Smokytown

Making Lists

     To compensate for failing eyesight that might terminate this blog, a loyal reader has made a helpful suggestion:  instead of the long-winded blogs, she thought I could save wear and tear on my eyes by posting lists with short bodies. She said that she got the idea from glancing at covers of magazines on bookstore racks. Many of them have lists like "8 Ways to Protect Your Heart," or, "10 Ways to Lose 300 Pounds." These attention-grabbers often lead to increased sales. She said often males have short-attention spans and find the lists appealing. What red-blooded macho man could pass up--"This month's  three worst men--Don Imus for sticking his big foot in his racist mouth again; Charlie Black, chief advisor to John McCain, for saying another terrorist attack on American would help elect John president; and Justice Scalia for passing a law to allow loaded guns in homes. Let's hope he doesn't visit a friend's home where rowdy kids are running around with their daddy's loded guns, playing Cowboys and Italians." By the way, can you guess what public servant spends the most taxpayers' money on his private travels?

                         Test List

     Let's test the idea by listing some suggestions from other loyal readers.

     #1 -  The end? Say it ain't so, Dusty Rogue. I have enjoyed them so much, even if they were something of a one-way street. Can the blog be dictated? Is speech recognition software a possibility?Your readership might not have been large, but what it read was always great. --Frisco Richie

     #2 - So sorry to learn that the macular degeneration has worsened. Helen and I enjoyed reading your and  the editor's war stories. Your writing, which is continually passionate, jocular, socially redeeming and interesting, will be greatly missed. Perhaps you could limit your missive to one page, in the interest of keeping it going longer. --Pedro

     #3 - I'm so sorry that the black mac has affected the other eye. May the laser treatment restore your sight. What will I do without your railing on about the wretched state of our politics! Hang on through November, at least!  --Karl the Actor

     #4 - I've enjoyed reading your war stories - history fascinates me and the war stories even bring me closer to my dad, go figure! I really hope you will continue to write, even now and then - it is a wonderful way for you to connect to all your friends around the world! --Pam

    #5 - I enjoyed reading the embers from Smokeytown. Needless to say, I miss you. On Memorial Day it's appropriate to thank a veteran...and the veteran I have chosen to thank is YOU. Yeah, yeah, sure, for the obvious - the service to this great country of ours, but most of all, for your continued wit and humor - always that familiar Firari-slant to it - sometimes subtle but always with the trade-mark Firari-edge! So my chosen Vet, I thank you for all your contributions - be they military or the humorous printed word - each in its own way was most appreciated. I will pray that your eyes hold up because I'm not done reading Smokeytown - and the emails you send. Know that you are loved and admired. --Jan

     #6 - Let's lump the males together since they are by nature, not loquacious. The Modest Editor volunteered to help out with editing if necessary, and then added,"Oh say can you see?" Prof Z: "Well, I guess all good things must come to an end."

                         More on lists

      I've been trying to remember some of the most important lists. When Moses came down from the mountain, he held up three stone tablets and said to his followers, "Behold, the Lord has given you 15 commandments!" CRASH! He then said,"Behold, He has given you 10 commandments!"

      That is the best list. One of the worst lists, of course, is George Carlin's "seven dirtiest words." Those words are--oops I just ran out of paper! George joined the long line of famous people who died in June of 2008. The month started on a bad note with the announcement that Ted Kennedy had cancer of the brain. He was followed by sportscaster Jim McKay and Tim Russert, and Big Brown dead last in the Belmont. His jockey was heard to say near the end of the race, "A horse, my kingdom for a horse!" No, that's wrong--his defeat was caused by a nail in the hoof or lack of steroids. But that is nothing in comparison to the loss of life from tornadoes in the old Dust Bowl, the burning of homes in the horrendous fires along the West Coast, and whole towns wiped out by floods.

     Let me share with you a passage from "Triple Play," taken from Ten Unusual Plays. One character says, "I have been giving more thought about finding God in nature. Do you remember those devastating floods in 1993 along the Mississippi River? Homes, villages, crops were all washed away. I think in the middle of the disaster, God was in one little town in Illinois. The town was lost, but God was found."

     Another character  asks, "And what did God look like?"

     Character number one says, "It's not what was seen, but what was felt.  You may remember that inmates of a boot camp, mostly Black and Hispanic, street kids who have committed non-violent crimes, were sent to Nashota to fight against the river. They expected to be called the usual ugly names, but found a friendly people, all endangered, but all helping one another. The inmates pitched in, filled sandbags, and tried to strengthen the levee for days and nights without sleep. And they learned how to smile because as they said: 'We're saving lives. We're gonna save the town.' On the last night, the women who had grown fond of the street kids made supper for them at the church, but they wouldn't eat because they didn't save the town. Later, back at the boot camp, the inmates were trying to hide their tears over a card with a picture of roses and signed by their new friends with the message: 'With warmest thanks to each of you from your Nashota family. You'll never be forgotten. God's grace - extended."

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This collection of plays and the children's book, Big Scare in Small Town, can be purchased at the Painter and the Poet Gallery, 307 North Main Street, Culver, Indiana 46511 or at www.painterandpoet.com. Esther, the store owner and book illustrator is a talented watercolorist, a wonderful friend, and at the top of my list.

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War Story - Part II

             MEMORIAL DAY

As we pay tribute to those who made the ultimate sacrifice in our wars, it is appropriate to publish the second part of the Modest Editor's World War Two story. a harrowing account of his journey across the Mediterranean from Oran to an Italian beach head. In the first half, he describes the trip on a rickety ship that served rancid rations and with an overload of traveling companions-- a goat-eating Hindu crew and a horde of rats in the sleeping compartment.

                (Continued from last blog)

We reached the rendezvous on a September morning marked by a sullen sky and sea. Liberty ships and various landing craft, all wearing battleship gray, moved slowly in a vague ellipse as destroyers and other menacing warships tore through the waves off the perimeter of the oval, guarding against marauding U-boats.

As old Koroa clumsily approached, an over sized, sleek launch, with signal flags flying and radar device revolving, sailed smartly toward us, evidently to assign our old tub to its place in the line of vessels that were soon to turn toward the Italian land mass. But our ugly ship, looking as alien to its surroundings as a hobo in high society, had yet to show its scorn for the whole show. Korea’s moment was to come presently.

      The launch was the flagship for the multi-striped invasion naval commander, and its appearance befit its lofty assignment: a beautiful craft in every respect, it gleamed from prow to taffrail. Its superstructure held a mass of important looking antennae, horns, bells, signal lights and searchlights among the signal flags. A tall officer with a craggy face stood on the bridge, loud-hailer at the ready, as the craft maneuvered crisply to come alongside our homely black cattle boat. Only after this splendid craft had narrowed the gap to a couple dozen yards did the elements of disaster become apparent.

      When Koroa departed the North African port, a command from the bridge had ordered the routine belaying of all cargo booms amidships, but somehow one spar still extended over the port side. And as luck would have it, the neglected cargo boom lay directly in the path of the fast approaching cutter. Suddenly a klaxon sounded aboard the Navy vessel and a string of unintelligible, highly amplified commands squawked from its bridge. Koroa’s  cargo boom smashed into the cutter’s superstructure, sweeping much of the signaling and navigational apparatus, together with the mast that held it, into the sea.

      The Navy craft sped past Koroa, but not before the tall American had screamed a string of pithy oaths at his counterpart on our bridge. In turn, the red-faced Briton vented his own outrage, shouting strong epithets in Hindi at the dark-skinned deck hands cowering below him.

     As Koroa lumbered toward its place in the invasion lineup, the offending cargo boom finally was swung out of harm’s way amidships. But the deed was done.

      As a ragtag platoon of American soldiers, on leaving French North Africa we had felt our role in the invasion scheme of dubious utility. To be sure, we had rifles, ammunition and rations, but all of our armored vehicles were on the Liberty ships. What could we do after landing on the beachhead but idly wait the three or four days it would take to land our heavy equipment?

      But ours was not to reason why. As Koroa’s turn came, the old freighter pulled into the invasion staging zone a couple of miles off the beach. We climbed down a cargo net to the deck of a slim LCI (Landing Craft, Infantry) that had tied up alongside our ship, surprisingly, without incident.

      The LCI then carried us close to the beach. When in water shallow enough for wading ashore, the LCI halted and the American troops, laden with full packs, gas masks, rifles and steel helmets, soon were on sandy Italian soil without looking back in the direction of old Koroa.

      Our officers had arrived before us. A German torpedo had sunk one of the Liberty ships, but all members of our company aboard the vessel were rescued from the sea unhurt.

      Why were we on the beachhead? On the California and Arizona deserts we had trained as Ordnance troops. Before learning to snatch disabled tanks from the battlefield, we ran an ASP - Ammunition Supply Point, or “ammo dump.” That was our mission in the first stages of the Italian invasion.

           - - - - - - - - - - -

     I hope this war story and other ones by the Modest Editor will make their way into the Library of Congress. Naturally, not all war stories deserve this honor. There were those who faked physical injury to gain 4-F status so that they could not be drafted. Others avoided battle action by claiming to be conscientious objectors. The most famous was Olaf, a literary creation of E. E. Cummings. His comrades tortured Olaf in many different ways to force him to fight, among them having his head pushed down into a latrine commode. At one point, close to death, he raises his head and says"  "There is some sh- - I will not eat."  Gradually transformed into a Christ-figure, "he was more brave than me, more blond than you."

             POSTSCRIPT

     Speaking of the end, I may have to close out my blogging. That Old Black Macular Degeneration has both eyes in its spell, and unless YAG, laser surgery, changes my eyesight radically, I will have to throw in the towel. Since I never developed a wide readership, the end of my blog will not be a great loss. I certainly appreciate the encouragement of a few loyal readers and contributors like Herodotus, Doc, the Actor,  Pedro, the Prof, and, of course, the Modest Editor. If anyone knows where there is a Home for the Blind in an interesting environment, let me know.

     I may do a short piece, now and then, "as I rage, rage into the dying light." Goodbye and good luck.

    

Army Story - WW II Part 1

The Modest Editor will be the guest blogger this month. Bill is not by any means a shy person--if you've ever met an editor you'll know what I mean. I used to write book reviews for Bill's publication and am still considered a low man on the totem pole. A professional will not stoop to the level of an amateur blogger. If he wishes to identify himself, all he has to do is send a comment to Smokytown.

As a combat veteran of WW II, Bill is a special commodity these days, since the ones still living are dying off at the rate of a thousand per day. Their war stories should be saved for posterity by being ensconced in the Library of Congress before it's too late. Bill experienced some very violent action in Italy, and in this story, he tells how he left Oran, North Africa, and took an interesting cruise to a beachhead in Italy.

      War Story - Part One

Steaming slowly away from Oran, Koroa was an antiquated, stubby freighter seemingly bent on spoiling any scene it happened upon. Reputedly the oldest ship on the cattle run between India and England before the war, Koroa stood in sharp contrast to the other vessels in the convoy heading northeast across the Mediterranean to the beachhead south of Salerno. Judging from its bulky lines and lumbering speed, Koroa predated the First World War by a decade or more.

Its hull, cabins and fittings all were painted black. British officers in starched white uniforms commanded a Hindu crew. The deck hands, slender, nimble fellows who swung among the rigging in the manner of acrobats, wore baggy garments of blue cotton cinched at the waist by a rope. Their dark skin and long black mustaches set off glistening white teeth. Packs of rats scurried below desks. The British officer staff occupied forward cabins, and the Hindus curled up for sleeping on mats on the open deck.

There the Indians tended a pen of goats which, according to the dictates of their religion, the crewmen butchered as needed for meals of fresh mutton, and chapitas made of corn that they milled by hand on the deck planking and baked with the meat in smoky braziers.

       As cargo, our platoon of American soldiers unrolled our sleeping bags in the cattle stalls below, creating a stir among the rats. Somehow we slept the first night, although fitfully, with the awful creatures running over and among us. On the second day at sea the British gave us sailors’ hammocks to string over the cattle stalls. The hammocks kept us out of reach of the hungry rodents -- a godsend.

The British officers of course had their own mess. We hadn’t the vaguest notion of what was on their dinner plates. While the Hindus ate mutton and corn cakes, most of us in the hold were driven by hunger to tear open our “K” rations. Each soldier had been told he would need to save the “K” rations for his first days on the beachhead.

None of our company’s officers were aboard Koroa. All six were parceled out to the three Liberty ships that carried our tanks and trucks and the rest of the other enlisted men -- so who could we ask where to find food? None of the American soldiers on Koroa were told of the arrangements for their transport. We learned we were headed for the western coast of Italy only a day or so before landing there.

Each “K” ration pasteboard carton held a small flat can of cooked, ground pork, another tin of bland processed cheese, a package of three virtually tasteless biscuits, a small fruit bar and a drink _ alternately instant coffee grounds, cocoa powder, or lemon flavored crystals to be mixed with water. The “K” ration meal seemed designed to intensify one’s hunger; that was its effect on the U.S. Army troops on board Koroa.

We weren’t quite hungry enough to approach the fiercely visaged Indians to barter for food. But the British, on the second day after our departure from North Africa, came to our aid as we were tearing into the last of the “K” rations. Presumably, the British officers took it upon themselves to save us from starvation. Who was to know? Maybe they had agreed to provide food for us from the onset of the voyage. At any rate, not one of us about criticize the steps taken for our salvation, however nominal they proved to be.

So each of our six-man squads delegated a soldier to climb twice a day to the main deck where he stood in line to be handed a tin dishpan containing cold bully beef, chunks of slightly maggoty bread, and a spouted tin pitcher full of lukewarm tea. Each dishpan  and “teapot” was shoved through a square opening in the deckhouse to the American at the head of the line on the open deck; none of us were allowed in the galley.

A day or two later, a corporal in our platoon broke through a flimsy bulkhead in the hold and stole a few pasteboard boxes of dried apple slices apparently stowed there for the Englishmen’s mess. These supplemental rations, although minimal in flavor, helped stave off hunger pangs for the rest of the five-day voyage to Malta and thence to a rendezvous point where the invasion flotilla grouped close to the Italian mainland.

    (to be continued)

In the next blog, readers will find out if the wreck of the Koroa will get close enough to the beachhead to disgorge Bill and his fellow soldiers. At least by now, if you've ever wondered, you know what enticing ingredients were in the famous "K" rations, not exactly an early Lean Cuisine, by any means.

Until next month, I hope this wartime adventure of the Modest Editor will serve as welcome relief from an overdose of poisonous politics, but I'll give in enough to select a Running Mate for John McCain.This Dream Team will knock your socks off and change the direction of the election. Would you like to take a guess at my selection? Send it along  to me.

Until then, ship ahoy!

War No More - 01/04/08

     Is it my imagination, or is madness creeping from the White House across the face of the globe? I don't think it has anything to do with April Fools' Day or the end of college basketball and the beginning of the baseball season. It may be Bush on a junket in Russian territory to look into Putin's GB-eyes to see if a soul is still there. I have to confess that some of the madness is escaping from bad dreams and nightmares. Just the other night I dreamed I was trapped on the Titanic. A madcap captain kept announcing there was nothing to worry about because he was an optimistic fellow and always held a glass that was half-full and was sure that the economy was going to come ROARING back. He tried to reassure passengers by saying that the ship had not hit an iceberg, but the edge of an ice floe the size of Vermont. Sitting in the middle of this huge detached sheet of ice was Rush Limbaugh, naked, holding Ann Poltergeist on his lap with a nice wide stance, both singing "Al Gore's Global Warming Is a Hoax."  From years of practice, Ann was able to suck in and expel the methane gas without passing out.

     This hideous picture changed to a US naval ship, the Caine, with an equally crazy captain who was obsessed by frozen strawberries, steel balls, and yellow cakes from Nigeria. The crew mutinies on the high seas, and the captain is declared nola competent, or whatever the Latin term for nuts is. (You don't expect me to check on spelling in the middle of a nightmare, do you?) Blindfolded, stripped, manacled, the captain undergoes extraordinary rendition at a black site where torture is permitted.

     A quick shift to Iraq. Bombs detonated in the Green Zone. Bloody conflict in Basra. Towns and villages under attack. What do we hear from the one who ordered the invasion? "Everything is normal in Iraq." If this isn't enough to question the sanity of our commander-in-chief, his statement that our soldiers should look forward to duty in Iraq and Afghanistan as a "romantic" adventure. Romantic? With over 4,000 dead and 30,000 grievously wounded, no one in his right mind would suggest that having a "romantic affair" in those war-torn countries was the right thing to do. I hope he has the decency to send the twin and her husband-to-be on their honeymoon among the deadly fields where poppies grow, row on row, each flower symbolic of a dead soldier.

     On the anniversary of the beginning of the Bush War, he said: "I vow so long as I am president to make sure that these lives were not lost in vain."             

        

      And where was his sidekick, the one who shoots lawyers, doing on the fifth anniversary of their war? He was fishing from a sultan's yacht.

                                  SO?

     When VP Cheney was asked about his response to a recent poll that  showed most Americans are opposed to the war, he said: "So?"

     All of the arrogance of the administration was buried in that short word. "So what? Or, "screw the majority." I think you'll have to agree that such a response from the second top gun shoots down the glorified democracy that Bush claims we are planting in Iraq. I know who is in the final throes without mission accomplished. Oh, where is Molly Ivins now that we need her. She would take a strong stand against water boarding and other forms of torture, along with the recent firebombing of Basra. She might echo Kurt Vonnegut: "If Jesus were alive today, we would kill Him with lethal injections." Cheney would call that progress. Although blind like the Greek soothsayerTiresias, I don't possess his powers, but I did predict last December that when spring arrived in Basra, it would bring death and destruction.

     A recent letter to the editor of a local paper made me think that Molly had been resurrected. Rae Kramer wrote: Twisted metal, stinking black smoke, unidentifiable body parts, disoriented stand byers, rivulets of blood--this is business as usual in Baghdad.

     Explosions, sirens, wailing mothers, weeping children, gunshots - this is business as usual in Baghdad. Water, sometimes; electricity, sometimes; fresh bread and fruit, sometimes; funeral processions, often; inadequate medical care, often; soldiers with guns ready, often - this is business as usual in Baghdad.

     Can one really empathize enough to feel what life must be like in Baghdad? Can we really understand what it must feel like to know that everyone one sees has lost a child or parent or cousin or brother or friend or coworker or schoolmate?

     Today marks the fifth anniversary of the unprovoked, illegal and immoral invasion of the sovereign nation of Iraq by the United States armed forces. We, the people who fund the ongoing presence or unwanted occupying troops and mercenaries, are not even permitted to see the coffins of our soldiers who died, for fear that this reminder of business as usual will arouse in us a passion to end the occupation now.

     Today will also be a day to say no to impotence - of Congress, the mainstream press and ourselves. We will gather at Clinton Square at noon to say, "No Business as Usual." The call to action is to join me and others as we pause in our life as we know it, and call out, as one voice, "Let there be peace!"

                                     War No More!

    Meanwhile, the close race to be the Democratic presidential candidate goes on between Hillary and Obama. On this special day, Obama has a razor-thin lead. Rush Limbaugh, the conservative mouthpiece of the Slime-by media, is trying to egg them both on with his Operation Chaos.

     One of Hillary's ads provides much grist for his attack mill--the ad about answering the emergency phone in the White House. On that topic, I too sent a letter to the editor of the local paper.

     Letter to the Editor:  According to a recent article, John McCain will be able to protect our children by handling any 3 a.m. emergency hot line calls. Suppose McCain is not the one in the White House to take the call.

     "Hello. What? Yes, I know it rang six times. What do you expect at this ungodly hour of the night? You're what? No, absolutely not. Take that order and get lost. Who am I? I just happen to be the commander-in-chief."

     After hanging up. "Bill, did you use the emergency phone in the Oval Office to order a late-night snack? I've told you not to do that. I almost ordered an air strike on a Papa John's Pizza."

     "I'm sorry, my little Valkyries warrior. I'll race you to the Lincoln Room."

                The End on April Fools' Day, 2008

         

Train Wreck - March 08

    A small area of Central New York seems to be collecting train wrecks. The last one--the derailment of a CSX freight--took place in mid-January of this year. Circular containers rolled off thirteen overturned cars and almost ended their interrupted journey in the village of Canastota, home of the International Boxing Hall of Fame.

    The engineer and conductor were uninjured, and no local resident of 4,400 was hurt, including a local boxer and onion farmer Carmen Basilio, soon to be honored by his induction into the Hall Canastota is only five miles from another CSX crash that happened a year ago in Oneida, triggering the explosions of four propane tankers, causing the evacuation of hundreds of citizens. That accident resulted from an undetected broken rail. There has been an epidemic of faulty ties that threaten lives of Amtrak passengers and could ignite dangerous freight cargo. In one county alone, In addition to the International Boxing Hall, the Village of Chittenango sponsors Munchkin events to honor native son L. Frank Baum, known mainly for The Wizard of Oz. and a 2,000-year-old Egyptian mummy who just changed his sex in Cazenovia's public library--all of these famous locations might go up in a fireball due to a defective railroad track. Try to imagine an ancient pug, an unwrapped mummy, and some squashed munchkins flying sky-high over Mumsville's courthouse.

     "Today's event near Chittenango is just the latest reminder that CSX's persistently troubling safety record continues to threaten communities across Central New York," said U.S. Senator Charles Schumer. "It's time we demand they step up performance and safety." That's a gentle way of telling the railroads to replace those defective tracks before passengers are killed or a toxic explosion destroys an entire community.

     Now if Robert R. Young, the outspoken visionary of the New York Central Railroad, were still on the scene, I'm sure the fire would fly. He once said, "Hogs ride from coast to coast without changing trains, but YOU can't." During the 1940s, he ruled a string of railroads with an iron fist, accusing bankers of being money-suckers and other financial agents of being weasels. I heard him give this advice to a graduating class: "Go out there and make as much money as fast as you can, and then later if you want to make a few donations to charity, that's your choice."  When New York Central started to go belly-up and failed to produce profits for the stockholders, Robert Young couldn't stand the heat and committed suicide.

                     My Own Wreck

     Last month I told you a war story about soldiers landing in Naples in the middle of the Red Light district (which Pedro and a few other readers found hilarious). In this blog, let me tell you about the time I was in a train wreck. My own wreck didn't happen in New York, but in Ohio a few years ago. Upper Sandusky was the exact location, and I hope the overflow from the lavatories never reached Lower Sandusky, if there is such a place.

The caption read: "Big Collision. Two Wyandot County emergency workers inspect the damage from an early Sunday crash of an Amtrak passenger and CSX freight train near Upper Sandusky, Ohio. There were no fatalities or cargo spills. Three Hoosier crew members and a passenger were injured when the Amtrak train hit the 13th car of the 116-car CSX freighter."

Friends who had never been in a train wreck looked at me with renewed interest. Some of them were kind enough to ask if I had any injuries. I made a mental note to improve my slight limp.

     "How did it feel when the trains collided?"

That was a question I was often asked. I wish I could come up with a dramatic description, but I have to stay with the facts. The train was moving slowly. A dull thud and an instant stop. No screeching of brakes before the thud (which means, your honor, that the engineer did not see the freight train before impact). On the thud, those passengers sitting up suddenly leaned forward as if they were trying to see the engine. Those passengers curled up on two seats went on sleeping.

This rail travel was my first since the troop trains of World War !!, when I had solemnly promised that I would never travel by trains again. What was I doing on this Amtrak?

I had gone to the Big Apple mainly to visit some relatives, who live near LaGuardia Airport. A few weeks ago a plane taking off went off the end of the run and splashed down in the East River, close to my relatives' backyard. I decided it would be safer to go by train.

Would someone in this age of computers and advanced technology please tell me how it's possible for one train to broadside a second in a town the size of Canastota? Asleep at the throttle? Drugs in the system?

                THE CONDUCTORS

A parade of conductors came through at about twenty-minute intervals. The first said: "There's been a minor accident." The next one said: "We bumped into another train." Meantime, sirens screamed for attention and lights on tops of police cars and ambulances twirled in the darkness.

Next to arrive, two important conductors. "Are there any injuries in this car?" None of the passengers responded. Under the stark emergency lights, the passengers stared straight ahead or moved like zombies in a horror movie.

A Red Cross lady passed through to cheer us up. No, she had no hot coffee or donuts. No, she couldn't help us make telephone calls. No, she couldn't get any heat turned up. She could offer us only cheerfulness.

Yet another conductor announced that we would continue our trip by bus. When pressed for an answer on bus arrival time, he said about four hours and hurried on.

The zombies began to change back to people and grew irritated and rebellious. We considered printing signs like "help" or "Amtrak is holding us hostage," and holding them up to the windows. The canteen and dining cars were locked. The explanation? No power to heat food or coffee. No power to heat the coaches. No one was allowed outside to make telephone calls or get food. The explanation? For our own protection, Amtrak ordered us to stay in our seats.

Commodes in the lavatories were soon plugged. On the toilet seats were the words from an earlier time: "Do not flush while train is standing still." The train couldn't be standing any stiller.! The overflow came close to the top edge of the shoes. I looked down at my smelly shoes and just then remembered Amtrak's motto: "Discover the Magic."

                Inspector Imtrack

Among the flashing lights, while it was still dark, I had noticed, rushing toward the crash site, dump trucks loaded with sand. The time had come for me to slip into my black raincoat and put on my Greek Fisherman's cap. Once outside, I could pass for a conductor. When the next one came rustling through the car, I got up, followed him down the aisle, down the steel stairs, and hastened to the impact. Sand was being dumped on something with an acrid odor. I overheard that a conductor had suffered a heart attack. Could it have been the engineer? The engine of the passenger train had been derailed and was leaning against a CSX car like a tired old man.

I couldn't get too close, but managed to make out two freight cars tipping precariously and a third on its side. Before being discovered and marched back to my coach by a rent-a-cop whose uniform smelled of mothballs. I had given myself away by asking if that was a doghouse floating in a swimming pool, a sight you seldom run into in real life. Instead of drawing attention to myself as a spy, I should have waited until the next day to read in a paper that a railroad shack had been pushed into a pool.

Thus ended the ignominious saga of Inspector Imtrack.

          Report to Fellow Passengers

Back in the coach, everyone felt much better when I told them what was happening. We passed the time by pooling food. Tins of cookies were quickly emptied in Upper Sandusky, whose citizens began discovering in the daylight that a wreck had occurred. Although my contribution of food was a popular one. I can't take credit for it. My daughter had shoved a long loaf of Italian bread under my arm when we were saying goodbye in Penn Station. I had protested: "A grown man doesn't walk around with a loaf of bread under his arm. Maybe in Italy, but not on an Amtrak train." Fairlie insisted: "Take it, Dad. You may need it before the trip is over." What a wise daughter I have!

The buses finally arrived. Passengers not going to Chicago were allowed off first. With two heavy suitcases hanging on the ends of my arms, I got off the train. A microphone was shoved in my face and a TV camera pointed at me. "Tell me," the young lady interviewer asked, "how did it feel when the trains smashed together?"

Oh my gosh, I thought, after twenty hours on the train I'm going to make the Six O'Clock News in Upper Sandusky. I said: "There was a thud and we stopped." She asked, "And since then, what's been going on in there?"

I turned to look at the coach that had been my prison. I was tempted to liven up the news with a vivid description of a Roman orgy. Or I wanted to complain about being held hostage by Amtrak, but I didn't. I said, "We just sat there." For over five hours, we just sat there. And now you'll have to excuse me. I have a bus to catch, and I wouldn't want to miss it."

Just before the bus pulled out, a lady and a man boarded it with donuts and milk. They weren't from Amtrak or the Red Cross. Neighbors living alongside the track had taken up a collection to buy breakfast for the strangers who had been staring out the train windows.

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Reminiscence - 01/08

     An ancient adage says:  "One man's meat is another man's poison." I hope (which springs eternal) my reminiscences do not lead to hisses.

     How about starting with a war story?  I understand that World War II veterans are being asked to record their adventures before it's too late. (And it is too late for the thousand vets who die every day). About the only excitement in this anecdote is the pursuit of the troop ship by Nazi sub wolf packs. We docked in the battle-ravaged harbor and disembarked by walking on gangplanks between sunken ships. So why am I bringing this up now? Because we had landed in Naples.

     If you've been reading the news, you know that presently the streets and sidewalks of a once-beautiful city are buried in garbage. Yes, garbage or rubbish or smelly mounds and mounds of wet and dry debris. To put it mildly, Naples stinks. The stench is unbearable. Kids walking to school are being asphyxiated, many of them contacting terrible diseases. The Mafia has taken garbage workers out on strike, and there is no predicting when things will get back to normal.

     When I landed there during WW II, more than 60 years ago, we entered the city through the Red Light district on the water front, a convenient location for more recreations than rest--but that's another story. Let's just say that some callow 19-year olds learned the facts of life in a hurry from the ladies-of-the-night who really know how to jump-start the economy and could teach the D.C lame-brains the art of stimulus without wasting $150 billion. For the time being, I just pray that this wonderful city can return to its historic self and provide a launching place for the trip up Mt. Vesuvius to buy some of those miniature reproductive organs. I mention this salacious bit to certify that I'm not humbugging you. If you doubt me, ask the Modest Editor, who also served in the Neapolitan area and claims he didn't sacrifice his modesty for the good of his country. At any rate, here's a shot of the current garbage:

                        

                From Naples to Baghdad by the Bay -

     After the death of Herb....Caen and the attack on Iraq, the sobriquet for San Francisco fadded away, some fearing that the president might get confused and bomb it. (let me throw in here: I predict that in two months Iraq will be ripped in bloody pieces by the most horrendous civil war ever. Keep in mind, after duty in Italy, I spent two years in Casablanca studying the psychology of Arab tribalism.)

        San Francisco is another of my favorite cities. At the present time, the Zoo is trying to recover from the terrible death of Carlos Sousa, a 17-year-old, torn apart by a tiger, as he warned two friends, the Dhaliwa brothers, to flee. Controversy continues to swirl around the Christmas Day killing. If the tiger, which was shot later, was taunted until she made the giant leap over the grotto and to the top of the wall, the teasing was probably done by the brothers, who are on trial for disorderly conduct and resisting arrest in another case. The tiger had had her first taste of human blood when she reached through the bars of a cage and ripped off the arm of a zookeeper.

                               

                                     

Tyger! Tygre!! Burning bright.

In the forest of the night.

What immortal hand or eye

Could form thy fearful symmetry?

                               --William Blake

      SF zoo administrators may have a lawsuit on their hands and a guilty conscience. An experiment conducted some years ago proved that the tiger could leap to the top of the wall. A piece of meat was dangled on a fishing pole at the top, and in a flash, the tiger had leaped to the top of the wall, snatched the slab of meat and in a matter of micro-seconds was gnawing on the meat on "the safe side"" of the wall.

                             Personal Zoo Story

     Would you like to hear a personal zoo story? Of course you would. I had rented a basement apartment from a former student, now one of the best movie critics in the Bay area. Not far from KV's place was a pleasant park with winding sidewalks for baby carriages and for toddlers to play. One day while I was strolling through Alta Plaza I noticed a flurry of activity. Moving up a hillock, I was stopped by a breathless woman who warned me I should turn back because there were two men engaged in a knife fight. After thanking her and moving a bit closer, I noticed something about the fighting that seemed familiar. When I reached the young men, I said: "I've been to the zoo." They fell to the ground, laughing, and wanted to know how I knew. I told them that I had directed Edward Albee's "Zoo Story" when I worked at the Culver Academies.

     They were kind enough to ask if I would take a look at the scene they were preparing for their drama class and give them some tips. I agreed, but asked them to turn and wave at their frightened audience to indicate the knife fight was being staged. They did, and once more peace was restored to Alta Plaza.

     They were interested to learn that in my workshop performance I had rewritten the ending for a secret second cast, shifting the killing from one character to the other one. They sympathized with Chan, an actor in the play as originally written, who was preening himself for the curtain call, only to catch a glimpse from the wings of the second cast in action. If you don't believe me, ask Chan, whose retelling of how he was cheated out of a curtain call grows with each retelling. The young thespians asked if I had a copy of my revised ending, but I had to disappoint then since it's unethical to do so much rewriting of another man's script and to play a trick on a loyal actor.

     Now you know what happened to me on the way to the zoo. To wrap up this blog, I'll feed you a few bites of doggerel. First from Doc, another former student, now a better writer than his master.

                               Primarily Painful

I thought that I would never see

A candidate like Hillary

And just to add some racial drama

How about Barrack Obama?

You want healthcare? Eat your spinach!

No-vote for KO'd Kucinich.

McCain enablers must like war

Since hawking it is what he's for.

If twits who think their view is omni

tickle you, then vote for Romney.

Oh dear, why can the Huckabee

want more Christian zealotry?

Thompson's out and on his fanny

which resembles Giuliani.

John Edwards, a Confederate,

thinks perfect Union is where it's at.

And just when you think you'd heard it all

comes the whacky whinging of Ron Paul.

     What a genius! But is it kosher to hit on a candidate's last name that rhymes with "spinach"? And you're really scraping the bottom to link Thompson's behind with the face of the 9/11 mayor, the Early Bird Special in Florida. And now, let me take a crack at it.

                             Running for Office

Hill and Bill went up the Hill

To fetch the nomination.

But clodhoppers in Iowa blocked her way

To the House where she once held sway.

Hill fell down and broke her crown

And her high rating came tumbling after.

                              

Piggy Tim & Lim attacked her gender

These Talking Heads would not surrender.

Their shifty eyes took on a fiendish glow

As they waited for the knockout blow.

(They should have listened to the NY Times.)

A jerk in Hampshire hurled sexist dirt.

He ordered the first lady to iron his shirt.

"If you can't stand the heat and the bitchin'

"Put on an apron and go back to the kichen."

When a kind lady lent a sympathetic ear,

It brought from Hill the glisten of a tear

And reminded all women they were second-class

So they turned out and voted en masse,

Helping Hill to poll fault and sink in velvet claws

To drive home in a hot flash, the meaning of men-a-pause.

MORAL: Don't take the fairer sex for granite,

Even in the Granite State--get it?

     While watching the debates unfold, I sometimes wonder what is going on in the minds of the presidential candidates as they tear one another apart. What would Jesus, the Lamb of God, say about all the nasty personal attacks, the backbiting, the tearing apart of reputations? He (or she) who strives for the top office may lose his (or her) soul.

"Did He smile his work to see?

Did He who made the Lamb make thee?"

                                                                       

                                     

                                                                                                               

Christmas - 2007

         MERRY CHRISTMAS -

from Dusty Rogue

      Counting the days until January 20, 2009                                         Thank goodness!

And when he steps off, for the last time, from Air Force One in Texas (with the words of his replacement still ringing in his ears:  "...preserve, protect and defend the Constitution) guess who is there to greet him? Cindy Sheehan. I think it would be fitting for all those parents who lost children in his unnecessary Iraqi War, to send him and VP Cheney Christmas cards inscribed: "Why did you murder my child?"  For the rest of their lives, he and Cheney must be reminded of the billions of taxpayers' money spent without reason, the damage they did to American law and order, and the thousands of lives  ruined by their warmonger decisions.

     What amazes me is that those who voted twice to put these mulish misleader's in the Oval Office refuse to hold them responsible. It was a hopeful sign in Bali on global warming when representatives of other countries grew tired of the U.S. bullying tactics and said: "We invite you to lead the way, but if you continue to block us, we have just one thing to say:  'Get out of the way!'" I remember what Bush said about the Kyoto Protocol when he was first given the office: "It does not suit our needs." What is the antecedent of "our"?  Oily corporations? I also enjoyed it recently when a Spanish Grandee said to Hugo Chavez:  "Sit down and shut up, you clown." Hugo is the Venezuelan leader who said he sniffed remnants of hell after he followed Bush to the speaker's stand.

     Ah, but I go astray. This was supposed to be a merry, merry Christmas blog. I must add a note of levity. Do you realize the next president in the White House won't have to measure for drapes in advance?                                          

                                       Writers' Strike

     I almost got beat up one time in the NY theater district at my brorther-in-law's establishment. Having forgotten that Joe Allen's was mainly a hangout for actors, I said too loudly that the playwright was far more important than actors. I became the focus of a tirade of insults, plus demands to know who I was to be so important. Joe wasn't there at the time, but the next day, when I dropped by to apologize for creating a disturbance, he asked me why I chose to cross swords with the actor who possessed the biggest mouth in the city.

     Both TV and movies are begging for new properties and for writers not out on the picket lines. Do you think I quietly chortle to myself about the importance of writers? You betcha I do. The entire entertainment business is finding out just how essential writers are. I haven't done much playwriting in recent years, but I'll do my best to fill in with a skeleton of a TV special. It's too late to get a production this year, but at least I'll try to write a vehicle that is warm and fuzzy. I'll try not to get too syrupy or tear jerky.

    

Santa Incognito

(A TV Christmas Special)

Characters

                                     Buddy – an 8-year old

                                     Ruth – his 5-year-old sister

John and Harriet Townsend – his wealthy parents

Sam Incognito – a bearded drunk

Max – taxi-driver

Fire Chief Smith

Two homeless people who sleep under the bridge

      (Along the street decorated heavily with Christmas cheer, BUDDY leads his sister. They look in a window.)

RUTH

      (Very smart for her age, points at the train circling around the store).

Is that what you want for Christmas? A train set?

BUDDY

No.  That’s just for little guys. I have something very special in mind. But I can’t tell, or I might not get it.

(Just then they spot Santa Incognito staggering along ahead of them. He is dressed in a rather ragged Santa suit. They follow him into an alley. Santa fumbles in his pockets and finds a half-pint of booze. He takes a swig. He moves along the alley and then leans against a building, takes out his corncob pipe, and lights it. Buddy and Ruth approach him).

BUDDY

Santa, are you okay?

SANTA

Uh, umm, no I’m not feeling good.

RUTH

Santa, do you want to come to our house? You can have some dinner and rest before Christmas.

(Santa looks somewhat confused but nods yes). (Ruth gets on her cellphone and tells her mother they are bringing a guest home for dinner and tells her mother to have money ready to pay the cab driver. Then she calls a cab).

CAB DRIVER

                  (getting out of cab)

What the heck is this? Did you call for a cab?

BUDDY

My sister did, but it’s okay. When we get home, our parents will pay you. Do you want to check with them on our phone? (The driver says that won’t be necessary. When he asks for the address, he whistles and comments that they live in a ritzy district, right next to the mayor. He tells Santa that he’ll have to put out his pipe before getting into the cab).

CAB DRIVER

You wouldn’t want to set my taxi on fire, would you now?

(Author’s Note:  This is what is known as “foreshadowing.” I learned that when I was studying playwriting under Professor John Gassner at the Yale Drama School. He also taught me what a “mise en scene” is, but I’ve forgotten. This is not unusual because no one else really remembers what it means either.)

      (When they burst in the front door and announce that they’ve found Santa, their father steps out on the porch, examines Santa, and tells the children to go inside. Their mother meets them at the door and leads them in.

Mr. Townsend

So, uh, Santa, how did you meet my kids and what are you doing with them?

(Santa stutters and swaggers a bit and Mr. Townsend realizes Santa is half-drunk. He tells him his children made a mistake and that Santa must leave the property. The father goes inside). (When Sam realizes he’s now alone, he sneaks around the house and finds a door that leads to the basement. He goes inside and makes himself at home. He finds a cot to curl up on. Before passing out, he lights his pipe). (Mr. Townsend tries to explain to his children why he had to send Santa away. Buddy is disappointed because it was Santa that he was hoping would help him get his special present. When he is alone with his sister, he explains that Santa has magical powers and he wants to learn magic. After they put on their pajamas, the mother tucks the children in bed. Mr. And Mrs. Townsend have the radio playing softly and choirs are singing in the background:  “Silent Night, Holy Night” etc. Night descends).

     Suddenly there is a loud outcry from the basement. “Fire, fire!” It is Santa Sam. Ruth reaches for cellphone and calls 911. Sam runs up the stairs to alert the family. When he tells them there is a fire in the basement and Mr. Townsend accuses him of setting it with his pipe. Meantime the mother has called the fire department.  Sam runs out the front door, shouting that it wasn’t his fault. The Fire Chief hurries into the house and down the basement steps. He soon returns and says the fire is out.

     The fire was started in the fuse box, which was overloaded by all the Christmas lights. He says whoever sounded the alarm saved the house from burning and maybe the lives of the family.

MR. TOWNSEND

     Oh, that poor man, we accused him of starting the fire but he saved our lives.

MRS. TOWNSEND

We must find him and bring him home for Christmas.

(But Sam is hard to catch because he thinks they are after him for lighting the fire. They finally catch up with him under the bridge, but are blocked by two of Santa’s friends, a black man and a woman. They explain that they want to invite Santa to Christmas dinner and that he should bring his two friends. Santa comes out of hiding, smiling from ear-to-ear! Buddy asks him if he will help him to learn magic. He reaches behind Buddy’s ear and shows not a coin, but nothing. Much laughter.  The father says he knows just the place for Santa Sam. A lady who runs a boarding house owes him some favors and he is certain that after Christmas they will find a nice home for Santa Incognito.

      At the Christmas dinner, Buddy lifts his cup of eggnog and drinks a toast to his new friends and then makes the cup disappear under a handkerchief. Cheering  & clapping.

THE END

What do you think?  Will Hallmark be knocking on my door? Probably not.

I'll wrap it up with greetings from Bob, Dusty (me), & Fairlie!

Son Bob has recently opened a boxing club in Warsaw, IN.  Check it out at:  boppinbob@BBBSW.net

From Boppin' O to Obama O,

Fairlie's website: http://my.barackobama.com/page/community/blog/fairliefirari

Cat or Pitcher - 12/07

     Let's start with a riddle:  "What's the difference between a cat and a pitcher?"

     You'll get the answer if you have the stamina to read the whole blog. I've been told that I would have a wider readership if I would stop being so long-winded. No one is holding a gun to your head to force you to read the entire article. Since my blog is free, there's no subscription to cancel. That's what I did to Newsweek when that magazine had the audacity and bad taste to hire Karl (Turd Blossom) Rove  to write a weekly column and provide the opportunity to blame Congress for starting the Bush War.

     >Before getting to the main topic, let me update a few previous matters. Youssit, the five-year-old Iraqi boy almost burned to death, is making progress at a burn unit in LA. He has been given a new lower jaw. Back in Baghdad, two more of the mistreated orphans have died of cholera from tainted water. The British teacher in Sudan escaped with a light sentence for allowing her class to name a teddy bear MUHAMMAD. I find that strange having had two friends in Casablanca with the same first name-- MUHAMMAD.

     >Here's a scary revelation:  terrible tempered Bob Knight packs heat. He's now coaching in Texas. Do you suppose we could arrange for him to go on a hunting trip with VP Dick Cheney?  Dick's wife reported that when Dick was told that Obama was a distant relative, Dick said: "I knew there was something weird about him."

     > Now it's Opa-and-Oba on the campaign trail together. Hillary may be in trouble in Iowa. Internet blogs and right-wing radio misogynistics are engaging in a reprehensible, anti-feminist vilification of Clinton. The lugubrious Rush Limbaugh babbles about "Clinton's testicle lock box." Tucker Carlson of MSNBC comments: "There's just something about her that feels castrating, overbearing, and scary." Limp wrist Carlson has nothing on him to put into Rush's lock box. There's no way I can discuss the operation performed on the animated show "South Park." What a spectacle of our democracy roiling around in the gutter with the whole world looking on!

     >At a recent GOP debate, Rudy and Romney had a sharp exchange about who provided the most extensive sanctuary for illegal aliens. It brought to mind a matter I've often thought about since 9/11. THE NEW YORK TIMES published a daily list of the those unfortunates who died in the Twin Towers disaster. About 80% of the names seemed to be of Hispanic origin. I wondered if the families of the deceased were taken care of by the employers or Mayor Giulian's city. Probably quickly forgotten--after all some of them were illegal aliens. So many Americans come down hard on them, like Lou Dobbs. We all should take a look at the wealthy fleeing the CA recent fires in expensive cars, while in the fields those despicable Mexicans went on harvesting crops amid toxic fumes and debris from the fires threatening their existence. We use then, then abuse them. Whatever happened to loving one's neighbors, Mr. Dobbs?

                   End of Stagehands' Strike

     They're singing and dancing again on Broadway. The New York City theater district is alive once more with plays and musicals. Even before the strike ended, the Grinch pried open the doors of a theatre, and the scoundrel got busy stealing Christmas.

                                          

Other productions soon followed. but not before the city lost $38 million. Many restaurants in the district lost between $30.000 to $60,000. Joe Allen, owner of a well-known actors' restaurant (and incidentally my brother-in-law), said that his sales fell off about 30 percent. Joe declined to say how much he lost. "I don't want to talk money," he said. "It's gone forever. It's like being the innocent victim of  a runaway train. People talk about making it up in the spring. That ain't going to happen."

     Joe doesn't sound as upbeat as he was during an earlier strike when he served refreshments to those walking the picket lines. Broadway theatre has always had an up-and-down reputation. Some years ago, people were asking if the fabulous invalid was really dead.

     Successful productions have been based on the poetry of Dr.Seuss. His Cat in the Hat has appeared in various versions.

                                            Here are a few lines by Dr. Seuss in person:

"Oh-oh," Sally said, 

"Don't you talk to that cat,

That cat is a bad one,

That Cat in the Hat.

He plays lots of bad tricks.

Don't you let him come near.

You know what he did

The last time he was here.

     Back in 1997, he played a very mean trick. The three-story Cat in the Hat air-balloon in Macy's 71st Thanksgiving Parade knocked down a street light, injuring four of the one million spectators. One of the injured with Marta as a first name suffered a fractured skull and spent a year in the hospital. In memory of this event, I wrote a few lines of doggerel and called them "No Longer Seussable."

Would you look up there...see that?

                              It's that naughty bad Cat in the Hat.

Under the candy-cane hat, he's really unbearable,

                              Made worse pumped up ever so air-able.

See how he bobs without showing a care?

That cat doesn't know he's full of hot air.

His handlers try hard to stay on their feet:

A deadly tug-of-war along the jammed street.

The spectators' love of that cat is no longer dabatable.

A crack on the head calls for a cat less inflatable.

The wind is giving that cat the whizz-ems.

Clearly the parade has become a cataclysm.

The handlers' feet are beginning to drag.

Someone must let the cat out of the bag.

The dented hat bows as if to offer a toast.

And knocks the daylights out of the post.

Spectators run holding their heads,

All the time wishing they were safe in their beds.

They cried out: "Please, please, give us a break."

And that's what they got, plus a Cat scan ache.

     End of story? Not quite. I mentioned the injured spectator, Marta, who spent a year in the hospital, recovering from a fractured skull. On her release, she moved back to her apartment in a NYC high-rise. She could afford it because her lawsuit against Macy's had awarded her $300 million.

     You may recall my riddle:  the difference between a cat and a pitcher. I'll a give you a clue.

                                                A terrible tragedy:  a single-engine aircraft carrying New York Yankees pitcher Cory lidle and his flight instructor slammed into a 40-story apartment building on Wednesday (Oct. 11, 2006). Both men were killed in the crash that rained flaming debris onto the sidewalks.

     A number of apartments were seriously damaged. One of those apartments belonged to Marta, who this time avoided any injury.

     And now you know the answer to the riddle. Don't you?   

                                    

Morpheus - 10/31/07

     I was criticized last month for devoting too much space to Iraqi children and their heart-rending problems caused by the war. One of them was five-year-old Youssit who had gone out to play wearing a black stocking cap on a January day when he was suddenly grabbed by masked men, doused in gas and set on fire. Leaving one's homeland is never an easy choice to make, even during war, but the family of the badly disfigured boy decided that he should seek treatment in the United States.

                                  

                              

     As soon as Youssif arrived at a burn unit in Los Angeles, treatments started, but were interrupted by the fires roaring down out of the mountains. Talk about going from the frying pan into the fire! There's more to report on Youssif, but I just remembered that I've been reprimanded for spending too much time on Iraqi matters.

                                  Next Complaint

     Here's a comment from a reader who goes by the name of "Sleepy reader:"  Hey, it's your blog, but might I humbly ask why do the articles have to so long? A good blog posts at least 3 times a week. Shorter is better. Try it, you might like it. Plus your readership will increase, just watch.  Sleepy reader.

     Dear Sleepy reader:  Okay, I'll try it with some reservations. I agree with you that I have a tendency to be long-winded. Posting three times a week is possible, but doing so would not distinguish me from all the other bloggers. Reading long articles on the Internet is certainly a challenge to those readers with short attention spans. I'm not too fond of it myself, although it sometimes brings a greater depth to a topic.

     If I maintain the usual length, is it possible that "Smokytown" might be used as a substitute for those drugs that help people go to sleep?  One that comes to mind, probably because it's plastered all over TV screens, is Rozerem, a sleep-producing aid with a connection to Morpheus, the god of dreams, who is able to fuse reality with fantasies about Abe Lincoln and a beaver. How Freudians will interpret these incongruous characters is beyond my grasp. To top it off, the patient's boss also has a sleeping problem involved with a blue horse.

     Dreams and nightmares have haunted literature, both religious and secular since time memorial. Shakespeare often mixed imagery of death and dreams:  "what dreams may come when we have shuffled off this mortal coil, must give us pause."  I don't think anyone has ever adequately explained how dreams are made. The other night I dreamed that Dick Chaney was out hunting and charged up a hill with a Confederate flag draped around his shoulders. I probably heard a new song about Sagging Pants and rap lyrics that demanded:  "Pull 'em up! Pull 'em up."  Or did I just make that up?

     But to return to my blog as a sleep-inducing agent--if you do make a copy and curl up in bed, there are certain WARNINGS and PRECAUTIONS to observe. 

     >Do not mix three martinis and drink them before curling up in bed with "Smokytown."

     >If you suffer a sudden onslaught of nose bleed, stop listening to Rush Limbaugh during the day.

     >Stop reading if you notice your testosterone level has gone down.

     >Should you begin to laugh uncontrollably, make a quick trip to the bathroom.

     >Don't get up in the middle of the night to drive heavy machinery, like a road grader.

     >Stop reading if you find a story about the Supreme Court stripping Al Gore of the Nobel Peace Prize and awarding it to George W. Bush.

               SO SHORTER IS BETTER. OKAY. GOODBYE!

                                     Halloween - 07

                           

Op-ed - 10/07

     Let's begin with a short piece from someone named Wondering. "Is this the Small Town blog, or the Iraq blog? I can't figure it out."

Dear wondering:  The name was changed almost a year ago. It is now called "Smokytown." Like you know (to use a bit of teen jargon) where there's smoke there's fire. I have to admit the last three blogs spent a lot of time in Iraq. You'll be pleased to learn that Youssif, the Iraqi burned boy, is now in America getting plastic surgery to repair his disfigured face.When his mother looked out the plane at all the green grass, she exclaimed, "Am I in Paradise?" Back in Iraq, Baby Fatima remains under the care of the American medical staff that nursed her back to health. They are still searching for a family to adopt her. One of the 24 orphans rescued from deplorable circumstances failed to survive.

     A question from Sam: "You have an Italian name and you've mentioned having German parentage. What side did you fight on during World War II?"

Dear Sam: My first reaction was to laugh, but then I realized everyone that I knew in the service has passed on. As you probably know, veterans of that war are dying off at the rate of a thousand a day. I fumbled around through some old records and I'm happy to report I found discharge papers indicating I served on the Allied side. Does that satisfy you, Sam?

     An e-mail from a relative: "Have your read any books or seen any videos by John Pilger, an Australian, who is now primarily based in London?  If you don't know his works, I think you might want to dip into them. You and John have much in common. In all of his work, Pilger has been a prominent and fervent critic of Western foreign policy." 

Dear Relative: Thanks to NPR, I have heard some of Pilger's speeches, the most recent drawing attention to his latest book: " Lapdogs with Laptops," an incisive attack on today's mainstream media. "We need a press that will hold the feet of the mighty to the fire and not drink Cabernet Avignon with them.Citizens are ill served by lapdogs with laptops. More terrorists are given training and sanctuary in the United States than anywhere on earth. They include mass murderers, torturers, former and future tyrants, and assorted international criminals. This is virtually unknown to the American publics. thanks to the freest media on earth."

     Originally published in "Counterpunch," this  Op-ed piece comes from a former student and good friend, James McEnteer.

            An Academic Hotshot Introduces a Petty Tyrant:

                                     Hell,Columbia

     "Before addressing our speaker, I have a few critical points to emphasize. First, just because we invite some nutcase here to sound off does not mean we endorse his ideas. Does the term 'political pressure' mean anything to you people? Enough said. Second, to those who are offended by this guy and everything he stands for and wish we'd never asked him here or that he'd never been born, I couldn't agree with you more completely.

"But as a noted free speech expert in a country that supposedly stands for freedom of speech, I didn't really have a choice, okay? So stop with those nasty letters and that evil spam already. Third, if what this lunatic says offends you or causes you pain, I am truly sorry and wish I could lay some percodan on each and every one of you. Fourth ... oh never mind. We scheduled it. We took heat for it. We didn't want to appear to back down. So we're going ahead with it. I just want you to know I really really don't like it, okay?

"Now, let me turn to you, Mr. President. You have unfairly and without trial or any due process imprisoned hundreds of people. You have denied them counsel. You have allowed them to be tortured. You have committed wanton acts of violence against the populations of several countries, including Afghanistan and Iraq.

"You lied about your reasons for this violence. But millions of innocent civilians have died, or been wounded or become refugees thanks to your brutal, unjustified policies. Your misleading inept actions have now killed more Americans than Osama bin Laden or the terrorists of September 11. You are now officially the greatest mass murderer of the twenty-first century.

"We could have expected brutality from you. After all, you presided over more executions than any modern ruler of any state. Even the mentally incompetent are not immune from the system you call justice. The ones you don't appoint to office you execute. Of course your own ascent to the presidency, abetted by your father's judicial cronies, which the rest of the world rightly saw as a coup, was enabled by your own fawning media and your country's one-party state. You are shameless, as your regime has been shameless, scornful of the rights of others, Americans and non-Americans alike.

"Let's be clear, Mr. President. You exhibit all the signs of a cruel and petty dictator. You have no integrity, no credibility and no competence. You have said and your Congressional lackeys have agreed that Iran is supplying arms to your enemies in Iraq. Many people fear you will attack Iran, despite your failure to contain the chaos you have unleashed in Afghanistan or Iraq. To do so would be immoral and irresponsible. But of course, that is precisely your signature style.

"You spout lies. You conduct official business in secret. You spy on your own countrymen. You put anyone who questions your policies on your no-fly list and harass them. Why are you so afraid of American citizens expressing their opinions for change?

"Frankly and in all candor, Mr. President, I doubt you will have the intellectual courage to answer these questions. I do expect you to exhibit the fanatical mindset that characterizes everything you say and do. I feel the weight of the modern civilized world, yearning to express the revulsion at what you stand for.

"And so folks, without further doodoo, let's put your hands together for that wacky dry drunk, that lyin' murderin' Christian himself, still beloved by 28 percent of us, that draft-dodging commander-in-chief and the illiterate leader of the free world himself, the son, the phony ... "

[Drowned out by jeers]

James McEnteer is the author of Shooting The Truth: The Rise of American Political Documentaries (Praeger, 2006).

     Gosh almighty, I wonder who was being introduced in Jim's piece? It certainly wasn't Iranian President Mahmound Ahmadimejad, who was rather rudely introduced by Columbia University President Lee Bollinger. Talk about inviting a speaker and then making chopped liver out of him by calling him to his face "a petty and cruel dictator."  Bollinger might want to go back to the times of King Arthur and the Round Table and review how guests should be treated. In those days, if an enemy managed to gain entrance to a castle, he was treated as a guest until he left the premises.

     Here are a few excerpts from Iranian blogs:

>Insulting the president of a country, no matter how unacceptable his point of view, is synonymous to insulting a nation.

>What is interesting is that we claim the Americans want to prevent our voice from being heard, so why do we censor ourselves?

>I was reading the news reports of the American media. I am truly dumbfounded. They have focused on Ahmadinejad's response to the homosexually question and are analyzing it. What has the world come to that, with innocent people dying in Iraq every day, the rights of the homosexuals have become the most important issue of the day?

>Someone who denies the Holocaust and promises the downfall of the Western World will inevitably remind Westerns of bin Laden and Al-Queda.

A late e-mail: What is your response to Bush's veto of the bill to expand the Children's Insurance Program?

     Dear Late:  I wold get an illustrator to draw a cartoon with Bush standing up to his neck in a quagmire of sand surrounded by a half-trillion dollars. He is saying: "We can't afford to increase the money to help children."

A second e-mail from "Wondering," who said I was spending too much time in Iraq. Remember?  "But I love your blog, don't get me wrong. Keep up the good work."