Category: Sardonic Side

For anyone running for president in 2008, the signs would typically be manifest by now. Parade Magazine references. Appearances on Sunday morning and late-night talk shows. Middle East travel. Encouraging Quinnipiac University poll numbers.

And a web site with lots of stuff for sale.

Obviously, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice must be in the hunt.

To be sure, there’s the Condi Rice for President 08 web site. But there’s much more than the requisite buttons, magnets, mugs, mouse pads and bumper stickers for sale. There’s also (honest) the Condi Rice for President 08 “Classic Thong” ($12.99), boxers ($18.99), trucker hat ($16.99), Christmas ornament ($9.99 – round or oval), infant creeper ($15.99) and dog tee-shirt ($19.99).

With free holiday shipping.

*Latest tactic among Palestinian women protecting besieged gunmen and trapped militants: offering themselves as human shields. Implicit is this message: “We trust you (Israelis) will observe rules of engagement that we are free to disregard.”

*If the wearing of the Muslim veil is a really, really controversial issue in places such as Muslim Egypt and downtown Cairo, is there any reason why it shouldn’t be in the West?

*The historically tolerant Dutch government continues to do an about-face, so to speak, on the issue of full-length veils like the Muslim burqa and other face-concealing apparel worn in public places. The Dutch now want them banned. Something about the fear that a terrorist might, well, don one to move beyond security checks and do something really, really unacceptable in a civilized society.

Lest they appear culturally intolerant, the Dutch also propose to ban ski masks as well. To date, however, no constituency has voiced an objection.

Say this for shrilly partisan Speaker-elect Nancy Pelosi, especially in the aftermath of the ham-handed fiasco of backing the ethically-challenged Jack Murtha for House Majority Leader. It’s obvious why she didn’t make a career out of her pre-politics calling: public relations consultant.

According to an annual survey by the “Chronicle of Higher Education,” presidents of some of this country’s biggest public universities are now closing the salary gap with their private school counterparts. In fact, the number of public university presidents earning more than $500,000 has nearly doubled to 42.

Not part of the survey: the degree to which college presidents had closed the salary gap with head football coaches.

Is there a more obnoxious sound in the morning – even if it doesn’t accompany your coffee, toast and morning newspaper – than that of a leaf blower?

Why is it that some of the nicer, posh even, restaurants in the area – where ambience is an obvious priority – persist in keeping a television on? Sure, it’s in the bar but typically it’s not enclosed, and its intrusive presence seeps into the dining area.

And why is it always tuned to ESPN2? Or, unbeknownst to the casual observer, is this where the monster truck and skate boarding crowds hang on a Saturday night?

Wasn’t there a time when a visit to the White House was pretty much reserved for a special class of honorees? Those of accomplishment – from the heroic to the scientific to the artistic. Think: John Glenn or Jonas Salk or Norman Rockwell. And to be sure, there have been luminaries from show business and the world of sports granted audiences as well. Think Bob Hope or Mark Spitz.

The sports theme, however, is now overdone and far transcends Olympians and Tour de France winners. Professional teams of every stripe now regularly parade their squads of millionaires – the ones who don’t have a conflict — through the White House.

And now it’s come to this.

The president of the United States recently agreed to meet with the latest (10) finalists of the “American Idol” competition.

It’s either a new low in the trivialization of a White House invitation or an acknowledgment that Taylor Hicks received more votes than George Bush, and the president could use the photo op.

Or both.

For the sake of argument, suppose there had been a 9/12 or 9/13 or some other terrorist-attack date already frozen in calamitous infamy. Can anyone not envision – at some point — this kind of account from a (Pulitzer Prize-winning) news story?

Sources tell (insert major national newspaper of record) that in the wake of the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, the United States didn’t avail itself of all the tools at its disposal to prevent a recurrence.

Sources, who requested anonymity, cite the failure to fully implement a surveillance program, under the aegis of the National Security Agency, which had the electronic wherewithal to monitor communications between people in the United States and overseas whenever terrorism was suspected. Moreover, it is also charged that the Administration failed to make maximum use of a financial-monitoring program that can scrutinize messages within an international database of money-transfer records.

“I’m shocked, shocked,” responded Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., “to learn that we haven’t done all we could have done to protect ourselves. Does it take a second atrocity for us to respond proportionately? That’s obscene.

“How do you tell the family members of all those who lost their lives from the dirty bomb in Los Angeles that we didn’t do enough to safeguard our own? How do you defend the rationale that the Administration apparently thought we were better off erring on the side of domestic civil liberties – even though the ultimate civil liberty is the freedom to remain alive? How do you explain that in an asymmetrical war with Islamic terrorists for whom death is martyrdom, we failed to utilize some of our most sophisticated, non-nuclear, pre-emptive weapons? How do you reconcile common sense with any of this? Is America’s epitaph going to be: ‘But we meant well?'”

According to Sen. Charles Schumer, D-NY., “This Administration, for all of its patriotic tough talk about the ‘War on Terror,’ is guilty of gross negligence and dereliction of duty in the defense of America’s homeland. As far as I’m concerned,” declared Schumer, “this is an impeachable offense, and the president of the United States has blood – Americans’ blood – on his hands. This is his watch – and he hasn’t been watching out for America. He cut and ran from his responsibility to protect the American people to the fullest extent possible.”

“In a time of war,” stated the Rev. Jesse Jackson, “we need a commander in chief – not a commander in grief. We are a great-nation – led by an abomi-nation.”

Then, again, maybe the media wouldn’t have handled it that way.

According to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta, Largo-based Ker’s WingHouse did not infringe on Hooters (trademark-like) trade dress. In other words, Hooters doesn’t have an exclusive on buxomly waitresses in tight shorts and tank tops.

It took a lawsuit to determine that?

You reach a certain point in life – after having seen and done some things – such that you feel qualified to not just pass on advice – but to codify it into rules. Here are some – thanks to the internet – and courtesy of Microsoft billionaire and philanthropist Bill Gates and comedian millionaire and societal scold George Carlin.

Gates’ “Rules for Life” are aimed at high school students. Basically, it’s what they did not — and will not — learn in any classroom. To wit:

*Life is not fair. Get used to it.

*The world won’t care about your self-esteem. The world will expect you to accomplish something BEFORE you feel good about yourself.

*If you think your teacher is tough, wait ’til you get a boss.

*Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity. Your grandparents had a different word for burger flipping. They called it opportunity.

*Before you were born, your parents weren’t as boring as they are now. They got that way from paying your bills, cleaning your clothes and listening to you talk about how cool you thought you were. So before you save the rain forest from the parasites of your parents’ generation, try delousing the closet in your own room.

*Life is not divided into semesters. You don’t get summers off and very few employees are interested in helping you FIND YOURSELF. Do that on your own time.

*Be nice to nerds. Chances are you’ll end up working for one.

Carlin’s acerbic, updated “New Rules for 2006” include, with some sanitization, these observations:

*Stop giving me that pop-up ad for classmates.com! There’s a reason you don’t talk to people for 25 years. Because you don’t particularly like them! Besides, I already know what the captain of the football team is doing these days: mowing my lawn.

*Don’t eat anything that’s served to you out a window unless you’re a seagull.

*If you need to shave and you still collect baseball cards, you’re a dope. If you’re a kid, the cards are keepsakes of your idols. If you’re a grown man, they’re pictures of men.

*Competitive eating isn’t a sport. It’s one of the seven deadly sins. ESPN recently televised the US Open of Competitive Eating, because watching those athletes at the poker table was just too damned exciting. What’s next? Competitive gas-passing? Oh wait. They’re already doing that. It’s called “The Howard Stern Show.”

*When I ask how old your toddler is, I don’t need to know in months. “27 months.” “He’s two” will do just fine. He’s not a cheese.

And here’s one more, this one attributed to the late holistic health guru, Dr. Bernard Jensen : “Life is short. Make it wide.”