coffee.mill

Candidates 2012

                I have wanted to not write about the politics drowning out most public communication in the US right now, but it seems inescapable.  It has given me both headaches and writer’s block.  Like the sewer backing up in your basement, at some point, you have to address it, or at least light some candles to mask the smell.

                One of the most disturbing realizations is that one of these petulant, prima donna millionaires will break out of the pack at the Republican Convention, will scrape the mud off his clothes and the egg off his face, will kiss and make up with the slingers of the mud and egg, and will run against the current occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Av., as if none of the mud and/or egg really matters all that much. 

                And then he, and the current resident will sling mud and egg for a couple of months, and We the People will name one of them President of the United States of America.

                The sad thing is, there are 22 official candidates for president to date and maybe, just maybe, one of them would be a good president.  One of them might possibly really not be a member of the club.  Perhaps they wouldn’t be able to get anything done, just because they aren’t a member of the club.  But would that be a bad thing?  Maybe he or she could stop the madness for just a bit. 

                One of the candidates is Matt Snyder.  Ever hear of him?  No, of course not.  He’s not an attorney, nor is he a millionaire.  There’s an interesting website, “2012.presidential-candidates.org” that lists all the candidates.  It has links to each person’s view on the major issues, and a link to compare each to the other.  I have no idea who sponsors the site or what the spin might be, but it certainly seems to have more information than spin relative to any other site I have seen.   

                On Snyder’s initial information page, it states that “Snyder has captured the imagination of many voters who have become disenfranchised with lawyers, big businessmen, millionaires, and career politicians who present academic solutions to problems that do not personally affect them. Organizations and protestors on the left and the right share a common belief in that there is inescapable corruption in Washington DC, the media, and the financial industry; Snyder’s popularity spans partisan boundaries as he bears no obligation to any of these entities.”

                It lists his background as “Construction worker, Teacher, Waiter, Picture framer, Salesman, Coach, Truck driver, Tutor, Landscaper, Business owner.”  I am neither endorsing nor vilifying Snyder, just noting that he is running for president.  Along with Stewart Alexander, Roger Gary (my personal favorite, with a nod to my brother Gary), RJ Harris, Gary Johnson, Fred Karger, Kathyern Lane, Andy Martin, Jimmy MacMillan, Tom Miller, Carl Person, Buddy Roemer, Randall Terry, Danny Woodring, R. Lee Wrights, Vern Wuensche.  The usual millionaires are also listed, along with our current president.

                Some of these folks are probably whackos, but then, have you listened to any of the debates?  And in truth, a person has to be more than a little bit crazy to even run, not?  Just growing skin thick enough to survive the lies, truth and innuendoes might be permanently emotionally crippling. 

                Those who study this particular democratic madness will say that is has always been this way.  Perhaps so.  But if we accept that as true, then there would be no explanation for airplanes.  For sewing machines.  For bubble gum. And even at last, for democracy itself.

                It is this way because we allow it to be this way.  I still believe we can change it, but we will have to make those changes sooner rather than later, because those who hold the power are not likely to relinquish it easily, a point made clear in the book Winner-Take-All Politics by political theorists Jacob Hacker and Paul Pierson.  But that’s another blog.

                I’ve had dozens of emails and forwards frothing with the sentiment that we need to throw all the bums out, start over, get some fresh folks in office.  Well, there are other people running besides the fat cats.  Others who have put their lives and reputations up for shredding and calumny…check ‘em out.  Get the word out.  Of course you won’t agree with everything they stand for.  But if you say you believe in everything the current front runners stand for, you are either lying to yourself or you are part of the problem.

Tahoe 2012

                We pulled it off, meeting for these instant days, the first since I’ve returned from Peace Corps service in Belize.

                My son and his wife, come from New York City, my daughter and her love up from Los Angeles, Tracy and I in from Florida.  We landed in San Francisco, and a friend from Peace Corps drove 2 ½ hours from near Sacramento to pick us up at the airport.  Then drove the 2 ½ hours back and gave us a place to stay until morning, and gave us their truck to drive on up into Tahoe.  I once heard ‘grace’ defined as an undeserved gift.  Clint and Kathy fit that definition to a tee for Tracy and I.  Clint had knee surgery about a week before we arrived.  No problem, he said.  It was his left; he could manage driving easily with his right. 

                So we drove from the southwest on Highway 50 into the visually stunning bowl of Lake Tahoe in Clint’s Ford one-ton diesel 6-man pickup.  I’ve never been here before.  Tahoe envelopes the liquid border between California and Nevada just where the vertical line takes a 45-degree kink to the east.  It’s a HUGE lake, the second deepest in the US, at an elevation of 6,200 feet, surrounded by majestic peaks.  Scattered about on those slopes are a dozen or more ski areas, many of which would seem enormous in any other setting, including Squaw Valley, site of the 1960 Winter Olympics.

                Last year at this time, seven feet of snow blanketed Tahoe.  This year, not so much.  As a matter of fact, the only snow here this year is man-made.  We skied Heavenly, and had a great time.  Somehow they managed to give us a two-foot base to ski select runs by pumping water from the lake and spraying it into the air at the same time blowing high pressure air into the water droplets to create snow.  Some five million gallons a day, according to one local.  I’ve skied better snow, but any day skiing is better than the best day working.

                We all took some falls, but that didn’t dampen our enthusiasm.  The sun was out, we had enough snow to slide crazily down a mountain, and we were together as family.  I wouldn’t have traded places with anyone.  It was the first time I’d ever been skiing where I could ski one day, and go on a six or seven mile hike the next, through a sugar pine forest devoid of snow.  Which also introduced Tracy to a German family day of rest.  A hike in the mountains.  She mentioned that it would probably have been more restful to just go ahead and ski, and as we were hiking at about seven or eight thousand feet, I had to agree she had a point.  There isn’t much air in the air at that altitude.

                It has been a great way to ring in the East Coast New Year.  We were way too tired to make it to our own time zone midnight. 

                As we rode the lifts and mingled with the other skiers, the prevailing attitude was one of recreation, with an emphasis on the root of the word, to re-create.  Make new.  Enjoy life and the moment.  There were a few sourpusses complaining about the lack of snow, the hundreds of acres of trails with only rocks, boulders and fallen trees visible, other than the occasional dropped glove or pole or ski, 40 to 50 feet below our speeding chairs.  But most everyone else was of good cheer, accepting of the reality that no one can predict the weather. 

                It is a long way from the poverty of Belize, this ski resort.  How I am here, able to enjoy this extravagant luxury is as much a mystery to me as it is a delight.  But I do not forget that it is only grace that brought me to this place, and that in this case, I am one of the one percenters, enjoying snow that would not be here but for dreams and technology and truckloads of money.

                Thanks to the dreamers; a nod of recognition to the truckloads of money.