Author: Stagger Lee

One of my best friends ever posted a very classy concession a day or two ago on behalf of the Republicans, and the son of a bitch short-circuited my planned post to the effect of “SUCK IT.” As a result, I now have to do something thoughtful on where the GOP goes from here, because it’s starting to look like the Party of Lincoln is going to spend a couple years as the Party of Rethinkin’. 1700-word claptrot follows…

Continue reading “So what happens now?”

OK, I know a lot of people in California are torn up about the results of Proposition 8. I’m not crazy about it myself, and I’m sure that a lot of people in parts East are thinking “how the hell can something like that pass in California?” Well, I’m going to spell it out for you:

1) California is the largest state in the country, with a massive population that is split in exactly the same fashion as the rest of the country in terms of culture, economics, religion and the urban/rural divide. To use the most hack cliche, there is definitely Red California and Blue California, and once you get outside the major urban centers, it turns really red – mostly because the makeup of the population is largely unchanged from the original Dust Bowl migrants who settled agricultural California during the Depression.

2) The final number looks like it’s going to be 52-48. In other words, if another bite at the apple comes round, shifting 2.5% would do the damn thing.

3) Getting to that 52% took a metric shitload of out-of-state cash and resources, mostly from rectangular states other than California.

4) Most importantly, the “No” vote didn’t jump on this early enough. The initial polling shows the proposition failing to pass by a wide margin, and I think a lot of people who didn’t have a personal interest pretty much punted on the issue – and did so largely out of fear that making a big deal out of gay marriage might worsen the prospects for the Democratic Party’s best shot at the White House in years. You can argue from dusk til dawn about whether this was correct or not, and the morality of it is a SHOW, but what’s done is done…for now.

Now, my understanding is that there’s nothing to prevent offering another proposition next year to basically overturn this one, as all you need in California is 8% on a petition and then 50%+1 in the election. I didn’t expect to find an even longer and more complicated state constitution than Alabama’s all the way out here, but there you go. But most importantly, consider the 14th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States: “citizens of the United States and the state in which they reside.” Uncle Sam has the hydrogen bomb, and if a federal court were to get involved under the “equal protection” clause…well, let’s just say that from a contract law perspective, it may not be that difficult a case to make, especially in front of the Ninth Circuit.

Don’t forget, too – gay marriage passed in the California legislature twice, only to be vetoed both times by the Governator. Then, when the state court ruling came down, he said he wouldn’t contest it. He even had some words to say against 8, though not nearly enough to actually make a difference, but you have to wonder what he might do now if another constitutional amendment were to pass out of the legislature and go to the ballot next November.

Now, the dry political-legal analysis aside…

I come from a famously benighted state, one that had to have basic ideas about equality before the law enforced at the point of a gun for a very long time. I’ve lived in a cloud of irrational bigotry and seen the effect it has on people. I’ve seen people cut off their nose to spite their face while other people suffer as a result, and I know how discouraging and sickening it is to live with.



But that’s not all there is.

A minority, by the very definition of the word, doesn’t have 50%+1. They can’t do it alone. It takes people with nothing to gain for themselves, people who could go on with their lives unaffected and untroubled, stopping and saying “Hold. Up.”

Ken Burns did a movie about the earliest suffragette movement called “Not For Ourselves Alone.” Or in Latin, non nobis solum. That’s when the important stuff happens – when people start looking beyond themselves. When you get out there and start to push back for your family and friends and loved ones.

November 5 was always going to be the first day of the hard part. The plan is just the same as it ever was. Let’s eat enough Advil to make the throbbing stop, let’s get enough Gatorade down us to get rehydrated, and then let’s ride for our people.

I think Olbermann, for all his bombast, nailed it: it’s a man on the moon.

This is the greatest fucking country on the face of the earth and don’t you forget it.

You don’t hear much about candidates in California. Let’s face it – unless the candidate is *from* California, this is a safe Democratic state all the way around. Nobody would pump serious money into California on a national level, any more than they would pour mad cash into New York or Texas. The only stuff that gets any airtime around here are…propositions.

Propositions are not nearly as much fun as they may sound. As a callow undergrad, I would have taken to the notion of “proposition” like an Irishman to a bottle of (INSERT APPROPRIATE SECTARIAN WHISKY HERE). But apparently that’s not what it means here beside the Western Sea. As far as I can tell, it means that all you have to do is round up a bunch of signatures, and you can have damn near anything show up on the ballot, and if 50% plus one will vote for it, pow – you have completely circumvented the normal political process. Woohoo! Break the chains of gridlock! Popular democracy at its finest!

Eh, noooo….

“A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky, dangerous animals and you know it. ”

-Tommy Lee Jones, Men In Black

Look, I’m a smart guy. That’s not ego or vanity talking, that’s documented by the State of Alabama with evidence going back 30 years. I have two degrees in political science and take an inordinate interest in the minutiae of the political process, as evidence by my logorrhea over the last year or so in this very space. You know what? I couldn’t tell you what half this year’s propositions are, let alone which way I should be voting, and I’m brilliant.

Now, if Wile E. Coyote, geeeeeeenius, doesn’t know which end is up – exactly what are the odds that the ten million people who are NOT as bright as me have a better grip on the situation or are even paying attention? I’ll give you a hint; they voted this as their governor:

(NB: I’m through taking S off these people about Alabama politics.)

So what you end up with is a bunch of ill-informed people voting on poorly-detailed notions based on opinions they formed by who ran the most ads during Dancing with the Steers or whatever it is. And you wonder how come the Golden State gets this reputation.

The problem is, though, it’s a handy way to completely circumvent the process. My understanding is that the whole thing came about at a time when the government was hopelessly corrupt in the first decade of the 20th Century, and this technique allowed the Progressives to work their way around the roadblocks of the era. What it’s turned into, however, is a way of dodging the entire legislative process by just appealing to people to vote directly. And because of the civic religion of American democracy, this idea that “why don’t you just let the people vote on it themselves?” is very nearly Holy Writ. What could be more right and proper than giving a direct voice to the people?

Problem is, “the people” are dumber than hammered snot. Which is how you end up with a whole slew of strange, absurd, and often mutually-contradictory items on the ballot. The most common coping mechanism around here – and one I find absolutely no fault with – is just to vote “No” on every single one of them. The way I see it, in 2008, putting something to a popular referendum is more or less a concession that you can’t get it done through normal government channels. And if you’re a small-government conservative type (and God knows I have certain minimalist tendencies in the realm of practical politics), what the hell could be worse than allowing people to directly add to the bulk and burden of government?

Look, maybe this is academic and professional bias from the old days, but when my leg hurts, do I go out and take a poll and ask people to vote on what to do with it? No, I go to the doctor and get it scoped. When my car is acting strange, do I start asking people to vote Yes or No on going under the hood and pulling wires? No, I take my happy ass to the dealership and let them outrage the honor of my checking account. When I got a toothache, I spend zippy time at a rally asking the crowd one by one which tooth I should try pulling.

Do I know all the ins and outs of California politics? Hell no. Why should I? I’ve got people to do that FOR me, and they’re getting a chunk of my hide twice monthly plus eight cents on the dollar every time I need another Nalgene bottle. And if I don’t like the people I’ve got, I’ll hire some more people. The miracle of modern civilization, the thing that separates us from Neanderthals and Geico pitchmen scrobbling around hunting and gathering, the thing that lets us have iPods and Guinness and six weeks off work if I’d just stuck with my first job, is specialization. And in the long run, it’s totally worth it.

Now, can I have my bloody TV back, or do I have to wait for Wednesday?

I thought it was unbelievable enough when Ralph Stanley actually cut a radio ad for Obama…but now it appears that the latest endorsement is none other than The Last American Hero.

Yes, it looks like Junior Johnson – THE Junior Johnson – has endorsed Barack Obama. For those of you who just think of Darrell Waltrip as the guy that goes “Boogity boogity boogity” and look funny when somebody talks about Pontiacs and Oldsmobiles in the Winston Cup, let me explain. Junior Johnson started life as a bootlegger, driving his daddy’s moonshine down from the holler in North Carolina in the 50s. He was never caught transporting in his entire career, and mostly laid off it once NASCAR’s Grand National series became a more profitable way to spend his time, but got popped helping his dad stack wood for the still and did some time in the Federal poke.

Afterwards, he became the first true superstar of stock car racing. He discovered drifting AND drafting. He beat everything and everyone else on the track, driving hell bent for leather every single week. He ran the entire 1963 season in a Chevy at a time when Chevrolet had pulled out of stock car racing altogether. He once broke an axle on his car, broke the spare axle, got a third axle from a fan who took it off his own car for Junior and broke that one too. And after retiring, his team went on to win six WInston Cups behind Waltrip and Cale Yarborough. He is, by any legitimate measure of Southern manhood, a stupendous badass.

I am incredulous. If this is legit…wow. Just plain f-ing wow.

Yesterday at the chiropractor:
HER: Are you watching True Blood?
ME: Am I what?
HER: Probably not, it’s more a chick thing, all the Gothic Southern romance stuff. And lots of violent blood and sex.
ME: One prom was enough.
HER: (Unable to speak.)
ME: (grin)
HER: Does your wife grasp how twisted you really are?
ME: She said ‘I do’, didn’t she?
And EZ-E gets a nickel for the prom joke.

The Hill’s Blog Briefing Room » Charles Barkley To Run For Alabama Governor in 2014:

NBA Hall of Famer Charles Barkley said he’s going to run for governor in Alabama.

“I plan on it in 2014,” Barkley told CNN’s Campbell Brown on Monday.

When asked if he was serious, the former Philadelphia 76er said, “I am, I can’t screw up Alabama.”

He added that his native state could only improve. “We are number 48 in everything and Arkansas and Mississippi aren’t going anywhere,” Barkley said.

Oddly enough, the entire UT team was found with a big S for “SABAN” carved on their asses…

Let’s see: Alabama putting the wood* to a clearly-overmatched Tennessee team that couldn’t shoot straight…Vanderbilt managing once more to shit the bed** against a clearly inferior foe at a time when a win was critical to their future prospects…Republicans complaining that the media is pushing a meme of inevitability on behalf of a sprightly young Democrat for President…the Redskins whoopin’ that ass in the NFC East and tied for most wins at the halfway mark…SNL bringing the funny week in and week out…and most incredibly, pouring myself into bed at 2 AM after a night of assorted Baptist sin only to answer the bell at 8 AM and commence again – for the second weekend in a row?

When did it become 1992 again?

Rolling sixteen years off one’s personal odometer is very much like the same operation performed on used cars by the Sand Mountain dealers of my youth: sure, it might look newer and fresher, and you might be deceived into thinking it’s a much more capable machine than it is, but come Monday, you’re gonna see the rust on the undercarriage and feel the sludge in the crankcase and say “what the HELL have I done?” However, I have some decided advantages now that I didn’t have then:

* An extra decade-and-a-half of experience with the fruit of the vine/grain/cane. I know things now I didn’t know then, i.e. stick with one type of booze and don’t put too much of that sweet shit in it. Also, drink lots of water before, during and after, and take your ibuprofen.

* A good 50 pounds extra to help soak up all that booze. Yes, the waist size of my jeans has gone up six inches in sixteen years, but the flip side is that I don’t immediately start going loopy at the first whiff of bourbon.

* A girlfriend*** who is not psychotic, doesn’t drink, and can provide me with ongoing updates regarding whether it’s time to tap out or at least knock another 20 dB off my inside voice.

* QUALITY CONTROL. Miller Lite, Early Times, Boone’s – the swills of my youth are long gone. Nowadays, those of us who once pledged ourselves to the C.O.D. Club**** are snobbish enough that we drink only Guinness, or Maker’s Mark, or fine handcrafted cherry ciders, with occasional forays into a pleasantly oaken Napa cab or a fine single-malt that tastes like a beach fire. If you have to be a grownup, you may as well drink like a grownup.

I have successfully evaded hangover the whole way through these last two weekends, of which I am rightly proud, but I can also say in honestly that when the alarm rings, I’ll rise – but I’ll be damned if I’ll shine.

*Right now the only thing between Alabama and a trip to the national championship game is hubris. And as far as I know, Nick Saban doesn’t have time for that shit. Whatever they’re paying him, I don’t want to hear any caterwauling – name me one other coach, ever, that has taken a team from disaster to national title contender in one and a half seasons.

** SAME. OLD. VANDY. That’s right, I said it, it had to be said. There is not one single game the rest of the way (Florida in 2 weeks, then at Kentucky, home to UT, and at Wake Forest) that Vanderbilt will be favored in. Aside from the fortuitous arrangement of games to allow the 5 wins to come at the beginning of the year, and create the illusion of hope, there is nothing to suggest this team is any better than the many others who stalled on 5 in the last decade or so. Bobby may be credited fairly for getting the Dores from two wins a year to a reliable five, but I’m starting to think that it’s going to take a better coach to break through from five to seven, because you can’t build a successful team on the notion that you will never, ever make a mistake in the “itty-bitty things” phases of the game. Success doesn’t mean you never make a mistake, it means you can overcome a mistake. Which the Dores cannot.

*** For long-term committed and ceremonially-bound values of “girlfriend.”

**** If I still claimed any connection with the history of my undergrad institution, this would be the place for a chorus of something that sounds strangely like the middle-eight of “California Drinking Song.” Not for nothing were the club’s posted hours “Midnight to 4 AM.”