Whataboutism

After church Sunday, had lunch with my sister, her husband, and my nephew, Ryan. The usual Sunday lunch banter was exchanged. Then Ryan launched into a classic demonstration of the latest fad in political conversation sweeping the nation...whataboutism.

Whataboutism is designed to end uncomfortable discussions about partisan politics by invoking that time honored characteristic of politicians over the past several millennia...hypocrisy and her twin sister, inconsistency, and their first cousin, the double standard. Only, it never actually does end an uncomfortable discussion, it only makes it more frustrating. Here's how it works:

Frustrated Republican: I hate the press. They are so over the top critical of ______. They pick apart every single word _______ says and try to twist it around. It's so infuriating!!

Frustrated Democrat: But, whatabout when _______ was President? Fox News twisted everything that came out of his mouth into something horrible. I didn't hear you complaining about that!!

Frustrated Republican: That's not even close to being the same thing! And whatabout how your liberal media buddies hated George W. Bush? They were on a vendetta against him for eight years!

Frustrated Democrat: You want to talk about vendettas?? Whatabout the vendetta the Republicans had against Bill Clinton?! Newt Gingrich trying to impeach the man over that Lewinsky thing at the very same time when he was having an affair himself!

Frustrated Republican: Are you kidding me?? The press did everything in their power to protect that pervert. Whatabout how they always hid JFK's womanizing from the people? Democrats...always protecting their own!

.......................................................three days later........................................................................

Frustrated Republican: I can't believe you're blaming Adam for that Garden of Eden thing!! Whatabout Eve? If it hadn't been for her weakness, everything would have been fine. Typical, man-hating feminist!

Frustrated Democrat: You pathetic patriarch-loving misogynist! Whatabout God's role in all of this, huh?? Why did he have to create man first?!

So, yeah...as a debating tactic, whataboutism is a dodge, an attempt to change the subject, to reengage the rhetorical battle on more favorable ground. Instead of dealing with the topic at hand, it's an attempt to point out equal or even more egregious examples of the failings of the other side. Everyone does it. As a result, no political argument ever changes anyone's mind. No one in America is persuading anyone of anything. We're all just trying to win the exchange. Everyone is floundering around in search of a mic drop moment, but few ever find one.

My pastor tried valiantly yesterday to give us some sage advice, by sharing something quite profound. Live your life seeking to understand, rather than seeking to be understood.

.....But whatabout......

Is Hollywood Out Of Ideas?

Cinebistro is our preferred movie house. Actually, it would be more accurate to say, our only movie house. Sure, it's expensive, but there are no kids, the floor is never sticky, and the food is out of this world. So, I was toying with the idea of taking my wife to a movie this evening. The six screens at Cinebistro are currently filled thusly:

Wonder Woman
Wonder Woman 3D
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales
Baywatch
Alien: Covenant
Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 2

In other words...Hollywood is out of ideas.

Ok, this lineup of films could be referred to as the revenge of the remake. You've got Wonder Woman, the latest in a long line of comic book..pardon me, graphic novels movies. This one, a reworking of a 70's television show. The only thing unique about this seems to be the fact that the hero is a woman and her first name isn't Chris.

The interminable Pirates of the Caribbean franchise returns for like the 16th time defying all explanation other than the fact that this is Hollywood's valiant and determined effort to keep Johnie Depp off food stamps.

Of course, then there's Baywatch, the answer to the question that absolutely no one was asking...When will Hollywood put The worst television show of the 1990's on the big screen?? This Show, best known for it's tight shots of female breasts bobbing up and down in slow motion, was actually begging to be made into a movie. With the technological advancements made over the last twenty years with HD and digital photography, I'm sure the bobbing boobs scenes will be off the charts.

Alien Covenant returns in its latest iteration, in a vain and pointless attempt to improve on the original. How many times can you watch a human being giving birth to a terrifying alien creature without eventually yawning?

I understand that this Guardians of the Galaxy thing is another graphic novel brought to life, and it has a Chris in it. But the emotional heavy lifting will be done by Vin Diesel playing someone named Groot. Luckily for the people at Disney, Mr. Diesel was available to take the part, as he had just wrapped up his turn as Hamlet at the Royal Shakespeare Company, and had some time to kill before playing Othello in the fall.

But seriously, these were my choices. Two comic book pictures, a sequel of a sequel of a sequel of a movie based on a ride at Disneyworld, a television show remake, and a sci-fi sequel.

I think I'll read a book.

Bill Maher's Bad Word

Bill Maher is all over my Twitter feed this morning. I'm not entirely sure who, or more precisely what he is. Sure, I know he has a show called Real Time on HBO which I don't watch. The only time I hear about him is when he says something unconventional enough to generate controversy, no small feat in today's America. What I'm not sure about is what he actually is, a comedian or a semi-serious political commentator? Since I don't watch the show, I'm not in a position to answer the question. Many of the controversial subjects I've heard him speak unconventionally about tend to be about serious business...hence the confusion.

Anyway, Mr. Maher has stepped in it, and suddenly the first amendment lynch mob has moved on from Kathy Griffin. (Hmmm, perhaps a little left wing pundit collusion???). See, I'm not even sure that lame attempt at a joke is accurate. Some of the opinions voiced by Maher on Islam, for example, seem positively neo-conish. It's all so very confusing.

Ok, so back to the topic at hand. On last night's show, Maher was interviewing Senator Ben Sasse from Nebraska. The Senator has written a book extolling the virtue of physical, manual labor (among other things) as a character building tool for the youth of America. During the interview, there was a light hearted exchange about how Mr. Maher needed to get out of his east coast elite bubble and come visit the Great Plains. The Senator said that they would welcome him to Nebraska with open arms and even maybe put him to work "in the fields." Since the subject of this interview, and his book was the morally therapeutic benefits of manual labor, and Nebraska is widely known for it's farming economy, this was an understandable attempt at humor, to which, out of freaking nowhere, Maher says, " Work in the fields? Senator, I'm a house nigger."

Uh-oh...This may not end well.

Although the rules about using the N-Word have more amendments and codicils than a Hollywood divorce decree, generally speaking, white people need to avoid this word at all times. Nothing good comes from its use. It's one of those words that is loaded with so much baggage, so much pain, it should be permanently banished from our collective vocabularies. My mother made this painfully aware to me when she happened to hear it come flying out of my mouth when I was ten years old. First, she lectured me about how hateful and ignorant it was, then launched into a quick bible study review of the evils of the tongue, and then (because it was 1968 and she was Betty Dunnevant) she "tanned my hide" with the closest stick she could find. Suffice it to say...lesson learned!!

Already, there are calls to cancel his show. Twitter is in a righteous fury, mostly from the left but also from some conservatives who want to be consistent after a week of calling for the head of Kathy Griffin,(sorry). So, what is a libertarian like me supposed to do?

I generally don't want anyone censored for words spoken. Calls for boycotts and cancellations seem juvenile to me, and vaguely Un-American. Land of the free, and all that. However, when I hear someone throw this particular word around, it does inform me about a great many things. If I were at a party and just met someone and were having an introductory conversation with them and they were to suddenly drop the N-Word during that conversation...I would instantly disengage, and probably say something like, Wait...what the hell is wrong with you, man? Their use of this sort of language tells me everything I need to know about them, primarily that there is a profound emptiness in their heart, and that they are someone who I no longer desire to be associated with. However, my next step would not be to begin a Facebook/Twitter campaign urging everyone who knows them to shun them from society. I mean, who died and placed me in charge?? In Maher's case, I now know more about him than I did before, and it ain't good. So, lesson learned. No Real Time With Bill Maher for me. Time to move on to the next outrage.

I hope he gets to keep his show, that he doesn't lose his livelihood because of a spoken word. But, I also hope that fewer and fewer people watch it, and eventually the free market votes his show away. Isn't this the same thing? If you think so, you completely don't understand the First Amendment. But it's not just you, there's a lot of that going around.

Stupid Metabolism...

Six weeks ago, I went on a diet. I'm 59. I've never, ever been on a diet. Mostly, this is because I've never piled on the weight. Thirty five years ago I was 185 pounds and for most every year since I've fluctuated between 185 and 190. The other reason I've never been on a diet is because I love food, and launching myself into some project that conspires to limit my access to food always seemed...well, stupid.

Suddenly, around a year ago I noticed that I was putting on weight. I wasn't doing anything differently. I was eating all the same stuff, still faithfully putting in my 3-4 workouts at the gym every week. But for some inexplicable reason, everything changed. A couple of months ago I stepped on the scale and was astonished to see the green digital number...203.4 blinking back at me. What was this outrage?? Surely our old scale was defective. But later, at the gym, their much newer, shinier scale confirmed the sad news. Actually, the reason for my weight gain wasn't inexplicable at all. For years, whenever one of my buddies would complain about gaining weight, I would pat my belly and say something obnoxious like, "You see this svelte physique? I got two words for you, my friend...superior metabolism!!" 

Uh...no longer. It would appear that Middle Age has caught up to me. So, I went on a diet.

It involves this app called My Fitness Pal, a truly annoying name for a diet if ever there was one. No, a diet is not my pal, buddy, or friend. It is this ruthless, demanding, 24/7 buzzkill that stalks me day in and day out, doling out guilt by the truckload every time I even look sideways at a donut. For the first several weeks of this purgatory, Pam did all the heavy lifting with the meal planning and such. I faithfully entered all of my meals into the fiendish app, appalled at what I learned about the quality of my diet. Note: I consume enough sodium on a daily basis to give my entire neighborhood high blood pressure. If I ever looked over my shoulder at Sodom, I wouldn't turn into a pillar of salt...because I already am one! But after the initial logging everything in phase, eventually I stopped logging in at all. But, I still stayed on the diet in one important way, I stopped eating so dang much food!! Smaller portions, better stuff, no snacks between meals. That's the extent of my diet right now...not stuffing so much food in my pie hole. Not very scientific, but when I stepped on the scale this morning, the blinking green number said, "192.8"

Of course, here's how this works. During the week, from Monday morning until Friday afternoon, I take great care to demonstrate restraint. I'm careful. I hit the gym pretty hard. But then the weekend comes and, well...man does not live by bread alone, people. We eat out a couple of times, or even worse, go visit the kids where we eat out a lot. So, essentially, every weekend I gain back 2-3 pounds.  It's one of those two steps forward, one step back sort of things. But, that's ok. The overall line still heads down, and that's all that matters. But, I gotta tell ya...I do love the weekends!

My goal when this all started was to get down to 190. Three more pounds to go.

Who am I kidding? I am fighting a rear guard action here. Stupid metabolism. For the rest of my life it's going to be a battle to keep the weight off. Right now I'm winning...a little. But, I know that losing some battles is just around the corner. I'm one encounter with a food truck away from a huge setback. You ever see me walking into a Brazilian steak house and you'll know that all bets are off.

Kathy Griffin and My Dilemma.

Just when I thought there was literally no form of Trump bashing that was unacceptable in America, a Hollywood D-lister comes along and proves me wrong. Thanks to Kathy Griffin, I now know that holding up a bloody, beheaded image of someone who is a dead ringer for the President, is beyond the pale. I mean sure...there was that Bush head on a spike image in Game of Thrones a few years back, but that was clearly an artsy thing, and it was George W. Bush for crying out loud. This severed, beheaded Trump thing was different. It looked an awful lot like something ISIS would have produced, only with better lighting. Nevertheless, the reaction was swift and bipartisan, conservatives and liberals, united in their disdain for Griffin's gag. Good.

I will now attempt to give voice to a nagging concern I have about the current state of American politics. It's an observation that has been slow to develope, but over time has picked up steam up there in the vast empty spaces of my gray matter. Here goes:

I take a back seat to no one  when it comes to my frustration with the Vaudvillian dumpster fire that is the Trump presidency. I have written of my views of the man many times in this space. I take back none of it. But, most of you also know of my other bedrock political belief, which is a congenital distrust of establishment politicians. I believe that in America there exists a permanent class of oligarchs, a bipartisan gang of apparatchiks who have been made rich by government, and who have a vested interest in keeping and hoarding all the status in status quo. Who are some examples of these people? In no particular order...Mitch McConnell, Paul Ryan, John McCain, Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer, Lindsey Graham, Diane Feinstein, Chuck Grassley, Dick Durbin. Everyone of these people, and others like them, are united by one thing...their white hot hatred of Donald Trump. This is the seed of the idea that is troubling me. As much of an unstable, embarrassment as Trump can be, he sure has all of the right enemies. Sure, it might be the broken clock theory at work here...no matter how moronic someone might be, the law of averages says that at some point they will be right about something, after all, a broken clock is still right twice a day. I sure hope that's what it is. Otherwise, I am faced with the possibility that what unites all of these establishment gadflies is their fear that Trump is a threat to their privilege and power. Who is this unrefined outsider who thinks he can waltz in here and bust up our racket?? So, I've got to decide which is worse, having a tweeting, vulgar, narcissist in the White House, or perpetuating an oligharchy which has enriched itself lustily at the public trough while wracking up 20 trillion dollars worth of debt for the rest of us to deal with? Is the enemy of my enemy really my friend?

Of course, a third option is out there on the far edge of the table...the blood-sucking, establishmentarians and Donald Trump are equal disasters. In which case, we're screwed..and will the last person in Washington please turn out the lights on your way out?

A Fallen Star

This is a difficult image. It's hard for me to look at full on, eye to eye. And I'm not even a Tiger Woods fan.

When this story broke earlier today, I wasn't surprised. After all, Mr. Woods has been on a slow fade into oblivion since his spaceship of a life came crashing down to earth nine years ago, that fateful night in Florida, his crumbling body surpassed only by his crumbling reputation. Still, this picture still shocks.

In his prime, I didn't care for him. He was just too good. Funny how that happens in sports. We say  that we want excellence in our athletes, but what we mean is occasional excellence...not too much. The very best are always hated by at least as many people as love them. Tom Brady, Lebron James, Barry Bonds, Tiger Woods. Everyone of them has a legion of haters out there gleefully cheering every mistake, denigrating every accomplishment. Today, Google any story about this DUI arrest and you will see a comment section dominated by people positively giddy at his latest humiliation. But, when I read the story and then look into the eyes of this once great athlete, I am overcome by sadness.

Yes, yes...I know. Tiger Woods made a fortune selling a lie to the world. He carefully crafted a wholesome, family man image that allowed him to sell us everything from wristwatches to Buicks. His was the story of prodigy made good through tenacious competitiveness and a work ethic forged into his DNA by his USArmy officer father. Here was natural talent wed to hard work. How could he not be great? But, there was always around Tiger Woods an air of arrogance, an off putting cockiness vibe. It's why I always rooted for whoever he was paired with on Sunday. That was actually the only time I bothered to watch golf on television...to see Tiger get beat. I wasn't alone. There were millions of us, and without Tiger those millions of eyeballs are watching something else on Sundays.

But even I had to admit that I had never seen anything like him before. I'm old enough to remember watching Jack play. He was great. I never watched Arnie, my favorite golfer, when he was in his prime. I saw a little of Gary Player, a lot of Tom Watson and Seve Ballesteros. They were all great. But none of them were Tiger woods great. Nobody hit the kinds of shots that Tiger hit. Nobody made as many clutch putts as Tiger Woods made. He was a phenomenon.

And now, it is all in pieces, his life seemingly ground into a fine dust, and his fall from grace has been as deep as his ascent had been steep. The four back surgeries have taken his game away, and his reckless personal behavior has destroyed his marriage. Now, his deshelved hair, unkempt beard and bulging, bloodshot eyes are plastered across every computer and television screen the world over, his epic disintegration laid bare.

I cannot take any pleasure from such a sight. I will not rejoice in such a thing. I can only pray that God will place someone in the man's life who can help him recover, help him pull himself out of the mire.

I am now a Tiger Woods fan.

The Eternal Search

I've just spent the last hour and a half doing the same thing I do every year about this time. As soon as  the Memorial Day weekend comes around, something draws me to my computer, where I find myself Googling Mid-Coast Maine lake houses. I blame my wife. If I had never met her I would have had no reason to ever set foot in Maine. I could have avoided this obsessive compulsion to be there when warm weather arrives.

A couple of years ago I made the decision that buying a lake house in Maine was a stupid idea. Even if we lived there all summer, (which we would), it would still be a stupid idea because my kids and my future grandkids wouldn't be able to afford flying up every summer. They wouldn't be in a position to visit for a month at a time, like they do in the fevered dreams of my imagination. No, we decided that renting a place for a month every summer was a better plan. Last year it was a beautiful house on Hobbs Pond, this year it will be an even more beautiful place on Quantabacook Lake. And yet, every year, I search the listings. Maybe I'll find the place that has my name on it, the place that I can pass on to my family when I die. Every year, they will all gather there for a couple of weeks in the summer and sit around the fire at night telling stories about me. In this way, I will live on, never leaving their hearts and minds. It would be the Dunnevant family compound and we would all vote on an awesome name for the place. The Bush's have the Bush Compound in Kennebunkport with 24/7 secret service protection. We would have the Dunnevant Compound on Megunticook with major plumbing headaches and a really annoying caretaker. But still...it would be ours.

But, it's just too far away. The trip from here to there is too long, hard and dangerous.

So, we rent a place every summer, which belongs to someone else, and is full of their memories. We Dunnevantize the place for a month and pretend that it's ours, and it actually works quite well. Then Memorial Day comes and I type in Mid-Coast Maine lake houses, obeying some primal urge within my heart which will not be denied.

Oh...here's one, three bedrooms, two baths, on Frye Island in the middle of Sebago Lake accessible only by ferry...an absolute steal at $475,000.

Hmmmm......