Kabuki Kongriss

If the theater is where we go to pretend, then surely there is no more delusional stage than our Kabuki Kongriss. Last week the House passed a new financial regulation bill. The Democrats are pretending that it is actually meaningful reform. The Republicans (100% of whom voted against it) are pretending that they were saving America from bureaucratic strangulation. Both parties are pretending that the financial services industry didn’t really give members of Congress $344 million in the first nine months of 2009. That is an annualized average take of a little over $857,000 per member of the House and Senate. But of course this had no bearing on anyone’s role in either writing a toothless joke of a reform bill, or on voting against it to prove what a macho conservative one is.

But no worries; the Senate now gets to remove whatever meaningful provisions the bill contains before sending it back to the House. If the Senate can drag its feet long enough they may be able to get the financial lobbies to throw in an extra $100 mil or so.
Next up: pretend health care reform.

In other Congressional action, the Senate also began an investigation into the collegiate football playoff system. According to Jimmy Fallon, “In a related note, the NCAA has begun to explore options for getting out of Afghanistan.”

Joke of the Week: What is the difference between Santa Claus and Tiger Woods? Santa usually stops after three ho’s.

According to Gary Trudeau, “Twitter is the first rough draft of gossip.”

Finally, thank you all so much for your support of my new cowbell career. Who knew so many of you were into cowbelliana? The inside bell technique described by McRik was simply my attempt to recreate the sound that I hear inside my own head whenever I hear Joe Lieberman attempt to explain how he reached a particular political position.

One thing all the books tell you is that you need to have goals in order to have a happy and successful retirement, and I confess that I’ve been struggling in this regard. However, I am delighted to announce today that in January I will be enrolling in “The Bruce Dickenson Cowbell Academy,” located in beautiful Punta Mantua, Florida. It is now my dream to one day perform the cowbell trifecta of (Don’t) Fear the Reaper, Mississippi Queen and Time Has Come Today at Carnegie Hall -- accompanied by the Prowlers, of course.

The social season is really heating up now. I’m not sure when I’ll be back so let me wish you Happy Holidays now in case I fall off the map in an egg nog stupor. Going to Babbo tonight with Buzzard and a couple of hot ladies. Can’t wait to get on the outside of some BBQ sweetbreads.

More cowbell

How much more excitement can retirement offer than last night? It’s hard to imagine. I met McRik, BD, Richie, Marshall, Johnnie and Eddie - the Prowlers - at the upstairs bar at City Crab. We threw done a few oysters and a couple see-throughs before heading over to the Techline Basement Lounge where the band store their gear and hold their weekly practice sessions.

I love basement acoustics and Techline was sounding pure as the band tore through The Ballad of John and Yoko, Pretty Woman, Messin’ Around, and Makes No Difference. Then it was a couple of originals: Strange Love (I had her photograph - I had to tear it in half) and Prisoner of Love (a Prowler “greatest hit”).

Somewhere around this point in the evening McRik gave me the cowbell, a well-worn stick and a mandate to have at it. From there it was a joyous ride down sensory lane via What Does It Take, Wild Nights, Walkin’ the Dog, Live Forever, Tequila, and a big finish with I Don’t Need No Doctor.

It was a tight, twelve-number set. The first half was just a little weak for want of adequate cowbell, but we built to a strong finish. Tequila was my favorite as there was a cowbell solo. I am now lobbying to have (Don’t Fear) the Reaper added to their repertoire, as it is, of course, the sin qua non of cowbell-driven rock. The Prowlers will be at the Ace of Clubs on Great Jones Street in the Village on Saturday January 23rd. I will be back in Florida by then – not sure who will be on cowbell.

The absurdity of Afghanistan

According to the administration, we are staying in Afghanistan in order to protect the population from violence, establish a non-corrupt and functioning government, build a working infrastructure, provide a functioning education system, eliminate drug trafficking, and eradicate terrorists inside their borders.

We can’t even accomplish these goals in the United States.

Lying is the best medicine

Tiger Woods’ recent problems offer an opportunity to examine one of those things everyone knows is true. I speak of the principle that the only way to deal with an embarrassing laps in personal deportment is to “get out in front of it” and “come clean with the complete truth” before it is inevitably made public via a long, Chinese-water torture, process of daily embarrassing revelations.

Like most bits of common wisdom there is an element of truth here; in all likelihood holding back will keep the dogs digging for more bones, and they are going to find some, but let’s examine this more closely. First of all, who is it that is dispensing all this sage advice to the philanderers, dog killers and drug users of America? Members of the working media, people selling advice books and other “experts,” as defined by 25-year-old Good Morning America and the Today Show associate producers.

The “experts” say that Tiger should have come clean to them, which is just a bit of a conflict of interest, isn’t it? And really, how realistic is that advice? They would have had Tiger stepping in front of the cameras, while the Escalade was still resting on its side, fessing up to who-the-hell-knows-how-many extra marital affairs in advance of their discovery. This just isn’t the way the male mind works. Deny, deny, deny is DNA hard-wired in men’s brains as the only reasonable response. As Richard Pryor once claimed to have said to one of his wives when she caught him in bed with another woman, “Who are you gonna believe baby? Me or your lyin’ eyes?”

But let’s say one was able to overcome the power of genetics; is the advice actually any good? I say no. The experts think they got the best of Tiger because they uncovered 3-4 of his playing partners. Well, what if there we actually 25 of them? Don’t the undiscovered five foursomes potentially save him tens of millions on his newly renegotiated prenuptial agreement?

Then there is the argument that stonewalling the media will inevitably lead to a ruined public image and lessening of celebrity-driven earning power. This is clearly horse hockey. Buzzard and I were discussing the issue on the phone yesterday during the Florida-Alabama game, and here is a very partial list of celebrities who did not come clean after some sort of public indiscretion: Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson, Ray Lewis, David Letterman, Bill Clinton, Kobe Bryant, Rob Lowe, Alex Rodriguez, Hugh Grant, and Eddie Murphy. Crack a beer and make your own list. It will be twice as long as ours before the foam settles.

Are any of these guys wandering penniless in the wilderness? No. Letterman’s ratings actually went up after his partial non-apology. Kobe is King of the NBA. They all earn millions a year. With the exception of Slick Willie, the expert’s advice may actually be true for politicians, but I think that’s only because nobody likes them before they screw-up so there is no reservoir of good will to draw upon.

So take my advice. If you get caught at whatever, don’t talk to the media, don’t admit anything, take as long a vacation as you can to the most remote place you can find, and when you come back, pretend nothing ever happened - this is America where everything is forgotten sooner or later.

West Point Afghanistan speech

President Obama’s speech from West Point tonight was one of his best. He made a strong, logical argument, and even infused it with a little emotion – something he injects into most of his speeches too sparingly.

Never-the-less, I am not persuaded that we will accomplish in the next eighteen months what we have failed to accomplish in the past eight years, using less than half as many troops as we’ve had in Iraq.

What will Afghanistan be like in a year after we pull out? The appropriate analogy is that is will be changed just as much as the glass of water is changed once one removes a finger from it.

It was very hard to look at all the strong young faces in the West Point audience – literally the best America has to offer – without wondering which of them will leave life or limb in the Afghan mountains, trying in vain to prop up a corrupt government while fighting a ghost army.

The Bush administration left Obama with few choices – none of them easy – but I fear he is not choosing wisely. We need to get out of there now and rebuild this country. Every day we spend in Afghanistan we’re nothing more than the most effective recruiting agent for the Taliban and Al Qaeda.

A modern conversation

I got a text message from someone named Matt tonight.

Matt (9:08 PM) Wats good 5 5

me (9:12) wrong number

Matt (9:20) Dis ain't Jessica???

me (9:22) not even close

Matt (9:23) Dis Matt. who dis?

me (9:24) Dis a 60 year old man

Matt (9:25) Sorry about that sir
me (9:25) no prblm

Intelligent design

We’ve probably offended everyone’s political convictions on this blog by now, so let’s work on religion for a change. Somebody said more people have been killed in the name of religion than any other cause, and surely that is true. For this and other reasons, I don’t have much use for organized religion, but I’m much less sure what I think when it comes to the existence of God.

Surely for every person killed in the name of God, many more have been comforted by the knowledge that there is a God who loves them. There is so much evil in the world it is easy to discount the possibility of a benevolent, supreme being overseeing our lives, (much less accept the idea that “He needs your money” as George Carlin liked to remind us). Disbelief is the easy path; belief is hard work.

I have no ambivalence when it comes to teaching creationism or intelligent design in public schools however - that’s not the place for it – but I was listening to one of my favorite podcasts while humping away on the elliptical at the gym today and got to wondering about something.

“Studio 360” devoted the whole program to Darwin in honor of his 200th birthday. If there was ever anything you could characterize as intelligent design, wouldn’t it be evolution? It would be hard to imagine a more complex, elegant and logically structured system. Whether it was invented by God or just happened, it is certainly an intelligent design.

So why can’t evolution be the intelligent design certain Christians want to be taught in school? And why don’t scientists propose this idea? Wouldn’t it stop a lot of arguing and make society just a little more harmonious?