The Rational Psychic

I am sick at heart that the leadership of the Democratic Party has not ended this fiasco earlier. Yes, we are all having fun playing politics and watching Hillary fight the tough fight she has advertised she can fight. But, the fun ends when we see how deeply this contest is dividing the Democratic Party.

I believe that we, as Democrats, believed at the beginning of the nomination race that we would offer the uniting choice for the country. However, I believe that Hillary and Bill Clinton’s political strategy has sought only to achieve a short-term victory and ignored the consequences of her strategy and his/her tactics.

The statements and actions taken by the Clinton campaign, even if she were to win, would only weaken the possibility of a mandate by the Democrats and weaken her standing as our country’s Chief Executive after the Presidential race was over. And I’m not willing to contemplate the possibility of a Republican win even though I have such grave misgivings about a Clinton presidency.

I haven’t been shy about my preference for Barack Obama as a candidate. Nor have I tried to play nice and say that I felt Hillary Clinton was a grand lady. No. So why am I even more angry and alarmed today about the continuation of Hillary Clinton’s cynical campaign? It started with a simple link to a WHYY interview with President Clinton (that’s how we are still supposed to refer to Bill out of respect for the office) in which the President says that he believes the Obama campaign “played the race card on [him]“.

Next, on YouTube.com, I found a video clip in which the President then claims he never said (on WHYY, no less) that he believed the race card had been played against him.

I can hear the Clinton supporters saying, “Why are you talking about Bill, when Hillary is the one running?” The answer to that should be obvious. If Obama had to spend a week answering for the statements of a man he saw as little as once a week, how much time should Hillary spend answering for the statements and actions of a man she chose to marry in 1975? And whom she promoted so actively that she claims the majority of her public experience lies in her partnership with him?

Other telling bits to look at are listed below. Most shocking is the demonstrated and substantive racist actions taken by our former President. The first, a backhanded kind of compliment of the former president is just an appetizer. This video shows former Ambassador Andrew Young on Bill Clinton’s ‘blackness’ and Hillary Clinton’s willingness to create a “defense committee” related to Bill’s alleged affairs before he began his first presidential run.

I thought this was a great Obama device: video of Bill Clinton on his perception of the importance of “courage to change” versus the “wrong” type of experience (in a 1992 debate with GHW Bush) and the obvious comparison with Obama. I didn’t even realize that Bill was 46 when he ran for President in 1992. He was just a pup! Who would trust a guy that young to run the country!? Oh…wait, we did.

Sources that indicate a level of institutional racism that I am ashamed to say I didn’t know of when I voted for Bill Clinton in ‘92 and ‘96. These include a news article and an appeal to the US Supreme Court from October, 1990. My reading may be inexact, but the gist appears to be that under Bill Clinton’s governorship, state legislative voting districts were not apportioned in a way which was in legal conformity with the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Finally, a documentary from the BBC that I never saw before but which has plenty of nastiness and maneuvering by both Bill and Hillary Clinton. Revealing statements by friends and former allies regarding how Hillary managed President Clinton’s contacts with women during his 1982 race for the Arkansas governorship.

Oh, yes, and a very interesting statement that Hillary Clinton was into teacher testing long before the No Child Left Behind legislation was proposed by the present Administration.

All in a life’s work, I say.

Some posts have to be followed up on. I think when you have the foolishness (ignorance + misplaced courage = a great potential for “it ain’t pretty, folks”) to say that you’re giving up self-pity and it’s no longer Lent: well, this just can’t be left to lie like a bloated raccoon along the shoulder of a two-lane highway.

To be more honest, I’ve always found self-pity to be an excellent defense mechanism. The real problem is, it’s been worn a bit thin through overuse.

My dad has been in St. Mary’s Hospital in Rochester, MN, for the past week. I have been feeling sorry for myself over this situation because his condition was related to a hematoma on his brain that made him decidedly confused and, for one of the few times I can ever remember, weak in his BODY. This guy is the grandson of a blacksmith and inherited the barrel-chested physique of his grandfather. Seeing him in a helpless state is just a reminder that I’m headed in the same direction. Mortality.

Oh, yes, to engage in self-pity is to be self-absorbed, self-centered and, especially, selfish. I’m telling you that seeing my father in such distress distresses me rather than telling you my empathic feelings for his suffering and the trap that his mind and body have been for him over the past week. I know that and still the empathic impulse is all but dead within me while self-pity plays the monarch.

For tonight, however, I’m spending time with someone I care about a great deal. Someone who I think is lovely, caring and who, self-pityingly, I know I may not deserve. She’s invited me to go along to Rep. Tim Walz’s birthday party tonight. Two of his supporters are holding it at their home in the country. Fittingly, it was the County Poor Farm at one time but the husband is a painter and he and his wife have transformed the place into a real home.

So we’ll see if self-pity can take the backseat to joy, society, and spending time with someone gorgeous. This requires a list of skills that is too lengthy to list and too boring to go into at this time. Thank God and the strange expression of evolutionary progress in the physical world. Why does love make us forget that we have trouble?

It’s a matter of perspective: the large and important overshadow the small and less significant.

Today’s the day I start to quit feeling sorry for myself.

What do you think about that?

I have been trying to get myself moving in terms of writing poems again. It’s funny how thinking in terms of prose can really dull the faculty you use to write poems.

I’ve been reading In the Palm of Your Hand, by Steve Kowit in an attempt to spark some thoughts and poetic impulses. It’s a good book with tons of ideas that I haven’t even touched yet.

I thought I’d try to involve you in a little participatory nonsense–merely for the sake of fun and the spirit of competition I hope it will ignite.

There are rules–guidelines, if you’d rather–to this bloodless exercise. Here they are:

1. Poem must be at least seven lines long. Otherwise, its form is up to you.
2. You must use at least seven of the ‘nouns, verbs, etc.’ listed below. One per line is a suggestion only, not a requirement.
3. Use two of the prepositional phrases provided.
4. Points are scored for: writing at least seven lines (7 pts.); using at least seven of the ‘nouns, verbs, etc.’ (7 pts., 3 additional for use of the word “quash”); using at least two of the prepositional phrases (2 pts.). Finally, one point each for any extra of the words or phrases provided. This gives a potential total of 20 points.
5. Snappy titles are not required and do not earn points. However, they do garner respect and admiration from the crowd.

Enjoy the power of creation.

Nouns, verbs, etc.

blemish, wheel, accordion, pill, tame,

vanilla, fling, Bill, hand, four,

post, cinnamon, squat, Althea, quash (triple word score)

Prepositional phrases

on the shore, near the city, above your head, next to,

from this, under my, inside this, around his/her