Dumb lines

Grandma dies, daughter and grandson
cremate her in back yard firepit,
continue collecting her retirement.

I knew it. I knew that when McCain said, “I’m not George Bush” this dumb line would be picked up and repeated as if it were the dominant moment of the debate last night. It has been. Even Eugene Robinson, one of my favorites, remarked on this remarkable “zinger.” I do not understand this tendency to literally swoon over what are basically dumb remarks. I fail to see anything clever about this line. It is neither creative nor stimulating. In fact it is so mundane it should have been immediately forgotten. Obviously McCain is not Bush. No one ever said he was Bush. What Obama and others have said is that he pursues the same policies of the Bush administration (which, in fact, he does). I suppose we might concede that it was a quick and easy way to try to distinguish himself from Bush, but if so, it failed. If anything, it probably just reinforced his identification with Bush. Recent American history is replete with other examples of what I take to be basically dumb remarks picked up and endlessly repeated as though they are part of the wisdom of the ages. “Tear down this wall,” is another one of these ordinary remarks that have been set aside as worthy of worshipful repetition. Another (presumably) more famous was Lloyd Bentsen’s statement to Dan Quale, “you’re no John Kennedy.” Still another that I have heard repeated for years is Hemingway’s remark when F. Scott Fitzgerald reportedly said, “the rich are different from others,” and Hemingway said, “yes, they have more money.” I have always wondered why anyone at all would ever have repeated this (to me) entirely insipid remark (apparently there is some doubt that Fitzgerald ever actually said this). Some have even argued that Fitzgerald’s insight about the difference of the really rich was profound and Hemingway missed the real point. Whether this is true or not, I do not believe this remark is worthy of being enshrined in the literature having to do with American literature. To me, every one of these examples (I’m certain there are many more) are basically obvious observations with no particular merit other than perhaps the contexts in which they were uttered, or the positions of those who uttered them, insipid all. But, then, I am no F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, or John McCain, or literary critic, or whatever, so what do I know?

I have been telling my son and others for quite a long time that Obama was going to win with a Landslide. Whispers to that effect are starting to be heard. Obama is cautioning about being too cocky. If Obama really does win with a landslide vote it will be the first time I will have ever been right about an election. I am trying not to be too cocky.

McCain’s creation, Joe the Plumber, turns out not to be a plumber. At best he must be a plumber’s helper. He doesn’t earn enough money to worry about his taxes increasing under an Obama administration. He doesn’t earn enough money to buy a plumbing business. If he had the business it would not net $250,000 per year. He says he thinks Social Security is stupid, he owes money in back taxes, and turns out to be basically just another right-wing loony. But not to worry, he’ll no doubt be interviewed on various TV programs and will bask in his new found fame (at least for a bit). He would, in fact, benefit from Obama’s tax plan. McCain has said that Joe the Plumber was the winner of last night’s debate. Go figure.

I am trying very hard to understand human behavior (which I sometimes believe is totally impossible). The Seattle Times recently reported a 14 year-old girl so severely starved by her parents she weighs only 48 pounds. Another recent case involved a 3 year-old so shockingly mistreated she had flesh hanging from her body. Not too long ago a woman was convicted of killing her infant by putting it in a microwave oven. A 16 year-old from the Middle East was forced to marry an older man at 13, subsequently brought to the U.S. where she was repeatedly raped and abused by five adults. Child abuse, including sexual abuse, seems to be rampant in our society. Obviously the vast majority of humans do not engage in such activity. But many do. The history of our tenure here on earth is so unpleasant it is difficult to even read about. There is something wrong with our species that I am unable to satisfactorily explain even to myself. I rather doubt I will ever understand it, but I cannot help but wonder about it.

LKBIQ:
There are many things of which a wise man might wish to be ignorant.
Ralph Waldo Emerson