Politics Archives - Page 30 of 31

Roger Answers Your Questions, Denise, Tom, Shooting Parrots, Jaquandor & dogs

I have no “traditional Christmas dinner menu”. Over the years, it’s been ham, chicken, turkey, duck, lamb, lasagna, probably roast beef, even Chinese takeout.

What a great bunch of responses to my request!

Ginger, Buddy and Shadow proving doggie wisdom from Pawprints in the Sands of Time ask the fundamental question:
Alright, here’s for your wish…Why do u want us to play this game of questions and answers this Christmas?

Because I learn so much, both about the person, er, entity, who is asking, and more, about myself as I think about things that might not have otherwise occurred to me. In other words, it’s an exercise in self-reflection.
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I “know” Denise Nesbitt – and “know” is such an interesting term for someone you have never actually met, but it’s accurate nevertheless – through her creation of ABC Wednesday. She also can be found at Mrs. Nesbitt’s Space.

OK, What did you buy your wife, mother, and daughter for Christmas Roger?

There was this Medieval Faire every year at the Cathedral of All Saints in Albany, NY for about 30 years. And while I was going out with Carol, I sometimes -thrice, she tells me – would buy her a hand knit wool sweater from this particular woman. Then the faire stopped for about eight years. I’d buy her a sweater from LL Bean, and once from this Irish shop across the river in Troy, but it just wasn’t the same. Then last year, the faire was backe…I mean, back! Unfortunately, this particular vendor couldn’t make it, as she had another commitment. Bummer. But this year, she was back, Carol hinted heavily what she wanted, we walked away, but later, I came back and bought. There was also this teddy bear that she lost, that was given to her by her late brother; I found not quite a replica, but close.

Lydia got a lot of things: books, clothes, an enhanced version of the old game Twister, with CDs rather than a spinner; the big thing was this expensive doll she wanted, complete with wardrobe. In fact, her mother and I had purchased SO many items, we held some back for her birthday, three months hence. At that same Faire I mentioned, there was a soap in the shape of a seashell that Santa discovered she wanted.

My mother has been difficult to shop for for years. If you ask her directly, she’ll either say, “Oh anything” or “You needn’t bother.” Unhelpful to be sure. But my sister tells me that she really likes these puzzle books. I ended going to the CVS Pharmacy, found a couple of those, plus a lap blanket and a bathrobe – it’s been COLD in North Carolina lately.
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Shooting Parrots, who provides “random thoughts in a random world”, asks:
What was the best ever Christmas present you received? And which was the worst?!
I think the best is the unexpected: my father helping me on my Sunday paper route on Christmas morning in 1966, or our first color TV in 1969, or the free tree my then significant other and I got on Christmas Eve 1991 from Sears, and took home on a city bus.
Worst?

Haven’t a clue. I mean, I groan when my wife gives me clothes, but it really isn’t a bad gift. Maybe it’s because I’ve mastered the art of regifting, long before I’d ever heard the term.
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Tom the Mayor I know from my time at FantaCo, though I actually met him when he worked at the Albany YMCA on Washington Avenue (RIP).
Do you ever feel any bigotry in your neighborhood in Albany? Do you think that Racial attitudes have changed since you first moved to Albany?

Interesting question. I always wonder how it would have been growing up in Albany. But I didn’t get here until I was 26 and already with the receding hairline. And some people know who I am here, a couple recognizing me from my Times Union blog just this week.

I’m not saying that my life in Albany has been incident-free. More than once, people have yelled racist comments, usually from moving vehicles. But that hasn’t happened in at least a decade.

I recall that in the early 1990s I got unsolicited lectures (at least twice) about the problems of miscegenation, not for the adults involved, but for “the children” that might arrive. So I’m curious how this will play out for my daughter, whether she’ll be subjected to that. It was really important for us that Lydia go to a diverse daycare, and she had friends who were black, white, and Asian. I have cautious hope that things are indeed better.
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Buffalo’s finest blogger, Jaquandor at Byzantium Shores asks:
1. You are ordered to design a new menu for your family’s Christmas dinner…with the one stipulation that you use none of the dishes that are currently featured in your traditional Christmas dinner. What’s the menu?

Here’s the problem: I have no “traditional Christmas dinner menu”. Over the years, it’s been ham, chicken, turkey, duck, lamb, lasagna, probably roast beef, even Chinese takeout. So I would have to go with hot dogs, hamburgers, fish filets, French fries, and grilled cheese sandwiches. What, no veggies? Again, it’s been all over the map, so it’s either a vegetable I’ve had, or do not like.

2. Are there any current “reality” shows that you would actually consider auditioning for?
If by stretching the definition to include game shows, “Who Wants To Be a Millionaire”, maybe. My antipathy for reality shows isn’t just with the game, it’s the editing to make the program more dramatic.

3. If you ran into Bill O’Reilly somewhere on the street on, say, December 19, would you tell him “Happy Holidays!” just to see him get angry? (I know I would!)
Yeah, except it’d be “Happy holidays, Bill,” so he knew I knew who he was.

4. Do you have high hopes, medium hopes, or not much hope at all for Governor-elect Cuomo?
Medium-low. I thought he ran a lousy campaign, he was not very forthcoming – his financials didn’t come out until weeks after the election – and I just don’t much trust him. The only reason he won is that he was running against a nutcase. I didn’t even vote for him. (No, I didn’t vote for Paladino, I voted for Howie Hawkins on the Green Party line, because it was evident that Cuomo was going to win anyway.)

Of course, to be fair, I’m not sure what ANYONE can do about this state and local government crisis. Did you see that 60 Minutes segment? ALL the states are in big fiscal trouble.

Well, next time out: Demeur, Anthony, Gordon, Scott, ChrisJ, and anyone else who wants to play.

My Favorite Years QUESTION

Note that we DIDN’T pick 2004, the year Lydia was born.

Possibly around the time I was writing about nostalgia, the Wife and I were talking about the favorite years in our lives.

I picked 1969, the year I turned 16, and my parents let me have a huge party. I had a girlfriend, I got elected president of the student government, which made me an irritant to the new principal, and I was figuring out who I was politically, especially compared to the transitional 1968. Music was great that year, too.

Then there was 1978, the year I worked at the Schenectady Arts Council, got a girlfriend, and finally stopped my nomadic existence.

1984 was the year after Mitch Cohn was fired from FantaCo and Raoul Vezina died. This made Tom Skulan more dependent on me to deal with the day-to-day stuff, while he worked on publications and the “big picture” stuff. Yes, affairs of the heart played here too.

Carol and I both picked 1998, the year before we got married, for different reasons. Her reasons are her own (she can start her own blog – unlikely). For me, it was going to Detroit (visit friend, Motown museum, Ford museums, Tigers game), Cleveland (Rock and Roll Hall of Fame), Washington, DC (visit friend, take JEOPARDY! test), and Boston (appear on JEOPARDY!) Interesting that neither of us picked 1999, the year we actually GOT married because that first year in that half a house she owned was tricky; buying OUR house in 2000 was definitely a vast improvement.

And we both picked 2003, which was the year Lydia was finally conceived. Carol and I went to Poland Spring, Maine after that. Note that we DIDN’T pick 2004, the year Lydia was born; that took some getting used to.

So what are some of your favorite years, and why?
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My Favorite Year with Peter O’Toole – Final scenes

S is for Sorry…and Second Chances

How DO we give someone a second chance after an apology?

An interesting article in the Wall Street Journal recently: I’m Very, Very, Very Sorry … Really? We Apologize More to Strangers Than Family, and Why Women Ask for Forgiveness More by ELIZABETH BERNSTEIN. Fascinating stuff. Also intriguing is this graphic indicating the hierarchy of apologies, from most to least effective.

There was a sidebar called “Saying ‘I’m Sorry'” which declares, “A ‘comprehensive’ apology is more likely to win forgiveness, researchers say. There are eight elements,” according to the University of Waterloo:
Remorse
Acceptance of responsibility
Admission of wrongdoing
Acknowledgment of harm
Promise to behave better
Request for forgiveness
Offer of repair
Explanation

Probably the apology I hate the most is the one that goes, “I’m sorry if you’re feeling bad,” (or whatever) as though it is MY fault that THEIR inappropriate behavior bothered me. In general, a bad apology – usually followed by the sentence, “Let’s move on” – is about as bad as no apology at all.

So how DO we give someone a second chance after an apology? I think about this, a lot.

Eliot Spitzer was governor of New York State. As state Attorney General and as governor, he slept with expensive call girls; he was designated as “Client 9.” He had to resign as governor, not because he cheated on his wife, but because the “sheriff of Wall Street” was a hypocrite, prosecuting the very laws he was breaking. They’ve even made a movie called “Client 9”: The Eliot Spitzer case: How we were bamboozled. “An intriguing new movie dissects the thicket of money, lies, and rumors around the governor’s downfall.” Now he has a TV news show with Kathleen Parker. Should he be given a second chance? I say: Yes. He apologized and lost his office. And from sources I trust, he is good at what he does.

Michael Vick was the very talented quarterback of the Atlanta Falcons in the National Football League. “In April 2007, Vick was implicated in an illegal interstate dogfighting ring that had operated over five years [some of it on property he owned]. In August 2007, he pleaded guilty to federal felony charges and served 21 months in prison, followed by two months in home confinement.” He has subsequently: filed for bankruptcy, and has been picked up as the Philadelphia Eagles’ backup quarterback, playing as the starter (when healthy) after the Eagles traded former starter, Donovan McNabb, to Washington. Should he be given a second chance? I say: Yes. He has also been mandated to be involved in making others aware of the wrongness of animal cruelty.

I’m sure there are other examples, such as actor Mel Gibson, who got booted from the movie The Hangover 2 because of several incidents, some involving him seeming to threaten the mother of his youngest child, that you can discuss. From a purely business decision, they might have thought Gibson would have been box office poison.

What do YOU think, about these and any other examples you can think of?

ABC Wednesday – Round 7

Election Day predictions

The French word for sea is MER + COW + SKI = Murkowski.

I predict that, no matter what the outcome of the election:

members of the Republican Party will claim that the vote was the rejection “by the American people” of “the failed policies of the Obama/Pelosi/Reid” cabal.
the Democrats will talk about opportunities for bipartisanship.
*some bills that should have passed between January 2009 and October 2010, will get passed in November 2010, without much, or any Republican support, which will lead the Republicans to complain that the Democrats “rammed” the bill “down the throat of the American people”

As for the vote today, I can’t make predictions. My gut says the Democrat will win the Senate race in Colorado, but lose in Illinois. Do you want predictions? Go to fivethirtyeight.com.

But I will go out on a limb to say that I think Lisa Murkowski will barely retain her Senate seat in Alaska. Three-way polling is much less reliable than that done for a two-person race. Good news: her name will appear on a list of potential write-in candidates. Bad news: there are about 100 people on the list. Good news: she has great name recognition in the state. Bad news: she’s been around a long time, and her father before her. Good news: it is established that a vote for a write-in candidate must be counted if the intent is clear. So someone drawing the three pictures on this page could be seen as voting for Murkowski, like so:

The French word for sea is MER + COW + SKI = Murkowski.

Anyway, I am voting today. I will vote for at least one non-Democrat. and by non-Democrat, I don’t mean voting for a Democrat on the Working Families line.

I will vote for my junior US Kirsten Gillibrand. I was going to anyway, but the bizarro Republican candidate for Governor Carl Paladino said some disparaging remarks about her recently, and that’s good enough for me. Nice profile of the senator in Vogue, of all places.

VOTE!! And if you choose not to, PLEASE don’t tell me about it, because THESE people are voting.

P is for Polly Ticks

So VOTE!

(With apologies to Anthony North):

Some largely nonpartisan things that have been bugging me about the electoral process in the United States recently, and not so recently.

MONEY: It has long been an issue, and there have been a series of legislative actions, Such as McCain-Feingold trying to limit the effect of money on the campaign. However, in January 2010, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, the Supreme Court decided that corporations and unions have the same First Amendment rights as individuals, and as such may now directly and expressly advocate for the election or defeat of candidates for federal office, as long as they do not coordinate their efforts with campaigns or political parties. Without getting too wonky here, social welfare organizations may engage in some political activities, so long as that is not their primary activity. As a result, there is a lot more election spending this cycle than ever before. GOP political operative Ed Gillespie said last week on ABC News, and someone said similarly on NBC’s Meet the Press, that the American people do not care about outside spending; I care– a lot.

RANCOR: With that much money, candidates are even more willing and able to run negative, misleading, even inaccurate advertisements. One can and should debate the issues, but it’d be nice if they could get along better while doing so.

Someone’s Photoshop of 2008 Democratic candidate for President Barack Obama, and Republican candidate for Vice-President Sarah Palin

NO REAL CHOICE: A growing number of people believe a third party is needed in the US. Now, there are third-party candidates legitimately doing well this political season, but it doesn’t reflect a sustained, or sustainable national organization. My sense is that there never will be without instant runoff voting.

VOTER SUPPRESSION: Latinos for Reform is running ads on television, radio and the Internet telling Nevada’s Hispanic population not to vote on election day so as to teach Democrats a lesson for failing on the promise to deliver on immigration reform. Others have reported intimidation tactics of voters likely to vote for the opposition.

Another form of voter suppression, I believe, is the overuse of polling. When one hears that Candidate X is a “sure thing” to win or to lose, voters often lose interest and stay home, skewing the results. I’m not sure what to make of poll results anyway. I’ve read that the Republicans may win 100 seats in the House of Representatives. I’ve also noticed another poll, which includes people whose only phone is a cell phone, Democrats lead by 6 points on the generic ballot.

All that said, and in particular, in response to the voter suppression tactics, I encourage people to vote at every opportunity. Not only do I believe it is one’s civic duty, but, for me, it is a personal necessity. I’ve had ancestors who could not vote, so I would be dishonoring those who fought for the ballot not to exercise the franchise.

Did you ever notice that a large number of the Amendments in the US Constitution, after the Bill of Rights, deal with voting?

Amendment 15 states that race or previous condition of servitude (i.e., slavery) is no bar to voting (1865), passed right after the Civil War.
Amendment 17 requires that US Senators be elected by popular vote, rather than by the state legislature (1913) – someone please explain to me why some candidates this year have indicated repealing this amendment?
Amendment 19 provided for nationwide women’s suffrage (1920), though some individual states had allowed women to vote earlier.
Amendment 23 gave the Presidential Vote to Washington, DC (1961) – now if they could only get a voting member in Congress.
Amendment 24 bars the imposition of a poll tax as a requirement for voting (1964), eliminating that particular voter suppression tactic.
Amendment 26 set the voting age at 18 years (1971); unfortunately, statistically, the group least likely to use it.

So VOTE! And if you’re elsewhere in the world, VOTE when your next chance occurs.

ABC Wednesday – Round 7