks to a retro television station, I am able to once again watch Gunsmoke every weekday at noon as I eat my lunch.  As I began to watch the show again, I realized that each episode is a small morality play and many issues of the day were addressed as life was depicted in Dodge City each week.  As I watched the show, I began to think how different the show might be if it was written today.  The following is a description of certain story lines I have seen over lunch lately and how I think they may have differed if they were written today.

THEN:  The son of a small rancher, whose go-it-alone attitude and suspicion of his neighbors has isolated him from the people of the greater Dodge City area, falls down a well and is injured.  The rancher resists his wife’s pleas for him to seek help and tries to rescue the boy alone.  His neighbor, who is unaware of the situation, is out dynamiting stumps, which results in the well partially caving in and further injuring the boy.

As things go from bad to worse, Matt and Festus stop at the ranch to water their horses.  When they discover what has happened, Matt sends Festus back to town to round up shovels, picks, wheelbarrows and volunteers willing to help rescue the boy before the rest of the well caves and buries him.  Festus races to town and gathers up the necessary tools and a large group of townspeople who race back to the ranch.

The rescuers all pitch in and are able to bring the boy up just before the well collapses entirely.  Doc Adams has the boy carried to the ranch house where he treats his injuries, thus setting up a winning situation for everyone involved.  The boy wins because he lives.  The Rancher wins because he learns a valuable lesson about community and cooperation that is reinforced every time he looks at his son’s smiling face.  The town’s people win because they have that special feeling that comes from knowing their combined efforts have saved the life of a small boy.  This wasn’t in the script, but I bet they went back to town and had a square dance with Festus doing the calling.

NOW:  The boy falls in the well and the small rancher tries to rescue him by himself.  The neighbor, unaware that anything has happened, continues to dynamite tree stumps and the well partially caves in.  Matt and Festus stop by to water their horses and Matt sends Festus back to town to get help.

As Festus gathers a crowd of townspeople around him, he finds a certain reluctance of the townspeople to rush off and help this rancher that no one really knows.  Doc Adams joins the crowd and asks what type of health insurance does the boy carry and when he is told the boy has no coverage, he is hesitant to join the rescue party.  When Festus asks if Doc is just going to let the boy die, a member of the crowd shouts, “let him die” while others cheer.

Doc decides to stay in Dodge and the response from the town is limited and weak.  The well caves in before the boy can be rescued.  The boy dies a free man.

THEN:  Dry conditions are putting pressure on small ranchers and federal lands are opened up so the cattlemen can find land to graze their herds. The Cattleman’s Association, which is made up of the three largest ranches in the area, hires gunmen to limit access to the federal land to the members of their Association.  The head of the Association justifies their action by saying they need to keep outsiders from Texas from over grazing the land.  Festus tells one of the big ranchers that what they are really doing is using their power to restrict use of the land for themselves when it should be open to everyone.

Tensions grow as the small rancher’s cattle begin to die and they clash with the Association’s hired guns.  Matt and Festus form a small posse and, together, they defeat the gunmen and open the land to all.

Government Employees

NOW:  The dry conditions pit the Cattleman’s Association against the small ranchers over the use of federal grazing land.  When Matt and Festus try to make sure all citizens have equal access to the range, the Cattleman’s Association organizes a wagon train of people carrying signs that say, “keep your government hands off federal land,” demand Matt and Festus stop impeding the job creators and stay out of this fight.  The Cattleman’s Association promises a new round of campaign contributions to Kansas’ senators and congressman and a new law is passed restricting use of the federal land while excepting large operations.

The small ranchers go bust and their land is bought up by members of the Cattleman’s Association for a pittance.  The small operators and their families drift off the land and into the slums of the big cites where many of them die from causes linked to poverty.  They die free men and women.

THEN:  Three desperados kidnap Kitty in a plot to lure Matt into a trap.  The leader of the bad guys is seeking revenge against Matt, for apprehending his brother, who was eventually hanged for murder.  Kitty is held in an old abandoned ranch house where she is beaten and abused.  The leader stops his two partners from raping Kitty, telling them there will be plenty of time for that after they kill Matt.

Waton Woman?

When Matt finds out Kitty is missing, he puts Festus in charge of Dodge, and rides out to find his main squeeze.  Festus argues with Matt about going with him but Matt needs Festus in Dodge because a bunch of drovers are coming to town and the usual fist fighting, drinking and shooting is expected.

Matt tracks the thugs to the abandoned ranch.  During the ensuing shootout, Matt is winged (marking the 400^th time Matt has been “winged” during the 20 year run of the show), but manages to kill two of the crooks and capture the third.  Kitty, beaten and terrorized, is rescued before she has to endure even worse treatment.  Doc treats Matt’s latest gunshot wound and the third kidnapper is tried and sentenced to a long prison term.

NOW:  Three desperados kidnap Kitty in a plot to lure Matt to her rescue so they can kill him.  Kitty is beaten and terrorized but the leader stops his two henchmen from raping her until after Matt is killed.

When Matt finds out Kitty is missing he is torn between staying in town to protect it from the drovers and going immediately to find Kitty.  Normally he would put Festus in charge but Festus was laid off the previous month because government workers, like federal deputies, are judged to be over paid, entitled symptoms of a bloated government.  Matt decides to stay in town for as long as necessary to protect the town he is sworn to serve.

When Matt doesn’t show up to rescue Kitty right away, the leader of the gang cannot stop his underlings from raping and further terrorizing her.

After a long weekend of busting up fist fights, disarming drunks and filling the town jail with drunken drovers, Matt rides out to rescue Kitty.  After a prolong gunfight, Matt wings two of the gang and captures the other slime ball.  Kitty is returned to Dodge, where she tries to put the pieces of her life back together.

Here I have three alternative endings for this episode.

Ending # 1:  Kitty becomes pregnant because of the rape so the men are released on the grounds that it was not a “legitimate rape.”  The fact that “god’s little shield” did not prevent the pregnancy is evidence enough that Kitty encouraged and enticed the gang and the sex was consensual.

Ending # 2:  Kitty does not become pregnant offering some evidence that she may have been legitimately raped.  At the ensuing trial the defense cast doubts on Kitty’s character, after all she does work in a saloon and wears those provocative off the shoulder dresses.  The charges are reduced to a misdemeanor because the prosecutor has doubts about the state’s ability to get a conviction for the more serious charge.  The gang is convicted of the lesser offense, pays a fine and leaves town.

Ending # 3:  Kitty becomes pregnant as a result of the rape.  Because of the trauma, both mentally and physically, her rather advanced age, and complications of the pregnancy, Kitty seeks to terminate the pregnancy.  She is prevented from doing so by a new law that requires her rapists to have been tried and found guilty of rape before the pregnancy can be terminated.  The gang’s trial begins 12 months after the rape.  Kitty dies, a free woman, during childbirth.

THEN:  A group of U.S. Army soldiers go rogue and begin stealing rifles from the army and selling them to gunrunners who are selling them illegally.  Festus, returning from a fishing trip, stumbles on to the gunrunners.  With Matt’s help the gunrunners are apprehended and Matt goes about trying to convince the officer in charge of the battalion that he has some rotten apples he needs to weed out.  Matt and Festus are finally able to convince the officer and the rogue soldiers are arrested and lead away in chains.

NOW:  This script cannot be rewrote for today because any criticism of the military is considered un-American and no TV studio is willing to risk the blowback.  It is the one area of the U.S. government that cannot be audited or questioned.

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I guess our attitudes have changed in the last thirty years.  The one belief, apparently held by nearly half the population, is that the government is worthless, incompetent and can provide nothing of value to the country besides a bloated military industrial complex.  It strikes me as a really strange belief for half the population of a democracy to hold.  After more than thirty years of being told “the government can’t solve the problem, the government is the problem,” and “government needs to be shrunk to the size where it can be drown in a bathtub,” many of our fellow citizens hold these “truths” to be self evident.

It only takes a few seconds to disprove this belief by simply taking a cursory glance at our history.  Government involvement and leadership has been crucial to the economic wellbeing of the country from practically the get-go.  That useless, do nothing government’s involvement in the building of the Erie and Panama Canals, the transcontinental railroad, winning World Wars I and II, the building of the electric power grid, the building of the interstate highway system, air travel, the space program, our education system, and drug and medical research, just to name a few, have contributed mightily to the economic well being of the country.  The one thing they all have in common is that each of these accomplishments was a very large undertaking that lacked immediate profitability.  Only the government is capable of financing these types of projects on behalf of the citizenry.  Without the government’s participation, which is to say, the people’s participation, because in a democracy, the government represents the people, this country would be a banana republic, clustered along the east coast, dancing to the tune of some foreign power.

Our hatred of “government” now extends to the state and local level.  Again, it is easy enough to point out the local roads, sewage systems, hospitals, school systems, etc. that would not have been built without public money and involvement.  Many of our fellow citizens look at teachers, cops, firefighters and all municipal and state workers as drags on the economy.  It has spawned an attitude that some how defines a job as a clerk in a private business as vastly more worthy and valuable than a job in the public sector.

The most damaging aspect of these beliefs is that it fosters hopelessness.  If the representation of the people in our democracy is useless, corrupt, and it deserves to be drowned, then where do people go from there?  It makes it much easier for the demagogues to convince people their problems are the fault of black people, gay people, women, Hispanic people, or the 47%.

I’m not saying a healthy skepticism about our government is necessarily a bad thing.  We need to be ever vigilant when it comes to protecting the Bill of Rights and holding the government accountable for the things it does in our name.  It is also truth that there have been very serious government screwups that have cost the taxpayers dearly.  Let me let you in on a little secret.  I worked in a highly sophisticated Fortune 300 company for 25 years and there were some mighty big screwups made in those 25 years.  That is because the world is a complex place and people are human.  Mistakes will happen and we need to hold people accountable in both the private and public sectors. But, that is entirely different from taking a position that government cannot benefit it’s people or that it needs to be stripped down to where it’s only function is to provide for the country’s military.  To take that position is to renounce democracy and turn the country over to the oligarchs, who will fill the vacuum and our country will move ever closer to a place that is run by the obscenely wealthy for the obscenely wealthy.

We have faced these challenges before.  Today our crumbling infrastructure, eroding education system and our need to develop clean energy sources once again call on us to respond.  Most importantly, the clock is ticking on climate change.  We will either address these issues or the American experiment will end. It won’t be members of the Walton family or the Koch brothers who step up to address our challenges.  It will, once again, be the people, through their government, who find our path for a better future.

Who?  Who let the grouch out?

¿Dondé Ésta La Carne?

After roaming around Mexico for a few months, spread over two trips, we decided to give South America a try.   It was early 1976 and once again, ignorance rode shotgun.

Gary, Pat and I thought we were going to a larger Mexico and packed our pup tents, sleeping bags, and foam pads, expecting to camp on the beaches as we had often done in Mexico.  We had no conception of the enormous size of the continent or its amazing diversity.

We made our way to Miami, and caught a flight to Barranquilla, Colombia. We found our first stop to be a noisy, dirty place.  Every night the sewers would back up, wetting the streets and causing the area around our hotel to smell like raw sewage.  There was a nicer section of town, but that was were the narco traffickers lived and we didn’t want to hang with those guys.

After a couple days we figured out our next destination and headed to Cartagena on the northern coast of Colombia.  Cartagena was founded in 1533 and its wealth made it a favorite site for pirates and privateers looking to sack and loot.  In the 17^th century, the city began 204 years of construction of walls and fortifications resulting in 6.8 miles of walls enclosing the city.   By the time we got there the city had grown outside the walls but the walls were still there enclosing the old section of the colonial city.

One day when were walking around the old part of the city, Pat was approached by a young man who suggested she carry her purse in a certain way if she wanted to avoid having it stolen.  As we talked with him we found out he was from El Salvador and was living illegally in Colombia.  He was the first of scores of people in Colombia who warned us to be vigilant if we were to avoid having everything we were carrying stolen.  He asked where we were staying and he suggested we move to a hotel he would show us later that evening.  Thankfully, he was an honest petty thief and he provided us with valuable information during our stay in Cartagena. 

Old Cartagena

That evening he took us to a nice, inexpensive hotel.  When we checked in we were given an itemized bill that included a sum for DAS.  When I inquired about that particular line item we were told that DAS was the federal secret police and by paying them up front we would be protected from their machinations. In effect, the hotel was a free zone where the clientele had a green light to ingest any thing they wanted without worrying the police would take notice. We would have a much closer encounter with DAS about a month later but that is a story for another post.

The next day, our new friend took us to a black market currency exchange.  Before we left he showed us a few tricks that were used by the moneychangers to cheat the rubes.  The black market was in an open field with individuals posted around it exchanging currencies from around the world.  The rate for dollars was a little better than the banks were offering.  We changed a small amount to be polite and not seem ungrateful to our new friend.

During our stay in Cartagena our “guardian angel” helped us out several times.  He proposed we join him in a couple of smuggling schemes but never seemed to mind when we declined.  He turned out to be the perfect tour guide for a lawless country where a lack of vigilance could have serious consequences.

While we were in Cartagena, the Palace of the Inquisition, which had been closed for a couple hundred years, was opened to the public.  We decided to go and as we got near the Palace, a small balding middle-aged man who wanted to be our guide approached us.  His English was sketchy, at best, and we weren’t inclined to hire him.  But he was a persistent bugger and his asking price was modest so we agreed to allow him to guide us through the museum.

The first room we entered was a display of native artifacts that had been used in religious ceremonies that included the use of cocoa (the base plant used in the production of cocaine).  There were little gold bowls and spoons and other paraphernalia and at each stop he felt it was necessary to explain that the utensils had been used to ingest cocaine, which he pronounced coca ca caine.  His eyes would get round and he would tell us for the tenth time that these things were used with the coca ca caine.  He then went on to explain why the church needed to kill a whole bunch of these folks to stop their religious ceremonies that included, of course, the use of coca ca caine.

After we looked at the coca ca caine exhibit we went into a room where the priests had determined who was a witch and who was a heretic.  The priests sat at an elevated bench, not unlike what you might find in a modern courtroom, where they had an excellent view of the festivities.  The could clearly see the vessel that suspected witches were thrown into to see if they floated or sank – floating was a bad sign.  There were also scales that were used to determine if a person’s weight was consistent with being a witch.  By an unfortunate coincidence, the witch weight was very much in the same weight range as the average Indian of those times.  There was also a large log that could be raised and then dropped on the heads of suspected witches to help them see the light.

There were your run of the mill thumbscrews and finger smashers, but the thing that really drew your eye was the rack.  The rack was a device that could be used to elicit testimony by tying the defendant’s four limbs to ropes that could then be tightened to give the person a few extra inches of height.  I don’t know if they ever stretched anyone beyond the acceptable size of a witch but knowing these fun lovers, I doubt anyone ever used this defense successfully.

The rack had a fifth rope that could be attached to the most sensitive part of the male body.  Gary kept asking our guide what the fifth rope was for.  Our poor guide tried all kinds of pantomimes, and broken English explanations but Gary kept faking incomprehension.  As our guide struggled to explain this most embarrassing rope, Gary ended the show by indicating he finally understood.  We demonstrated the appropriate horror, but I tucked away an idea for a late night TV ad for a male enhancement product.

The last stop on this grisly tour was the room that contained the ovens in which the poor souls who fell into the clutches of the priests were burned.  Something like 700 unfortunates met their fates in those ovens.  It was a sobering conclusion to our visit.  Why do the wonders of religion always require leaps of faith but the atrocities are all too real?

After about a week to ten days in Cartagena, we decided to head to Maracaibo in northwestern Venezuela.  We were going to Maracaibo at the invitation of a Venezuelan economics professor, I met in Madison when he was doing postgraduate work at the University.  We asked around about routes and were told we could take a bus to the border town of Maicao, cross there and then take another bus to Maracaibo.

Let me just take a minute here to tell you a little something about Maicao.  By the 1970’s, Maicao had become a commercial hub due to oil and drug smuggling.  In the late 70’s, Middle Eastern and Arab immigrants settled in the area.  In 2000, the FBI estimated that 70% of the commerce was controlled by Hezbollah.  In the 80’s, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia (FARC), a guerilla army that has waged armed conflict against the Columbian government for decades moved into the area and Maicao became a center for extortion, kidnapping and assassination.  In the 90’s, the good people of Maicao burned down the local equivalent of the IRS office in town and the government has had real struggles with collecting taxes there.  Currently the town is a center of black market weapons and money laundering.  At the time, we bought our bus ticket to Maicao, we were told local indigenous mafia gangs sometimes sprayed tourist’s cars with sub machine gun fire and then pulled out the bodies and drove away with the cars and their contents.  So, no problem, let’s go to Maicao.

A couple of hours into the trip the army stopped the bus, came aboard and did a cursory check of everyone’s belongings.  They ordered all the men off the bus and lined us up facing the bus with our hands over our heads.  A soldier began to frisk us.  When he got to me, I began to yell “naranja, naranja” because I had an orange in my jacket pocket.  I didn’t want the soldier to mistake the orange for a pineapple and order someone to start shooting.  There is something unnerving about being lined up in front of heavily armed young men that looked like they shaved once a month with a spoon. The soldier pulled the orange out of my pocket and handed it back to me.  Once everyone had been frisked, we were allowed back on the bus. 

Apparently, we had left the part of Colombia that was controlled by government forces and they were stopping vehicles to make sure no one was bringing any weapons to the FARC.  It struck me that they did not search the women.  There was one other American woman on the bus and after we were on the road again she came back and asked if she could sit with us.  She was visibly upset and told us that the man sitting next to her had pulled out a big revolver and placed it under her seat when the Army flagged down the bus.

About 7 hours later we pulled into Maicao.  As Gary was getting off the bus one of our fellow passengers shoved his hand deep into Gary’s pocket exploring for whatever he might find there.  Gary grabbed his wrist and pulled his hand out of his pocket.  Welcome to Maicao.  Once we were off the bus, we were surrounded by a small mob shouting names of hotels and offering to carry luggage.  While this was going on, others were eyeing our backpacks and making attempts to open zippered flaps and pockets.  The three of us turned our backs to each other in a protective triangle and moved over to an area where we could sit down and wait for our bus out of there.  From our perch we could see a main drag that had an open sewer running down the middle of the street.  People came out and dumped garbage directly into the sewer.  I have to admit that as a tourist destination, Maicao left something to be desired.  After we waited for a couple of hours, we were able to board the bus that would take us across the boarder and on to Maracaibo.

The first Europeans to arrive at the sight that would become Maracaibo were, of all people, Germans in 1499.  A series of bloody battles were fought which lead to the founding of the city in 1529.  The city had the honor of being sacked and looted in the 17^th century by Henry Morgan, the famous British admiral, privateer and pirate.  Coincidentally, Morgan also sacked Cartagena prior to reaching Maracaibo.

When we arrived in the mid seventies, Maracaibo was the second largest city in Venezuela and was known as the oil capital of South America.  The city sits on the north west coast of Lake Maracaibo and its climate is that of a dry tropical forest.

Maracaibo

When we arrived we checked into a hotel and then went to look for my professor friend at his university.  He was surprised to see us because, he told me, so many people from the U.S. said they would visit but almost no one ever actually made the trip.  He worked us into his busy schedule and spent time showing us around.  He arranged for us to have the use of the faculty “beach house” for a few days on Lake Maracaibo and introduced us to some students at the university.

While we were there, I noticed that the Aguilas del Zulia, Maracaibo’s professional baseball team, were in town and I expressed an interest in going to a game.  My friend had a prior commitment so he sent his nephew to accompany us to the game. Venezuela is a hotbed of baseball and for many years major league players traveled to Venezuela during the off-season in the U.S. to play in what is called “the Winter League.” Venezuela has produced many major league players and many of them returned and played at home during the winter.  So the quality of the play promised to be high and I wanted to experience going to game there.

We arrived shortly before the game started at a fairly modern stadium that held around 25,000 fans.  There was a good crowd on hand and both teams were sprinkled with names I recognized.  It was a beautiful night and our young host liked his beer, so we commenced drinking cans of Polar, the local brew with a slightly higher alcohol content than beer from the U.S.

Estadio Luis Aparicio El Grande Home of the Aguilas

The game was a close, low scoring affair with the visiting team pulling out to a two to nothing lead.  Around the fifth inning Gary decided to go get a hotdog at a stand in the stadium concourse.  Forgoing some of the more exotic Venezuelan condiments, he asked for his dog with “salsa de tomate solamente” (ketchup only).  When he got back to our seats he unwrapped his hotdog and found that the vendor had given him exactly what he had asked for – a bun with ketchup on it, but no hotdog.  It was a classic lost in translation moment and when we stopped laughing, our host told us he would take us to a place we could get hotdogs after the game.

Around the seventh inning, my big tank was full as a result of us averaging nearly a beer an inning.   I made my way down from our seats and located the men’s room.  As I approached it, I noticed that there was no light and there was about an inch and a half of water (at least I think it was water) on the floor.  It was so dark, that I could see people moving around in there but barely.  Now, I have been in some pretty horrendous bathrooms during my travels, both in the U.S. and elsewhere, but I was having a real tough time entering this dark sewer of a facility.  On the other hand, my teeth were floating and I really, really had to go.  As I surveyed the scene, I made a desperate decision and walked up to the outside wall of the restroom and proceeded to pee on the wall.  Almost instantly, no fewer than four men joined me.  The guy next to me looked at me, smiled and said, “Good idea.”  I finished as fast as I could (although those of you with big tanks know, it’s never as fast as you’d like) and hurried back to my seat, a much-relieved man.

In the eighth inning the Aguilas finally scored to make it 2 to 1.  The crowd went wild.  Beer was thrown in the air, firecrackers set off in the stands, and crowd came alive.  Unfortunately, the Aguilas didn’t score again and the home team went down to defeat.

With the game over, our attention turned to hotdogs again.  The nephew drove us to a park that had a wagon, similar to the popcorn wagons you see at festivals and other public gatherings here in Minnesota, only this wagon was devoted to hotdogs.  As our host turned to look in the backseat he asked how many dogs did we want?  We thought, four of us, four hotdogs should do it.  Our host got out of the car, went up to the front of the wagon and ordered our dogs.  When the order was ready he returned to the wagon and brought back sixteen hotdogs – four each.  Another hotdog related breakdown in communication.  I haven’t given you many travel tips in this blog, but I suggest caution when ordering hotdogs in South America or better still avoid hotdogs altogether when you travel.

Feeling we needed to be polite we ate all four of our hotdogs.  Our host then asked if we would like to go to a club to cap off the evening.  We agreed and when we arrived we were seated at a table, drink orders were taken, and a huge platter of meatballs and other tapas like items were put in front of us.  To my horror, Gary and Pat dug right in and ate like they hadn’t just eaten four hotdogs.  All I can remember is getting back to our hotel around 2:30am and thinking, “I can’t believe they ate the whole thing.”

South America is an amazing place.  We spent four months wandering around and barely scratched the surface.  To give you some inkling of its size, Brazil alone is geographically larger than the continental United States.  We were surprised at the diversity of the people we encountered.  One doesn’t think of a large Chinese population living in Colombia, but there they were, having lived there for generations.  We ran into people from a myriad of cultures and races.  The physical beauty of the countries we visited was often breath taking.  Each country was an interesting mix of the modern and the ancient.  The politics were volatile.  The government of Ecuador passed from one military junta to another while we were there after a prolonged transit strike and a day spent bombarding the presidential palace.  The indigenous people ranged from the Otavalo Indians, who are master weavers, merchants, and world travelers, to people who lived in the remote regions of the Amazon River basin and the Andes and spoke no Spanish.  Each country had its own distinct culture and history.  What I am trying to get at is how little we know about our neighbors in the Western Hemisphere.  I know many, many people who have traveled to Europe, the Middle East, or Asia, but can think of only two other people who have gone to South America.  I don’t know if the stars will ever align and I will return, but if it happens, I know it will be an interesting and enlightening trip.  I will avoid hotdogs.