To hell with the campaign -- more on Paul Newman

http://www.slate.com/id/2201116?wpisrc=newsletter

It's infinitely more uplifting.

Paul Newman 1925-2008

Sorry for your loss, Joanne and family. Sorry for our loss of a generous humanitarian and a celebrity with true depth and majesty. He stayed married to the same woman for fifty years in a culture in which marriages have long been a travesty. He gave every bit of the huge proceeds of his food company to charity. He had the distinction of being on Nixon's infamous "enemies list," which he considered an honor.

The last thing I saw Paul in was Our Town, in which he played "the Stage Manager." He did a wonderful job and it was the best version I've seen. Of course he was great in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Cool Hand Luke, Hud, The Sting, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, The Verdict, The Hustler, and many others. The ones I named hardly begin to cover the fine body of work he did.

Goodbye, Paul. The God I believe in will have a high place in heaven for you.

Big John! Big John ! Big, Bad John ... Gas Masks for the Media

McCain announced at 2:30 this afternoon that he is “suspending” his campaign because of the financial crisis in which the treasury secretary and fed chairman seek 700 billion dollars to bail out private finance and insurance companies who are in “meltdown” because of failed mortgages and what have you and it is apparent even to economic dummies like me that we are in deep shit. He says he is going to Washington to attend the crisis in a bipartisan manner and is asking Obama to do the same. Oh yes, he wants to cancel Friday's debate. (As Church Lady would say, "Well. Isn't that conveeen-ient?")

When I started reading this story on CNN online, it seemed that McCain was taking the “nonpartisan” initiative to dive into this crisis and focus on its solution.

But then … wait a minute.

I read the entire story and buried half-way down in the text, it became clear that Obama was the one who took the initiative by phoning the McCain campaign at 8:30 this morning and asking him to issue a joint, nonpartisan statement resolving to focus on the problem, free of campaign rhetoric.

McCain, the hustler (doubtless machinating with Rovian operatives between early this morning and the “suspension” announcement), grabbed up Obama’s idea and ran with it, and CNN and no doubt the "deans" and "pundits" of the mainstream will report this straight-faced as not a ruse but as a "patriotic country-first, reaching across the aisles" move by that great "war hero" (granted) and, yes -- we must hear it every miserable day -- "maverick."

A talking point, if you will.

When the crisis came to light, McCain started out by saying astoundingly that the "fundamentals of the economy are sound," an endlessly iterated, boneheaded Dubya-ism if ever there was one,

and then that he meant American workers are what he meant by "fundamentals,"

and then he called for the SEC chairman's head (for starters, not knowing that the POTUS can't fire the SEC chairman w/o advice and consent),

and then he rolled his Marlboros up in the sleeve of his Harley T-shirt and called for taking away the bonuses of the CEOs,

and then ... he blamed Obama.

The point is: aren't the media tired of the stench of all the things this man pulls out of his ass every day? They never complain of the smell.

I'm not done. More in the next post.

(1) On Being a Christian and (2) Sighting of an Authentic TFM

(1) Wanted to share a blog I read on the Huffington Post today which I strongly identify with. The author is Ian Walsh. He said he was raised as a Catholic and one of the "basics" he learned about Jesus was this:

"Better to be a Good Samaritan than a Pharisee (i.e., better [not to] believe and do good deeds, than to believe and not do good deeds)." AMEN AND HALLELUJAH, BROTHER! YOU SPOKE A BOOK!

(2) Visiting with friends at a meeting place this morning, I saw a Jeep Cherokee come barreling into the lot next door. I must have glared as I saw a big "Sodrel"* sticker on the gas-guzzler
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* "Sodrel" is the mustachioed, rich trucking dude who's a sort of Fred Thompson type posing as just plain folks so he can represent his rich cohorts in Congress, and who when he lost the Indiana 9th District to Baron Hill last election, contemptuously abandoned his office during the lame duck period. Now he's ba-ack, apparently sans contempt for the public he purportedly "served." E.S. & D., Sodrel.
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and then I saw on the Cherokee a really trendy sticker: "BIG MAC AND CUDA." LMAO!

Rachel Maddow said that "Cuda" was a "laugh out loud" choice, a la Dan Quayle. (Remember that one? In his no-Jack Kennedy debate with Lloyd Bentsen in 1988, he was asked what he would do if he became president and he said, "First I'd pray." He couldn't seem to get past that and repeated that he'd pray twice more. At which point Tom Brokaw without irony said, "We'd all pray, Senator, but then what?")

I was saying that I glared when I saw the Sodrel sticker and I then saw that the driver, a square-jawed, muscular man, was glaring at me -- or perhaps at my humble puddle-jumper which sports contrary stickers of its own: "Obama '08" and "Got Hope?"

But I love that: "Big Mac and Cuda." Republican Shtik. It doesn't get any cooler than that.

God help us. We are a sorry lot. (That's a prayer, just in case "Cuda" forgets to pray.)